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Dunphy-Marshall Family
Frank Dunphy
Played By: Fred Willard
Phil's father.
- Cool Old Guy: He's a truckload of fun?
- Generation Xerox: It's really blatant how much he has influenced Phil as a father and as a man.
- Nice Guy: He's very friendly and cheery to mostly everybody.
- Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: In his final appearance in the episode “Legacy” he dies at the end of the episode. (Tragically became a meta example a few months later, when Willard himself passed away.)
Grace Dunphy
Phil's mother.
- Delicate and Sickly: When she dies, it's implied that she had been sick for a while.
- The Ghost: She never actually appears on screen.
- Grandparent Favoritism: Alex is very proud of the special connection they shared; it seems Grace saw a lot of herself in her.
Farrah Marshall
Played By: Rachel Bay Jones
Dylan's mother.- Abusive Parents: Implied early in the series. In one episode, when he (temporarily) lives with Cam and Mitch he mentions that his mother made him leave because of her new boyfriend moving in.
- The Ghost: She was mentioned by Dylan a couple of times before actually appearing in seasons 10 and 11, where she took a more significant role as Poppy and George's other grandma.
- Granola Girl: She's a complete hippie.
- December–December Romance: With Jerry, DeDe's widowed second husband.
- Suspiciously Similar Substitute: An obnoxious, invasive hippie with bleach blonde hair and a complex relationship with her kid? Claire is the first to point out that's she's basically DeDe reincarnate.
Pritchett Family
DeDe Pritchett
Played By: Shelley Long
Claire and Mitchell's mother and Jay's ex-wife.
- Abusive Mom: Mostly towards Claire.
- Dirty Old Woman: Age did not affect DeDe's appetite.
- The Dreaded: Her announced visits always spark a feeling of unease in the family. Lampshaded in one episode where Alex unknowingly plays the Jaws theme on her cello the moment DeDe arrives at the Dunphy house.
- Granola Girl: DeDe is a bit of a hippie.
- My Beloved Smother: She's extremely coddling to and overprotective of Mitch, which only furthers her opposition to Claire, who is The Unfavorite. It mostly manifests in DeDe's relationship with Cam, which is extremely tense: DeDe makes it clear that she thinks Cam isn't good enough for Mitchell, which hurts the feelings of everyone involved.Cam: There's a fish in nature that swims around with its babies in its mouth. That fish would look at Mitchell's relationship with his mother and say "That's messed up."
- Obnoxious In-Laws: DeDe’s second husband Gerry, who shares a similar personality with DeDe as in them both being hippies yet also having vicious traits, gets along fine with DeDe’s children and even her ex-husband. However, Gerry’s son and his wife were seen talking about DeDe behind her back and Gerry’s side of the family seem to dislike DeDe and wish for Gerry not to marry her.
- Old Windbag: Do not expect Claire to successfully hush her when she spills the beans on her daughter's wild years or her own saucy relationships.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Her real name is Delia.
Donald "Donnie" Pritchett
Played By: Jonathan Banks
Jay's younger brother.- Big Brother Bully: He and Jay have been play-fighting as long as they can remember; as a result, while they love each other, they struggle to open up on anything more complicated.
- The Disease That Shall Not Be Named: He refused to tell Jay that he was under treatment for prostate cancer.
Becky Pritchett
Played By: Mary Louise Wilson
Jay's sister.- Amnesia Episode: During her first and only on-screen appearance, she is recovering from a stroke that has jammed her memories. Well, she's pretending, really.
- Daddy's Girl: Implied, as mentioned in the Season 2 episode “The Kiss” that one time her father had kissed Jay goodnight, but instead said “Goodnight, Becky” and in her only appearance Jay said his father had a fishing cabin that he promised would go to Jay, but instead left it to Becky.
- Evil Aunt: She is so mean that she actually scared the bejesus out of Claire and Mitchell, her niece and nephew, in the past.
- Grumpy Old Woman: She's harsh and bitter; no one on Jay's side of the family likes her much.
- Hate Sink: She is not exactly a pleasant person to be around since she is a monster and also demonstrated by her selfish behaviour, she tries to keep Claire’s necklace.
- Jerkass: She is a horrible and mean-spirited person, quite that it is mentioned that she and Jay hadn’t spoken in 9 years, apparently since his wedding to Gloria. She is also selfish enough to keep Claire’s necklace to herself and refuse to give it back to her.
Ramirez/Delgado Family
Javier Delgado
Played By: Benjamin Bratt
- All Girls Want Bad Boys: Deconstructed. Gloria was initially very attracted to him for this, but she eventually divorced him over his inability to grow into the husband/father his family needed him to be.
- Depending on the Writer: How much of a deadbeat jerk he is depends on the episode.
- Disneyland Dad: Likes to spoil Manny on the rare occasions he's around, but fails to even be the literal example of this trope in Season 1. He genuinely loves his son; he's just too self-centered and immature to actually be around.
- Visit by Divorced Dad: Goes to visit Manny whenever he visits California.
Sonia Ramirez
Played By: Stephanie Beatriz.
Gloria's younger sister.- Daddy's Girl: Was apparently their father's favorite, much to Gloria's dismay. Their shared attraction towards Jay is heavily influenced by this fact.
- Foil: To her sister. At first, she's a Shrinking Violet who couldn't get a grasp of confidence if it smacked her in the face, unlike Gloria who's a bundle of energy and class... because she's repeatedly stolen opportunities from her. After Sonia realizes this, she comes out of her shell and becomes, unlike Gloria, a genuine gold digger running after every guy in a semi-fancy suit.
- The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry: Becomes much more apparent after she realizes how many times Gloria snatched opportunities from her, after which she repeatedly attempts to seduce Jay and imitate her sister's life.
- Pet the Dog: For all her weird antics, she seems to be the only one in Gloria's massive Colombian family that Jay actually likes.
Pilar Ramirez
Played By: Elizabeth Peña
Gloria's mother.- Abusive Parent: To both of her daughters. She treats Sonia like a maid, constantly berates Gloria, and guilt-trips both of them into staying at her beck and call.
- Obnoxious In-Laws: She really dislikes Jay and doesn't bother to hide it.
Tucker Family
Barb Tucker
Played By: Celia Weston
Cam's mother.- In-Universe Nickname: Her full name is Barbara.
- No Sense of Personal Space: Is very touchy-feely with Mitch.
- Retcon: In a Freeze-Frame Bonus, the newspaper article about Fizbo in the eponymous episode calls her Jammy. She is afterwards known as Barb.
Merle Tucker
Played By: Barry Corbin
Cam's father.- Grumpy Old Man: He's a Deep South red-blooded American man's man; in that, he gets along pretty well with Jay. He loves his son and has his own ways of expressing it, he's just not exactly a fountain of emotions.
- Secret Other Family: Downplayed, as they never actually had children; but he spent a full year living apart from his wife, with a younger woman, while letting Cam believe that he was serving in the army well into his forties.
Pam Tucker
Played By: Dana Powell
Cam's older sister.- Big Sister Bully: She strong-arms her way into everything and is not above manipulating people to get her way; Cam and Mitch agree that between her and Claire, they really have a lot on their hands.
- In-Universe Nickname: Her full name, weirdly, is Pameron.
- My Secret Pregnancy: Kept her pregnancy secret until the day of the birth because she wanted to get a job first and was afraid of her little brother's judgment.
- Prison Episode: She's in prison for most of season 9, having broken her parole by shoplifting.
Calhoun Johnson
Pam's son and Cam's nephew.
- Nephewism: Cam and Mitch agree to raise him while his mother is in prison.
