Fresh Off the Boat

I don't watch a lot of television series due to my need to like a TV show from the first episode (a problem I feel many people have)... maybe it has something to do with my profession as a Cardiothoracic surgeon and me having not much time for a build up of slow starting sitcom.

This show was great best show I have watched since the first few seasons of Modern Family it gives of a great everybody hates Chris vibe.

Would recommend to anyone who watches TV and wants to enjoy a light hearted comedy.

It's the 1990's. Eddie Huang moves from Washington D.C. to Orlando, Florida with his Taiwanese family. His father (Randall Park) opens a western style steakhouse. His mother (Constance Wu) is the Asian tiger mom. Honey (Chelsey Crisp) and Marvin (Ray Wise) are their next door neighbor.

This starts with a potential for an edgy sitcom of an Asian family moving into an all-white neighborhood. In the end, it is a very standard network sitcom. This should be Eddie's story but the breakout star is Constance Wu. The kids are fine but more could have been done. Marvin's daughter Nicole could have been a great side character but she gets ghosted over time. The brothers don't get to expand their roles. The show is good network fare but it doesn't stand out other than having the Asian cast.

Living in today's world we see more and more Asian people all in our communities I like living around them too, they are intelligent attractive and mostly friendly. This new ABC series set in 1990's Orlando about a Taiwanses family who moved from Washington D.C. to start a new life is a big winner! It centers around the young man and oldest child in the family named Eddie Huang(Hudson Yang)who is learning more and more American culture in the 90's from the style, music, TV, movies and one liners as this series captures the 90's culture well with it's slang and one liners! A real sugar and spice treat is the performance of the mom Jessica(Constance Wu)she's a sexy and sassy outspoken loving matriarch who guides the ship for the whole Huang clan as her husband(Randall Park)runs his steakhouse. Overall great show that learns us about Asian culture all the while being funny, educated and capturing 90's culture without taking things to serious! A thumbs up winner.

These TV series are very watchable, rewatchable and perfect as a background watch when you do something else. Many characters have undeniable charisma, relatable and the story line is rather lighthearted instilling the right values. It's also, in a way, generation X's nostalgic porn.

What didn't work for me:

• the family cast is rather mismatched visually, they didn't look as of the same ethnicity to me
• Louis's character is very cardboard like and lacks depth.

• They often forgot to balance Jessica's character, sacrificing showcasing the traits her family loves her for -all for the sake of comedy relief attached to her pushiness and other rather negative traits.

• I lived as a foreigner in a southern US town and it's already difficult to integrate even if you are a crowd pleaser. And though I am white and my town was mostly very lovely, I still experienced xenophobia, at least, once per month. With Jessica's character forget about it...I think the whole integration issue was super sugarcoated.

"Fresh Off the Boat" is a show about a Taiwanese-American family who has moved from Washington, DC (where there are lots of Taiwanese- Americans) to Orlando, Florida (where there are none!). While this sounds a bit like "Fresh Prince of Bel Air" or the like, the show still is surprisingly original and worth seeing. There are several things I really appreciate about it: it DOES talk about race and stereotypes (something very rare on TV today) and writing is so good. The characters, as a result, are very likable. Overall, there's very little not to like about this one and I see it as actually being a lot like the wonderful show, "Brooklyn Bridge"--but with a greater emphasis on humor. Well worth seeing--whether you are Asian or not.