Erika, I started watching Parenthood somewhere in Season 2. I liked Season 1 a lot more than Season 2. I choose to look at it as Season 1 informing me better about the characters. Good deep background, say.
Season 1 has lots of examples where the four siblings are sitting around talking about the parents or other family situations, which is so very realistic. I don't remember just the four sibs getting together in Seasons 2 but then again, because I started in the middle, it took a while just to figure out who was who. They cover a lot of ground in the pilot! What is it, like, 15 primary characters?
I really hated where they took Crosby in Season 2 (or maybe it was 3?); the autism-teacher indiscretion, I thought was completely justified, and would've voted for him to dump Jasmine and run off with the Minka Kelly character. Jasmine was a stone-cold bitch to him. And the way all the other characters treated him like an idiot, and he was sniveling -- a really annoying "learning" moment - I blame the writers for not being creative enough on that one. He wasn't made out to be an unlikable guy in Season 1.
I am such a fan of the characters and the actors. Come on! Lauren Graham! Peter Krause!
I love the guy who plays Joel (Sam Jaeger). He is the male version of Tammy/Mrs. Coach in FNL. In Season 1, Erika Christiansen's Julia is more like Coach Taylor than I think she is in subsequent seasons. (Need to rewatch Seasons 2 and 3!) Joel is smart, attractive, supportive to his spouse without being a pushover or cliche (not a Mary Sue imho), excellent at his non-traditional job, as well as his contractor-around-the-house stuff. Julia in Season 1 is super believable. Too bad the writers don't have the guts to make her more like Coach Taylor, or is it just sexism. Julia constantly has to be fretting about whether or not she's a good enough mother?
I didn't particularly like the Christina character at first but she grew on me.
Oh! and in Season 1, they really did film all around here (SF Bay area). In fact, I had dinner with my sisters at Brennan's in Berkeley last night and I am pretty sure that's where they filmed Sarah's bartending scenes.
Zeke (I reject the abomination of Zeek) is such a jerk in Season 1 but comes around. Eh, they are all good. And Lauren Graham! I keep watching Bunheads and it's okay but .... I'm so sorry Sutton Foster, you just aren't Lauren Graham. I'll give Bunheads the whole season though, unless Comcast makes it untenable to watch by imposing no-fast-forwarding on it. Come on, Comcast, this show isn't so compelling that people won't want to watch a little, go away, come back, watch the rest. Idiots, making it hard to watch the freaking show.