‘Roseanne’ Leaves Twitter Talking After Muslim Neighbors Storyline

Roseanne had a problem with her Muslim neighbors during Tuesday’s all new episode, and Twitter had some things to say about it.

During the episode, titled “Go Cubs”, Roseanne (Barr) is at first scared of her new next door neighbors, who are revealed to be a Muslim family.

“You can’t just stand on the front porch staring at your Muslim neighbors,” Jackie (Laurie Metcalf).

“Did you see the crazy amount of fertilizer they have in their garage?” Roseanne says. “What if it’s a sleeper cell full of terrorists getting ready to blow up our neighborhood.”

“What proof do you have Roseanne?” Anne-Marie asks.

“Anytime something bad happens it was somebody who lives next door to somebody.”

“You figured it out, terrorists are always neighbors,” Jackie says.

The Conner family matriarch is later forced to ask her neighbors for help after they are not able to pay for their Wi-Fi bill and need to access theirs so Roseanne’s granddaughter Mary (Jayden Rey) can video-chat her mother stationed in Afghanistan.

“The Gurksys moved away and now the terrorists are living there,” Roseanne says when the subject of asking her neighbors for the Wi-Fi password comes up.

“Oh my God Mom, you have no reason to believe those people want to hurt you. They’d have to get to know you first,” Darlene (Sara Gilbert) said.

When they arrive at the family’s home, Roseanne is surprised to see that the couple, played by guest stars Alain Washnevksy and Anne Bedia, are also scared of her.

“We’re from Yemen,” Fatima (Bedia) says.

“Oh good, Yemen isn’t even on the travel ban list,” Roseanne says.

“Yes, it is,” she replies.

The interaction leads Roseanne to see more similarities that differences between her new neighbors and herself and moves her toward tolerance and and understanding.

Fans of the series were quick to celebrate the episode’s message of reaching out to others, and finding common ground with those who are different.

Not everyone was on board with the storytelling in the episode, however, as some Twitter users were not O.K. with the way Roseanne spoke of her neighbors.

Later, Roseanne comes to her neighbor’s defense after seeing the supermarket teller being racist toward her, showing Roseanne’s growth from the beginning of the episode.

Ahead of the new installment, Roseanne cast member Michael Fishman said the episode would “open eyes.”

Speaking of the episode, co-executive producer David Caplan explained the
reasoning behind the storyline.

“Roseanne said, ‘what if a Muslim family lives next door?’ And all of the writers looked at each other for like five seconds and we said, ‘yeah… we’re doing that,” Caplan said.

“She’s frightened of living next to the Muslims because she has heard so many things on the news,” Barr said in an interview released by ABC. “So she has a lot of preconceived notions.”

“Once she gets to know them she realizes, there’s probably more similarities than differences,” Caplan added.

Roseanne airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on ABC.