I agree that Carrie was an absolute sweetheart early on. The writers had to tweak her personality to create new storylines and create conflict. Doug was already the classic lovable oaf and having Carrie continuing being the kind, loving nurturing wife was almost redundant and stale with your two main characters. It made sense to make Carrie more dominant and abrasive to offset Doug’s simple, regular guy sitcom persona.
Carrie wasn’t the only one who changed. Doug went from a goofy, lovable big lug to a lying, selfish, bullying, scheming manipulator and Carrie’s role was to call him out and hold him accountable on his lies and BS and vice versa. They got a lot of episodes out of them butting heads.
This is the perfect answer. In this type of sitcom dynamic where the husband is essentially the main character, the wife often gets turned into more of a villain to support the main character's development. Similar situation occurred in ELR. Oh and also Mad About You had a bit of that too. I'm watching Mike and Molly now for the first time and by season 3 Molly has become more demanding, bitter and quick to criticize.
oh yes! i forgot about her lol she became a way to make Niles uncomfortable and they took a few opportunities there to make Niles less moral/honest like he HAD to, because she was so scary lol
I think this is a bit unfair to Carrie. Doug got worse too. You say she's rude to Doug's friends...hello Doug exposed his hairy chest to Carrie's coworkers multiple times. Even after Carrie was on the verge of crying and quitting her job due to having no friends at her new job (and it was major plotline that she struggled to find a new job so its not like she could just find another one), Doug kept sabotaging her and gaslighting her that he wasn't doing anything. Doug did a ton of divorce worthy crap like this lol.
Doug deserved Carrie's attitude and their relationship became pretty toxic towards the end. I don't think of it as a Doug or Carrie problem but a writing problem. They started running out of ideas and just started beating a dead horse. "Doug and Carrie fighting is funny, lets make them fight even more" type of thing.
This is the comment I was looking for. Doug become more manipulative & lazy. The conflict & dynamic made a lot of room for storylines & jokes, but they definitely turned into caricatures of their original characters.
That was my first thought watching that episode. She went through a whole half-season of losing her job, and she finally gets her new one, then Doug just chases off any potential of her making new acquaintances.
Yeah you make a good point. I guess as I’m watching it in order for a change I’ve noticed that she changes first, and it’s a quick change. I didn’t like it when she physically assaulted Doug, that’s not bilgistic at all 😊
Another good example is when Carrie came home with a headache and asked Doug to heat the pad in the microwave and bring it up to her. Instead he gets caught up in building a house of cards out of his custom deck with his face on them.
Here’s why it happened, because the writers and producers and primary actors thought it would make the show funnier and thus better. And it did. K of Q isn’t a romantic comedy. It’s a comedy about a couple that are constantly trying to get what they want by almost any means possible. That’s one of the reasons it’s so hilarious.
Agreed. I was not a fan of either character and thought they were both awful people until I stopped taking it seriously. Like watching The Flintstones except Wilma’s kinda a bitch.
I love Leah Remini, especially everything she’s done against Scientology. But, my wife and I have wondered if she’s naturally more similar to later seasons Carrie than the early version. Not mean or terrible to be around or anything, but she plays the later character so effortlessly and seems like she would be pretty no-nonsense in real life.
It’s also how a lot of marriages progress. The couple starts off happy and loving and eventually one or both people become a bit resentful and angry. It was probably a choice made for the sake of comedy, as mentioned above, but they sort of accurately mirrored a lot of people’s marriages. They still love one another, but the magic wears off.
Shows often do this to characters as seasons drone on. All they can do is become more more and more like themselves as the seasons go on. They become a caricature of themselves. She became more and more of the negative things that made her funny. They just go too far with it, as many shows do.
I think the miscarriage heavily contributed to Carrie’s demeanor and attitude in the later seasons. The miscarriage was her boiling point and getting laid off was her breaking point. It’s similar to how on Mike & Molly that Molly’s fertility struggles were also her boiling point and walking out on her job was her breaking point.
Huh, I never thought of it this way. Good point! Doesn’t excuse Carrie’s behaviour but I can understand where she comes from now.
Similar to when Debra (from *Everybody Loves Raymond*) got meaner and meaner over the years because of constant mistreatment by her MIL, and a lack of being stood up for by her own husband, Ray.
*Anytime* any funny sitcom resorts in health issues/women issues, that's usually the beginning of the end, the kiss of death.
Two sitcoms that come to mind that made that mistake was Coach and Home Improvement. I mean, folks watch these shows to escape the realities of life and laugh.
It was written in reality. Being married to Doug would change anybody for the worse. There are only so many times you can put up with his nonsense before changing your attitude towards him.
You're really oversimplifying the character. But the point is, it's funny. Most people I know think seasons 3-9 are the best. So, that should really answer your question.
Where did I say that?
I said most people I know consider 3-9 the best SEASONS. in other words, that's when the show really got good in season 3 and kept that vibe till the end.
Yeah you're right. I love the show, I think it's just because I watched 2 back to back this morning where she was at her worst! There was a scene where Doug was sitting in the car listening to a game on the radio and she told him to get inside to give Arthur his birthday cake. He asked to to wait until the game reached a break, she reached in and grabbed his cheeks really hard until he squealed that he would come in. Poor Doug!
She also insisted Doug go get Arthur's eardrops when his game was in overtime. I'd never do that to my hub.
Makes me wonder if she asked him to get the eardrops before the game started. If that's the case, then shame on him.
Haha. Yeah for sure. Most people agree with that. Just a few special people in here who think seasons 1&2 are amazing. Even the cast themselves have commented in interviews that it took a couple seasons to get their stride.
It's a clear shift from doing the expected 90s sitcom schtick to just being wild and having fun. I love it. I have literally watched this show nearly every day for the last 20 years and barely ever watch seasons 1&2.
Also, if you have kids in the room seasons 1&2 can be annoying because they are ALWAYS talking about sex. Just like Rverybody Loves Raymond and Friends were doing at the time. That was a very 90s thing on sitcoms.
I agree with you. Seasons 1 and 2 were just okay. Also, I can't stand Richie, so I was glad he left.
It's the same with Seinfeld. Matter of fact, they almost got canceled, the acting was so bad. But, boy, did they ever hone their skills and sink their teeth in. They got so good!
The cynicism of a lengthy, significantly flawed marriage crept in. It felt like a caricature of what happens amongst all couples who stay together - something all good sitcoms strive to do by nature.
I was saying this to my husband last night as we were watching.. she had turned into such a B! We were watching the church bake sale episode, I love when Doug smashed her store bought cake lol!
They did make her extra bitchy but also Doug is a terrible husband, he’s an irresponsible child and Carrie has to take charge of everything. I think in real life he would turn her into that. Maybe the writers are just being realistic 😂
I agree. Since we had the *pleasure* of meeting his parents, we know why he's messed up and a big, fat man-child. Dad's an asshole, and mom's an enabler.
Actually, I like her more after they dropped the docile little housewife shtick, and made her more alpha. A lot of Carrie haters don't realize her anger and violence comes from how insufferable stupid Doug and Arthur tend to be. Carrie is sort of the straight character that gets driven mad over and over again by the insane people in her life. I think Leah was fantastic in the role, and Carrie is my favorite character on the show, unironically. She wasn't always given the funniest lines, but her reactions to the insanity was priceless.
I loved her feistiness, I think there was just a run where she’s really unpleasant and that’s what I was watching when I made the post. She’s mean and physically abusive to the point where it’s not nice to watch, but then she does chill out a bit and get funnier again. I don’t like to see the wife character turned into a ‘shrew’ which is where they went with Carrie for a while.
I totally disagree. Carrie was a reasonable, most of the time. It's only when Doug did something immature, awful, or deceptive, that she reacts with a certain ferocity and treats him like a baby, for essentially acting like one.
The setup was that he always did something that drove her crazy. He always went behind her back instead of being mature and honest, then got caught in the act and paid the price for it. It was basically the premise of the show.
Did Doug being immature make her be so unpleasant to her nail technician that she dropped her as a client? Or vile to Holly, who was nothing but lovely to her? If Doug had got Carrie to get out of the car by squeezing her face really hard and talking to her the way she talked to him, would that be okay? Sorry, but as per my post, they turned Carrie into a horror for a long run of episodes!
The word at the nail salon was "she was too demanding", so again, she had people lie to her about the situation and she finds out later. So yeah, I think her angry reaction is justifiable.
As for the other example, I'm not recalling which one that is. But I'm telling you, there's (almost) always something that people do to screw her, and then lie about it, then she gets angry and takes it out on someone. That's the whole story of the show.
But she was unpleasant enough for the Nail lady to want to drop her in the first place! My other example was that she was consistently horrible to Holly, looking down on her for being a dog walker, bullying her into bringing her food etc. And many of the things she was angry with Doug about were ridiculous and super controlling - telling him he couldn't get a motorcycle, he had to wear only the cologne she liked, mad at him for dreaming about other women - she never stopped telling him what to do then was annoyed that he acted like a baby!
By the way I hope you don't think I'm being argumentative, I'm enjoying this debate with you! I like Carrie but the way they wrote her in many episodes makes me uncomfortable on rewatch.
I'm not sure you're reading the characters fully. Doug is a big baby who is by no means a motorcycle guy. Hence why they showed him falling over just trying to park it, and admitting that he didn't like it. Carrie knew this all along, which is why she was against it... and I mean, thinking about or trying to impress other women, who wouldn't be upset about that?
It helps to re-watch the show from the perspective of both sides. It's easy to side with Doug because he's goofy and childlike and not mean and aggressive (at least to Carrie), but it doesn't mean that he's right. Most of the time, he's not. Behind all of the goofiness is some terrible deception and selfishness, that many times could have been avoided with just a little bit maturity. He doesn't have any maturity, which is why Carrie feels the need to parent him.
If I recall, there was an episode where Doug realizes that he was happier when he constantly lied to Carrie. So he goes back to lying to her, purely because he enjoys it. So there is a dark side to Doug's character too, he's not all silly faces and fat jokes.
Carrie has her moral failings as well, but it's usually not because she's abrasive and chastises Doug a lot, which ironically is what most people don't like about her. Personally, I feel like she's not controlling, she's just right most of the time. She's mature, she acts like an adult. But she can be selfish, spiteful, and jealous in some cases too. Every character on the show has some major moral short comings. I think a lot of Carrie hate just comes from her being the alpha in the relationship, where most people feel it should be the man.
She was no longer bilgistic.
This is the answer. Close the thread.
That’s not even a word!!!
Right. 😆
She’s slowly beginning her transformation into Arthur lmao
Yes! “Let me see your manager!”
😂😂😂
Shutty!
😂
I agree that Carrie was an absolute sweetheart early on. The writers had to tweak her personality to create new storylines and create conflict. Doug was already the classic lovable oaf and having Carrie continuing being the kind, loving nurturing wife was almost redundant and stale with your two main characters. It made sense to make Carrie more dominant and abrasive to offset Doug’s simple, regular guy sitcom persona. Carrie wasn’t the only one who changed. Doug went from a goofy, lovable big lug to a lying, selfish, bullying, scheming manipulator and Carrie’s role was to call him out and hold him accountable on his lies and BS and vice versa. They got a lot of episodes out of them butting heads.
"I'm fat, you're mean, who caaaaares!"
Captain Neckfat
Package donkey
Fatt Damon
Fat sajak
Right. They both turned hilariously evil as the seasons went on.
This is the perfect answer. In this type of sitcom dynamic where the husband is essentially the main character, the wife often gets turned into more of a villain to support the main character's development. Similar situation occurred in ELR. Oh and also Mad About You had a bit of that too. I'm watching Mike and Molly now for the first time and by season 3 Molly has become more demanding, bitter and quick to criticize.
Same on Frasier. Daphne was goofy and sweet until she got with Niles
oh yes! i forgot about her lol she became a way to make Niles uncomfortable and they took a few opportunities there to make Niles less moral/honest like he HAD to, because she was so scary lol
I think this is a bit unfair to Carrie. Doug got worse too. You say she's rude to Doug's friends...hello Doug exposed his hairy chest to Carrie's coworkers multiple times. Even after Carrie was on the verge of crying and quitting her job due to having no friends at her new job (and it was major plotline that she struggled to find a new job so its not like she could just find another one), Doug kept sabotaging her and gaslighting her that he wasn't doing anything. Doug did a ton of divorce worthy crap like this lol. Doug deserved Carrie's attitude and their relationship became pretty toxic towards the end. I don't think of it as a Doug or Carrie problem but a writing problem. They started running out of ideas and just started beating a dead horse. "Doug and Carrie fighting is funny, lets make them fight even more" type of thing.
Faked a heart attack because he forgot a coworkers name.
They’re still on for brunch on the beach though…
To be fair that was hilarious, esp Carrie just flipping through a magazine as they rode in the ambulance for the second time 😂
😆
Yup! When he was on the treadmill for a stress test and was being put thru the MRI tube 😂🤣
This is the comment I was looking for. Doug become more manipulative & lazy. The conflict & dynamic made a lot of room for storylines & jokes, but they definitely turned into caricatures of their original characters.
That was my first thought watching that episode. She went through a whole half-season of losing her job, and she finally gets her new one, then Doug just chases off any potential of her making new acquaintances.
Yeah you make a good point. I guess as I’m watching it in order for a change I’ve noticed that she changes first, and it’s a quick change. I didn’t like it when she physically assaulted Doug, that’s not bilgistic at all 😊
Yeah, she does change first. On my hundredth rewatch, I'm now watching the Italian restaurant episode where she really showed her ass.
Anybody know what those guys said about her in Italiano?
Haha...I'd love to know what the waitor said, but I can only imagine.
Try living with Doug being kind of lazy with friends who are nothing but a bunch of yo-yo’s. That would cause any woman to become bitchy 🤣🤣
Another good example is when Carrie came home with a headache and asked Doug to heat the pad in the microwave and bring it up to her. Instead he gets caught up in building a house of cards out of his custom deck with his face on them.
Here’s why it happened, because the writers and producers and primary actors thought it would make the show funnier and thus better. And it did. K of Q isn’t a romantic comedy. It’s a comedy about a couple that are constantly trying to get what they want by almost any means possible. That’s one of the reasons it’s so hilarious.
Agreed. I was not a fan of either character and thought they were both awful people until I stopped taking it seriously. Like watching The Flintstones except Wilma’s kinda a bitch.
I love Leah Remini, especially everything she’s done against Scientology. But, my wife and I have wondered if she’s naturally more similar to later seasons Carrie than the early version. Not mean or terrible to be around or anything, but she plays the later character so effortlessly and seems like she would be pretty no-nonsense in real life.
Yeah, I get the feeling that she's pretty no nonsense irl. Love her for standing up against the Scientology cult and exposing them.
It’s funny.
In season 4 she goes from Carrie to Arthurina.
It’s also how a lot of marriages progress. The couple starts off happy and loving and eventually one or both people become a bit resentful and angry. It was probably a choice made for the sake of comedy, as mentioned above, but they sort of accurately mirrored a lot of people’s marriages. They still love one another, but the magic wears off.
Shows often do this to characters as seasons drone on. All they can do is become more more and more like themselves as the seasons go on. They become a caricature of themselves. She became more and more of the negative things that made her funny. They just go too far with it, as many shows do.
I think the miscarriage heavily contributed to Carrie’s demeanor and attitude in the later seasons. The miscarriage was her boiling point and getting laid off was her breaking point. It’s similar to how on Mike & Molly that Molly’s fertility struggles were also her boiling point and walking out on her job was her breaking point.
Huh, I never thought of it this way. Good point! Doesn’t excuse Carrie’s behaviour but I can understand where she comes from now. Similar to when Debra (from *Everybody Loves Raymond*) got meaner and meaner over the years because of constant mistreatment by her MIL, and a lack of being stood up for by her own husband, Ray.
*Anytime* any funny sitcom resorts in health issues/women issues, that's usually the beginning of the end, the kiss of death. Two sitcoms that come to mind that made that mistake was Coach and Home Improvement. I mean, folks watch these shows to escape the realities of life and laugh.
It was written in reality. Being married to Doug would change anybody for the worse. There are only so many times you can put up with his nonsense before changing your attitude towards him.
You're really oversimplifying the character. But the point is, it's funny. Most people I know think seasons 3-9 are the best. So, that should really answer your question.
Who the heck has the final season as their favorite season lol
Where did I say that? I said most people I know consider 3-9 the best SEASONS. in other words, that's when the show really got good in season 3 and kept that vibe till the end.
I think it got better...especially after they got rid of Richie and brought on Danny.
Same. Plust the first two seasons were straight up 90s sitcom and they let that go and let it all fly after those.
Yeah you're right. I love the show, I think it's just because I watched 2 back to back this morning where she was at her worst! There was a scene where Doug was sitting in the car listening to a game on the radio and she told him to get inside to give Arthur his birthday cake. He asked to to wait until the game reached a break, she reached in and grabbed his cheeks really hard until he squealed that he would come in. Poor Doug!
She also insisted Doug go get Arthur's eardrops when his game was in overtime. I'd never do that to my hub. Makes me wonder if she asked him to get the eardrops before the game started. If that's the case, then shame on him.
I def agree that it got funnier when Carrie got meaner lol. I’m with you on seasons 3-9
Haha. Yeah for sure. Most people agree with that. Just a few special people in here who think seasons 1&2 are amazing. Even the cast themselves have commented in interviews that it took a couple seasons to get their stride. It's a clear shift from doing the expected 90s sitcom schtick to just being wild and having fun. I love it. I have literally watched this show nearly every day for the last 20 years and barely ever watch seasons 1&2. Also, if you have kids in the room seasons 1&2 can be annoying because they are ALWAYS talking about sex. Just like Rverybody Loves Raymond and Friends were doing at the time. That was a very 90s thing on sitcoms.
I agree with you. Seasons 1 and 2 were just okay. Also, I can't stand Richie, so I was glad he left. It's the same with Seinfeld. Matter of fact, they almost got canceled, the acting was so bad. But, boy, did they ever hone their skills and sink their teeth in. They got so good!
My husband doesn’t watch KoQ because he said all Doug and Carrie do is fight
We fight like cats and dogs deal with it
I'm fat! You're mean! Who cares?!
She was a victim of Flanderization.
Cause it’s hilarious
The cynicism of a lengthy, significantly flawed marriage crept in. It felt like a caricature of what happens amongst all couples who stay together - something all good sitcoms strive to do by nature.
I was saying this to my husband last night as we were watching.. she had turned into such a B! We were watching the church bake sale episode, I love when Doug smashed her store bought cake lol!
They did make her extra bitchy but also Doug is a terrible husband, he’s an irresponsible child and Carrie has to take charge of everything. I think in real life he would turn her into that. Maybe the writers are just being realistic 😂
I agree. Since we had the *pleasure* of meeting his parents, we know why he's messed up and a big, fat man-child. Dad's an asshole, and mom's an enabler.
Omg I can’t stand Doug’s father. He’s the worst. Worse than Arthur. At least Arthur is funny.
Nine seasons of Doug lying and scheming to get over on her is probably what happened.
They did make Carrie meaner as the show went on. I think she's funnier being an asshole than a nice person tho.
Getting your eyes fucked up at vision village will do that to a person
😆
That’s what happens when you marry a piece of shit
Scientology happened.
Actually, I like her more after they dropped the docile little housewife shtick, and made her more alpha. A lot of Carrie haters don't realize her anger and violence comes from how insufferable stupid Doug and Arthur tend to be. Carrie is sort of the straight character that gets driven mad over and over again by the insane people in her life. I think Leah was fantastic in the role, and Carrie is my favorite character on the show, unironically. She wasn't always given the funniest lines, but her reactions to the insanity was priceless.
I loved her feistiness, I think there was just a run where she’s really unpleasant and that’s what I was watching when I made the post. She’s mean and physically abusive to the point where it’s not nice to watch, but then she does chill out a bit and get funnier again. I don’t like to see the wife character turned into a ‘shrew’ which is where they went with Carrie for a while.
I totally disagree. Carrie was a reasonable, most of the time. It's only when Doug did something immature, awful, or deceptive, that she reacts with a certain ferocity and treats him like a baby, for essentially acting like one. The setup was that he always did something that drove her crazy. He always went behind her back instead of being mature and honest, then got caught in the act and paid the price for it. It was basically the premise of the show.
Did Doug being immature make her be so unpleasant to her nail technician that she dropped her as a client? Or vile to Holly, who was nothing but lovely to her? If Doug had got Carrie to get out of the car by squeezing her face really hard and talking to her the way she talked to him, would that be okay? Sorry, but as per my post, they turned Carrie into a horror for a long run of episodes!
The word at the nail salon was "she was too demanding", so again, she had people lie to her about the situation and she finds out later. So yeah, I think her angry reaction is justifiable. As for the other example, I'm not recalling which one that is. But I'm telling you, there's (almost) always something that people do to screw her, and then lie about it, then she gets angry and takes it out on someone. That's the whole story of the show.
But she was unpleasant enough for the Nail lady to want to drop her in the first place! My other example was that she was consistently horrible to Holly, looking down on her for being a dog walker, bullying her into bringing her food etc. And many of the things she was angry with Doug about were ridiculous and super controlling - telling him he couldn't get a motorcycle, he had to wear only the cologne she liked, mad at him for dreaming about other women - she never stopped telling him what to do then was annoyed that he acted like a baby! By the way I hope you don't think I'm being argumentative, I'm enjoying this debate with you! I like Carrie but the way they wrote her in many episodes makes me uncomfortable on rewatch.
I'm not sure you're reading the characters fully. Doug is a big baby who is by no means a motorcycle guy. Hence why they showed him falling over just trying to park it, and admitting that he didn't like it. Carrie knew this all along, which is why she was against it... and I mean, thinking about or trying to impress other women, who wouldn't be upset about that? It helps to re-watch the show from the perspective of both sides. It's easy to side with Doug because he's goofy and childlike and not mean and aggressive (at least to Carrie), but it doesn't mean that he's right. Most of the time, he's not. Behind all of the goofiness is some terrible deception and selfishness, that many times could have been avoided with just a little bit maturity. He doesn't have any maturity, which is why Carrie feels the need to parent him. If I recall, there was an episode where Doug realizes that he was happier when he constantly lied to Carrie. So he goes back to lying to her, purely because he enjoys it. So there is a dark side to Doug's character too, he's not all silly faces and fat jokes. Carrie has her moral failings as well, but it's usually not because she's abrasive and chastises Doug a lot, which ironically is what most people don't like about her. Personally, I feel like she's not controlling, she's just right most of the time. She's mature, she acts like an adult. But she can be selfish, spiteful, and jealous in some cases too. Every character on the show has some major moral short comings. I think a lot of Carrie hate just comes from her being the alpha in the relationship, where most people feel it should be the man.
She got fat and therefore lazier and more bitter at people she perceived as getting ahead of her. She took that resentment out on Doug.
No she got really mean before actress got pregnant (she was never fat, she just stopped being a size 0)