Father Knows Best

Recently, I asked several Irish people if they'd ever heard of the American sitcom Father Knows Best. (Actually, I didn't even tell them if it was a sitcom, I just asked them if they got the reference.) None of them did.

I was quite surprised by this. I've heard many references to Father Knows Best. For instance, the title of a book by the Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin is The Fathers Know Best. (It's about the Church Fathers.) I've also often heard it mentioned in relation to the "bumbling Dad" stereotype which is at this stage a hoary cliché in sitcoms. Apparently, this was itself a reaction against sitcoms like Father Knows Best.

(But before I get to the sitcom itself, it's very interesting to me that after about a century of immersion in American culture, Irish people still have surprising blind spots when it comes to American culture. For instance, I asked several Irish people recently if they knew who Jefferson Davis was. None of them did, except one guy who thought it might have something to do with the American Civil War. And honestly, I didn't know who he was either, until I happened to read about him recently. He was the President of the Confederate States. But these blind spots aren't only historical, they often have to do with pop culture or idioms.)

Anyway, I'd never actually seen Father Knows Best, so I watched an episode this afternoon. It was this one, "The Great Anderson Mystery".

It was fairly good. I laughed out loud on a couple of occasions. It was charming, and it held my interest for most of the time-- although, honestly, there were a few points where I found it a bit of a drudge. Despite the title of the series, the father figure doesn't actually know best in the episode. In fact, he gets fooled by his youngest child-- as does the rest of the family.

I've decided I'm going to try to see episodes of as many sitcoms as I can. A lot of them are on YouTube.

I've long been an admirer and defender of the sitcom format. I think they're wonderful windows onto social and cultural history, and celebrations of the ordinary.

Last Christmas I did something like this. I found a YouTube channel that had Christmas episodes of lots of different sitcoms. But there's so many sitcoms out there that I've never seen at all.

Have you ever done anything like this? For instance, deciding to watch a film set in every American state, or to walk down every street in a city, or play as many sports as possible? I'm fascinated by such personal, self-imposed projects.