Degrassi: Season 4 Review

I actually finished watching this at the end of April. School and stuff just got in the way, as usual, and… now I’m watching season 8. And seeing as the show has like 25 characters plus reoccurring characters, I’m not going to do the chart anymore.

I like Paige because she’s really grown as a person. The old Paige wouldn’t be nice to Rick or Alex but she’s becoming a nicer person. She’s also building an identity outside her relationship with Spinner, by dumping him.

I originally liked Ellie because she was the most unique girl on the show. And she stood up to old Paige. Now I like her because she has an emotional, non-relationship storyline. And she’s cute with Sean. Unfortunately, this is her last season as her own person. After the episode Queen of Hearts, Ellie gambles to earn rent to keep her and Sean’s apartment, but she loses and has to move back with her Mom. This would be a GREAT storyline to go back to. But the show never did. They just turned her into some boy crazy girl who shops at Hot Topic, not the goth girl we knew and love. But that’s for season 5 and on, so yeah. Did you know the people who wrote Juno modeled Juno after Ellie/Stacey (her actress)? I didn’t. I wonder why she wasn’t in the movie.

Jimmy kind of grew as a person, so I guess I like him now. I admit, most of the reason why I like him is because he got shot and I feel bad for him, especially considering the circumstances of how he got shot. I’d like to say he became more interesting after he got shot, but no, he didn’t.

I like Hazel because she supported Jimmy. Most people say she’s a shallow character but I think that’s rude. A shallow character would’ve leave Jimmy, but Hazel stayed with him and supported him when he needed her. And Andrea had a good performance when she found out Jimmy got shot.

I still like Ashley because she was dramatic and I agreed with her on most of her actions. I think she did a good job of supporting Craig when he needed her but she left when she felt uncomfortable. She showed that people should leave relationships that make them feel uncomfortable.

Liberty and JT finally hooked up this season. So that makes both characters more likeable, because their only plots aren’t Liberty wants JT but JT doesn’t want Liberty. Toby was forgettable this season, but I guess he was okay during the Rick storyline.

This is the last time I like Sean. I think he had a strong performance, but I want to know why Daniel Clark left the show. Especially if he decided to come back later. Oh well. He grew as a character and it feels like a full circle moment.

Emma and Manny are intolerable now. Manny breaks up yet ANOTHER couple (Paige and Spinner) while Emma becomes even more self righteous and hypocritical. Manny and Spinner was possibly the stupidest thing I’ve seen on Degrassi so far. Emma is slowly becoming out of character because the writers realized no teenager would protest for the environment during high school. Emma gained a new nickname from me: GonnorEmma, because… well, she did stuff with a guy in a van. Ironically, she also broke up a couple.

I liked Alex, the new bully girl, even if she caused the shooting. She was nice in Mercy Street, King of Pain and Queen of Hearts. She interacted with a LOT of groups, and represents the demographic Degrassi doesn’t represent but should. She had funny dialogue (“Look at me, beautiful and a virgin!” “Now that’s acting”) as well. She’s that character that says what’s on the viewer’s mind at this point.

I DESPISE Spinner. At least before, he was just annoying or my hatred was just what I thought. But he actually got his best friend SHOT. What the hell? He also cheated on Paige (sort of) with Manny. And he got such a stupid haircut. Normally I don’t pick on the actors or their looks but goodness. He was terrible.

I hate Craig because he hogged most of the season and he didn’t even interest me as a character. I just got bored by all of the relationship drama, screen time and everything else he got.

Marco started to get boring this season. He starts off strong and independent and even comes out to his Mom. But then he discovers his boyfriend is cheating on him and his character falls apart as clingy and boring. Yawn. At least Ashley’s depression featured music. Marco just got whiny.

The Shooting

I want to know why Rick came back to Degrassi. They don’t have anything education wise, so it’s not like he’s missing out on much. I think Radditch should’ve have an assembly the day before he came back or have a teacher walk him from class to class or SOMETHING. The paint-and-feather scene reminded me of Carrie. I think Ephraim Ellis was a great actor.

Paige and Spinner and Some Other Drama

I think the relationship fell apart because Spinner became ‘in charge’ and started to abuse his power. I’m glad Paige dumped him before he got serious with Manny or he was worse to Paige. I think this started a downfall of Paige, sort of. She started to have a crush on Mr.Oleander and then he gave her pot and she befriended Alex who taught her to be more carefree and then her breakdown happened… I’m getting ahead of myself. And then Spinner started hanging out with Jay then the shooting happened. So yeah, they kind of needed each other. Spinner and Manny annoyed me because the build up was longer than their relationship. Paige and Mr.Oleander was forgettable.

More Craig Drama

The season starts with a Craig B plot and continues with a Craig and Ashley relationship. But Ashley became an accessory to Craig this season. Then he gets diagnosed with bipolar disorder, becomes attached to Ashley until he drives her away and runs away. But the show can’t go on without Craig, so he comes back. I don’t like how the show revolved around Craig, especially because he never paid for his consequences.

Degrassi Jumps the Shark

The season started out great, but got extremely boring after Time Stands Still. Too much Craig drama. Then the show started to bring famous people. And I use that term loosely. Kevin Smith, an American director or something, had to film his latest movie at their school. This created an extremely boring and unrealistic arc. And the point where Degrassi jumps the shark.

 

Overall, it was a good season, but the second half fails by featuring too much relationships and not enough issues, a problem the show would later have more frequently. And people started to become out of character for the plot.

Degrassi Season 3 Review

I finished up Degrassi Season 3 last Friday. This season has really matured since Season 2. The plots have gotten more serious and it feels less like a Disney sitcom. This has also been the first season with reoccurring themes and plots, like less standalone episodes. So, the reviews will be a little different from now on. But first, the like/neutral/dislike table with a new category: Why are you even on my screen?.

Name:	Category:	Reasons:
Paige	Like	She’s slowly turning from the Queen Bee into an actually nice person. And she didn’t suffer from Plot Induced Stupidity Syndrome.
Ellie	Like	She’s interesting, but I think she ‘outed’ Marco kind of poorly. I like her relationship with Sean.
Ashley	Like	A lot of the fanbase hates her, but she’s one of my favorites. I think anyone would be pissed if their boyfriend cheated on them. Most teenage girls I know act as overdramatic as Ashley, so her characters is pretty accurate. And I like her hair and singing, too.
Terri	Like	She’s a nice friend but… that’s it. The writers didn’t use her a lot, which kind of makes her a 1 dimensional character. At least it was her decision to leave the show.
Sean	Like	He’s so far the only boy that’s not extremely irritating or out to get the ladies. I like how’s he responsible-ish, and he’s more mature than the other guys (Spinner, JT, Toby)
Emma	Like	I’m warming up to her for several reasons. Miriam McDonald looked like she actually slept for more than 20 minutes in this season; her character was interesting in Manny’s plots, and Emma and Chris were a cute couple, although I don’t think anyone expected them to be soul mates, though.
Jimmy	Neutral	He did nothing this season. His acting bored me and… I don’t even remember anything about him. Let’s hope he gets better from season 4 and on *cough school shooting*. I like him with Hazel, though.
Hazel	Neutral	She’s boring. But she did nothing for me to hate her, so… yeah.
Marco	Neutral	I liked him in Pride, but I don’t like how he expects the worse to happen out of everything. And all of his plots revolve around homosexuality, but that’s the writers’ fault.
Liberty	Neutral	She got better this season, but she’s still a bit nerdy. But we’re all nerdy on the inside, so… yeah. I guess I like how she’s learning to let go sometimes. Like, she’s not stalking JT anymore and she accepted Sean’s rejection of her.
JT	Neutral	I don’t like how he left Toby & the crew but I don’t like Toby, so it’s okay. I like how he was close with Manny at the end of the season, but based on the episode Mercy Street,… yeah, no.
Toby	Neutral	He’s boring and I dislike him from previous seasons, but I feel bad for him because of JT leaving him.
Manny	Dislike	Oh God, where do I begin with Manny. Her makeover is the wrong way to approach guys, she annoyed me in the love triangle and she ruined her friendship with Emma so many times. The only thing that redeemed her this season was hooking up with JT, but I just finished Mercy Street, so that ship has sailed. And she kind of looks like my cousin who’s only 14, so .
Craig	Dislike	The love triangle, basically. And the hat he wore in Holiday. And he expected Manny to keep the baby AND Ashley couldn’t be sad or angry because he cheated on her.
Spinner	Why are you even on my screen?	He conned a lot of people into trading their lockers just for Paige, he outed Marco cruelly, he treated Dylan like his personal chauffer (Is that the driving one?) monkey, his hair sucked, he’s intolerant, he encouraged Craig to cheat… the list goes on and on.

Now, time for the reoccurring plot reviews:

• Manny’s new look

I dislike this plot because it’s not Manny’s look that bothers me, but how she thinks that’s the only way she could get guys. Ashley, Emma and Paige all got guys without being slutty. And it’s her behavior that’s annoying, too. Not dressing like a 5 year old and being Maury material are 2 different things. Like, most of the sluts at my school know not to break up a relationship or have some morals, or act like sluts if they’re single. For Manny, she could be married and she’ll still fool around. And she tried to get Emma’s friendship back so much after she screwed it up. Heck, she even used Mrs. Nelson-Simpson but screwed that up, too. The abortion episode wasn’t my favorite episode of her, and I’m surprised some pro-life group hasn’t said ‘Abortions are only used by slutty teenagers who are cheating on other people’ or something, but it’s a Canadian teen drama, so it’s not like any pro-life group knows about it. Oh wait, The N banned it in the US for 2 years because of protestors.

• Marco’s homosexuality

It’s not Marco being gay that annoys me. It’s that he’s only ‘the gay one’. And he annoyed me in The Power of Love. Oh, and his relationship with Dylan seems shallow. And once again, the writers make it seem like ‘there’s 2 gay people in the same school! They’re soul mates!’. But it’s not Marco’s fault, so… yeah.

• Sean & The Sesame Street Gang

I could see why Sean would leave JT & Toby because he’s not with Emma anymore, but I’m pretty sure that Jay & the Sesame Street Gang (My term for poser gang people) aren’t the only other guys in the school. I think they didn’t have to steal Snake’s laptop and they were just immature in general. I guess I like them individually, not as a group. If that makes sense.

• The Ashley/Craig/Manny Love Triangle

I think that both parts sucked. I didn’t want Ash and Craig because Craig cheated on her, but I disliked Craig and Manny together. I think Ash wasn’t a prude and Craig should’ve dump her if he wanted to be with Manny. But whatever gives Ashley Kerwin more screentime, the better.   

• Terri and Rick

I see where Terri was coming from for not dumping him, because she’s plus sized and it’s not like she could be picky about who she dates and whatnot, but she could’ve just hang out with him in groups. I’m surprised nobody reported him to the authorities or anything. I wish Christina Schmidt (sp?), Terri’s actress, didn’t leave the show because I’m gonna miss her, and I’d rather have her graduate out of the story than be transferred to another school. At least she gets to teach people about abusive relationships.

Degrassi- Hide & Seek Review

Here’s the review for the Degrassi episode Hide & Seek. I know, what a descriptive introduction.

A plot: Holly J is becoming sicker and sicker. Like, falling during class presentations, sore throats, and wetting herself. So she starts self medicating herself (Read: getting Tylenol, Advil and other medicine and hoping the problem would go away like most people would). I thought it was like since Holly J went through financial issues last season or something, she couldn’t afford going to the doctor, but I’m pretty sure Canada uses socialism, which means that everyone could go to the doctor. Holly J later woke up in a hospital bed with an IV thing in her arm, but later took it out and acted like nothing was wrong. By the end of the episode, she has to undergo kidney dialysis. Apparently, Holly J’s strep throat turned into kidney problems. o.O So remember kids, always go to the doctor!

B plot: Alli tries to go to Vancouver, but gets mugged and goes back to Johnny’s dorm. Johnny called Sav! So Alli goes back to the Bhandari household and they have an intervention for the problem and decide to go to family counseling together. I’m happy that the Alli plot is (hopefully) tied up for the season, she’s been in the last 4 episodes, and with the season ending in like 4 episodes, I’d rather see other characters focused on. Oh, and I’m happy that Alli got her life back together again.

C plot: Wesley tries to get a world record after reading his time capsule letter from 7th grade. He fails, but in the process, he gets a new girlfriend, Hannah. I wish they’d give Wesley, Connor, and Dave better plots that aren’t ripped off from Disney or Nick. But they’re almost juniors, so maybe the powers that be will decide ‘hey, some girls find nerds attractive. Let’s give them makeovers and make them hook up with people!’. But hopefully Hannah will stick around. Now, only Connor needs a girlfriend.

 

The new characters for next season seem interesting. There’s…

• Mo MacDonnel, an (unconfirmed) overweight senior. Maybe he’ll be a male version of Terri?
• Imogen Moreno, a junior who pretends to cut herself for attention. But she’s hiding a big secret: She’s boring.
• Jake Martin, a heartthrob who knows Clare from childhood? Great, this love triangle just turned into a love… T? With Clare being the perpendicular part, Eli, Fitz and Jake being the corners.
• Katie Matlin, a tomboy.

And it’s interesting to know what will happen once all the seniors graduate.

• The show could follow them to college, because we’ve only known them since they were sophomores and juniors, so it won’t be like what happened with Paige’s and Emma’s classes, because they still have potential storylines.
• New kids? Self explanatory.
• Someone gets held back: Fiona, because of rehab and the trial stuff (And it would be interesting to see Fiona survive without an emotional crutch) or Holly J (Because of her kidney dialysis and it would be interesting to see how she’d deal with being a super senior).
• The cast will become (gasp) small again.
• Another school gets burned down and needs to share with Degrassi, like Lakehurst in season 7 (Which reminds me, are they even trying to rebuild it?).

The first half of season 11 is gonna be the nightly telenovela format like the first half of this season (As in, nightly blog post reviews, maybe?) and it’s starting out with spring break of this school year.

Whatever it Takes, I know I can make it through (Season 2)

Ironically, after blogging about blogging about too much Degrassi, I’m gonna make a post on… Degrassi!

So anyway, I started this season at Winter Break and I finished it Thursday night. This season was really good, but… I don’t know. It had it’s challenges.

For starters, the Teenick website doesn’t have a lot of the 22 episodes up. The episodes that were missing were

• When Doves Cry, Part 2. It dealt with child abuse, but greatly impacted the storyline. It also had a (14 year old) character have a suicide attempt.
• Careless Whisper. A boy named Marco is confused about his sexuality (By the end of the season, he admits he’s gay to his best friend). I don’t understand why they didn’t have this episode up. I mean, I know why, but so far, there are 2 episodes that have actually showed the 13 and 14 year old cast with condoms. This episode had a nice discussion on being gay with a counselor lady, which had questions teens would ask, like ‘isn’t it a sin?’, or ‘are people born gay?’. For the first question, the lady said ‘isn’t it more of a sin to not be who you are?’ and she said ‘some people say yes, others say no’ for the second question. The only homophobes were the actual kids, but seeing as they’re high school freshmen living in suburbia, I’m not too shocked.
• The 2 part finale, Tears Are Not Enough. It dealt with child abuse, death and dealing with the death of a loved one. It didn’t have anything that bad, although I cringed at the child abuse scenes (And I knew about them in advance! Thanks, spoilers! –_–) .

Some of their decisions bother me, because they chose to play episodes with rape and terrorism as the main plot, but they thought those were suitable for kids. I think it’s because TeenNick became lighter and softer as opposed to TheN, it’s original channel. And Careless Whisper confuses me, because TeenNick had 2 episodes last month about a gay teenage boy who was coming out to his Mom, and those 2 episodes featured make out scenes and whatnot. I’m not saying gay make out scenes are bad or threatening or anything, but apparently it’s not okay to talk about homosexuality but showing actual gay people (Well, characters) show their affection (I can’t word this paragraph without sounding like a homophobe, sorry D: ) is okay? Nick Cannon needs to get his act together.

And because some of the episodes were blocked, I had to go online to find videos elsewhere. I didn’t want to download anything because I know online TV links are shoddy if 900 pop up windows come when you load the page. And I wanted to find legal copies, too. I’m not just saying that to look nice, but SS knows how paranoid I get about those things. When Doves Cry part 2 was easy to find, along with Careless Whisper, but the finale was extremely hard to find. But I found the links eventually. I hope the rest of the seasons are up on TeenNick.com .

And the worst part? Most people became unlikeable this season. It’s time for my like-neutral-dislike chart!

Like

• Paige- The Cheerleader who got raped. She was one of the few characters who wasn’t affected by PISS (Plot induced stupidity syndrome). Intentional acronym.
• Craig- The child abuse victim. He’s into art (Well, photography and music). He’s friends with a lot of the guys, Emma and Manny, and Ashley. I think his actor was really great. Although, I wish he didn’t ruin the dance for Ashley and everyone else.
• Ashley! I still like her after her ‘Goth’ transformation. Her poem in Shout was nice, and I loved Dressed in Black.
• Terri. To be honest, I thought I was gonna dislike her after she left Ashley at the start of the season. And she was slipping down my list throughout the season. But she reclaimed her spot in the like section by comforting Craig after his Dad died.
• Ellie: Although she wasn’t in the main theme song, I really liked her. She was a great friend to Ashley and treated Marco well. And she stood up to Paige in the computer lab.
• Marco- the boy who’s gay. I like how he’s probably the only guy on the show who isn’t stupid or intolerable so far. I just hope all of his plots won’t revolve around his sexuality.

Neutral

• Liberty- Was Sarah unavailable when they shot this season? She was in like 3 episodes. But yeah. She got annoying in Relax. I never even knew Liberty liked sports.
• Emma – She disappeared this season, which was okay because she only was the hippie girl. She’s friends with Ashley, apparently, so that saves her from the Dislike section… for now.
• JT- He grew up from the younger brother to… the class clown. He was okay in the Science Teacher episode. I like how he still went to the Luau dance with Liberty.
• Sean- the drinking episode annoyed me because Sean got mad at Emma’s Mom for offering leftovers and he thought she meant it like he was a welfare case, and he called her judgmental. But he was homophobic to Marco a few episodes before, and he made fun of Ms.Hot Sauce Science Teacher whose name I can’t spell for being attractive. And he crashed Jimmy’s party and got kicked out. Why.
• Toby- He hasn’t seriously pissed me off this season. There’s nothing else I could say about him, besides the fact that him and Kendra are annoying together.

Dislike

• Spinner- annoying character, annoying plots. He looks like the older brother from Home Alone at this point of the show.
• Jimmy- annoying. Drake can’t act. Like, he tries to say everything in a narmy, serious tone, but he can’t pull it off.
• Manny- I try to like Manny. I really do. But she’s annoying. She reminds me of those annoying girls who misread any male communication as ‘he loves me’. She’s just annoying. Ugh. Unfortunately, the actress looks like my cousin at this point, and I heard Manny gets a slutty makeover later on in the show… . It doesn’t help that my cousin is currently 14 and Cassie was/is 2 years younger than everyone else.

Last night’s episode was good, but I’ll recap it once both parts are played, as in next week.

Question

Would you prefer if I made another blog for like Degrassi reviews and whatnot? Because I’m pretty sure my weekly (okay, bi-weekly) Degrassi updates are irrelevant-ish, and I kind of want my blog to be about my personal life and the Sims and stuff, not just a review blog, if that makes sense.

Like, I know most of the blogs that have my link don’t have it up for the Degrassi parts, but I think having a separate blog for one tag would be pointless. Maybe I could put other reviews on it too, or something.

Then again, this season ends April 22nd (Good Friday, I believe), so after that, there’s probably gonna be less Degrassi posts. Never mind, I watch it online, too.

So… what do you think?

One Week

Has it really been one week since my last post? Sorry, school was time consuming last week and I was too lazy to post anything. And March in general is just a bad time, spare time wise, so… yeah. Nothing else to say, unless if you want a random post about me complaining for everything.

However, my latest blogging goldmine, Degrassi, had a new episode last Friday. It was awful.

• Sav acted like a jerk to Alli, who is now suspended from her private school. Did someone forget to tell me it’s ‘hate Alli month’?
• Eli and Clare had a boring plot. Fitz came back, and now he’s a born again Christian. Unlike other fans, I was excited to see the new Fitz and if he’d make Clare & Eli break up. They didn’t. But Eli is being strange and protective over Clare, and believes that Clare can’t talk with Fitz. This was before he mocked Clare’s religion and Christianity. Adam, the voice of reason, sided with Eli on this one because he almost stabbed Eli @ Vegas Night. Eli poisoned Fitz’s drink and got him suspended or expelled or something and actually ruined Fitz’s life. I’d be scared and stuff too if I was Eli, but Fitz only almost stabbed him because of what Eli did. I’m not an EClare fan, if you can’t tell.  
• Jenna is being an OCD pregnant teen. KC is a slacker dad. Jenna feels that KC isn’t taking an active role in the baby’s life, so she drags him to her prenatal class thing. Then some relay race-diaper change game thing that KC won made Jenna feel like she’d be a bad parent. But the instructor lady was like ‘oh you can babysit my son’ and Jenna said yes… but we didn’t see the babysitting actually happen. Next week, maybe?

Season 2 > Season 10. In so many levels. But I’ll wait a few more episodes into season 2 (I’m on like episode 9 or something) for my character review.

Yay

I finally finished my homework. Ish. I have to make one more blog entry for English, but I need someone else to comment first, but the teacher needs to approve it… so yeah. Then I’m going to the mall.

Our laptop charger came yesterday! But another one came today. o.O I just hope my parents don’t think I’m involved for getting it.  

The new Degrassi episode sucked yesterday. I mean, it’s still intense, but the commercials ruin it. Riley and Zane are still together, and Riley’s Mom is in denial about his sexuality, but they spent a lot of time just so we could watch a ‘I’m gay/No you’re not/Yes I am’ scene go on for like 5 minutes. If it was an hour long episode, okay, but a 30 minutes episode with 3 plots is NOT where you include recycled lines.

Poor Alli got caught with a cigarette yesterday. Because her friend was like ‘here, hold this while I search my purse for a nonexistant item’ and then Alli’s Mom caught her and Alli’s Mom made Alli confess for ‘smoking’ to the principal. Alli then got a suspension.

And Drew and Bianca. Bianca made a bad impression after calling Jenna an idiot for buying diet pills earlier this season. I actually agree with her, though. Jessica Tyler, Jenna’s actress looks like this:

Although Jenna was preggerz and she didn’t know it, but yeah. Then Jenna and KC were angry with her for the boiler room scandal, but Bianca and Drew appropriately called them out for being teen parents. But yeah. Then Bianca gave Drew drugs before the big game and nothing happened. I mean, Drew’s friends and Mom were pissed, but this is Degrassi. Getting yelled at for doing drugs is too tame.

And next week, Eli and Clare are back.

Another Degrassi Post

I swear, this blog is gonna turn into a Degrassi episode guide by summer. xD
I only have 3 episodes left to watch in Season 1, and there was a new episode on last night. You know what that means!
Season 1


Like
Ashley- She treats Liberty like a younger sister (Basketball Diaries, Rumors and Reputations), she has a nice personality, she hasn't done anything really unlikeable yet, and Melissa Mcintyre is really pretty. That sounded awkward. Pretty? It feels like a third grader said it. But beautiful is too much. And I don't like the phrase 'hot' because it objectifies people. So... attractive? Side note; there's a girl named Ashley in my school who looks like her and has the same overachieving personality. o.O
Paige- Paige really improved since last week. She was actually nice to people (Emma when she got her first... yeah) and she sounded sincere when she tried to comfort Ashley when she found out her father was gay. The blaming Hazel for the Grapevine thing was kind of stupid, but Hazel's a minor character so far, so I guess nobody got hurt.
Terri- She hasn't really been in the spotlight since last week. However, she told Ashley to not sleep with Jimmy if she wasn't ready for it. Ashley just told her that she doesn't know anything about relationships because she's never been asked out. I wanted to hug poor Terr-bear. :(
Liberty- What did Libz do since last week to improve her rating? She had no public speaking skills in Basketball Diaries, which made me relate to her. I wanted to hug her in the entire episode of Rumors and Reputations. And she warned Emma not to publish the rant on cheerleading if she wanted to stay friends with Manny. Basically, she's been a good friend and she's played 'the dorky girl' quite well.
Sean- I don't really know why I like him. But he seems to be a nice love interest (Do they call them love interests if they're a main character?) for Emma and he's kind of multi dimensional so far. I thought he'd be more emo-ish about being held back, but that hasn't been brought up yet, so let's hope that the writers forgot about that plot. I thought he would hate girls like Emma and would be more interested in.... wait, it's season one. There's no flirty girl with a bad rep yet.
Emma- She acted so awkward in a cute way in the episode Friday Night. I thought she overreacted in the episode Coming of Age until I learned that she was PMSing. I understood where she came from in the episode Rumors and Reputations for unintentionally starting a rumor because somebody misinterpreted her, seeing as I've been there. I don't like how it feels like she's a Mary Sue so far, but the writers haven't been so unbalanced yet.
Neutral
JT- His stereotype of gay people really annoyed me in Secrets and Lies. And his class clown-liness is annoying. The best way to describe him is the annoying little brother, but he's not actually anyone's brother, so... yeah.
Manny- She managed to avoid having a real plot until the 12th episode, Wannabe. Then she actually had an episode and I got bored. She's just the mandatory ethnic sidekick who wisecracks and gives advice, so far. We don't know her personality In fact, in the last character recap, I forgot to summarize her until the comments. That's how forgettable she is. Is she a feminist? Athletic? Does she itemize herself? Does she stand up to protect her rights? Is she good in school? Is she the popular friend? Is she outgoing? Well, I can't answer anything now. I just know she was born in 1989 (I think) in the Philippines as of Coming of Age.
Jimmy- He's kind of redeemed himself, but the whole Miss Kwan thing made me dislike him. I want to know if he's so close with Ashley, why was it a plot point only in The Mating Game and Coming of Age? He's pretty boring, actually. I guess I just don't like Drake.
Dislike
Spinner- Bullying Miss Kwan, the lunchroom incident, forcing Jimmy into sleeping with Ashley... yeah, let's just say I don't like Spinner.
Toby- He treated Ashley's Dad's homosexuality like it was a terminal illness, his crush on Emma and how he almost destroyed Ashley's and Jimmy's relationship are all reasons why I dislike Toby.

And last night's episode:
Drew can't get a date because of his boiler room activities with Bianca. So then he goes out with Bianca because he's desperate. Then his teammates and their girlfriends (AKA a pregnant girl, the father, a shallow kid and a new freshman) all judged Bianca, and she feels like she doesn't feel accepted. Next time don't cheat, honey. Next week, apparently Bianca gives Drew drugs? Right before the big game? I hope this plot is more interesting than it sounds.
Riley gets invited to an art museum place thing by Zane, but Riley doesn't wanna go. Zane guilt trips him into it, and then Riley meets Zane's ex over there. After a pseudo love triangle there, Riley goes home. Zane goes into his room and assures him that they're still together, or something. Then Riley's Mom walks in on them making out and is shocked, appalled and so on. Unfortunately, there are only about 90 seconds left in this week's episode, so we'll have to wait until next week for her full reaction! :/
And in the shoe-horned C plot, Alli befriends a girl from her... religious circle (I forgot the correct term D:) at her new private school and then invites her over. Alli's family likes her. Unfortunately, Alli's friend is way worse than Alli, because she sneaks out, smokes and so on. Alli's friend then leaves Alli's house to meet her boyfriend because her parents won't let her see him and going over to Alli's house would be the perfect opportunity to see him. Alli promises to leave the door unlocked, and feels disappointed that she doesn't have a real friend yet.
I predict that Alli's friend will leave things like a positive pregnancy test or a cigarette in Alli's room and then one day Alli's Mom will clean her bedroom and think Alli is the pregnant one and the smoker, and Alli will be shipped off to boarding school for real. I think Alli's actress films another show, so it isn't too far fetched.

I Never Thought I Would Say This…

But I think I became a soap opera addict. xD Okay, well, teen soap opera. Degrassi. For those of you who don’t know what it is, it’s basically a Canadian high school/town and the lives of It’s students. It used to be ‘good’, like with real issues and plots and stuff, but after American parents got all angry, so they had to turn it down a little. Now it’s just another teen soap opera. Well, they still have ‘issues’, but it’s not as scandalous anymore, if that makes sense.

But yeah. It all started out when I didn’t have anything to watch on Nick @ Nite or TVLand, and I remembered that we have TeeNick now, so I checked what was on, and it was Degrassi. I never thought I would like it and I thought it would be fun to make fun of them, but… yeah, that didn’t work out. I watched like 4 episodes last night, and 6 today. I’m such a soap opera junkie.

I guess I also like that it’s on TeeNick. I like how now it’s not just random reruns of Nick’s library from the 90’s, but they have a ‘theme’, if that makes sense. They know it’s for teens, not preteens who think they’re cool, or people in their 20’s who still live at home and sit in their pajamas all day. Seriously. The old The N used to have a lot of texting commercials, and promotions for Nickelodeon shows on. And those online college commercials. There was this one girl in the commercials who claimed people who went to online colleges only went to online college so they could be in their pajamas all day. :/

And that was just the COMMERCIALS. The actual shows on were either iCarly, True Jackson VP, and whatever else you could normally watch on Nickelodeon. I don’t know about other people, but The N was a premium channel for me, so I got annoyed when I saw Miranda Cosgrove on yet another channel. Or even worse, shows from the 90s which I’ve NEVER seen anyone complain about missing, like all of those game shows. At least All That and stuff were well known. But most of these short lived game shows were just irritating. Now, they have Ned’s Declassified (Which is like one of my favorite shows of all time), Drake & Josh (Which is still somehow relevant after like 3 or 4 years of cancellation), Zoey 101, What I like about you (I have a feeling Dan Schneider forced them to do it), That 70’s show (Which I never grew to like, but whatever), Degrassi, and some other show called Gigantic.

I guess I also like it compared to it’s competition, ABC Family. ABC Family also has syndication (except it’s older and ABC-owned, with exceptions like That 70’s show) and teen ‘dramas’, like Secret Life of an American Teenager (Or that pregnant show, if you’ve seen ads), Pretty Little Liars (Or the one with the real-live bratz dolls lying down on the ground) and so on. There aren’t texting commercials, either! But… the commercials are aimed at women. I’m not sexist, but it’s awkward to watch commercials about air fresheners, breakfast foods, microwavable stuff, and dog food. Oh, and… female hygiene stuff. At least TeeNick has ProActive and stuff.

TeeNick is also nice because it’s a nice escape from overexposed tween stars. It’s nice to not see a Miranda Cosgrove anything in between iCarly episodes, or not seeing Big Time Rush or Victorious on every second of the day. Degrassi has like 20 characters credited in their theme song, and each episode only revolves around a few of the kids, so it’s not like they try fitting in everyone everyday, and I don’t get bored from watching the same characters over and over again. Then again, I watched a marathon, so I’d just wait an hour or so to see ‘my’ characters. If I’d be watching once a week, I’d hate to wait a month to see plots I care about. But I heard they’re trying out an episode a night, so… yeah. But if the main audience is high schoolers, I could see how someone could lose track of the show easily.

So, would I recommend Degrassi? If you can handle sappy drama, fake romances and issues, and unrealistically attractive people, then yes. But do to all the kissing and ‘I think I’m ready for my first time’ plots, I have to change the channel or mute when my parents come in the room, so don’t expect wholesome stuff. It’s extremely easily to get hooked to, too.

And here’s a character from Degrassi that looks like they have Custom content hair.

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I guess that’s how NewSea wanted it to look.

I finished half of my homework, so now I have to type up my cell project and actually do it. The weather isn’t that bad over here, today.