Only minor spoilers ahead!
I need to start out by saying, I have started watching but have not yet managed to finish Tina Fey’s The Four Seasons with my Netflix subscription yet. I was planning to binge the whole thing over the weekend and have something more formal finished by today, but I’ve found I can only manage an episode or two of this show at a time. However, it’s the type of show that’s been sticking with me in a way that I find notable and realistic, but also makes me stressed out about hitting middle age. It’s a case of love the show, hate the way it makes me feel. Let’s talk it out.
I recently hit my late thirties, so I’m not exactly the same age as the likes of Tina Fey, Will Forte, Colman Domingo and co. However, I’m not exactly a spring chicken at this point either. I feel like I’m always hitting my health insurance deductible now, and some mornings I wake up and my neck is just not working correctly. Add to that the various stresses of owning a house and a yard I have to take care of, and I’m no longer adulting. I’m a straight up adult with all the complications that entails.
So, in a lot of ways The Four Seasons is targeted right at me, or at least right at the me I’ll be in the near future. It’s about a group of friends who have been pals for a long time, but who are going through new struggles in a changing time of life. They have the partners, the careers and the cool homes and cars, but they’ve kind of lost their way in their personal lives. I get this doesn’t sound like a comedy, but it has Tina Fey’s great observational wit in a lot of moments, and it’s funny and charming in others.
I’d give the remake of the Alan Alda film a thumbs up. I just don’t know if I like the way it makes me feel.
The Four Seasons Is Sticking With Me, But I’m Not Sure I Can Recommend It
I spent my 20s really trying to get ahead: ahead in my career, ahead of debt, etc. It felt like there were goals and purpose to my life, but so far in The Four Seasons it’s sort of pointing out the ennui that has settled in in more recent years in a way that causes me as much stress as it causes me amusement.
There’s a conversation early on in The Four Seasons when Danny (Steve Carell) talks about how he feels stuck in his relationship with his wife Anne (Kerri Kenney). He says he’s tried patience and tried to get her into returning to beloved activities, even building a kiln in their backyard so she can do pottery, but nothing has stuck. Instead, she just putszes around on her phone, and he can’t stand it. In fact, he can’t stand her.
It’s a great monologue from Carell, but the bigger point, I think, is how real the dialogue feels, and it honestly makes me confront all the depressing stuff I see in my real day-to-day life, like when I go out with friends who are constantly on their phones, Or feel stuck in the same repetitive behavioral loop over and over again. Or even when friends know there are problems but can’t communicate them. It’s great, well-executed stuff, and it’s leaving me feeling like a disheveled mess at basically every turn. It’s no wonder I can only watch one episode at a time.
I do love that The Four Seasons is formatted in such a way that we just catch up with the group of friends across a period of four seasons, exactly as the title implies. It’s a neat way to tie a story together with a bow, and should continue to be a great format in the future. The acting performances are also top-notch (though I’d basically watch Will Forte in anything anyway), and I like that Alan Alda gets a cameo. So I’m happy I checked out the Netflix schedule and turned the new series on… at least, I think.
This year has been one for uncomfortable content for me. I also recently watched Friendship, which made me uncomfortable in a less realism-based way. This type of content may be becoming a new trend, and I’m not sure how much I can get behind it, but I’ll need to get on board because the Netflix show has already been renewed for Season 2.
Anyway, The Four Seasons is great. Just don’t go into it expecting a barrel of laughs, friends.
