(no subject)

[aphrodite_mine]

so whatever, i wasn't going to post about skins us because skins fandom already hates me for a variety of reasons, but this my journal and you all can unfriend me if it hurts you that much. cry moar. etc.

i was legitimately trying to give this show a shot, and the second episode is always better than the pilot, right? skins us is no exception. it deviates from the uk pilot/plot/script, obviously, since it focuses on the one character who doesn't have a uk counterpart. and i dig tea, don't get me wrong. she's unique. she's hot.

and it took me till this episode to come up with legitimate reasons not to tune in (i.e. reasons that weren't 'oh hai its just copying off the uk version and its not doing very good lol') do you care? probably not. whatever. read on, or don't.

spoilers.


1. bad/lazy writing. last week had them using british phrases, this week had a conversation between tea and her dad that consisted of "blah blah, dad" "blah blah, kid" "blah blah, dad" "blah blah, tea" "blah blah, dad" "blah blah, kid" i almost threw up
2. rough acting. i know these are kids. i know they haven't acted before. but why the fuck did you hire them? just based on their looks? there is supposed to be an audition process!
3. the whitest multicultural cast i've ever seen. sure, abbud is legitimately brown, but daisy, cadie, and betty are the lightest-skinned blacks i've seen on television in a long time. and all in one cast, it really can't be a coincidence. [not by a long shot trying to imply that the only real black character is 'dark' or anything, i just think that it's implying something about the way an american teen should look/want to look according to mtv's aesthetic]
4. bad/lazy writing part 2. i know skins isn't always on the cutting edge of everything (hell, uk gen 1 had the original mad le dong or whatever his name was in that incarnation) but maudlin tear-jerking ww2 stories about lesbian grandmas is just playing for emotions, and that's flat out lazy writing. win over the populace with emotions? sure! but you won't win over anyone already taking a critical eye. that scene could have been moving sans over-the-top narration, thank you.
5. personal triggers. not likely to become an issue again and actually wasn't an issue during watching due to crappy editing and censorship, but tea and tony's drunken hook up/sex made me flip on this shit instantly. i went from saying "oh i wish my first time with a guy had preemptively ended with me laughing and saying you think the girls like that?" and hi-tailing it out of there to freaking the fuck out "oh god they actually did" and basically wanting to die all over again.

Comments

[youreyesaregems.livejournal.com]

As you know, I am right there with you. The acting was baaad, if anything worse this episode than the last.

Sorry about the triggering, especially if that was from my post. I have many feelings about is hook up and what an asshole move it was by the writers, but I don't think they belong here.

I've been chewing over the WWII/McCarthyism story ever since I watched the episode. Maybe it wasn't manipulative/designed to tug on viewers' heartstrings? Maybe it was well-meaning but just terribly written? I'm not sure the story 'belonged' here anyway - as in it felt very shoehorned in, inorganic, and basically inauthentic. It was just so badly done.

[aphrodite-mine.livejournal.com]

It would have sunk in eventually, I think. So thanks to your post, and thanks to you, for not letting me go on in ignorance because of shitty editing.

I like a lot of what you said in deleted comments about the WWII storyline, too, jsyk. :)

Off topic bright side? I got 'Cracks' for Christmas (just delivered, because ebay is dubious) so once I finish all these redonkulous fandom charity fic, I can pick your brain about that. (I've only seen it once so far, and I'm horrible about retaining canon.)

[youreyesaregems.livejournal.com]

Pick away! Excited to see what you do with it.

[sisterjune.livejournal.com]

awww I really hoped t his wouldn't suck. i was kind of defending the idea at the start since if the US didnt rip off brit shows and do their own thing with it we'd have never got jefferson and son or The office. but it seems this is another life on mars situation where the UK version is far superior. well for s1-2 anyway. cant speak on s3-4 since i kind of hated them alot. (yet i STILL WATCHED IT ALL)

[aphrodite-mine.livejournal.com]

I can't speak for how other people feel about the show (honestly, there are a lot of Skins UK fans that are quite into the US version) but I feel like I take pride in my critical eye and just can't deal with this.