The Michael J Fox Show Offseason

Even with cable making original programming a year-round affair, the Summer is still a quiet time for my TV viewing. I've got a lot of extra time in my schedule and thought it would be a good time to start a little project.
I do my weekly DVR Purges, but let's be frank: they are crap. I don't proofread them at all most weeks. They're collections of scattered thoughts that barely even make sense a week later. What I've decided to do is, with most of these shows I watch taking a break, reflect on where I stand with them, assessing what is in the show's favor (assets) and what could get it in trouble (liabilities).
Now, not every show I watch will be included. In general, I'm sticking to shows that I've kept notes (be them from Purges or otherwise) as I've watched. That means, shows like The Bridge, Looking, Sherlock, and Dexter will not be included. To get my thoughts on those, ask me. This project, supposing I stay on schedule should take all month and I hope it does a good job summing up where these shows stand. In some cases, I'm hoping to convince you to start watching. Other times, it'll be nothing more than a postmortem for a show that's gone.
I hope you enjoy.
Favorite Episode(s): "Party" & "Christmas"

Assets:

Michale J. Fox: He's a legend and one of the most decorated TV actors ever. Losing him for a decade to Parkinson's was a blow to the TV community and I, along with most people, was happy to hear he'd be coming back to TV regularly on a show. The networks were banking on this too, which is how this show got a full season order before a pilot had been shot. Lesson learned. NBC forgot the fact that Fox never drew ratings much. Family Ties was a hit, but one that he took over. It wasn't developed for him. Spin City was never a ratings smash. Fox was surprisingly nimble with his delivery still. It's kind of amazing that his timing is so great that it beat out the Parkinson's most of the time. I'd love to see him on another show too, but I'll admit, he's better used in a supporting role now.

Juliette Goglia: The casting director didn't do spectacularly inspired work casting the children (Conor Romero was mostly underdeveloped and boring as Ian. Jack Gore wasn't game for most of the precocious kid material written for Graham), but I have to give credit for finding Juliette Goglia. The show immediately had more of an idea what to do with her than anyone other than Fox. She tended to get more of the B-plots that hit my sweet-spot, like her picking up yiddish in "Christmas".

Betsy Brandt: Look, I have no idea how much of this is overflow from Breaking Bad love, but I definitely found her to be a strength of the show. She played off Fox well and didn't entirely feel like a cookie-cutter wife character. Actually, the more I think about it, maybe the entire reason I liked this character was because Brandt was on Breaking Bad...

Liabilities:

9:30: This was a stupid move by NBC. It sounded questionable when the schedule was released last Spring and quickly proved to be disastrous. They thought it would be a lead into Parenthood. That was dumb. The shows didn't flow together at all well, even ignoring that it's a comedy to a drama. You only put this show at 9:30 if there is a 9:00 pm lead in that will be propping it up, not Sean Saves the Universe. At least have the marquee comedy of your Fall lineup lead an hour. But really, this is a family-friendly 8 pm kind of show. I know going up against Big Bang would've been certain death, but 9:30 is too damn late for the desired audience.

1987: The biggest thing that didn't work about this show was that, other than being single-camera without a laugh track, everything about this show felt dated. It was all designed within Fox's comfort zone but with just enough modern touches to turn off the rest of the audiences. For god's sake, their biggest guest star was Sting! I almost would've preferred the laugh track, because if I was going to watch something that took plots based on farce and misunderstanding from the 80s, it might as well feel like it was made then too.

Half Workplace/Half Family: Spin City ran into the same issue, so I'm wondering how much of this is something  Michael J Fox likes doing. They tried to make the show half about his family and half about his workplace. Like Spin City, it was quickly apparent which part worked better. Unlike Spin City, it was the personal life stuff. The less time at the new studio, the better, no matter how much I did enjoy seeing Wendell Pierce. Spin City didn't figure this out until season two, a timetable The Michael J Fox show won't have the opportunity to follow.

Outlook:

Well, it's cancelled, so the outlook is bleak. I thought about skipping cancelled series entirely for this offseason project and decided to include them for a couple reasons: 1) I'm talking about series that ended, like HIMYM and cancellation isn't all that different. 2) I put the time in to watch them so I might as well. 3) It's either this or do something productive with my time. The Michael J Fox Show was always doomed when you look back on it. Expectations were too high. There was no clear idea about what the show was about other than "Well, we have Michael J Fox available for a series". No one in the cast was all that dynamic, more like a collection of actors doing their part. There wasn't anyone who's talent transformed the way the character was written and that's a bad sign. I was not bothered when it fell off the schedule after the Olympics. Going back and looking at the episodes, I struggled to find favorites among them. It's a shame that it didn't work, but the key thing is it didn't work.

Previously this Offseason...
Community
Brooklyn Nine Nine
New Girl
Suburgatory
Modern Family 
Parenthood
The Mindy Project