Failure is the only option

What bothers me most about the new-run format is that it's an exercise in futility. Sure, Lynn may change a detail or two, like moving up the arrival of Farley a year or trying and failing to keep the setting current but we know that they're headed to the same destination as the people we've just seen. Mike is still a sullen little goof who's going to grow up to be an entitled jackass, John is still an oaf, Elly is still a crappy mother and Liz will still marry Anthony. Just because Sisyphus takes a slightly different path up the hill doesn't mean that that ol'debbil stone isn't gonna roll back down again. If she wanted to show us how Farley wound up on the road to the Ravine of Death, she could simply write a graphic novel and retire before she really burnt herself out.