So I used to love Home Improvement back in the day as it was very Al Murray type comedy - it deliberately looked superficial but then would try and tackle real issues in parenting and the like. But I've sort of ignored it especially as Tim the Toolman in real life went full MAGA. (Although I note two of my favourite actors are massively rabidly right wing, and yet it's never stopped me watching Sleuth or Rear Window!)
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However, I stumbled across one of its better episodes by accident, and couldn't help but watch, and, while its quite 90s in hairstyles, character and people, it holds up surprisingly well.
A ludicrous example of show within a show, Tool Time has some construction workers, who appear to have walked off the set from the Village People, showing us their grooming techniques, which all involve drills. Of course. After the filming, Tim's co-host Al (played by the always larger than life Richard Karn) finds out that John Binford, the main sponsor of the show and Tim's mentor, has died.
He tells Tim, and just for a split second Tim Allen has this shocked look on his face before he reverts to type and starts telling jokes in the next scene.
And then we have, in a mid 90s family show, a sudden meditation on how men are expected to react to loss. Al, never shy to let his own feelings show, is very upset by the news. Tim reacts to the death of the man who gave him his big break by playing darts and keeping a stiff upper lip. And teasing Al.
He tells Jill, his wife, about it, and she expects him to be upset, but he wants to play with the kids instead. Its quite clear he's deliberately distracting himself from his feelings (he plays an hour long basketball game with his kids) because he feels he can't show them. Because in the society he lives in, men can't show their own emotions.
And when his oldest son points out that "men don't cry", Tim tries to give the proper Dad response and realises he has nothing to fall back on but gags about wrecking his car. He has no way of showing his emotions, or telling his son its OK to show their emotions.
"You never let stuff get to you!"
"I let stuff get to me!"
"Yeah, but no one can ever tell..."
And he stands there with his beer in his hand (face showing the story) when he spots Wilson in his backyard, and so goes out to speak to his friend/neighbour/Yoda figure. Earl Hindman became an international name on this show and no one ever saw his face! (He also died the day after Granda Bob.)
As usual, Wilson helps Tim work out the morals he's learned, and helps him come to terms with that just because he's not crying, that doesn't mean he's not upset, and that he'll find his own way to mourn his fallen friend.
"I'm really uncomfortable with this death thing, which is why we had kids and not pets as they last longer" he says, and Patricia Richardson actually corpses. Tim and Jill have a heart to heart, and Tim admits he was worried that his sadness was selfish because it was all about him losing a friend.
Naturally he does find the perfect way for Tim the Toolman to grieve. Yes, with a 21 NAIL GUN SALUTE. Which goes hilariously wrong as you'd expect. "John Binford always told me there was a tool to fix anything but there's none to fix how bad I'm feeling."
Then the nails go everywhere... Pathos and farce in the same scene.
Afterwards, his oldest kid finds out that his stone cold Dad actually wept like a baby at the funeral. Of course he did, says his dad, because its healthy to mourn those you love.
Not only does it hold up surprisingly well as a slice of 90s sitcom fare, but it is a succinct yet telling reveal of the male role model in US society. Come for the nail gun scene, stay for the cod philosophy.
And arrivederci Mr Binford - we never heard of you before or since... Probably because you were dead.
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