“Like Trees Exposed By Fall, Time Reveals It All”

For some reason, last week they changed the title of tonight's episode to “Putting Down Roots”.  No idea why, and it really wasn't significant enough to merit mentioning until now.

On the other hand, the promo for the episode which I saw last night (unfortunately I can't find it online yet) [2:00 PM UPDATE:  I found it - I've posted it after the page jump], well that's another story:

Secrets are slipping out tonight on a new #ModernFamily! pic.twitter.com/Y6dgkYfQ2r

— Modern Family (@ModernFam) December 5, 2018

My main interest in seeing the promo in the first place was to hope Alex would be in it, to allay the fear that was starting to creep in that tonight might be Alex-less Episode #3.   Not only was that wish fulfilled, but we get a bit of an early “present”, so to speak.

The promo shows a scene with Alex and Haley, neither of whom seem happy.  And then Haley tearfully hits Alex with the news that she is pregnant, but she asks her not to tell anyone.   The latter gets ruined rather quickly, through no fault of Alex's, as Luke was hiding in the room and quickly appears to make it (at least) two people in the family who know.

So instead of waiting until next week to see how Alex reacts, we probably get to find out tonight.  Needless to say this changes a lot of how this post was going to look half a day ago:

Anticipation Level: High.  Of course, there is still the question of what did the late Dede bequeath Alex, and how Alex will feel about it (I suspect that may play into her mood later).   That probably wasn't going to be that big a deal in the first place (and possibly no deal, if Alex wasn't going to be there), but now it really does pale in comparison to how Alex reacts to Haley's revelation.

In the immediate, the question is how supportive will Alex be to Haley – will she be happy and be there for Haley, or will she be snarky about it? (A younger Alex would definitely be snarky.) This is one rare time when I am definitely not rooting for snarky - hopefully the fact that Alex is (one of) the first family member(s) in whom Haley felt she could confide will sway Alex¹.   (It's also possible she could go from snarky to supportive.)

I'll get to beyond tonight shortly.

Emotional Moment Potential: Medium to High.  The promo hinted that there would be at least some emotion.  How Alex reacts will decide how emotional tonight gets.

Game Changing Potential: Medium.  And then there's the “beyond tonight” question – how does Haley's news play into Alex's relationship with Bill?   Will Alex start pressuring Bill into making a commitment (marriage and/or having a kid or two of their own)?

I only have this as “medium” for tonight because Bill isn't around (as far as I know he won't appear next week either) – it's more of a long game that probably won't start to play out until 2019 (maybe a story for Alex's upcoming 21st birthday?²).

Unless of course they've already broken up – I wouldn't put it past the writers to do that to Alex.

Are There Any Other Questions? I think we've got plenty for now.

If I see a promo online later on I'll post it here - otherwise I'll see you tonight.
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¹ I had to qualify this because it's possible Haley might tell someone within the family but outside the Dunphy household (e.g. Gloria or maybe Mitch or Cam - there's no way she tells Jay) first.  Alex would still be the first person inside her immediate family to know.

² For now I'm sticking with my original theory of Alex's birthday being in January. I know there's an alternate theory  that she already is 21 (early in Season 2 in "The Kiss" she said she was then 13).