AIO Couples Having Kids: Can That Really Work?

[Pound Foolish]

Stopping Eugene and Katrina from having kids raised one of the most collosal fandom rebellions the show has ever seen. Blogs, the Whit's End.org comments, and message boards all put forth their reasons the couple should have kids. (Then Paul McCusker introduced Buck and everyone was happy.) And, as PennyBassett recently reminded me, one of the main reasons people want Wooton and Penny to get together is the idea of their parenthood is so entertaining. Also, we want to see what their kids are like.

But knowing what kids are like takes time. It takes time for kids to grow and have a lot of personality.

We all say we want aio couples to have kids, but what exactly is it we want to come of that? Do we want to see the the Meltsners and Bassetts raising a baby? Do we want the baby to age one year at a time? If so then, naturally, five years from now, the baby will be five. That's a lllllotta waiting. We can't be sure the show wouldn't over by the time the kid was ten!

Do we mean we want them to have a baby followed by a classic Odyssey time warp? Would we be okay with the baby morphing into a ten year old over a year or two? Or should the show take a hiatus for a year or two and then come back with a fully grown kid? What exactly are we hoping for?

[SirWhit]

I wouldn't be a fan of the whole time skip thing since that'd totally mess up my Odyssey Time theory But I'm not really sure otherwise, because like you said it would take a prohibitively long time for the kid to have decent character development past crying 24/7.

[PennyBassett]

Yes. I have thought about this quite a lot myself. And I can't say for sure how I would want them to accomplish a child growing up in Odyssey. They could speed things up a bit, say, do 2 years for every one of our years, but then we would be left wondering why the other kids in Odyssey haven't grown, because if they did, then we would have new kid characters every year. I've also thought about how Buck is going to grow up. (Well, as much as a fourteen-year-old can grow up) But Eugene and Katrina have been long lasting characters, they're not a family that can just disappear whenever the writers want them too. (figuratively speaking) So if they do adopt Buck, will he stay the same age forever or something? And if he did, wouldn't other kids his age grow up before him?

[TigerShadow]

Well, does keeping Eugene and Katrina around automatically prohibit Buck from aging properly? Families on this show aren't exactly perpetual, after all.

[PennyBassett]

I don't think so... but it will still be odd, since, after a while, he'll be like 16 or something and the new kid characters will all be 11 or 12. But it might work if they keep Jules and maybe Olivia around for a while, then we could have a group of middle school characters, and a group of high school characters, to relate to different Odyences. (See what I did there?)

[Jo March]

I agree with PennyBasset. That would work well--except for one thing, why is Olivia in middle school, when Barrett has obviously gone on to highschool?

[Mickey]

I would love to see new Odyssey families with kids but it would be weird having babies on a show, I mean all they could do was cry on occasion. Maybe they can all adopt?

[PennyBassett]

I agree with PennyBasset. That would work well--except for one thing, why is Olivia in middle school, when Barrett has obviously gone on to highschool?

Barrett is still around. He just hasn't been in any episodes recently. In Take It On Trust Olivia says Barrett and Priscilla are still in her class.

[Connie G.]

The Barclays had a baby, but all he did was cry occasionally, too I guess it could have worked, except we didn't get to see him grow up because the Barclays were moved out of Odyssey (for a different reason altogether) before then.

[TigerShadow]

to relate to different Odyences. (See what I did there?)

That pun is the worst. You should be ashamed, you mONSTER. >=(



On the whole, though, I'm pretty much in agreement with PF here. I think we want the characters to have kids because that's our idea of married couples—they've fallen in love, they've gotten married, now they're supposed to have kids. We don't really think about the storytelling implications. I think they've struck a good compromise with having a pre-established character returning and the Meltsners fostering him; it helps showcase what Eugene and Katrina might be like as parents, facilitates character development for Buck, and keeps them from having to run Eugene and Katrina ragged with the inherently hectic lifestyle of parents with new babies.

Come to think of it, the Connie/Jules relationship might be a look into what Connie might be like as a parent, although obviously the dynamic is different since a. Connie isn't married, b. Jules is her half-sister rather than an unrelated child, and c. Jules does have some rebellious behaviors that she needs to be disciplined for.

[PennyBassett]

"If you think that what you've done is right well then, you're a fool! Think again!" (Beauty and the Beast on broadway) Btw that wasn't directed toward your comment, I was just finishing your sentence because the line before in the song is, "You, monster!" I actually completely agree with what you just said.