Workin’ Moms: Every Main Character Ranked, According To Intelligence

The CBC/Netflix sitcom Workin’ Moms is honest, hilarious, and sorely needed. While rom-coms make motherhood look funny and some episodes of TV dramas show the realness of postpartum depression, until Workin’ Moms there was no TV show that really told the tales of women balancing their careers and their babies.

There are many characters who get a lot of screen time on this show, from the protagonist Kate to her boss Richard to her circle of friends, and they all vary in terms of how smart they are. Here is every main character on Workin’ Moms, ranked according to their intelligence.

10 Nathan Foster

Nathan Foster (Philip Sternberg) is married to Kate, and his emotional intelligence is pretty low. He also doesn’t seem to understand his wife at all, which puts him last on this list.

Nathan is always shocked when Kate wants to make a move related to her career, which is weird since he should know the person that he married. For example, when Kate gets a promotion that means working in Montreal for three months, Nathan acts like she doesn’t care about him or their baby, which is totally unfair.

9 Jenny Matthews

Jenny Matthews (Jessalyn Wanlim) ranks at because number nine she seems pretty ditzy both at her job and family life.

Since Jenny is having a tough time adjusting to motherhood, she’s not very nice to her husband, Ian, which results in their separation. Jenny isn’t someone who can have very high-level intellectual talks, but she does want to have fun and be the life of the party, like when she insists on piercing her nipple in one early episode (which isn’t the best idea, of course).

8 Ian Matthews

Ian Matthews (Dennis Andres) is definitely not very smart, but he does seem to know a bit more than Jenny about raising a kid.

He’s a really good father who is devoted to their baby, but when it comes to his career, Ian’s not that intelligent. It seems like he spends years coming up with ideas for screenplays, and then he can’t execute them or get a movie made.

7 Lionel Carlson

Lionel (Ryan Belleville) is Anne’s husband and he’s super sweet and caring, but he’s not the smartest character on the show. While he knows more than the previously mentioned characters about parenting and marriage and love, he’s still not really on the right track.

For instance, when Anne shares the news that she’s pregnant with their third child, he says that this is the way that he grows as a person. He doesn’t realize that she’s scared and unsure, and that the pregnancy is tough on her. Since he’s not very perceptive, he’s not that intelligent.

6 Richard Greenwood

Richard Greenwood (Peter Keleghan) is Kate’s boss at the ad agency that she has worked at for a long time. He’s number six on this list because on the one hand, he’s traditional, conservative, and sexist. He makes comments that really should never be spoken out loud and acts like Kate’s baby is a burden.

On the other hand, Richard knows that he should promote Kate over her coworker and give her the Montreal job, so he’s intelligent enough to see something in her and value her as an employee.

5 Frankie Coyne

While Frankie (Juno Rinaldi) knows a lot about real estate and can sell anything (well, when she’s putting her mind to it, that is), she is a bit of a hippie and that can affect how intelligent she seems. She’s a kind, sensitive soul who wants the best for her baby, but she doesn’t always make the smartest decisions.

4 Val Szalinsky

Val (Sarah McVie) is the woman who runs the mom and baby group that the main characters are a part of, and she definitely knows a thing or two about raising babies. Val may not be the smartest when it comes to social connections but she’s the person to go to when there’s a question or problem related to parenting.

Based on her extensive parenting knowledge, Val is definitely very smart, earning her the number four spot.

3 Alice Carlson

Sadie Munroe’s Workin’ Moms character Alice is Anne’s daughter. She’s ranked at number three on this list because she’s precocious and it’s clear that she’s already got a very intelligent mind.

Alice makes her mom super emotional when she completes a school assignment comparing the modern woman to the pioneer woman. She films her mom, which freaks Anne out since she doesn’t look very good in it, but at the end, Alice talks about how much she loves and respects her mother. It seems like Alice could get into a debate with any adult and win.

2 Anne Carlson

Anne (Dani Kind) and Kate’s friendship is a big part of Workin’ Moms, and Anne is the second most intelligent character on the hilarious show.

Whether she’s trying to raise her kids or giving people advice through her work as a therapist, Anne has a great B.S. detector and also no filter. She tells it like it is. The smartest thing that Anne does is hire a nanny (who they call “mean nanny”) for her daughter Alice when she’s not sure how to get through to her.

1 Kate Foster

When ranking the main characters of Workin’ Moms by intelligence, Catherine Reitman’s character, Kate, seems like the smartest one of all.

Kate may not be perfect, but that’s totally fine since she’s a total pro in her advertising career. She might make some mistakes, like when she comes up with the same Instagram campaign for her two jobs while high, but she means well and she doesn’t do anything bad intentionally. Kate is smart enough to know that her Montreal boss is wrong for acting like business should come before family, and she’s the strongest and most capable of all of the characters.

About The Author

Aya Tsintziras
(1734 Articles Published)

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Aya Tsintziras is a freelance writer who writes about pop culture and TV. She has a Political Science degree from the University of Toronto and a Masters of Journalism from Ryerson University. She loves coffee, reading, working out, and watching TV. She lives in Toronto with her husband.

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