Warning: Spoilers ahead for The Conners season 5, episode 16.
While Roseanne did have numerous pregnancy storylines, the series never acknowledged the common reality of miscarriage, which its spinoff The Conners managed to do with one particularly poignant season 5 outing. Roseanne took more than its fair share of risks for a family sitcom in the ‘90s. One episode of the show focused on Jackie’s abusive relationship and managed to mine some compelling drama from this challenging subject matter, while another famous Roseanne outing saw the eponymous heroine tearfully apologize to her son DJ after hitting him before revealing that she was a victim of childhood abuse at the hands of her father.
However, as Dan’s stance on abortion in The Conners season 5 proved, the spinoff’s characters haven’t always been consistent when it comes to their views on this sort of sensitive topic. As such, it was a pleasant surprise to see The Conners season 5, episode 16, “Hiding In and Moving Out,” tactfully handle a subject that has gone almost unmentioned on American network sitcoms over the last few decades. While a handful of shows have broached the taboo subject, few family comedies talk about miscarriages despite how common the phenomenon is and how relevant it is to the subject of family life. Luckily, The Conners season 5 broached the topic well.
Harris’s Miscarriage Let The Conners Address A TV Taboo
In “Hiding In and Moving Out,” Harris’s miscarriage was a poignant, sensitive depiction of a subject Roseanne never had the boldness to televise in the 90s. While The Conners handled Harris’s pregnancy poorly only an episode earlier, this outing did a lot to make up for that misstep by allowing characters in a network family sitcom to discuss an issue that affects millions of Americans annually. While King of Queens, Grey’s Anatomy, and Sex and the City touched on miscarriages before, the subject remains a rare sight in network TV. Fortunately, Harris’s experience was handled with tact and used as an opportunity to mend her relationship with Darlene.
Harris’s miscarriage was first brought up after she returned from the doctor midway through the story of “Hiding In and Moving Out.” In an attempt to maintain a brave face, Harris noted that this put her back in the position she was in before learning of her pregnancy and noted that the pregnancy had not been planned anyway. When Darlene agreed, Harris took this as tacit confirmation that her mother secretly didn’t want her pregnancy to succeed. Darlene is rapidly becoming Roseanne’s replacement in The Conners as she constantly gets into emotional battles with her children. Fortunately, the sardonic character was eventually able to reconcile with Harris.
Roseanne Always Avoided This Conners Storyline
While Roseanne may have touched on the subject of pregnancy many times, the show went to some lengths to avoid mentioning miscarriages. In one episode, Roseanne had a pregnancy scan that indicated special needs and considered abortion, while in another outing, Darlene gave birth to an extremely premature Harris. Roseanne even depicted Jackie having a child (who was later full-on retconned), but the sitcom still never mentioned miscarriages. Although both Roseanne and The Conners took working-class issues seriously and touched on many major social, cultural, and political issues, this was one storyline that the spinoff did better than its predecessor.
Why The Conners Season 5’s Harris Story Worked
Harris’s story in “Hiding In and Moving Out” worked well because she had not played a major role in The Conners season 5 before this. As such, this storyline gave her a chance to shine and gave the character something more meaningful to feud with her mother over (rather than standard issue boy problems). The last time Darlene and Harris shared a major storyline in The Conners, Darlene attempted to convince Harris not to marry the worryingly immature and unstable Aldo. This plot soon grew tiresome fast as it featured little in the way of stakes.
While Roseanne’s influence on her daughter might have meant that Darlene was excessively abrasive when insulting Aldo’s intelligence, she was still clearly right about Harris ending the relationship before marrying him. Aldo was bad news, and everyone but Harris knew it, making the storyline feel predictable and rote. In contrast, Harris’s miscarriage gave The Conners heroine a moving storyline, and the subsequent conflict with her mother carried more weight than the last story that two Roseanne alumni shared.