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The Upshaws

175 statements
33 feature instances
5 referencing feature instances

The Upshaws	type	TVTItem
The Upshaws	label	The Upshaws
The Upshaws	page	TheUpshaws
The Upshaws	comment	The Upshaws is an American Dom Com created by Regina Y. Hicks and Wanda Sykes for Netflix. It's about the Upshaws, a black working-class Dysfunctional Family in Indiana. Bennie Sr. (Mike Epps): Bumbling Dad and car mechanic Regina (Kim Fields): Antics-Enabling Wife, Bennie's high school sweetheart Lucretia (Wanda Sykes): Regina's older sister, Maiden Aunt and additional parental figure to the kids Bernard Jr. (Jermelle Simon): Regina and Bennie's adult son from a Teen Pregnancy Aaliyah (Khali Spraggins): Regina and Bennie's somewhat Bratty Teenage Daughter Maya (Journey Christine): Regina and Bennie's adorable youngest daughter Kelvin (Diamond Lyons): Bennie's other son, the same age as Aaliyah, who he co-parents with his former fling Tasha (Gabrielle Dennis)The show is characterized by a duality of of cheesy sitcom jokes with a Laugh Track, and some brutally realistic characters and emotional dynamics.
The Upshaws	fetched	2024-03-05T17:16:36Z
The Upshaws	parsed	2024-03-05T17:16:36Z
The Upshaws	processingComment	Dropped link to UnderappreciatedWomensWork: Not a Feature - UNKNOWN
The Upshaws	processingUnknown	Underappreciated Women's Work
The Upshaws	isPartOf	DBTropes
The Upshaws / int_13b7c384	type	Pizza Boy Special Delivery
The Upshaws / int_13b7c384	comment	Pizza Boy Special Delivery: Downplayed Trope. Bernard is a handsome fit young man who works as a UPS driver, and his short shorts are remarked upon.
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The Upshaws / int_264a140b	type	Fat and Skinny
The Upshaws / int_264a140b	comment	Fat and Skinny: Bennie has 3 employees at his auto shop: Tony (thin), Davis (fat) — and Duck (muscled).
The Upshaws / int_264a140b	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_266a9dd6	type	Heel–Faith Turn
The Upshaws / int_266a9dd6	comment	Heelâ€“Faith Turn: Bennie's friend Duck went to prison, found Jesus while he was in there, and came out a changed man.
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The Upshaws / int_306faf0d	type	Close to Home
The Upshaws / int_306faf0d	comment	Close to Home: Because Bennie cheated on Regina with Tasha, Regina is livid when he finds out Lucretia is The Mistress to Captain Cam, a married man.
The Upshaws / int_306faf0d	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_33d5c59d	type	Relationship Revolving Door
The Upshaws / int_33d5c59d	comment	Relationship Revolving Door: Played for Drama with Bennie and Regina. They've been together for 30 years, and during that time their relationship has been rocky, but pretty consistent. Regina has taken Bennie back, time and time again, after numerous rounds of his bullshit. This means Bennie can depend—accurately—on her eventual forgiveness, and he has little reason to change. When she throws him out near the end of season 1, even Lucretia—who would love to see Bennie gone for good—says Regina will probably forgive him eventually.
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The Upshaws / int_3e378863	type	Last Het Romance
The Upshaws / int_3e378863	comment	Last Het Romance: Bernard had sex with a woman once: his high school girlfriend Monique on the night of graduation. He regards her very highly, even a decade later. Afterwards, he didn't tell her he was gay, and she didn't tell him she was pregnant.
The Upshaws / int_3e378863	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_4548bae	type	Teen Pregnancy
The Upshaws / int_4548bae	comment	Teen Pregnancy: Regina got pregnant with her eldest son, Bernard, when she was 16. That was a long time ago, and in some ways it's settled, all's well that ends well. In other ways the shadow of it still hangs over everything.
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The Upshaws / int_460ffa29	type	Transparent Closet
The Upshaws / int_460ffa29	comment	Transparent Closet: Zigzagged with Bernard. Some people are somehow innately aware he's gay, while others are oblivious to the fact. Lucretia says she'd known since Bernard was a young flamboyant kid. Kelvin says he and Tasha are very aware because Tasha (a stylist by trade) can tell Bernard has well tended eyebrows. His high school girlfriend Monique suspected he was gay, and also cited his eyebrows as evidence. His parents, in contrast, are surprised to find out.
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The Upshaws / int_4a6e9fd9	type	Obnoxious In-Laws
The Upshaws / int_4a6e9fd9	comment	Obnoxious In-Laws: Regina's husband Bennie and sister Lucretia hate each other and are constantly sniping. They have occasional Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other—at the very least, they both love Regina and will rally together for her when the need arises.
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The Upshaws / int_509e8f83	type	Affair? Blame the Bastard
The Upshaws / int_509e8f83	comment	Affair? Blame the Bastard: There is a tense relationship between Regina and Kelvin, her husband's son with another woman, conceived under "we were on a break" circumstances. Intellectually speaking she's trying to avert the trope — she knows it's not Kelvin's fault — but emotionally speaking the situation is still fraught. While she wouldn't say it to Kelvin's face, she very flippantly calls him Bennie's bastard when he's not around.
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The Upshaws / int_60985aa7	type	In with the In Crowd
The Upshaws / int_60985aa7	comment	In with the In Crowd: Aaliyah is obsessed with popularity, and becoming friends with Steph Greene. She looses her old best friend Savannah in the process.
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The Upshaws / int_612f2a40	type	Hates Their Parent
The Upshaws / int_612f2a40	comment	Hates Their Parent: Bernard openly resents his father Bennie for being largely absent during his younger years.
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The Upshaws / int_61b8f9e2	type	Bunny-Ears Lawyer
The Upshaws / int_61b8f9e2	comment	Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Downplayed Trope in Tasha, who is loud, colorful, and can be annoying at times, but owns her own business and appears to run it pretty well.
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The Upshaws / int_65e25170	type	Gym Bunny
The Upshaws / int_65e25170	comment	Gym Bunny: Downplayed Trope. Bernard is a fit young gay man who's into boxing.
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The Upshaws / int_6861146e	type	Epiphany Therapy
The Upshaws / int_6861146e	comment	Epiphany Therapy: Downplayed Trope. Regina has a breakthrough in 4.02 and it's a turning point, although not a cure-all.
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The Upshaws / int_6da937c	type	Fake High
The Upshaws / int_6da937c	comment	Fake High: In episode 1.09, 13-year-old Aaliyah steals a beer from the fridge to drink with her friend Savannah, not knowing that O'Doul's is nonalcoholic beer. They start speaking of the effects they're feeling after mere sips, and Savannah mixes up her drugs and says she's getting the munchies. When Regina catches them, she starts laughing hysterically. She uses it as a teachable moment, an opportunity to teach Aaliyah about the dangers of drinking, and doesn't tell her the truth. Aaliyah goes on to experience a psychosomatic hangover.
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The Upshaws / int_7a08e8d1	type	They Call Me MISTER Tibbs!
The Upshaws / int_7a08e8d1	comment	They Call Me MISTER Tibbs!: When Kelvin first spends time at the Upshaw house, he tries calling Lucretia "Auntie" like his sisters do. She objects. He tries "Lucretia," then "Ma'am." She tells him to call her "Ms. Turner."
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The Upshaws / int_822ff0d7	type	Relative Error
The Upshaws / int_822ff0d7	comment	Relative Error: When Kelvin first comes into Aaliyah's life, people don't know he's her brother because 1) he's the same age as her, and 2) she's never talked about him before, leading to the mistake that he's her boyfriend.
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The Upshaws / int_8797239c	type	Bait-and-Switch
The Upshaws / int_8797239c	comment	Bait-and-Switch: Season 1 ends with a little girl arriving at the house looking for her father, Bernard Upshaw. This turns out to be Bernard Jr, conceived via his Last Het Romance.
The Upshaws / int_8797239c	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_8984e5d1	type	Commonality Connection
The Upshaws / int_8984e5d1	comment	Commonality Connection: In 1.06, Bennie gets a man to give him more time to fix his car by bonding with him over adultery.
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The Upshaws / int_8d08960c	type	Two-Timer Date
The Upshaws / int_8d08960c	comment	Two-Timer Date: The plot of the pilot involves Bennie running back and forth between Aaliyah and Kelvin's birthday parties. This introduces the fact that they're born less than a month apart.
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The Upshaws / int_958f1f57	type	Maiden Aunt
The Upshaws / int_958f1f57	comment	Maiden Aunt: Regina got pregnant when she was in high school. Lucretia dropped out of college and broke up with her world-traveling boyfriend, Frank, to take care of her sister and new baby nephew. Lucretia has dated since then, but never seriously. She never married or had children of her own, and instead devoted herself to being the backstop keeping Regina's family safe. The Deconstruction is that the resulting family dynamics can be messy. In a practical sense, this is Lucretia's family — this is the family she's spent decades taking care of; she's their financial safety net; she practically raised her nephew Bernard. But it's not officially her family, and this changes how her contributions are viewed. For example: money. If this were her family, providing financially would just be providing for her family, not worth commenting on. Because it's not, providing financially is alternatingly seen as very charitable, or a controlling-the-purse-strings power move. In a fight between the sisters, this gets pulled out:
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The Upshaws / int_95b875b1	type	Not Me This Time
The Upshaws / int_95b875b1	comment	Not Me This Time: Discussed in relation to Sydney. When she shows up on their doorstep looking for her father, everyone assumes she's Bennie's daughter. Bennie is offended by this assumption. Regina and Lucretia argue he has no grounds to be, considering Kelvin.
The Upshaws / int_95b875b1	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_9acd7704	type	Dom Com
The Upshaws / int_9acd7704	comment	Dom Com: The Upshaws draw upon sitcom tropes from The '90s, like the bumbling husband and long-suffering wife.
The Upshaws / int_9acd7704	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws	hasFeature	The Upshaws / int_9acd7704
The Upshaws / int_b9c3de84	type	Bumbling Dad
The Upshaws / int_b9c3de84	comment	Bumbling Dad: Bennie is a layabout car mechanic and a Manchild who never grew up, in a frustrating but realistic way. Played with, in that show is tonally ambiguous about him. The family lives under the constant threat of Bennie's backsliding. Sometimes it really does frame him like a deadweight they should cut out, and other times that is walked back.
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The Upshaws / int_cad80e66	type	Blame the Paramour
The Upshaws / int_cad80e66	comment	Blame the Paramour: Bennie and Tasha briefly got together over a decade ago when Bennie and Regina were "on a break". The fact that Kelvin was conceived then keeps the incident very much alive in Regina's memory. In episode 2.6, Tasha calls Regina out on how unfair it is for her to deflect the resentment of the situation onto Tasha, rather than placing it on Bennie where it belongs.
The Upshaws / int_cad80e66	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_e502e268	type	Family Theme Naming
The Upshaws / int_e502e268	comment	Family Theme Naming: The Turner sisters have Roman names: Althea, Lucretia, Regina.
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The Upshaws / int_e58a7b9f	type	A Girl in Every Port
The Upshaws / int_e58a7b9f	comment	A Girl in Every Port: Downplayed Trope. Lucretia has a boyfriend, Captain Cam, who's a pilot. He has a wife at home, and an ongoing affair with Lucretia when he flies in.
The Upshaws / int_e58a7b9f	featureApplicability	1.0
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The Upshaws / int_e598d4ac	type	Innocent Inaccurate
The Upshaws / int_e598d4ac	comment	Innocent Inaccurate: The parents' rocky relationship is such a staple of life in the Upshaw family that their daughters parody it with this little sketch. Aaliyah (13) knows her parents' fights end with makeup sex; Maya (6) thinks they end in some sort of conciliatory dance parties.
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The Upshaws / int_f34a4c1e	type	Lower-Class Lout
The Upshaws / int_f34a4c1e	comment	Lower-Class Lout: One of the things Regina criticizes Tasha for is being trashy, but part of the reason Tasha is that way is because she's a Struggling Single Mother, a situation Regina intensifies by not liking Bennie to be too involved in that family.
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The Upshaws / int_f81d8982	type	High-School Sweethearts
The Upshaws / int_f81d8982	comment	High-School Sweethearts: Why Bennie and Regina are together is a perpetual question. The simple answer is that they're High-School Sweethearts who had a Teen Pregnancy, and that tied them together. However, given how flaky Bennie is, and how eagar Lucretia would be to help Regina leave Bennie, it's very easy to imagine a scenario where they didn't stay together, suggesting there might be something more to the reason they did.
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The Upshaws / int_fb5ebbc8	type	Antics-Enabling Wife
The Upshaws / int_fb5ebbc8	comment	Antics-Enabling Wife: Alongside Bennie's Bumbling Dad, Regina's role as the long-suffering wife is also played with. She is definitely the more stable, responsible parent, who holds their household together, but she's no saint. The show is very blunt about how Regina is a major player in creating the difficult situations she finds herself in. Regina is not trapped in this marriage — Lucretia would love to help her leave, and the relationship itself is a somewhat rocky one. There's blame aplenty for Bennie for being a poor husband and father, but there's also blame for Regina, who keeps keeps taking Bennie back even though she knows damn well what he is. She's made her own bed here.
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The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

The Upshaws	hasFeature	Blame the Paramour / int_63e46d83
The Upshaws	hasFeature	Maiden Aunt / int_63e46d83
The Upshaws	hasFeature	Relationship Revolving Door / int_63e46d83
The Upshaws	hasFeature	Series of the 2020s / int_63e46d83
The Upshaws	hasFeature	Underappreciated Women's Work / int_63e46d83

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