Don't Turn A Deaf Ear To Switched At Birth
Show: Switched At Birth, which airs Mondays at 8 PM on ABC Family.
Plot: When Bay and Daphne were born, a harried hospital employee accidentally mixed them up. The result? They were raised by one another's biological parents, who had no idea until a DNA project Bay (played as a teenager by Vanessa Marano) did for her Biology class revealed that she did not share genes with Kathryn (Lea Thompson) and John (D.W. Moffett). In fact, her biological mother is Regina (Constance Marie), who's spent the past decade and a half parenting Daphne (played as a teen by Katie LeClerc).
Soapy Intrigue: After a childhood bout of meningitis, Daphne lost her hearing, so her biological parents and her new kind-of sister get an immersion in Deaf culture, and learn ASL to communicate with her (though Daphne is adept at lip reading). At this point in the story, Bay and her brother Toby (Lucas Grabeel) are still smarting from a situation where her boyfriend, Emmett (Sean Berdy), cheated on her with Toby's girlfriend Simone (Maiara Walsh). Everyone broke up, but Emmett is still pining after Bay. Meanwhile, Bay is getting more and more involved in a street-art collective of sorts, risking arrest on a regular basis. THEN there's the matter of Bay's biological father, Angelo (Gilles Marini), who suspected all along that Daphne wasn't his child (though he thought that Regina had cheated on him), and who took off when Daphne lost her hearing. Things are still tense between him and Daphne -- even more so since Regina has married him for the sake of his green card. He ran into some legal trouble during his missing years and still seems kind of sketchy.
What It Will Remind You Of: It's like a much less edgy Gilmore Girls, with twice as many ladies, except people talk a bit slower because some of them are Deaf.
What's Best About It: Producers do a very good job of dramatizing this somewhat outlandish premise in what seems to be a realistic way: the tensions of blending these two families never feels easy, but you do feel the effort of everyone involved to make it work anyway.
What's Worst About It: You do have to look up from painting your nails or whatever during scenes with more than one Deaf character, because then they're just signing to each other and you'll need to read the subtitles. The rest of the time, someone usually does simultaneous translation.
But If I Save It Until Friday, Don't I Risk Having Someone Spoil It For Me Before I Watch It? You're safe. This one's pretty under-the-radar.
Finally, And Most Importantly, Do the Female Leads Wear Cute Outfits? Some do. Daphne and Kathryn are a bit on the frumpy side, though even so, Daphne does rock some adorable patterned sweaters. Regina and Bay are both artsy types, so they get slightly more adventurous with their colour choices and statement jewellery. No matter what your personal style may be, you will probably see something worth coveting.