Young Sheldon’s Germany Storyline Solves One of Season 7’s Biggest Challenges

While incorporating Sheldon himself into the story of Young Sheldon season 7 seemed like a major challenge, The Big Bang Theory’s Germany plot line has cleverly handled this issue. Young Sheldon season 7 has got a lot of ground to cover since it is the final outing of The Big Bang Theory’s prequel. According to The Big Bang Theory’s canon, Sheldon walks in on his father, George Sr, having an extramarital affair, George Sr dies suddenly, Meemaw’s personality changes significantly, and Georgie’s marriage to Mandy ends in divorce. Young Sheldon needs to explain how and when all these things happened.

Fortunately for the spinoff, Young Sheldon has already found a way to avoid at least one canon plot hole. While Young Sheldon’s entire cast of characters have big storylines to contend with this season, Mandy and Georgie will reportedly receive a spinoff of their own after the series ends. This means that Young Sheldon season 7 doesn’t need to explain their engagement, wedding, marriage, and subsequent divorce in the span of only 14 episodes while still juggling the rest of the family’s storylines. Similarly, season 7 found a way to temporarily sideline Sheldon himself without compromising the show’s premise.

Young Sheldon Season 7 Separated Sheldon’s Story

Keeping Sheldon apart from the Cooper family has helped season 7

For the first three episodes of Young Sheldon season 7, Sheldon was in Germany with his mother, Mary. Sheldon’s chance to study abroad offered Young Sheldon an opportunity to focus on the rest of the Cooper family without drawing attention to his absence. Ever since Young Sheldon’s season 6 finale, the series has split its time between Sheldon’s cartoony, light-hearted adventures in Germany and the more dramatic storylines shared by the Cooper family. This geographical distance means that Sheldon’s plots don’t feel jarringly silly, thus ensuring that his antics don’t detract from the rest of the family’s storylines.

By sending him to Germany, Young Sheldon has been able to give Sheldon increasingly zany storylines that don’t directly link up to the more grounded events in Texas. As fans of The Big Bang Theory can attest, Sheldon is a pretty absurd character who frequently gets involved in all manner of bizarre plots. However, Young Sheldon takes the rest of the Coopers a little more seriously. Plots like Missy’s teenage rebellion, George Sr. losing his job, or Mary being fired from the church were all portrayed rather dramatically, which can sometimes make Sheldon’s storylines seem low-stakes and pointless in comparison.

Young Sheldon’s Germany Story Fixes A Recurring Sheldon Issue

Sheldon’s storylines didn’t really fit Young Sheldon’s tone in seasons 5 and 6

Sheldon is a silly, over-the-top character. Much like Young Sheldon season 7 made Mary a fish out of water in Sheldon’s world of academia, the spinoff has often made Sheldon an outsider in the small-town Texan milieu that his family calls home. While this quality is central to his appeal, it can sometimes jar with the more dramatic tone of his family’s storylines. This was epitomized by the uneasy contrast between season 6’s grant database story and Missy’s teenage rebellion or George Sr and Mary’s marriage struggles, both of which were a lot more impactful and serious than Sheldon’s plot.

This does a disservice to all the show’s characters. Sheldon’s sillier stories feel less funny when surrounded by his family’s drama and the serious issues that characters like Missy, Meemaw, or George Sr face are cheapened by Sheldon’s zany subplots. As such, Sheldon’s Young Sheldon season 7 story was right to uproot the character and send him to a new setting. In its first three episodes alone, season 7 has seen Meemaw lose her house and double down on her illegal gambling business while Missy returns to deceiving her father despite her promises in the season 6 finale.

Incorporating Sheldon Into Young Sheldon Season 7 Will Be Tricky

Sheldon’s return could be a tonal problem

The reason that Meemaw and Missy’s respective arcs worked is that Sheldon was not around to puncture their dramatic weight. Similarly, sights like Sheldon losing a shoe when a wild dog chased him or getting tutored by a small child who is even smarter than Sheldon worked better in Germany than they would have in his hometown. These sillier storylines felt less rooted in the spinoff’s version of reality since Sheldon wasn’t in the show’s usual setting, and Young Sheldon season 7 pulled off these broader, goofier plots as a result. However, this is likely to become a problem later.

Since Young Sheldon season 7 kills off George Sr, the show has to bring Sheldon home soon. He needs to return to Texas to walk in on his father’s affair and he must be present when George Sr dies, but this will mess with the balance in the Cooper family’s current setup. Obviously, George Sr’s untimely death itself will also alter the tone of its remaining episodes even further, which makes Sheldon’s comeback harder. While Young Sheldon may bring Sheldon back without ruining season 7, it is tough to see how The Big Bang Theory spinoff could pull this off.