Party of Five (1994–2000)
10/10
Wonderful show from the 90's
15 April 2018
Warning: Spoilers
I haven't watched it then but am very happy that I discovered it on Netflix. The show starts with a bit of an unusual premise where 5 siblings, ranging from a baby to a 24 years old, are left alone when their parents die in a car accident and need to live their life taking care of each other.

The show has kind of soapy themes but they still manage to show them in a pretty realistic way. This is thanks to amazing writing and acting. Not one episode felt to be below average to me, only very few were average and the majority were outstanding. I am glad it didn't get cancelled after the first season. Even though it didn't have a high rating at first the fans managed to keep it on air and I am thankful to them for that pleasure. It is also good that it ended after 6 seasons as it would probably go down in quality after that. But we got to enjoy a lot of stories on their relationships., Charlie's cancer and Bailey's alcoholism.

The characters are well done and developed. I loved Matthew Fox as Charlie. He shows so well his development from being a regular 24 year old who wants to have fun and is stuck with his siblings to a guy who made all the sacrifices to his family, loved them and managed to put his life on the path he wanted to. All his struggles and mistakes are shown in a very humane way. I don't get how people can not connect to Charlie. And he is my favorite of Matthew Fox's roles now, I like him better than on Lost where I first got to know him.

Scott Wolf also makes a great job as Bailey. Sometimes he is annoying because he acts way older than his age but we remember that this is also because he had to grow up so fast. And he manages to make the character sympathetic even when he does bad things. His struggle with alcohol was also very realistic.

Neve Campbell as Julia was actually my least favorite character of them. But she was still wonderful and did great acting. I just couldn't connect to most of her stories. But this is how it is, one can't always love every single character. The good thing is that I also never really disliked her.

Lacey Chabert as Claudia was my favorite in the beginning. She didn't become worse later but her as a very witty, sensible and courageous child was a great period. She always went on missions such as finding their grandpa or meet the man who killed their parents in the accident. Loved her family and dealt with her growing up as well as she could having only her siblings to help her. As well as Ross who sure was a great role model to her.

Besides the main characters we have some outstanding support characters that help us to enjoy the show. Sarah, Will, Justin, Griffin, Kirsten, Ross. I could say a lot about all of them but I will just stick to the fact that they were all well developed, portrayed and played a huge support to the Salingers when they needed them.
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