It was a huge shock when ABC canceled Last Man Standing in the spring of 2017, considering the show still seemed to be a high performer for the network and did well in a tough timeslot on Friday nights. The network ultimately said there was no room in the schedule for the show after ABC decided to drift away from comedy on Friday nights; however, it didn't take that long for another network to swoop in and grab the series. Last Man Standing will return for Season 7 on Fox this fall and since its return directly came about because of Roseanne's success, there's one question that has been on a lot of minds: Will the sitcom address politics? According to Fox's Gary Newman...
I will say right now the producers' plans are not to address whether or not he might be a Trump supporter. That could change during the season, but there are no plans at this time... Clearly, he's a character with a conservative viewpoint.
Tim Allen's Last Man Standing character, Mike Baxter, has always been a character with a bit of a conservative bent, much like Tim Allen himself. At the time of the show's original cancelation and thereafter, Allen has been vocal about feeling blindsided about ABC's decision to cancel the series and others have connected it to his personal politics. Still, as noted earlier in this story, ABC's Channing Dungey has said it had to do with the Friday night lineup. From what we can tell about the Fox version of the series from Gary Newman's TCA comments (via TV Line), Mike Baxter will be the character fans tuned in for prior, but the show has no plans to get into specifics or bring in President Donald Trump.
In the past, Last Man Standing has mostly been a broad family comedy. Occasionally, though, the show has shifted into political commentary. I specifically remember one time when two of the characters were trying to look at losing as a win, and one character, Ryan, mentioned to the other, Kyle, that he "sounded like Hillary Clinton's therapist." Cracks like that clearly have a political bent, but no more or less than the types of jokes that are made on other network shows. We'll have to wait and see if the comedy on the series changes given the new network, but Newman has mentioned he doesn't see the series "being more political" than it was previously. We do know, however, that the series does have plans to poke fun at its network change.
Following Roseanne's cancellation, ABC will be sticking with the Conner family this fall, only the spinoff will not feature Roseanne Barr. So, there should be at least two network sitcoms that include political and socioeconomical viewpoints in one way or another, although plenty of other comedies on the air right now also touch on the social issues of our times. To find out what else is hitting the airwaves, we have you covered with our fall TV schedule.
