You're like a big, dirty raccoon!: David and Alexis Rose

Previous posts in the countdown:

#5: Missy and Cliff Pantone (Bring It On)

#4: Wendy and Jon Savage (The Savages)

“I never thought I’d have to say this, but there is only space in this family for one unstable sibling, and I have held that title for a very long time, so you are going to have to get it together.” - David Rose

The moment that Schitt’s Creek’s David Rose (Dan Levy) tells his younger sister, Alexis (Annie Murphy), that he has always worried about her is, at the point in the series that it happens (season 3), probably the truest moment between the siblings. The two of them have had a fight on the way to David’s driving test; Alexis tells her brother that “nobody cares”, nobody is thinking about him as much as he thinks they are, and that he needs to stop worrying so much and relax. On the way home from the test, with David now driving, Alexis accuses him of not trusting her and asks what makes her different from the other women in his life that he does talk to. Alexis’s assumption is that she somehow means less to him. David’s response reveals this assumption to be faulty:

Or maybe the truest moment between David and Alexis is actually this: when David disappears at the end of season 1 and his family eventually find him living in an Amish community, he is outraged by how long it’s taken them to get to him. His mother points out that no one knew where he was and that his phone was turned off.

Within five seconds of this exchange (all yelled across a field), Alexis has pivoted to her tumultuous love life:

The truth of the Roses’ sibling relationship exists in the pivot. Sometimes these pivots happen in the moment, like when David switches from annoyance to intrigue - he’s mad at Alexis, but he also wants to know the gossip. Sometimes these pivots happen over time: siblings-as-strangers, forced to share a motel room, to siblings-as-friends. That ability to switch modes in an instant is one of the great joys and frustrations of siblinghood: allies to enemies and back again. Schitt’s Creek does a very good job of capturing this oscillation.

Those scenes in the car in the Driving Test episode function as non-declarations of sibling love. Alexis’s “nobody cares” sounds harsh but is meant to snap David out of his debilitating worry; David’s “constant worry” for his sister is an admission of his depth of feeling. We don’t need Alexis to tell David she loves him (although she does, as she walks him down the aisle at his wedding), because she teaches him to ride a bike as an adult man. They’re a weird team and Schitt’s Creek succeeds in its depiction of the brother-sister relationship because ultimately, it gets that at their best/worst, that’s what siblings are.

Also, proof that siblings have the best insults: