Becoming Us: The New Normal?

I'll be honest: I watched the first two episodes of Becoming Us thinking it was another of ABCFamily's teen-oriented scripted dramas with a timely twist, like The Fosters (about a lesbian couple who adopts a multi-racial group of kids.)   It was only when the cast turned up on a talk show that I realized that Becoming Us is a reality series about an extended family in Evanston, Illinois that - as we now know well into the first season- includes three transgendered individuals.  It's almost as if Caitlyn Jenner were anticipating this series when she proclaimed, "I am the new normal."

The series revolves around 17-year old Ben, his mom Suzy, and his transgendered dad, who now goes by Carly.  "Who could have guessed that just as I was becoming a man, my dad would decide to become a woman?" Ben asks us in one of many direct-to-camera asides.    Becoming Us loves to break through the fourth wall, letting Ben narrate his own story with remarkably adult perception.  It's one of several factors that makes becoming Becoming Us feel like it's scripted.  Reality shows like the Real Housewives franchise or  Jersey Shore show us stupid people doing stupid stuff; here, a remarkably empathetic family goes through an incredibly stressful situation with grownup understanding, compassion, and  humility.  They're almost too good to be real.

Ben has two allies in dealing with his dad's transition, his understanding older half-sister Brook  (who's busy planning her wedding) and his platonic girlfriend Danielle, who also has a transgendered dad.  (What are the odds of that?)  In addition, Ben has two older friends, Ayton and his live-in girlfriend Brook, who are dealing with Brook's couch-surfing kid brother Lathan.  Lathan's "going through some stuff" but just when we're ready for the skinny goth boy to come out and announce he's gay, he instead reveals that he's transgendered too and was actually born a girl.

Ben's obviously got a lot to deal with:  Poor grades, his weird but co--dependent relationship with Danielle, and his evolving relationship with his father (whom he refuses to call "mom.")  Lathan's cloying presence stresses out Ayton and Brook's relationship, while Brook has to deal with introducing her straight-laced in-laws to her transgendered step-dad (and deciding what role, if any, she'll play in the wedding.)

I don't watch much reality TV - I've never seen an entire episode of any show  featuring real housewives, Kardashians, Chrisleys, or duck-call salesmen - but I assume one problem they all share has to be vignettes that feel, if not completely scripted, at least set up for the cameras.   In one episode, Danielle's dad and Carly go bra-shopping together with their two kids in a tow, which has to set a new watermark for teenage humiliation on TV.  When Ayton and Ben's relationships with their girlfriends sour, it happens on the same episode at supposedly the same time, which didn't feel natural either.  And when Carly takes Ben, Ayton, and Lathan camping for some she/male bonding in the woods, their campfire confessions don't ring true at all.

Still, Becoming Us couldn't have arrived at a better moment,  coinciding with Caitlyn Jenner's front-page transition and  raising  positive awareness of this unique segment of the LGBT community.  You might not believe every minute of Becoming Us, but it's nearly impossible not to like these people or root for them to stay together.  That, after all, is what Robert Frost told us family is all about:  When you have to go there, they're the people who have to take you in.