I Love Lucy to Catastrophe: how the sitcom wife evolved in 10 classic characters

New comedy Kevin Can F**k Himself, about a put-upon partner seeking revenge, is the latest show to highlight the shift in the way women are represented on screen

Traditionally, the sitcom wife isn't much of a laugh. In the collective imagination, she is the selfless linchpin of the family, the fun police, the industrious straight woman, the butt of the joke, the servile glamourpuss who is weirdly delighted - or at least not utterly dismayed - with her sad lot. Now, thanks to a meta new comedy, she is having a moment. Switching between sunny studio sitcom and grim dramedy, Kevin Can F**k Himself, starring Schitt's Creek's Annie Murphy, injects some dark reality into the trope of the long-suffering spouse.

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