It Might Be Time For The Royces To Roll Out Of Suburgatory

After a second season of huge departures — an actual relationship between George and Dallas; Tessa dating the jock next door; Tessa actually living with her absentee mother — Suburgatory's third season seems, judging by its premiere, to be a return to first principles. Though George and Tessa realize that there's nothing really keeping them in Chatswin anymore and seriously consider a move back to Manhattan, the city they (mostly George) fled in the series premiere, they decide to stay for the people they actually like. Alex, Tessa's mother, reverted to form and left town without saying goodbye to the child she'd been happily cohabitating with. Having broken things off with George, Dallas is back to being the person she was before she fell for George, and I'm not sure that's someone I need to see much more of.

It's not that Dallas turned into a different person, really, when she was seeing George. She still had the same mostly silly interests and concerns, spent her money on ridiculous nonsense, and was far too indulgent with her daughter, Dalia. It's not even like George even has, or had, the capacity to change her into someone more substantial through sheer force of his superior personality: like Arrested Development's Michael Bluth, George Altman is someone whose self-image as a level-headed salt-of-the-earth type is rarely put to any meaningful kind of test. But when the two of them were together, there was the possibility of their continuing to grow together and influence each other in unexpected, fun ways — she could help him to be less rigid and too-cool-for-school, and he could help her to be less determinedly superficial. They would both have their work cut out for them, but still, there was a chance! At least, unlike so many pop culture odd couples, George and Dallas actually seemed to like each other.

But what stuck out to me in the season premiere was how insular Dallas and Dalia's storyline was — and how pointless. Insular, I can somewhat forgive: Dallas is still-fairly-newly single, and it would make sense for a real person to want to come out of that experience by reconnecting with the child who may have lacked some of her attention when she was all in love with this new dude. And while Dalia's sullenness has made her an entertaining side character, if we like Dallas at all — and I actually do — there's something kind of heartbreaking about her becoming the sole focus of all of Dallas's love and nurturing. For all her silliness, Dallas is sweet and a good person. Dalia is not only undeserving of a nice mom like Dallas...but her ongoing dickishness kind of forces the viewer to wonder what specific things Dallas did in her formative years to screw her up.

My other problem with the amount of airtime devoted to Dallas and Dalia's relationship is that it steals focus from the show's actually compelling mother-daughter relationship: that of Sheila and Lisa. For the first two seasons, the Shays were focused on just one thing: Ryan's success in literally every aspect of his life. Now that their project has paid off and he's gone to college, Sheila is having empty-nest syndrome even though her nest isn't actually empty, as her remaining child has to point out. This means there are so many new directions these characters could go. Will Sheila get so bored without Ryan that she actually pays some attention to Lisa — and, if so, what will that...look like? Will Lisa try ever more desperate (maybe even dangerous) tactics to force Sheila to acknowledge her? Out from Ryan's shadow, will Lisa become an achiever to rival Ryan — and, if so, will that just make Sheila turn on her even more? Ana Gasteyer (as Sheila) and Allie Grant (as Lisa) have always been a great comic duo, even as Grant's mostly been given a mix of defeat and incredulity to play. Let's open them up!

Dallas and Dalia have started out the season siloed off from the rest of the cast, and no, the accountants that Dalia (hackily) hired so she could teach them to twerk don't count. It's almost as though they're alone on their own show. Tessa and Dalia are, it seems clear, never going to be friends, and though it's not impossible that a couple of attractive people in their forties like George and Dallas might reconcile someday, the Altmans' new mission of being in Chatswin but not of it would seem to suggest that he should look a little further afield for his next romantic relationship, and in the meantime, there's not much for Dallas to do but hawk her crystals. Maybe she and Dalia should just go do that in the next hamlet over.