You know George Lopez, the actor and comedian. Now, meet his fictional counterpart.
In NBC’s Lopez vs. Lopez, George and his daughter Mayan play George Lopez and Mayan Lopez as they navigate their dysfunctional family and attempt to reconnect after 10 years estranged.
Yes, you read that right. George and Mayan Lopez play George and Mayan Lopez. So is this a sitcom or reality?
The answer is a little bit of both. Our two leads may have the same names as their characters, but their lives on the show are (mostly) fictional, a bit like Jerry Seinfeld on Seinfeld. The show’s structure allows them to, broadly, be themselves while stepping into different (and distinctly fictional) situations.The real Mayan Lopez is not a veterinarian like her character, for instance, and the real George Lopez doesn’t share a bunkbed with his grandson—as far as we know, anyway.
Still, while the story may be fictional, there’s much more truth here than meets the eye. In real life, Mayan Lopez went viral on TikTok for posting short videos about her reconnection with her father George, who cheated on and divorced her mother more than a decade earlier.
On the show, it’s much the same; fictional George split from fictional Mayan’s fictional mother after being fictionally unfaithful, in addition to struggling with alcoholism and a gambling addiction. After a decade out of the picture, he’s back to make things right with his daughter and her young son. Take the real story of George and Mayan, remove their celebrity status, add in a supporting cast and a laugh track, and boom—you just sold a sitcom to NBC.
There are definitely things to like about Lopez vs. Lopez. George has made a lot of mistakes in the past, but he’s doing his best to make amends with his daughter and grandson, and Mayan emphasizes the importance of mutual respect in their relationship, insisting on “honesty over everything.” George himself is much more considerate than he initially seems; he’s currently broke and homeless, but only because he insisted on continuing to pay his employees while his business suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic.
He may be prone to slipping up, but George’s motives are clear: he wants to make up for his failures and be present in the lives of his daughter and grandson. Despite its title, Lopez vs. Lopez is a story anchored in the importance of sticking with your family no matter what.
But, like with George himself, good intentions don’t always guarantee good actions. The show is plagued by content issues, including sensuality and sexual references, as well as the appearance of drugs and alcohol. George may be doing his best to leave his bad habits behind him, but the series gets significant mileage out of turning them into jokes. He’s rarely seen without a beer in his hand, and though Mayan reprimands him for it, her complaints are usually followed by an eye roll and a laugh track. It’s hard to tell whether the show wants to treat George’s issues as serious problems or play them off as cheap jokes.
Family may be at the center of Lopex vs. Lopez, but before you engage with this semi-autobiographical sitcom, be warned: you’ll have to navigate some content issues and questionable messages to find it.
Mayan Lopez, a veterinarian living with her boyfriend and their young son, attempts to reconcile with her father George when he re-enters her life.
Our introduction to Mayan and George comes in the form of a TikTok, where Mayan claims that her father “drinks too much,” is “cheap,” “was never around” and cheated on her mom, leading to their divorce. She goes on to say in the TikTok that she grew up and went to therapy, and while she still has anger, she’s “twerking on it,” all while—you guessed it—twerking suggestively against a wall.
Characters constantly discuss and joke about George’s prior infidelity, and George tells Mayan that he suspects her white boyfriend (whom she lives with and calls her “life partner,” despite being unmarried), is not the father of her son, Chance. References are made to a platform where users can pay for explicit content, and Mayan’s coworker jokes that Mayan is “turning me on.” (A customer listening in on their conversation says the same.) George’s ex-wife, Rosie, wears a low-cut blouse and teaches him how to twerk in a TikTok he makes apologizing to his daughter. He brags about having eight followers, only for Mayan to tell him that they’re probably “Polish sex bots.”
George constantly drinks beer. It’s clearly been a habit of his for years, though it’s played more for comedic purposes than anything else. He even brings a bottle to bed, even though his grandson sleeps in the bunk right above him. One night, George gets tipsy and Mayan’s boyfriend, Quentin, has to put him to bed. (Again, these instances are all treated as jokes rather than issues in need of addressing.) Quentin finds Mayan in the kitchen pouring tequila in her coffee, then holds out his mug to join in.
References are also made to marijuana and “getting high.” George initially thinks that Instagram is a weed delivery service, and he and a friend reminisce about a time they went off to smoke together.
“A–” is heard twice, as well as “h—” and “b–ch” (one of them used as an insult from George to Mayan). God’s name is taken in vain twice as well. Mayan takes her father up on his advice to yell at a customer in order to get what she wants (what he calls “the Lopez way”). “Sometimes, the healthiest thing to do is just scream at a b–ch,” she says.
Lauren Cook is serving as a 2021 summer intern for the Parenting and Youth department at Focus on the Family. She is studying film and screenwriting at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. You can get her talking for hours about anything from Star Wars to her family to how Inception was the best movie of the 2010s. But more than anything, she’s passionate about showing how every form of art in some way reflects the Gospel. Coffee is a close second.
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