Ah. Those younger and more vulnerable years. Remember when you were actually concerned about whether or not there'd be a pop quiz? If that guy in your grade who was 5 years older than everyone else was gonna give you and friends shit today? If girls boobs were as soft as they looked? The time of our lives we all try to block from our memories. Let's make a TV show about it!
Ok, so I hope you guys can sense the tongue in cheek quality of those statements. Most people hated middle school. Its a shitty time. You know just enough of the world to get into trouble, but are treated as if you're already a fully functioning adult with a lifetime of experience learned lessons. Your body does crazy things and makes it literally so you can barely function physically, emotionally, or mentally. Plus the schoolwork begins to pile on as it seems every weekend you had some stupid busywork project to do. Yup, sounds like a time I'd rather forget.
Middle school being shitty is practically a universal experience. I know very few people who refer to middle school as a good time in their lives. I'm also aware of how lucky I was. My biggest problems in middle school were nothing compared to what the majority of my friends went through. Or what people go through now. Having worked in a few, I can with no trepidation that it can truly be a heartless place.
That doesn't make it any less of a rite of passage. We've all done it. We all had those feelings of being lost in the crowd, overwhelmed with love for a girl we barely remember the name of, or fighting with our best friend because he sucked at something we were good at and vice versa. Some geniuses in the 80's had an idea to make a television series that encapsulated that sense of middle school confusion perfectly: The Wonder Years.
Set against a backdrop of the late 60s, The Wonder Years follows Kevin Arnold (Fred Savage) through his trials and tribulations in junior high. Most topics get covered at some point and they're all covered relatively well. Along for the ride are Kevin's best friend Paul (although I don't get why they're friends, Kevin is constantly a dick to Paul), his family (that includes parents, asshole older brother, and hippie older sister), the entire school faculty, and most importantly his friend/crush Winnie Cooper. Given that premise, this show could be bland and boring. Each episode could have a sappy moral with a touch of humor no one quite understands why everyone thought it was funny. Full House is the prime example of that. The Wonder Years is the anti-Full House in one key way.
The Wonder Years is good because above all else: it's real. Things don't always end in a nice little package. Hell, they rarely end well for anyone involved. The show is basically a kid finding out sometimes the world is kinda shitty and part of growing up is learning to cope with that. Sure there might be a "moral" to the story, but it's not about that. It's about the emotions and events that lead Kevin there and on from the events of the episode. The show has a voiceover narration that's synced perfectly to what's occurring in the show and Fred Savage's facial expressions portrays a perfect sense of overconfidence, heartbreak, confusion, and every other thought that pops into Kevin's head. The narration script is hysterical and profound in all the right doses. To make things even better, it's set to a soundtrack of fantastic classic rock to help the convey the tone when a narrator just can't explain it well enough.
There's really not a lot to pick apart her but I guess the only problem I have is at each episode you're not sure what the tone is going to be. There's some episodes that are fucking hysterical (Kevin has a Good the Bad and the Ugly Showdown with an ex) and some that are so heavy you're emotionally drained at the end. But if that's the biggest problem you have you've got a damn good show. Its aged pretty well and watching it in the early 2010's it doesn't feel any less relevant than it would have if I had watched it in the 80's
If you've got time, give it a look on Netflix and laugh as you remember how truly confusing and phenomenal this world can be, all at the same time.
What would you do if I sang out of tune?
-Oz
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