Comedies have also evolved from slapstick step-parenting (Daddy’s Home) to more nuanced, character-driven conflicts. uses the blended family as a pressure cooker for adolescent angst. The protagonist, Nadine, is already grieving her father’s death when her mother begins dating—and then marries—her boss. The film’s humor derives not from the stepfather being monstrous, but from his being perfectly reasonable , which makes Nadine’s rage feel simultaneously irrational and totally valid. The film understands that for a teen, the step-parent’s greatest sin is simply existing in a space once occupied by a biological parent.

The future of the blended family on film is about telling every kind of story—because in the multiplex as in life, family is no longer a single story, but a collection of them.