'The Goldbergs' First Impressions: A show on 80s nostalgia and family chaos

I think we're fortunately over the 80s nostalgia bait in most of the media at this point, but there was a show that released back in 2013 that would loosely fit into this category, for it's not really nostalgia bait in the same sense. If anything, it's nostalgia for the creator of the show, a filmmaker that grew up in the 80s and spent much of his childhood documenting everything he could with a camera. As a lover of all the pop culture, a love for films and storytelling, this meant that much of his childhood remained recorded and preserved throughout the years. Adam F. Goldberg is pretty much the main character of the show, and also the name of the show's creator. It is a sitcom loosely based on the events of his childhood and the interactions he had with his family growing up, much of these stories having some actual connection to real events. Either based on something that happened in his childhood, or follows up on a particularly specific trait that one of his family members had back then. From the love his father had for his chair, or the desperate attempts to look cool and get girls from his brother. Even Adam's own attempts to try to understand the world and fit in, especially back then in the 80s in which the world was void of the Internet's modern horrors. This is a sitcom done well, though. It's one that isn't riddled with annoying laugh tracks and constant cuts and edits, within clearly cheap sets in a studio.

The show first caught my attention a few years back when I saw it advertised on Amazon's Prime Video, but I just never gave it any attention for some reason. The production company behind it is none other than Adam Sandler's Happy Madison Productions, the same that handles his own silly films throughout the decades. I was surprised to see that production company logo spring up, but the more I watched, the more it actually made sense. A big reason to watch for me was the featuring of Jeff Garlin, a great actor that I thoroughly enjoy in the much-missed televisions series Curb Your Enthusiasm alongside Larry David. The actor is great in these situations where things are stupid, where he's able to use that powerful voice to shout about things that don't make sense, or make a fool out of himself with his more cartoonish appearance, and that's exactly what I found here in The Goldbergs: Jeff playing the father of the family, a man that calls everyone a moron, sits in his cozy chair and removes his trousers the moment he returns home, sitting around in his underwear for maximum comfort. I do think Jeff is absolutely the star of the show here, and I'm not sure if it would have the same appeal to me had he not starred in the show. The rest of the cast are mostly unknowns, with a few familiar faces from Sandler's previous titles appearing here and there.

First off, I've really liked that the show isn't utilising annoying laugh tracks in any of the episodes. It makes the whole thing feel much more authentic, and then there's this better flow of the episodes that's felt without that formula of delivering a joke and then waiting for the track before progressing. The show has relatively short runtimes per episode at your usual 24 minutes. I think each episode does a lot with that time though, with each episode having a specific thing in mind that it handles. Whether it's about the release of Star Wars, a birthday party, or the worries of school life. Each episode starts with narration from Patton Oswalt, who narrates the child of Adam Goldberg, speaking on the date but never knowing which year of the 80s it was. It sets up the episode with the theme it holds and sometimes we'd still get that narration popping in and out as if we're hearing Adam's thoughts either later or in real time, a bit of self-reflection almost. Oh, and each episode ends with some real footage from the 80s of Adam's real family and friends, connecting the episode with the reality of things. It's a nice touch that definitely makes the characters seem a bit more real and easy to connect with.

The show doesn't just orient itself around Adam though, it gives a lot of depth into the rest of the family, giving us more context into their lives and personalities. Some episodes are almost entirely focused on a specific character, and I really like how this is done. Of course my favourite character is definitely the father, but I quite like the character of Adam and his brother, Barry. Barry's character is like your typical idiotic teenage boy, completely oblivious to the world and incapable of having any real self-awareness. A bit annoying at times, but that accurately sums up the chaos of a family. Even down to showing the youthful attitude of the grandfather in the family, which dresses like he's in his 30s (in the 70s) and is always running around. With a great connection to Adam, often keeping his secrets and being the 'cool' adult that is always up for a bit of fun. For a sitcom, it's probably one of the best I have seen in terms of being engaging and having a wide range of interesting characters and stories to tell. 22 episodes in the first season and I don't think a single one of them could be considered weak. It's more surprising that this is a sitcom that released in 2013 and managed to have as many seasons as it did. I think that alone tells that it's something that managed to have an impact.

I'm curious as to where it goes from here though, with one season out of the way already, I'm not sure how many stories they could still have that could remain of quality, especially with the inevitable process of all of the actors growing up or aging more. Especially the younger ones the show focuses on a lot. That usually tends to be one of the major problems of a show like this