What I’m Watching: Modern Family

Modern Family: Season 1, Episode 18 “Starry Night” (B+)

The opening to this episode was brilliant, starting with Phil’s immersion in the TV with his noise-cancelling headphones and the abrupt exit from the serenity imposed by an angry Claire. He also delivered one of the best lines yet on this show, trying to defend his suspecting that Claire might smother her daughter – “It’s not your fault! It’s part of the word! You’ve never heard of anyone being sfathered to death!” Having both parents try to work with their children on teaching them was extremely entertaining, and I particularly enjoyed Haley’s certainty about how to exploit her mother and Claire’s refusal to stand for it by throwing out all of her cupcakes after teaching her how to make them. Another hilarious scenario presented came from the horribly misunderstood conversation between Cameron, Mitchell and Claire where he said that the Columbian woman should go back to where she came from and take her brown friend with her. Their follow-up dinner was fantastic, and among the funniest lines were “I feel like I ate the sun” and “breathing only makes the fire spread” after Cameron tried to impress her by ordering the hottest food. As I’ve stated before, mixing and matching all of the family members makes this show even better. Along those lines, Mitchell being jealous of Manny because he wanted to spend time alone with his dad doing the one thing they both like doing started out as fun but turned into a truly dramatic bonding moment because father, son, and stepson.