Greetings,
I certainly always considered myself a very precocious child. I was always attracted to things far beyond my years, be they movies, books, or television shows. But I can admit freely that, every so often, I could fall into certain traps. One of those was a little show called Saved By the Bell. Yes, I was a very big fan of the show in my youth. What can I say? I fell for the idea that what they showed me was what high school actually was, and I couldn't wait until I was old enough to go because, of course, it was going to be exactly like Bayside. Spoiler Alert! It wasn't!! No, no, my high school experience was nothing like that of the kids on Saved By the Bell. I mean, we never stole another team's mascot or got addicted to "drugs" to pass our geometry tests or lost our pet duck to an oil spill. Oh, and, as crazy as this may sound, our principal was actually smarter than us kids. Weird, I know. But like I said, I got sucked in. And I got sucked in enough to follow this group of kids all the way to college. Thus, bringing us to our subject today, Saved By the Bell: The College Years.
Okay, if you don't know this, Saved By the Bell . . . The High School Years aired originally on Saturday mornings in amongst a boatload of cartoons and was, therefore, aimed at a very young audience. Probably an audience younger than the characters. I'm not sure if a ton of actual high school kids watched this show, most likely having developed a taste for something more mature, like Beverly Hills, 90210. But after Zack, Slater, Screech, Kelly, Jessie and Lisa graduated from high school, they decided to spin off the show and move it to prime time. Unfortunately, when writing the episodes, I think they often forgot that they were no longer on Saturday mornings. More on that later. Let's get to the actual set up of the show.
After graduation, Zack, Slater and Screech decide to go to college together in California, despite Zack getting in to Yale, Slater getting a full scholarship to Iowa State and Screech being accepted to pretty much every Ivy League school, as it was told to us on this show's predecessor. Yeah, I doubt their parents would have allowed that, but, whatever! The plot of the show says they have to be here. They all attend the fictional California University, which is extremely obviously U.C. Berkeley. In the pilot, we see the three guys we already know, as well as three new girls: Leslie Burke, a tall, intelligent blonde who Zack is immediately interested in, Alex Tabour, a drama student who is, well, very dramatic, (dramatic, in this case, being code for slightly annoying) and Danielle Marks, a girl who clearly comes from a well-to-do family and who has a bit of sass to her. We also meet Mike Rogers, the dorm adviser who is also an ex-football player. I'd tell you to not forget that aspect of his life, but they really never let you. Like ever. EVER!
So, that is the set up of the pilot. In that first episode, of course, Zack tries to pull some shenanigans, but he actually gets punished pretty harshly for it. Mike does remind him that he is not a kid anymore and is no longer in high school. I wish he would have told that to the writers.
After the pilot, they decided to get rid of the character of Danielle and bring back a familiar face, Kelly Kapowski. Oh, I wonder if this might cause some upheaval when it comes to Zack and Leslie's burgeoning relationship. Spoiler Alert again! It does. Yeah, that is a plot point for a little bit of time, but not as long as you'd think. Also, later in the series, they brought in the character of Dean Susan McMann who was miraculously played by Holland Taylor. I say, "miraculous" because being able to get that fantastic actress in this show must have required nothing short of divine intervention. Safe to say, she was the most entertaining person on this thing. And about those aforementioned plots, let's get to some of the ones that were tackled during this series' short run.
Like I said, this show did not try that hard to transition into the more adult audience of prime time. They tried a little, but not much. I think the edgiest thing they did was having Kelly be "involved" with one of her professors. I see a little Valerie Malone was getting awakened at that point. And, then, there was that episode where Slater met a girl who told him he was Mexican, because, I guess he didn't know. Okay...how? And, of course, we got an obligatory "date rape" episode, which really wasn't that at all, but they tried to pass it off as one. Oh, show, you were in WAY over your head on that one. You are so not A Different World. Believe it or not, I think the original Saved By the Bell probably tackled heavier issues than this. Granted, it was on the air longer, but still. And I suppose it was slightly an adult thing that the series ended on a cliffhanger of Zack and Kelly running off to get married. I guess I'm using the term "adult" a bit loosely. As we all know, that led to the TV movie wherein they eloped in Vegas. But that thing is a whole other can of worms that I just cannot open today.
Okay, I guess this leaves us with the one question I always ask. Did this show deserve a second season? I'm going to say no. Although, to be honest, I feel like I should be saying that Saved By the Bell did not deserve a sixth (or possibly seventh) season, because, when you think about it, this show was less of a spin off and more of a continuation of the original. A really inferior continuation at that, and considering the quality of the original? Yeah. I almost feel strange putting this in The One Seasoner's Club, since it barely feels like a standalone series, as many spin offs were able to become. But technically, it is, so I can. Like I said, giving this even one season seems like too much, especially when moving it to the night schedule. It just did not translate to an adult audience. Maybe it could have if they would have put more of an effort into it. Or not.
Look, Saved By the Bell was a high school show for a young audience to air on Saturday mornings, and it should not have left that comfortable little cocoon. It was fine for what it was and should not have attempted to go further. But for us and Bayside and all of the fictional students therein, we will always have the 90's.
Love and full moons,
Becky the Writer
