So I have heard about how horrible this show, on MTV is, and how teenagers shouldn’t watch it. So I checked out he first episode on YouTube.
I didn’t think it was so bad. Well-acted and scripted. I think it depends on the kid, and I don’t have kids, but I think I’d rather my 16-year-old watch that than Survivor or Deal-No Deal. Or a lot of other stuff. I’ve never seen Jersey Shore, but I think I’d probably rather my kid watch Skins than JS. I dunno. Maybe I should watch it and find out.
Am I being naive? Again, it depends on the kid.
The kids seem pretty clueless - we sure didn’t have to go to a whorehouse to buy weed from some creepy psycho. And we didn’t have to plot and plan so much to get a friend laid. But I’m not sure that watching clueless kids makes a kid with a clue clueless.
The MTV version is a remake of the original British version. In my experience, American remakes are always inferior. I watched a few of the original British eppies on BBC America. It was too over the top for my tastes, but I did appreciate the complexity, less restricted censorship, and superior acting and directing … as I do in nearly all Brit productions.
Another great Brit show is “Being Human.” There’s a Canadian remake being shown on SyFy and it’s horrible in comparison.
My suggestion is to stick with the original British versions of anything. There’s an energy for greatness, creativity, complexity, and really superior acting that just hardly ever exists in America. The actors aren’t nearly as plasticized either.
I would loosely echo these sentiments. The first british series I would recommend if that’s your thing, but the quality deteriorates as the series’ progress.
In response to the OP.
If I had kids, I wouldn’t let them watch it. It’s pretty trashy, and sexualised, but what isn’t these days? I t does reflect youth culture in that respect. Perhaps in saying that kids shouldn’t watch it people are showing how out of touch with youth culture, either that or they don’t want to add fuel to the fire consuming moral degradation, which might be the same thing.
All I do know is that if people are saying kids shouldn’t watch it, then it’s going to be hit, and that I’d rather kids watch Skins than Twilight.
Skins is like an anatomically correct nude statue, while Twilight is one with a fig leaf covering the genitals and haircovering the breasts. If your going to watch crap, then watch something a little closer to reality and with a bit of depth at least.
I watched the first series when it was ‘cool’ here in England, and it was pretty good. But then they killed off a lot of the cast and re-cast basically everybody, now it is shit.
The Office has always had a huge place in my heart, the American re-make is different but also good.
This is well thought and stated I think, though I haven’t seen Twilight. Another Brit show I watched for a while was Shameless, but again it was too over the top for me as well. What I like to do is see what the trend is and how the acting goes. Once I get that, then I will lose interest if the show itself doesn’t appeal to me, and that’s what happened with Skins and Shameless.
I’m watching Downton Abbey now, which of course is light years different from those two. It’s showing on PBS here, and it’s kind of grown on me in a way I never expected because I wasn’t much grabbed at first. Maggie Smith literally makes the show, though, so I’ve been sticking with it and plan to see it through all five episodes, two more to go. I also want to see the Brit remake of Upstairs, Downstairs. That was a fantastic series from the 70’s. Word is that it’s better than Downton Abbey, but I’m not sure that anything can surpass the original.
That reminds me. I was watching a few minutes of Toddlers and Tiaras, and some of it was in Austin. All I’ve heard is that Austin is a cool town, so this is no reflection on Austin as a whole, but some of it was set there. One of the most offensive shows on TV.
Well, I can’t say it’s the show, per se, because they are evidently documenting stuff that happens IRL. But that’s stuff is embarrassing. I mean, it’s one of those things that embarrasses on a species-wide basis. Unless this is a wholly american thing.
Oh, so I just saw a vid that compares the first episodes of the two shows, and it looks like the US version is just like the Brit version, except in the american vernacular. So, I guess I’ve “seen” it. I don’t know where it goes from here, but I still think it’s not that bad a show.
I have known kids who were more screwed up than that. Kids use drugs and kids have sex. In the show I saw, they were using weed. Maybe there’s more drugs to come, but we used a lot more than weed when I was 16 or 17. And they seem to be having sex a lot. We did, every chance we got. I was not promiscuous, but many were.
I read that one bad scene was when they drove an SUV into the river. When it happened in Risky Business, everyone laughed. No one was in it, true. But I’ve done more dangerous stuff than that - I once wound up on top of a stone wall (in a car). I was lucky that the car landed on the top of the wall (I don’t know how - I had passed out behind the wheel, drunk). If you saw it in a movie, you wouldn’t believe it. I was a little older than 17 - maybe 19 or 20. But still. Kids do dumb stuff. In many ways, I was wilder than these kids, and now everyone here thinks I’m a square.
I guess my point is that there’s always something that white, suburban parents can panic about. While their kids eat their prescription drugs like peanuts, drink their scotch like Evian and give blowjobs as a secret handshake.
I’m not familiar with that show. To me, Austin is a cool, funky, green mecca in a very toxic world. The weather here is marvelous, and nobody is a stranger. Motto: Keep Austin Weird. Texas as a whole, though, is batshit crazeeee.
