Thursday, October 2, 2008

Gauche and Unsophisticated List: Redemption and New Lows

So I disappeared again, and I really have no excuse, since I spent the last month or so lounging around and having my mom do my laundry. However, now I am an officially an adult and an actual lawyer (weird!) with my own one-bedroom apartment in the midwest and an actual job with a contract that is longer than the summer. Since I have only worked two days at the grown up job, I'm not sure exactly how I feel about this adulthood stuff yet.

Enough about my real life though, time for more confessions about my tragically bad taste.

First some good news!
After the horrible Mr. Boston bullying debacle I did not watch another episode of "I Love Money." Okay, so I watched about 15 minutes of the next episode. However, I found that after the bar exam that these contestants were awful, horrible, no good little twerps, and I could not root for any of them. Plus, a show watching them do nothing but form alliances and hissy fits, is dull. Yay, I have some standards! They may be low, but they are still there!

Now, the bad....
Since I had quit watching Degrassi: The Next Generation and Gossip Girl I had not been watching any cheesy teen dramas or teen dramas that rip off plot lines from 1970s storylines of Soap Operas. Then came the new, hip 90210 (because putting the city name in front of the zip code is so 1990s).

When I was in the fourth and fifth grade, I loved Beverly Hills 90210. My mom refused to let me watch the show until halfway through the fourth grade, but then I was hooked. I was glued in front of my tv set during the "Donna Martin Graduates" rally in season three. I was honestly concerned that Donna Martin would not be able to graduate because of her drunken shenanigans at prom, and I thought the school board was being totally unfair!

However, my favorite character on that show was Brenda. I thought she and Dylan were the best couple ever. When my friend LV and I would discuss 90210 in Mrs. Scheck's fourth grade class (right before Mrs. Scheck sent me to the quiet corner for being too chatty), he would always rant about what a bitch Kelly Taylor was for stealing Dylan away from Brenda and that if Brenda was able to go to Dylan's party, Dylan would have chosen her. After gently admonishing LV about swearing in class, I would agree with his general sentiment. (Somehow though, I was still shocked, SHOCKED I tell you, when LV came out senior year of high school. Sadly, I did not hone my oversensitive gaydar until college.) And in the season 4 finale when Brenda and Dylan kissed before she went to London, I was giddy. Of course then Brenda never came back and the writers decided that Kelly and Dylan were soulmates and the show got lame. So halfway through season 5, I gave it up. I think it was the first guilty pleasure show that I quit watching. Valerie would never live up to Brenda!

When I first heard about this spin off, I did not care one bit. Kelly Taylor as the guidance counselor? Lame! What was she going to do? Teach students how to steal their best friends boyfriends while being condescending and sanctimonious? However, then the showrunners managed to get Shannen Doherty, the awesome Brenda!, to return and then I was in.

I have watched every single poorly written episode. Objectively this show is not good. The interesting storylines move too fast (i.e. Silver, Kelly Taylor's much cooler sister, dealing with her mother's, Jackie Taylor - fashion show cokehead!, alcoholism). The really tedious, annoying storylines drag (i.e. Naomi, supposedly the bitch, tries to save her parents marriage and scrunches her face to show she has layers!). The lead female character, Annie Wilson, is such a "Mary Sue" (seriously students were applauding her in the hallway) and really needs some flaws and for other characters to call her on her crap already.

Somehow though I am invested already. I love Dixon and Silver! They are the new Brenda and Dylan. They are so flirty, and cute, and Dixon punched out the sleazy, inappropriate agent that was hitting on Silver, and Silver called out Dixon for presuming that making out would lead to sex. Hopefully the writers don't screw this up.

Also Brenda is back and was so-o past the high school drama, even when I thought she totally should have called Kelly on her crap in the last episode. It was glorious when she told boy toy teacher that he dodged a huge bullet by not having a relationship with Kelly, and then flounced off with him. Glorious!

I actually even like most of the new characters on this show, even Annie has her moments. If the writers would have Ethan the cardboard, yet sensitive, jock stop mooning over Annie and their summer relationship from two years ago, and give him storylines about dealing with his autistic brother and school and sports and balancing it all, then he would even be interesting. However, there is no hope for Naomi, and she should just be sent to boarding school.

Despite this, I faithfully DVR the show every Tuesday, and then watch it after Greek, so I can fast forward through all the commercials and Naomi's scenes.

At least I have a new teen show to watch, but knowing my track record with teen shows, my relationship with 90210 will probably only last about two seasons. Of course by then I will have fallen in love with another cheesy show that I will blog about.

No comments: