Just finished the last episode. I haven't seen all the episodes but he was likable in the pilot and that episode when he goes on his first date. But, he really comes across as a pr*ck now.
All he is being gay and if I was his Mom I'd tell him to STFU: You're 16. I'm the boss. She's my mother and not everything has to be about you. Just because you want everyone to know the truth about you doesn't mean she has to know the truth about me.
He comes across as an embodiment of what gay middle-age men, bitter idealogues at that, would wish if they could go back in time and have their ACT-UP days brought into the 21st century.
Kenny seems like the sort of guy who would out everyone, whether they like it or not, because he self-righteously thinks it to be correct and his way must the be the only way. He's a teen but somehow he seems to be the one running the family.
Kenny seems to be a guy who would grow up and out gays on the internet, even if it ruins their families, if they are in the closet, taking away the decision from the individual.
And if they wanted to dispel notions of gay boys being affected by their mom, well, basically having a show where he's always having heart-to-hearts with his Mom, while they eat cake or something, isn't helping.
People who say this show is anti-Catholic are spot on and Kenny basically serves as a more neutered type of guy who would interrupt Italian grandmothers attending Mass during the early 90's because for some reason Catholicism was responsible for AIDS?!? That little old grandma who just wanted to go to church is somehow responsible for men engaging in homosexual sex? I never understood that.
It just seems like the show's setting and Catholicism exists solely for Dan Savage to vent his early 90's prejudice against Catholics. The whole show has a "Silence equals Death" vibe, though couched in "humor."
None of the Catholicism depicted in the show seems like it is in anything in the real world. They seem more like Jehovah's Witnesses or fundamentalist Evangelicals, not Irish-Catholics (let alone blue-collar, literally since the father is a cop) in Chicago. If they are going to play up the supposed Irish-Catholic cop family thing, you know what, there better be a couple of bottles of Hennessy lying around.
Sure that's a stereotype, but since the characters are so extremely caricatured, why not have the whole Irish drunk thing going on?
But, of course, that would distract from the stereotypes they wish to enforce, like Granny walking around as if she's the mom from Carrie or something.
Kenny never seems like a real character. He seems like a 50-year old writer getting his digs in at the establishment or living vicariously through a character who imagines going to Gay Camp. Or, in another episode, getting hit on by a barista who looked like he was in his late 20s when the main character looks like he's in middle school and this being considered apropos. Then Kenny gets embarrassed because his Mom interrupts and c*ckblocks whatever was going on with the near-30 something pushing free lattes on him. Absent being embarrassed where was that flirting going lead to, because surely it was supposed to lead to something, at the very least on the part of the barista, who apparently likes jailbait? It's a 1970's to 1990s mentality from middle aged men who came of age during that time, or even earlier.
It's really rather interesting how obvious this is but also how implicit it is.
And the entire episode reminded me of, ironically, Three's Company. Instead of putting on a ruse so that Mr. Roper doesn't find out Jack's straight, they all pretend that they aren't getting divorced or gay or what not and hijinks ensue!
Considering how much the Mom disliked her Mom, it doesn't seem like she'd have ever cared really what Grandma thought. And she'd probably have repudiated this (fake) depiction of Catholicism. But, it's all designed so that Mom can tell Grandma to take a hike, with Kenny looking pleased at having the battle axe set up with his uncle.
None of it rings true.
I'd rather have seen a show about Sue's gay friend from The Middle than Kenny.
reply
share
dma-maillist
8 years ago
I saw some of the episodes I missed and I think I may have misstated, in tone, what I wrote above. Kenny isn't bitter. He's a nice guy, I suppose. It's just that everyone else are on a spectrum of oblivious boob to absolutely repellant and so Kenny comes across as a pedant for being the "normal" one. If he's a jerk it's because everything is about him being gay.
Take the camping episode. The show begins about making jokes about non-sexual male physical play (and between father and son no less) when the Dad and other son are roughhousing with wrestling in the kitchen and Kenny thinks it's gay. Fine. It's a dumb joke. No big deal. But, he's basically s*itting on normal father son bonding, esp. I would suppose in a blue-collar household with a dad being a cop and the son being on the wrestling team.
Then the dad brings up taking his son camping. And Kenny brings up that he would like to go and he doesn't want his homosexuality coming between male bonding. He feels offended at being excluded, apparently because he's gay, when he's probably being excluded because he has no evident interest in such things.
Not two minutes into it he makes Dad not inviting him along about his coming out, when it's clearly about Kenny not being interested in things like that. Say what you will about Kenny being gay, but he's not like Cameron on Modern Family who grew up on a ranch and is comfortable in the outdoors or likes football and stuff like and Cam isn't exactly Mr. Macho. For lack of a better term, Kenny is a bit of a sis*y and he's been that way apparently before he came out.
I suppose if his Dad had two tickets to Mamma Mia! and wanted to bond, he'd probably look to Kenny before anybody else in his family because that is something Kenny would be interested in, while probably excluding the older son.
In short, his Dad would seem to be sensitive to what his son likes and dislikes which should be applauded, I suppose.
There's nothing wrong with Kenny in that episode. He's not mean. But, everything has to be about his being gay.
In that way, he's a jerk.
The actor is likable and brings it to the character. That is, with another actor, it might have felt worse.
But, the likeability if it is there is in spite of the writing, not because of it.
So, I guess I give grudging kudos to Noah Galvin having to work with such shoddy material.
But, the shoddy material is the fault of the writers and producers.
reply
share
acwoodcraft-1
8 years ago
I have to agree, Kenny doesn't seem like he'd be much into camping. But I can also understand why he wouldn't want to be excluded from their camping trip. He loves his Dad and Brother and wants to spend time with them and not be left out of activites simply because he's gay. The main thing I took away from that ep. was that their Dad learned something about communicating with his kids. Jimmy had come to hate the wrestling team because he thought that's all his Dad cared about. When his Dad finally told him it was important to him because he was concerned about Jimmy's future and that wrestling was Jimmy's ticket into college, Jimmy's attitude towards wrestling and his Dad changed immediately.
reply
share
dma-maillist
8 years ago
Yes, but it seems the writers are making everything serve some sort of convenience. In the pilot, everyone was a liar on some level, with Jimmy being "anorexic." Then the next episode it's gone. Just like that.
He's on the wrestling team and apparently does well at it, but for some reason he doesn't want to do it. There's no real explanation for why esp. since it would seem with what we know of the character (or what little we know), chances are, he'd be wanting to be on the wrestling team. There's nothing indicating that he'd really prefer to do something else, like being a studious student, writing, making music, painting, etc.
So he "comes out" to his dad and says he doesn't want to be on the team. His dad says something and Jimmy just changes back. So much for real conflict. Just like the anorexia, it's just a convenient plot device, that is just gone for no good reason.
I never bought that Jimmy had any inclination to leave wrestling nor that Kenny would even remotely want to go camping.
It all seems contrived to keep the "conflict" in the family going.
reply
share