Review: The Stanley Dynamic “The Stanley Neighbours”

Posted on October 13, 2015May 4, 2017 by Tommy North

If you’re reading this review about a Canadian show, I have to assume you’re Canadian, and in that case I hope you had an excellent Thanksgiving weekend. Whether you live in the U.S or Canada, Thanksgiving is really about coming together and giving thanks to the ones you love, friends, family, and neighbours. Speaking of neighbours (excellent segway, Tommy) it appears the Stanley’s have some new neighbours of their own! Do you think they’ll get along well? It’s television, obviously they won’t, but let’s find out if the episode was good anyway!

In “The Stanley Neighbours” a new couple moves in next door and mom and dad are desperate to impress and befriend them. Meanwhile, there is a new girl in town and her competitive nature makes Larry jealous.

If you read along with Bubble Blabber’s Family Guy reviews, one of big complaints about the show is that it has a stagnating cast. They have so few pieces and those pieces can only be moved around in so many different ways. This is a problem I feel The Stanley Dynamic may never run into. We’re constantly seeing new faces on the show and whether they are reoccurring roles or not is irrelevant because when you take a step back and look at each individual story, you can still feel you’re getting something different every week. The show is always positioning itself to give us something different and that’s always a good thing. That isn’t to say the only way to fix your problems is to introduce new characters, it isn’t. But it’s like working in a kitchen for five years without cheese and suddenly you open the fridge one day and you suddenly have cheese. Your food could end up tasting horrible, but at least you have something new to experiment with.

In addition to some interesting new characters for The Stanley’s to interact with, I found the writing to be particularly well done in the second and third acts. This episode took a little while to find it’s pacing throughout the first act, but it followed through and finished on a high note. A lot of the jokes were clever, especially a scene involving Lane dressing up as Harry Potter (hopefully the target audience knows who Harry Potter is!). The thing about the comedy in this show is that it is rich for the young mind. I can imagine myself at ten years old laughing along with this show easily, but as an adult I find a lot of the jokes to be cheesy. This episode is certainly no exception. But the over the top goofiness of the show could very well be end up the change of pace for parents who haven’t been exposed to this kind of comedy in awhile. Earlier on the show’s run, I found the comedy to be really over the top, but there was something enduring about it. It’s the type of show I haven’t watched in years, so it sort of did make me feel like a kid again.

The stories of the episode were good and straightforward. They were stories that younger audience members will be able to relate to with meaningful endings I think may go over the heads of some viewers. We see mom and dad battle for the admiration of these new neighbors for the entire episode, but finally come to the conclusion that they may be better off not being friends. You won’t get along with everybody in life, sometimes you’ll never be on the same page and that is okay. In Larry’s story, it ends with him seeing past his insecurities and putting himself in the shoes of somebody who is new to school and doesn’t know anybody. Another good lesson. Also points to the writers for that twist ending!

Some areas where the episode fell short for me was in the editing. The final free-throw contest at the end felt sloppy, it didn’t mesh together very well. As I mentioned before, the first act felt slower in comparison to the other two. It was a slow pick up, but it got on track.

Overall, this was a good episode. Well written with a good message, some good laughs, and a good tag at the end. Speaking of the tag, I think Darnell (Isaiah Lee) was great in this episode. He got a lot of great lines, and I think he’s getting better and better at his delivery. Acting can already be tough, but selling a joke well is a different beast. I guess you can consider that bit of praise to be my tag on this review. Good episode.