Am I supposed to hate Julia? (Motherland)

[BernadetteRostankowskiWolowitz]

I'm about 4 episodes in (season one), and honestly - I find her and, more specifically, her husband, so fucking annoying that I may just have to throw the towel in.

I get that she is supposed to be a harangued mother, feckless dad, etc, but she is just so incredibly unlikeable.

She berates her mother, so cruelly, for stepping back on childcare (creating a gap the wanker dad should be helping to fill), sometimes in front of her mothers friends.

She only ever does stuff with or for her kids because other people have basically played on her massive insecurities. But it's at caricature point now, where its losing any humour.

I'm just not finding the comedy at all with her. I'm wondering if the fact that there isn't even a drop of niceness written into her character means we are supposed to dislike her?

I'm only still watching for Anne and Liz. Even Kevin - they made him a bit funny at the start but it's going a bit slapstick (the wearing all the coats scene?)

I want to get it, and I want to like it, and there bits I like. But it just feels so over over the top. Like they've ramped up any potential for a bit of comedy to just levels of ridiculousness.

like modern family and friends the quality of writing so high it bears re watching

I found Julia very annoying at the start, and Liz the obviously sympathetic one who kept me watching.

But the genius of the show is the character development. The whole point is that as time goes on, you get to see the background of the characters (Julia's, Kevin's and Amanda's unhappy marriages etc.), and how they (very slowly) start to learn from their experiences and develop. So I went from strongly disliking both Julia and Amanda, and finding Kevin very annoying, to genuinely warming to every character - even Anne.

So anyone who says they've watched a few episodes in series 1 and then gave up, are missing the point.

In this, it's very similar to another of my recent favourite shows, Schitt's Creek, where had I not been warned by friends to stick with it through the first few episodes, I would have given up, as all the characters seemed so dislikeable. But that's the point - you can't have show that focuses on character development, if the characters are perfect to begin with.

I'd advise anyone to stick with it. One of my very favourite shows of recent years. Also the longest and hardest I've ever laughed at a sitcom set-up (in Series 3) - won't spoil it, for anyone who's managed to miss the spoilers further up this thread. I laughed so loudly my teen went to check I was OK!!

Apologies if someone already said, but there’s a new Xmas special on bbc1 on 23rd

www.whattowatch.com/watching-guides/motherland-last-christmas-air-date-stars-trailer-cast-and-all-we-know-about-the-2022-festive-special

that looks great! Good to see that Joanna Lumley is back. And we’ll meet Tamara - poor Amanda.

I cant believe the amount of hate Julia's getting, when her husband literally exists. I cannot STAND Julias husband. He is completely useless and should be fined for this level of child neglect. I know its meant to be comedic, normalising husbands being useless and worthless (straight relationships), but I HATE how she gets angry at her mother for not looking after her grandchildren when that is literally the FATHERS responsibility?? If I was Julia, I would divorce him and kick him out of the house. If the roles were reversed, people would find it disgusting that she has no care for the kids and the poor father is doing everything. Cannot stand him

Obviously her husband is a useless dick. An absent useless dick. But from the first episode it's clear the writers intend Julia to be unlikeable, or at least to challenge our ideas of what a leading female character should be like. Which is refreshing really. Usually the way comedies make a female character relatable is by having them fall over a bit and say 'oh I'm such a klutz'.

In the first episode we see Julia dropping her kids off at school, having forgotten it's half term and then rather than just admit that she forgot she gets herself involved in this complicated situation where she pretends she's there because a 5 year old boy, whose name she randomly picks from a painting on the wall, is bullying her daughter. Randomly trying to throw a kid under the bus rather than own up to something that's not even that consequential anyway.

And that sets the tone for her character.

Having said all that, I quite like that she's a bit prickly and can be a bit of a user. As I say, makes for a nice change when it comes to a female lead character.