Did you think it got over the top after a while? I mean the neighbor behind the fence made sense, but after while having an oar hide his face was just silly.
shareThe reason they never showed Wilson was because he was incredibly ugly. Had he ever shown his face, the audience would have turned to stone!
shareIt was a running gag, I always found it funny when they found creative ways to hide his face. Kind of ironic since his face was visible long before Home Improvement when he was on Ryan's Hope and many movies in the 70s and 80s.
shareMany aspects of Home Improvement were actually autobiographical and ideas by Tim Allen himself. The idea of not seeing Wilson's face over the fence was inspired by Tim's feelings of not being able to see his neighbors over the fence at his parents' house when he was little (because he was too short to see over the fence). But yes. I get what you're saying. It was a little over the top because not seeing Wilson's face was a running gag throughout the show, even when they were not at the fence.
The episodes with Tim's mom and no dad are symbolic of his real childhood, too. Tim lost his dad in a car accident when he was 11 years old.