YMMV / Hi Honey, I'm Home!

• Audience-Alienating Premise: The show was a Deconstructive Parody of 1950s Sitcom tropes, set in a universe where sitcom characters are real and the main character, Mike, lives next door to his favorite (fictional) '50s sitcom family. All is well and good...except this was a Nickelodeon production (even though the first season aired on ABC, on the TGIF block) and was instead for kids (the show was part of a block meant to lead in Nick at Nite; the clumsy attempt at Multiple Demographic Appeal was on purpose). The problem is a lot of the jokes rely on the viewer's knowledge of classic television and its tropes. The show even had a cameo from a classic sitcom character every episode, which is great if you're a television nerd, for a kid in the '90s, you didn't get it. The show was very inconsistent with its theme as well. In one episode the mother, Honey, learns about sex, and other episode deals with sexism, while at the same time there's an episode about Mike trying to get a girl to a dance. This makes the show very confusing on who they want this to appeal to. Plus it can be argued that the main character is Honey, when being a Kid Com, Mike should have been the true lead. All in all, the show was a major flop, limping around for two seasons.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • The pilot episode features A.J. McLean (who would later join the Backstreet Boys) as Skunk, before he was replaced by Eric Kushnick for the series.
  • This was only of the first roles of Julie Benz, of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fame.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Downplayed, as the series was a "family" sitcom but it did contain a few off-color jokes and mild swearing. It did only air on Nick at Nite, but during Nickelodeon's 20th anniversary celebration weekend on June 27, 1999, Nickelodeon aired the pilot episode during the daytime, complete with the off-color jokes and use of the word "hell".

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