SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

GazerRise Fantastic!

Celia A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Josephina Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

alv790 The story is told from Henry Fisher's (Eli Baker) point of view. It uses the same grown-up main character narrating his (pre) adolescence in voice-over technique as The Wonder Years. Of course, this show is not as brilliantly inspired as Wonder Years, but it would be unfair to judge a new TV show by such high standards. Eli Baker has a lot of boyish charm and does a convincing job.Nowadays, it feels a bit old fashioned to have a traditional family sitcom. It's true that the parents are divorced, but they have such a good relationship that there's not such a large difference.Any new show needs a differentiating element, and here the Mel's (J.K. Simmons, playing the father) blindness plays that role.One problem is that, for a comedy, Growing Up Fisher is not very funny. A lot of jokes are made from Mel's blindness and how he doesn't let that keep him from any activity. Some of those are enjoyable, but that premise only takes us so far. Another problem is that it relies too much on clichés. Henry starts awkwardly noticing girls, which is a reasonable plot point for a protagonist this age but one we have often seen. Joyce (Jenna Elfman), his mother, has gone back to the university and is obsessed about being cool and being friends with the other students and with her teenage daughter and her friends. There's nothing wrong with her interpretation, but beyond this not too promising plot element she is not given much to work with. The same can be said about Katie (Ava Deluca-Verley), who plays Henry's older sister. She does fine, but is not given much to do. Henry's best friend Runyen (Lance Lim), is an Asian mouthy kid who also feels like a sitcom cliché.The show is at his best with heart-warming family lessons, like when Katie stands up for his father when he is almost expelled from a musical where she is starring because his guide dog started barking. This came after Mel had told her that he was so obnoxious and outspoken because when he was a teen his rowing coach had not liked having a blind kid in the team and had asked him to leave. Mel had left and he had always regretted it. Katie standing up for him in spite of being mad at him for spoiling her date was a nice moment. I fear that in our cynic times such simple feel-good messages are seen as too corny.It's a pity this show was cancelled so soon. I enjoyed it and felt that it had potential to grow beyond the clichés that were holding it back. Unfortunately, we won't have the opportunity to see whether that's the case.

kofila I had to watch the pilot due to the synopsis which is so annoying and unoriginal. Normal stupid family sitcom with blind dad?! Oh my lord! Who the F gave green light to this incredibly stupid and half ass idea? And who cares about washed up JK Simmons and double-washed up Jenna Elfman? You truly need to be retarded to enjoy this. The actors are pushing it so hard and there is no chemistry whatsoever. Jokes that you've heard zillion times... Isn't there anyone left who can make a decent clever sitcom?!It would make you less retarded to sniff thinner while watching Two and a half men, trust me... UGH

HerbsReviews "Are you sure you should be driving?" NBC is currently trying a couple of new family centered series of which this is one and the other being About A Boy. Unfortunately, the premise is relatively thin and the show quickly abuses the abilities of the protagonist, Mel Fisher. The premise revolves around Mel Fisher, a blind lawyer, who goes about his life fooling everyone into believing he can see. The protagonist can apparently chop down trees with a chainsaw, teach his daughter to parallel park, leap over other lawyers with a simple bound. The comedy would need to be irreverent and edu for this to have the slightest shot at success. 'instead, it goes for a sappy, feel-good vibe with a voice-over by Jason Bateman. Despite it being based on the creator's actual childhood, the element of truth doesn't make it any less absurd or any more worthy of being a TV show. Just as it's hard to keep up with how many failed sitcoms there have been during mid-seasons, I'm losing track of how many mawkish, barely funny sitcoms these days are drawn from the writer's own family experience and upbringing. Creatively, the story of Me is an awfully stifling place to start. Memoir has its place beyond the page, but sitcoms are usually not it - for the same reasons that family stories you think are so table-poundingly hilarious are difficult to convey to any audience larger than a dinner party. Network execs need to stop indulging this strange habit and ask writers and producers to look for pilot pitches someplace other than their home movies and photo albums: it just isn't funny. For these reasons Growing Up Fisher gets a 2/10.

bwilliams1947 The age gap between Elfman and Simmons spoiled the show for me. He looked more like the grandfather than the father/husband. She looked like she might have been the second or third wife but then they would have had younger children, if any. Elfman's character acts as childish or more childish than the children. I can look past the unbelievable abilities of the blind husband but the family just doesn't ring true as one that would have been established in the first place. Jason Bateman would have been better as the husband with Simmons as the narrator. Perhaps ensuing episodes will improve but usually the pilot is supposed to be better in order to get accepted.