History Series / TooCloseForComfort

Jim J. Bullock (whose first name for unknown reasons was always abbreviated as "Jm." in all episodes he appeared in) was brought in three episodes into the series as [[CloudCuckooLander Monroe]] [[DropInCharacter Ficus]], a nutty classmate of Sara's who seems to constantly annoy Henry every time they meet. Season two also introduced April (played by Deena Freeman), Henry's hippie niece who stays with the Rushes during that season. At the start of season three, Muriel gave birth to a third child, a son named Andrew (who oddly though, was seen less often after Joshua Goodwin assumed the role of the youngest Rush in season five).

* BiggerOnTheInside: When the series was set in San Francisco, the opening credits and establishing shots show the Rush house as one of the city's iconic multistory Victorian homes. The houses themselves are actually quite small, though it is shown to be a duplex as those type of homes usually are (which serves as part of the plot, with Jackie and Sara moving into the downstairs apartment of said house). Yet somehow here, the top floor of the home has a living room almost the dimensions of the entire building and an attached kitchen of almost equal size, and two bedrooms (one fairly big; and another, which is unseen), along with a hallway. The apartment Jackie and Sara live appears somewhat comparitively smaller.

* {{Blackmail}}: The episode "Miss Marin Bugler" (from the final season, when the series was known as ''The Ted Knight Show'') involved a man named Ed Hugo, who threatened to release nude pictures of the winner of a beauty pageant (taken when she was only 17) that was organized by Henry to drum up publicity in the ''Marin Bugler'' newspaper. Henry is blackmailed by Hugo – who calls it a [[BlackmailIsSuchAnUglyWord "business proposition"]] – to paying money ([[spoiler:ultimately doing so, acing him out of the opportunity to purchase a sailboat]]) in exchange for preventing the photos from being released.[[note]]Interestingly, the episode fails to acknowledge that taking and distributing nude photographs of anyone under 18 constitutes as felony child pornography in the United States. The fact the photos were in the possession of Henry and his boss Hope (who both own and are editor/publisher of a newspaper, respectively) makes it very problematic (they do find the photos scandalous though, and dislike the fact that the young woman was exploited like that at such a young age). The photographer who took the photos and the person who blackmailed Henry into paying him off to prevent the photos from being released could have also faced charges as well (the photographer for taking the photos, and the blackmailer for extortion, and possession and distribution of child pornography).[[/note]] The plot appears to be a nod to the 1984 Music/VanessaWilliams ''Penthouse'' photo scandal (which also involved nude photos voluntarily taken of a pageant winner) that resulted in Williams resigning as Miss America.[[note]]The infamous September 1984 issue Williams appeared in also featured a nude pictorial of Traci Lords, rendering the issue itself illegal following the revelation that Lords lied about being over 18 when she posed for the pictures and performed in all but one of the pornographic films she starred in between 1984 and 1986. (Lords’ ''Penthouse'' shoot occurred and her porn career began when she was 15.)[[/note]]

-->'''Henry:''' "What time is it?"
-->'''Bill:''' (''checks his watch'') "7:30, why?"
-->'''Henry:''' "Because you're poisoned, that's why."

** At the end of the episode "As the Cookie Crumbles", Henry turns Monroe over to an immigration agent who was looking for a busboy/student from Sara and Monroe's college, because of issues regarding his student visa (see FromBadToWorse below). Apparently, Henry is annoyed by Monroe so much that he actually is willing to have him wrongfully deported (of course, Monroe appears again the next episode because StatusQuoIsGod).

-->'''Henry''' (to Sara, after Henry tells the family the next day that he hired Monroe): “I hired him yesterday morning.”
-->'''Muriel:''' “How’d he do?”
-->'''Henry:''' “I ''fired'' him yesterday morning.”

* DoubleStandard:
** Pointed out and justifiably balked at by Jackie, Sara and April in the episode "Where There's a Will", Henry does a videotaped will (an idea given to him by Monroe after Henry had a nightmare about how the family would end up, if he didn't have a will) and states that in the event that Henry, Muriel or both should die, if his and Muriel's third child is born a boy, he'll get his inheritance at age 21, if it is born a girl, she won't get the inheritance until she's ''25!''
** DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale: Addressed in season five’s "For Every Man, There's Two Women". After Monroe reveals he was raped by two women who kidnapped him as he was leaving his mall security job the previous night, Henry is the only character to take Monroe's assault seriously. [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome He calls out Jackie, Sara and Muriel]] when they not only express skepticism that the police will take Monroe’s case seriously since the sexual assault victim was a man, ''they outright suggest'' that men can’t be assaulted by a woman and must be a willing participant in the encounter, and that it’s a less serious offense than sexual assaults against a female victim. Dismayed when a police officer tries to convince Monroe not to press charges to avoid the kind of spectacle the cop thinks such a case would make given Monroe’s gender, Henry sets in motion a plot to find and capture the women (described and shown as a short overweight blonde, and a very husky, taller brunette) with Monroe’s help.

* NotWhatItLooksLike + MistakenForCheating:

* ObliviousAdoption: Muriel (see HappilyAdopted above).

** Used intermittenly during the first season, Henry would fall off of the girls' ultra-modern chairs or couch that they inherited from former tenant Mr. Rafkin every time he attempts to sit down on them; this is even shown at the end of the opening credits for the first four seasons.

** Lydia Cornell (Sara Rush) is absent from the episode "Brotherly Hate", with her [[HandWave abscence explained]] as going on a ski trip with friends to Lake Tahoe.

* OnlySaneMan: Muriel.
** Jackie is this as well, ''most'' of the time.
* OverprotectiveDad: Henry crosses into this category several times, moreso as the PapaWolf type.
* PapaWolf: Henry.

* DyingDream: Acutally Henry's nightmare sequence in "Where There's a Will", is set after Henry is dead (of course, he appears in the dream, with no one noticing he's there); the dream, which spurs Henry to draw up his own will after previously saying he doesn't want to, [[YourWorstNightmare involves what might happen to his family without a will]].

* PrisonEpisode: The episode "Front Page Monroe" from the show's final season (as ''The Ted Knight Show'') features Monroe going to jail for refusing to disclose the identity of a dock worker who whistleblows on his employer for dumping chemicals into the San Francisco Bay.[[note]]It is unclear whether the episode was inspired by it, but the situation that happened to Monroe happened to a real-life reporter. Susan Wornick of ABC affiliate WCVB-TV in Boston wad sentenced to three months in jail in 1985 for refusing to identify a source she conducted an interview with, who claimed he saw police officers looting a Massachussets drugstore. The man (whose identity was not revealed in the interview) [[http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1899&dat=19850607&id=ucVGAAAAIBAJ&sjid=svMMAAAAIBAJ&pg=2610,731845 appeared in court on the day Wornick was to begin serving her sentence]], revealing his identity as that of the person Wornick interviewed for that report; the judge later dropped the charges against Wornick.[[/note]]

* HappilyMarried: Henry and Muriel.

* ManChild: Monroe to some extent.

* ShesGotLegs: Many episodes in which involve a scene at Jackie and Sara's apartment at night will often feature Sara wearing some sort of negligee that is cut high enough to show lots of leg ("The Boy in the Band" from season one is one such example).
* SiblingYinYang: Jackie and Sara.
* [[SpellMyNameWithAnS Spell My Name Without An I]]: The show always credited Jim J. Bullock without the "i" in his first name, he was for some reason credited as "Jm M. Bullock" in his initial season one appearances; for the rest of the series, he was credited as "Jm J. Bullock".

* BiggerOnTheInside: When the show was set in San Francisco, the opening credits and establishing shots show the Rush house as one of the city's iconic multistory Victorian homes. The houses themselves are actually quite small, though it is shown to be a duplex as those type of homes usually are (which serves as part of the plot for the show, Jackie and Sara move into the downstairs apartment of said house). Yet somehow on the show, the top floor of the home has a living room almost the dimensions of the entire building and an attached kitchen of almost equal size, and two bedrooms (one fairly big one, and another which is unseen), along with a hallway. The apartment Jackie and Sara live appears somewhat comparitively smaller.
* BlackComedyRape: In the episode "For Every Man, There's Two Women" from season five, Monroe fails to come home one night. When he does return that morning, he tells the family that he was approached and abducted by two women, who take him to their apartment and have their way with him the entire night. When an officer tries to convince Monroe not to press charges in order to avoid the spectacle such a case would make, Henry and Monroe proceed to find and capture the women themselves. [[spoiler:When they go to the scene of the crime and see one of the women, Monroe runs off to call the police, leaving Henry behind; she tries to have her way with him, but Henry escapes her advances, and the women are taken into police custody]].