This Is Us. Anyone watching?

@bevhills I, too, like Gerald McRaney but he is only in the pilot, according to one article I read.

Dh and I just watched it and are intrigued enough to watch again. I think it hooked meā€¦I also probably wonā€™t but think itā€™d be fun to rewatch and look for the clues I missed the first time.

In thinking about it, the father waiting to be informed about his wifeā€™s c-section instead of being there shouldā€™ve been a clue. I think while watching it I dismissed it since I assumed he was not invited in because it was an emergency c-section.

What really should have been a clue was the OB offering the new dad a cigarette in the waiting room, and realizing that there was lots of smoking going on there. Also, the really old-fashioned equipment. And Mandy Moore, who has always seemed like she belonged to another era (although for me that era wouldnā€™t necessarily have been 1980).

There was also a birthday clue in the email opened on Randallā€™s computer screen.

I thought it was the firefighter who brought in Randall who offered the dad a cigarette, not the OB. Thatā€™s when I started realizing something was up.

I noticed the clues too so knew that story line was in the past ( the dads longish hair was another clue for me it wasnā€™t present day.)

When I heard she was having triplets figured the three same day birthdays had to be that they were related - plus the looking for the bio dad made it obvious to me (in part because of the adopted brothers in Grace and Frankie are different races, too.)

I enjoyed it and will watch the next few episodes to see if itā€™s a keeper.

The thought flitted through my mind early in the show that the dadā€™s hair and beard looked like my dadā€™s in 1970s and not so much like the hipster-ish beard/hair today, but then I promptly forgot about it. I read somewhere that the earlier year is actually 1979 (not sure why) and found it interesting since I was a sophomore in college then, exactly the year my daughter is now.

I got it immediately when the father insisted on ā€œnaturalā€ birth. With my oldest was born (he is 34) giving birth was a competition of who lasted the longest sans meds, and no c sections.

Wowā€“I missed so much! So I watched again while on my elliptical today and caught much more.
I am in for at least a few episodes. Guessing I will watch as this type of show relaxing to me.
Now the new Greyā€™s was Not satisfying at all.

^I agree. Nobody wants Meredith pulling this kind of stupid stunts at this point.

Finally watched it. I probably wonā€™t watch it again. I found it predictable and just not very interesting. Oh well.

Romani and I must have had our computer screens going at the same timeā€¦I just finished watching!

I had not read anything about the show - nothing beyond the first post on this thread so though I knew there was a ā€œtwistā€ I had no idea what. I did not see it coming until the cigarette was offered. And then seeing the photo of the 3 sibs in the apartment. I loved all the actors - I didnā€™t think the long hair/beard was not current!

Iā€™m super curious what the next episode will bring. I have never watched Parenthood. BUT, I started watching Scandal this summer and am almost done with season four, so I TOTALLY was expecting something horrible to happen at the end of This Is Us - too much Scandal on my mind!!!

Ha, funny abasket.

I watched with my in-laws. FIL liked it. MIL and I were not fans. Heā€™s the sentimental one of the bunch though.

Before this though we watched Designated Survivor. Already hooked on that.

After watching the second episode, Iā€™m still not sold. The expectation of a surprise twist at the end of each hour is not going to be enough to keep me on board for what seems to be a pretty boring 59 minutes. Kate and Kevin are still poorly developed characters (heā€™s dumb and needy, sheā€™s fat and self loathingā€“and thatā€™s all we know), and Kateā€™s boyfriend is one of the more repellent characters Iā€™ve seen on TV in ages. Randallā€™s story line and the parental flashbacks are more interesting (mostly because the actors in those segments are the most competent), though I fear Randallā€™s bio dad is in danger of toppling into ā€œmagical Negroā€ territory. But at the end of the day, Iā€™m just not finding anything in this show very compelling.

Why do you think Kateā€™s boyfriend is so repellent? I thought he was one of the better characters (although also in danger of toppling into ā€œmagical fat personā€ territory). Otherwise, I pretty much agree with @MommaJ .

Iā€™m still a fan. No one is shooting anyone, nothing is getting blown up. I donā€™t like all the critically acclaimed shows where violence is the major plot factor. I like shows about families, but many family sitcoms seem so dopey and unfunny to m. This is the first show that has come close to void left by Parenthood and Friday Night Lights, although I will concede they will have to turn the writing up a notch to move into their shoes.

I donā€™t like the ā€œevery episode has a twist at the endā€ nature of this show. Itā€™s hokey and already getting old. Iā€™ll still give the show a little more time to flesh out the characters.

I donā€™t dig the attempt at cliff-hanger twists, but I do appreciate the attempt at literary sophistication by having the story roll out in multiple time periods at once. In many cases, you know what is going to happen, but you donā€™t know when, how, or why. Yet. The big challenge that poses, however, is that we spend so little time in each time period that the characters tend to seem superficial in all of them.

@JHS, I guess I dislike the character of Toby because I donā€™t like people who are always ā€œonā€ā€“they wear me out. If I were in a group with him, Iā€™d be taking care to sit as far away from him as possible every time. Perhaps I could tolerate him more if we knew something about him beyond his avid wooing of Kate, including learning what he likes about her (other than the fact that sheā€™s willing to go out with a overweight guy). Maybe we need some scenes with him in a context other than the pursuit of Kate? In general, I think the Kate/Kevin side of the show needs a lot of work, and if there was more time spent on character development (and dialogue, which is often very weak) and less on twists, it would be a better show. I know two hours isnā€™t a lot of time to build an array of characters, but if I think back to Friday Night Lights, for example, another show with a big cast, I feel like I was all in with the population of Dillon right away.

My D was excited to see Milo Ventigmiglia in a new show, since she remembers him as a heartthrob from his Gilmore Girls days. Maybe itā€™s the facial hair, or maybe he hasnā€™t aged well, but I donā€™t see his appeal at all. Just me? Iā€™ve always loved Mandy Moore though. Thereā€™s something so genuine and un-actressy about her.