Jennifer (Tina Yothers) is in the hospital to have her tonsils removed, and she’s a little stressed and worried about what will happen in Diary of a Young Girl.

The penultimate episode of season two of Family Ties was written by Ruth Bennett and it aired on 3 May, 1984. Jennifer hasn’t been super lucky with the episodes written around her yet, and this one doesn’t fare much better. It’s a pretty simple message episode reminding us to treat those we love with respect and affection because we don’t know what tomorrow brings.

In this case, Jennifer is very worried about the operation and is revisiting her diary and feeling rather badly about how she’s treated the members of her family. Each one gets a short vignette that shows Jennifer treating them badly, acting out, not being responsible, or just believing that she is horrible.

Now, to be clear, Jennifer’s a child, of course, she’s going to have moments like that. Adults still do as well. Yes, it’s nice to be reminded once in a while that perhaps we should be a little more mindful of those around us, and the way we treat them, but was Jennifer the right character for this to happen with? I’m not sure.

I like the exploration of her being the youngest and not being able to connect with Alex (Micheal J. Fox) and losing her connection with Mallory (Justine Bateman) as she grows up and think that may have been a better story to be explored.

Still, it’s a pleasant enough episode.

Season one ends with Working at It. Written by Lloyd Garver, this episode brought the season to a close on 10 May, 1984.

Elyse (Meredith Baxter) is nervous and anxious. She’s got an interview with an architectural firm, and she hasn’t worked in an office for twelve years, she’s been running her own firm from the family kitchen.

She nails the interview with Rebecca Balding (Karen Banks) and meets a new, but odd, co-worker, Bill (Walter Olkewicz) and is offered the job. She’s super-excited bit once she starts she begins to feel weighed down by all the new technology and her lack of understanding of how to use it.

Instead of asking for help, she begins to overwork herself, and while Steven (Micheal Gross) is very happy to pick up the slack at home, she begins to feel like she’s screwing everything up, which culminates in a disastrous meeting with a client.

Asking for help when you need it is definitely the message here, and it seems, as the episode comes to a close, that Elyse will be keeping her new job and loving it.

The Gambler opened season three on 20 September, 1984. Written by Micheal J. Weithorn and Alan Uger, the story sees Alex come up with a system to beat blackjack and he wants Elyse and Steven to try it when the family goes to Atlantic City for a convention that Elyse has to give a speech at.

Despite saying that she isn’t going to gamble, she sits down for one, and of course, gets addicted and begins to play Alex’s system. She begins to win and win and win again, but sooner or later the ‘streak’ is going to break and she begins to lose money that the Keatons can’t afford to lose.

There are some fun moments throughout especially watching Fox and Baxter work off of one another, but it’s a fairly run-of-the-mill sitcom family story and the series didn’t bring anything new to it.

It’s just a basic episode and it certainly doesn’t feel like a season opener, but I get it times were different back then. Don’t get me wrong I didn’t hate this one, it just was fairly standard for a show that knows it can be smarter and funnier.