I don’t know…I’d call Hal more of an immature man-child than a dick.
And I kind of loved Lwaxana. Then again, I’m sympathetic toward the (95% fictional) Mama Rose in Gypsy, too, despite the fact that an objective analysis even of the fictional character (not even going into the real-life Rose Hovick, who was an honest-to-god piece of work sans parallel in her century) shows her as a domineering, greedy, lying, delusional bitch.
Just wanted to say in Deborah’s (Everybody Loves Raymond) defense, that if there was a worst sitcom dad/husband thread, Raymond would win hands down. The character has NO redeeming qualities whatsoever. He’s a wishy-washy, whiny, jealous, two faced loser who deserves a long, slow, horrible, screaming painful death. He’s not a good husband, a good dad, a good brother, or a good son. And having his parents as in laws would result in my hiring of a hitman pronto. In fact, the only character on that show with any redeeming qualities whatsoever (and the only one who was actually funny) was Robert.
Yeah, because sitting kids down and talking to them NEVER winds up with everything you say going in one ear and out the other. Dude, have you ever met a kid? Letting them pee on the electric fence (with the power turned down, she and Cliff never let the kids suffer any truly serious consequences for their mistakes) for themselves is generally going to make a lot deeper and longer-lasting impression than if you talk yourself blue in the face.
As for Cliff eating junk, didn’t he have high cholesterol and/or hypertension? At the time, prevailing medical wisdom was that the sort of diet Cliff tried to sneak, combined with his health issues, was likely to put him in an early grave. If my spouse is doing something that’s likely to result in him leaving me a premature widow with a houseful of kids to raise, you bet your ass he’s going to hear about it. Especially when he bloody well knows that what he’s doing is likely to have such negative consequences for our entire family.
Yes, it would have been nicer if she’d sat him down and said “Look, I know you like eating this stuff, but I don’t want to lose you at the age of 50, and I really don’t want to have to raise these five kids alone or to have them grow up without a dad. It would mean a lot to me if you’d take care of yourself for our sakes,” and he’d agreed. But they couldn’t really have gotten a running gag out of it, could they?
As for Deb Barone, I don’t think she was so much a bitch as a moron. Yes, her tension level was always through the roof because of her idiot man-child husband and bitchy, hyper-intrusive mil who hated her guts. But how blind and stupid do you have to be to not see that coming if you marry into that family?
This. Except for the death part. Substitute Deborah divorcing him and getting a large enough settlement that forces him to move in with his parents! A LIVING death! MuhahahahHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!