skryche

Aw gee, why are the virtues of Leave it to Beaver rarely mentioned? These days it's thought of as a naive portrait of the fifties nuclear family, but the adventures of Wally and the Beav are so much more than that.

The show is funny. Rarely an episode passes that I don't laugh out loud. On that scoreboard, it's better than Friends.

It's ironic. Satires of Leave it the Beaver (like Pleasantville) portray it as unbelievably earnest, but have you listened to Ward? Every other thing he utters has the subtext, "No duh."

It's a little morbid. Have you heard some of the things that come out of the Beav's mouth? June asks Beaver what he's thinking about over a plateful of pork products. Beaver answers, "I was just thinking what it'd be like to be a pig eating human ribs." Now, come on, that's fucked up.

And, best of all, Beaver and Wally are total raving psychopaths. Don't believe me? When's the last time you witnessed one of them feeling regretful about causing someone pain? In the episode I watched the other day, a girl became upset because Wally (quite callously) dumped her. His reaction? Puzzlement -- without a drop of sympathy. The only thing that keeps the boys from a city-wide crime-spree is the threat of punishment: "Gosh, Beav, when Dad finds out about this, you're gonna be in for such a walloping."

Any of this sound familiar? That's right: in my opinion, LitB is a strong precursor to Seinfeld.