Gabby Duran & the Unsittables

Gabby Duran & the Unsittables is an American sci-fi comedy television series created by Mike Alber and Gabe Snyder that premiered on Disney Channel on October 11, 2019. Based on the novel Gabby Duran and the Unsittables by Elise Allen and Daryle Conners, the series stars Kylie Cantrall, Maxwell Acee Donovan, Callan Farris, Coco Christo, Valery Ortiz, and Nathan Lovejoy.

Plot

A girl finally finds her moment to shine when she inadvertently lands an out-of-this-world job to baby-sit an unruly group of very important extraterrestrial children who are hiding out on Earth with their families, disguised as everyday kids.

Why This Show is Unsittable

1. The majority of the episodes are boring, predictable and at times repetitive, where you can easily guess where the episode will go because it was previously done in another episode.
2. Much like other bad Disney Channel shows, the series tries way too hard to be hip and cool with the young crowd, using slang and pop-cultural references that just make the show dated, even by 2019 standards.
3. The designs of the aliens are unimaginative, particularly the Gor-Monites, who look like candy-colored blobs of snot.
4. While none of the characters are truly unlikable, they are all unoriginal tropes, and some even have very little personality.
   • Gabby is the typical self-absorbed protagonist.
   • Principal Swift is the generic uptight authority figure.
   • Jeremy is the bland, annoying kid.
   • Olivia is the generic child prodigy.
   • Wesley is the goofy best friend character.
   • Dina is the bland mother character.
5. The acting is mostly pretty bad, particularly from the child actors who seem like they don't want to be there.
6. The comedy mostly falls flat, mostly consisting of gross-out gags, characters screaming, or dated pop culture references. One example is a running gag of Swift writing several reports on the Hemsworth brothers.
7. The visual effects are terrible and often unintentionally frightening.
8. Some of the episodes' climaxes are rather anticlimactic and rushed, such as when the episode "Night Train and Vortex" resolves the conflict by having the villains accidentally kiss. Granted, it works better in the context of the episode, but the ending still feels forced. Another example is the pilot, where the conflict is resolved by having Jeremy eat a mint from Swift’s mouth. This is not only painfully rushed, but also kind of disgusting.
9. The show has a poor grasp of its source material. It has almost nothing to do with the original book.
10. The theme song, while catchy, is barely memorable and just adds to the dated tone.
11. The makeup used on the Mungos in “Tailoring Swift” is laughably bad.
12. The sound effects get pretty annoying after a while.
13. The editing is really obnoxious and all over the place. Perhaps the biggest culprit of this is in the episode "Fake News" when there is a split screen used to show Gabby and Olivia pacing back and forth across from each other, which is entirely unneeded since the two are in the exact same area.
14. Season 2 premiered over a year after Season 1 ended, which is awfully late considering the fact that most Disney Channel shows have their seasons premiere a few months or so after the previous season ends (and yes, we know it was because of the pandemic, but it's still weird regardless).

Redeeming Qualities

1. Nathan Lovejoy does provide a solid performance as Swift.
2. This show has a pretty catchy theme song.
3. While the visual effects are abhorrent, the set designs and props are rather impressive.
4. The episode "Warm, Thick, and Saucy" has a really fun subplot where Jeremy loses Swift's DNA sample in order to allow him to shift into his human form, so they have to retrieve it from the source who is faking his own death, all while Swift is in the body of a sandwich.
5. The season finale "Enter the Dranis" does have a decent emotional conclusion between Dranis and Jeremy, as well as it being pretty well acted.
6. There are a few funny moments.
7. The series is a bit more story-driven, which helps it stand out from other Disney Channel sitcoms.
8. The series finale, “The Fault in Our Star Night” was a great way to end the series, although it leaves off on a cliffhanger.

Reception

TBA