The Excavation of an Aborted Arrested Development Joke

I honestly can’t believe we’re still extracting hidden Arrested Development jokes from the show years later, but it had so many layers it seems like we’ll never find them all.

This joke is one that actually got killed before it came to fruition, but as the show tends to do, it was being hinted at long before it was to come to fruition. The idea? That Tobias was really an albino black man.

“[The writers have] gone on little tangents where you think they’re going to start a storyline and they’ll pull it back. I remember they were going to do one about Tobias actually being a rare black person, where he would have this rare disease and was actually black. It’s these hysterical, crazy ideas that they could have continued on.”

Strange, I know, but when you think back…

Tobias: I am surprised that she’s going after somebody so similar to my own type.
(in reference to Lindsay flirting with Ice the Bounty Hunter, from the episode “Good Grief”)

Lindsay: People hear the name Tobias, they think ‘big black guy.’
Tobias: Well, obviously, I’m not a big guy. I’m not a Carl Weathers, par example. (from the episode “Afternoon Delight”)

Lucille: Michael. I was almost attacked last night in my own home. I walk in and there’s a colored man in my kitchen.M
Michael: “Colored?” What color was he exactly?
Lucille: Blue. (from the episode “Afternoon Delight”)

Lindsay (to Maeby): I don’t know where that hair of yours came from. (in reference to how Maeby’s frizzy hair hurt her chances in child beauty pageants, from the episode “Notapusy”)

And then there’s the cover of The Man Inside Me.

Holy. Freaking. Shit.

[via Splitsider]

Similar Posts

3 Comments

  1. I actually did pick up on this one originally. I think they def would have explored it more if the show continued. Maybe they will possibley pick it back up when the show returns in May

  2. They revived this in the new episodes…. I haven’t finished all of them, but when Lindsay finds herself attracted to Herbert Love, a black man, the narrator says, “Maybe it’s because he reminded Lindsay so much of Tobias…”

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.