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First Episode Review

Written by Suzanne

So far I've just watched the first episode of the show; I plan to watch the four other episodes are available online sometime this week.  If I weren't a very devoted soap fan, I'm not sure I would have kept watching after the first episode. To be fair, though, it's aimed at teens (and perhaps not very bright ones), and I'm 50.

The show is about a teenaged girl, Loren, who has a crush on a rock star, Eddie, who is coming to her home town (Los Angeles).  She wants to be a songwriter and singer like him one day, although she is kind of shy.  She and her friend Melissa are excited about seeing Eddie's concert. So far, this is the plot for the cartoon "Rockin' with Judy Jetson" that I reviewed last year, and not too fondly.

We also learn about Loren and Melissa's families, and Eddie and his girlfriend, and some other people. These are the people in this soap. The odd thing is that I think they are all roughly the same age, even though some are still in high school and some are not. It's fairly normal for a teenaged girl to have a crush on a rock star, but if that rock star reciprocates, it's kind of creepy, no matter what age he is. But they anticipated that to a certain extent because Loren is a senior, so at least she is not under-age, if she ever does get together with Eddie.

I don't think that Cody Longo was the best choice as the star of the show. I don't think he has enough charisma to pull this role off, and he's not that masculine (to me). But what do I know, since I'm not a teenager? Maybe they find him to be hot.  The other problem is that he looks like he might be losing his hair, but perhaps that's just the way they styled it in the first episode. As is common on TV shows about teens, he is a little chubby-faced, probably to make him look younger. To me he just looks chubby. I think they should have picked someone a little sexier.

I wish I could say that it's really good and that I love it, or that it is as good as "Savannah" or any of the other soaps I've loved in the past.  Just based on the one episode, though, it's very bland and insipid, with few surprises or anything too exciting. Just because someone is a teenager doesn't mean they want to watch something that's simplistic and just filled with pretty people. I didn't think the show was bad or boring, just okay.

The show has a lot of music, sung by Eddie and others. Loren sings, too, so I'm sure we will get to hear her sing more in future episodes. She has a good voice. The music is kind of bland, too, but again, I'm not the right age to judge that.

On the good side, it does have a great multi-racial and multi-generational cast, and the actors are very good. Many of them, like the two stars Cody Longo (Eddie) and Brittany Underwood (Loren), have worked for years on soap operas and other shows, honing their gifts. I'm glad that Brittany, who was so great on One Life to Live, has her own show. I am enjoying seeing Grayson McCouch (Don), even if it does seem to be a minor role as one of the teens' dads. He is always great, and gorgeous.  The show's executive producer is Jill Faren Phelps, who was just fired from "General Hospital" and has been producer and writer on many daytime soap operas. Also, James Franco will play a small roll, so that will be great to see.

You might ask why I'm bothering to watch the show or create a whole section of our site for it if I don't think much of the show. Well, for one thing, I've only seen one episode, so I'm going to watch more and see if it gets better. That does happen sometimes. For another, I'm hoping that it is really successful and helps save the soap opera genre. It would be great if other cable channels started their own soap operas, since the major networks keep canceling them.

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Page updated 6/22/12