The Easter holidays gave me time
to reflect; time to socialise; time to pursue my ambitions and study. Instead,
I watched small-budget American teenage dramadies I stumbled across on TV
Choice with one eye, with the other focussed on a Maths past-paper question I
had started 2 and a half hours earlier. I regret nothing.
The first series I watched was Glory Daze, a love-letter to the
American student-in-college lifestyle of partying hard and working not so
hard, and an even more poetic letter to American ‘Fraternities’. Set in the eighties, all the
cheesy rock anthems are present; ludicrous shenanigans and pranks are
carried out on those dastardly Republicans from Theta-somethingorother house;
alcohol is consumed via red plastic cups. It’s not entirely dissimilar from a
sketch performed by a famous Glaswegian comedian, a sketch mind you, which has
been referenced so excessively, that any possible crumb of humour which
remained has been crumpled into nothingness, accompanied by a self-satisfied
guffaw. Anyways, four newly arrived freshmen; The Decent Leader And
Protaganist, The Awkward Jewish Comic Relief, The Quirky Jock, and the
Conservative Rich Kid, find themselves rejected from every ‘fraternity’, sort
of the equivalent of the British ‘College’ system, except for the house that
has only one rule; PAARTAAYYYYY!!! Totally, wicked, crazy antics ensue. Glory Daze should be the type of programme that I hate; it’s
contrived, clichéd, embarrassingly corny and wholly unoriginal.
But I liked it.
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| The prize of eternal friendship to whoever can name me the characters from this photo alone. |
In the forced humour, wit seeps through
the cracks. The characters may be simplistic, but they are all very likable and
you hold genuine affection for them by the end of the series. My personal
favourites are The Oracle, a 32 year-old stoner who illegally remains in the
‘fraternity’ house; his drug-induced philosophical and theological rantings are
easily the highlights of the show, and Reno, the laid-back, insanely
charismatic (unofficial) leader of the ‘fraternity’, who approaches every
challenge life presents with a casual witticism, and the offering of a beer.
The 80’s soundtrack is great, and the inevitable romance which blossoms between
the protagonist and his (already involved) love interest is surprisingly
intelligent, both in its development and its conclusion. In fact, despite the
clichéd storylines and (the majority of the) jokes, it’s actually quite a smart
show. Contemporary themes such as the repression of hip-hop in the music
business are represented. I never said they were socially important themes,
mind, but they do, technically, still count. They do, honestly. Its
unapologetic love of hedonism is infectious, and I am unashamed to say that I
fell for its wily charms. Very entertaining.
What wasn’t entertaining was Awkward. I really hated this TV show.
It’s basically a less funny Mean
Girls/Clueless/Easy A, without the self-awareness which made those
teen-movie classics so enjoyable. Jenna Hamilton, played by Ashley Rickards,
who looks like a more attractive Ellen Page, is a strong contender for the most
(unintentionally) dislikeable protagonist in any form of fiction. Teenagers
are, by their very nature, generally self-involved people; we’ve all
experienced this in some form, however, Jenna’s overwhelmingly selfish and
deluded outlook blows all these conceptions out of the water. We teenagers all,
at one stage or another, experience the search for our ‘self-being’, to solve
the mystery of our individuality. Jenna goes one step further, beyond the
journey for her identity; she strives for attention. She repeatedly narrates
that she’s ‘invisible’, and that she just wants people to ‘notice her.’ In
fact, it seems to me that that’s all she talks about. The opening scene
involves her losing her virginity with one of the down-with-it, cool kids in
the school. He looks at her, hereby showing her the sexual attention she
desperately craves, nods in the direction of an empty storage cupboard, and
they go off and have sex. That’s it. No character backstory or anything. We’re
supposed to immediately sympathise with people as hopelessly shallow as that?
That sets the rest of the tone for the series. Easy A and Clueless
succeeded because they dealt with the topical issue of ‘first-world teenage
problems’ with honesty, while having the tongue firmly in cheek. Awkward takes its self far too
seriously, when it really has no right to do so. It just isn’t fun.
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| Don't roll your eyes at me or I'll break your other arm, you self-absorbed, nihilistic fart-weasel. |
Anyways, back to hating Jenna.
This self-absorbed, superficial persona does not develop into anything remotely
likable as the series drags on. Even when she has the two popular boys in the
school lusting after her, which initially seemed to be everything she aspired
to have in life, (The Twilight effect
of female characters’ sole ambition as being someone’s boyfriend appears to be
more widespread than earlier thought) she still isn’t happy. It’s get to the
point where I just don’t care. In fact, I’ve written her a letter;
Dear Jenna,
I don’t care, okay? I don’t care that
nobody gives you attention that you probably don’t warrant. I don’t care that
you have to choose between two guys, who are so stereotypically ‘teenagery’
that they are literally hormones who have assumed human form, and who desire
you so extensively that you can physically see their pupils dilate as they stare
at you, reeking of testosterone and adolescent angstiness. More importantly, I
don’t care that you are embarrassed by walking about with a broken arm. That’s
just stupid. If I wanted to listen to a teenage girl complain about stuff I
didn’t care about for half-an-hour, I’d go and ask my sister to list every thing/person/situation
which annoyed her. But that’d be sanity-suicide, so I don’t. Please, please,
please, get over yourself, and just be happy? You’re witty, clever and
attractive. It isn’t difficult to be happy with your life. Try it sometime.
Yours sincerely,
Everyone, everywhere
There, that should do the trick.
Oh no wait, it wouldn’t, because every other character is just as infuriatingly
self-obsessed. I’ve mentioned the arrogant romantic (I use the term purely out
of triple irony, being oh so very superior and clever) interests, but Awkward also bears host to countless
self-consciously quirky characters; you know the type, they say gibberish like ‘I
feel like a meercat on a scooter after last night,’ and it feels as if they’re
grabbing you aggressively by the shoulders and screaming in your ear ‘omg, I’m
so random! LOL AT ME!,’ forcing you to break down into tears of terror, confusion
and bitter hatred. You’ll wake up screaming and naked in six years time, as the
image of bright pink beanie hats comes back to haunt you in a flashback which had
seeped out of the darkness of receded memory.
This is your life if you watch Awkward. You’ve been well warned.
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