6 /10 1 Votes
5.5/10 TV Directed by Tom Trbovich Final episode date 31 August 1996 | 6.4/10 IMDb Genre Sci-fi/fantasy Sitcom | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Created by Andy BorowitzSusan Borowitz Written by Susan BorowitzAndy BorowitzPatricia MarxCharlie Rubin Starring John Bedford LloydMargaret Trigg Network American Broadcasting Company Cast | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Aliens in the Family is an American sci-fi/fantasy sitcom that aired on ABC, conceived as part of its TGIF lineup.
Contents
Premise
The show was about single dad Doug Brody (John Bedford Lloyd), who is abducted by single alien mom Cookie (Margaret Trigg). The two fall in love, get married, and try to live a normal life on Earth as a mixed family. Much of the series humor was derived from gags involving the assimilation of the alien family into everyday life—despite being pink and having massive heads (all of the aliens were puppets designed by Jim Henson's Creature Shop), everyone on Earth seems to accept their presence, and in spite of possessing technology far superior to that of Earth, the aliens all go about their everyday lives in the same fashion as all the humans.
Although not the focus of the show, the character to receive the most attention in episodes was Bobut, Cookie's infant son. Baby Bobut could talk, had a genius-level IQ, and was perpetually plotting a grisly fate for those around him though the series position as a family show meant that Bobut's plans were always family-friendly: for example, wreaking havoc on the city by causing a frog to grow ten times its size. However the frog did grow so large that it ate a jetliner mid-flight, implying all passengers, and crew were eaten alive.
Cancellation
The show premiered on March 15, 1996; ABC pulled the series from its TGIF lineup after two weeks, replacing the show's scheduled third airing with re-runs of other TGIF programs. The show did not return for over four months and finally burned off the rest of its episodes on Saturday mornings in the summer of 1996.
Jaleel White, who starred as Steve Urkel on another TGIF program (Family Matters), was a vocal critic of TGIF adding Jim Henson programs onto the TGIF block (Aliens in the Family debuted the same year as Muppets Tonight) and speculated that their addition ruined the block's credibility by changing its target demographic from whole families to children.