What’s the name of the show? Fresh Off the Boat

When does it premiere? Wednesday 4 February at 8.30pm ET on ABC. A second episode airs at 9.30pm ET.

What is this show? Eddie Huang (Hudson Yang) is a 12-year-old hip-hop fan in the mid-90s who moves with his family from Washington DC’s Chinatown to Orlando. They do not fit in. Oh, do we need to mention that they’re Asian – Taiwanese American, to be precise?

An Asian family? On network television? Yes, that’s right. This is the first show on network TV about an Asian family since Margaret Cho’s All-American Girl went off the air 20 years ago.

What’s the show’s pedigree? It is based on a memoir by Huang, a broadcaster and restaurateur. Huang wrote an amazing essay for New York magazine about adapting his life for television. The pilot was written by Nahnatchka Khan, the creator of cancelled-too-soon Don’t Trust the B---- in Apartment 23, and directed by indie film darling Lynn Shelton, who made Humpday and Your Sister’s Sister.

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What happens in the premiere? The Huangs pack up the car and move to Orlando so Eddie’s father Louis (Randall Park) can open the Cattleman’s Ranch steak restaurant. Eddie has a hard time fitting in at school, mostly because his mother packs him Chinese food rather than the Lunchables all the other kids eat. After getting in a fight when the only black kid in school racially abuses him, Eddie finally earns the grudging respect of his white peers. The second episode focuses on Eddie’s mother homeschooling him and his two brothers. They all got straight A’s, so that has to mean that school is too easy, right?

Is this show any good? With Huang, Khan and Shelton, Fresh Off the Boat has a sitcom dream team. This show falls squarely into a niche that ABC has carved out for itself of sitcoms about unconventional families that are quirky enough to hold our attention but familiar enough not to alienate the casual viewer. ABC previously did this expertly with the sadly departed Trophy Wife and this season’s hit Black-ish.



It would be easy to call Fresh Off the Boat the “Asian Black-ish” but that’s a little too simplistic. With a voiceover from the grown-up Eddie, a retro 90s feel (especially thanks to a well-curated rap soundtrack), and themes of not fitting in and growing up, it’s more like an Asian version of The Wonder Years. However, just as Black-ish tackles topics other than race, so does Fresh Off the Boat; it’s at its best when it either gets really wacky or delves into the family dynamic. It also offers an Asian perspective on race relations – something we rarely see in pop culture.

Fresh Off the Boat is the least funny when it tries to tell traditional sitcom jokes. But it’s when the program’s quirks shine through – Eddie trying to make it rain with a stack of coupons, Eddie’s mother shopping for the first time at a western supermarket, or his younger brother hilariously re-enacting a neighborhood planning meeting – that it’s at its funniest. Like Eddie himself, Fresh Off the Boat is still trying to figure out what it wants to be, but by the time it gets there it will be something totally original.

Which characters will you love? Yang does a great job of making Eddie relatable yet still ridiculous in the best way, but it’s his mother, Jessica (Constance Wu), who steals the show. Her barely concealed rage is great fodder for comedy and keeps her from becoming a tiger mom cliche. Younger brothers Emery (Forrest Wheeler) and Evan (Ian Chen) are underutilised but make hay with the little they’re given.

Which characters will you hate? Eddie’s father Louis doesn’t yet seem fully developed. All he really does is worry about how bad the business is at his restaurant, something that will grow tired very quickly, especially if we are supposed to believe a restaurant with no people in it can survive that long.

What’s the best thing about it? The fact that it is finally giving a huge audience the chance to learn about Taiwanese and Chinese culture by celebrating the outsider in all of us. It’s hard enough to get any Asian character on a prime-time show; a whole bunch of them is a miracle.

What’s the worst thing about it? Park and Wu seem unable to make up their minds about exactly what their accents are or how strong they are supposed to be. Thankfully they’re not Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, but a little bit of consistency wouldn’t hurt.

Should you watch this show? This is not as funny as Black-ish or as daring as Parks and Recreation, but it’s something different and fun that could grow into a really special family comedy if it finds its voice.