GRΣΣK – Chapter Two + The Secret
Life of the American Teenager – Season One (ABC/Disney DVDs)
Picture:
B- Sound: B- Extras: C Episodes: C+
Teen
drama is nothing new to television and in the same vein Greek and The Secret Life of
the American Teenager are nothing new to television either. Both series appear on ABC Family and are about as deep as everything else that appears on
that network (you can decide what that means).
This reviewer was not impressed with Greek: Chapter One and Chapter
Two is simply more of the same unentertaining, pseudo-college antics. Greek attempts
to be a ‘family friendly’ version of Animal
House and once again fails to bring anything new to the party in its
sophomore year. There are moments here
and there of quality television, but overall is disappointing. The
Secret Life of the American Teenager is a fairly new series that premiered
in July of 2008 and differs from Greek as
it embraces a dramatic storyline as opposed to Greek’s campy college comedy.
The Secret Life of the American
Teenager stars 17 year old Shailene Woodley as 15 year old Amy Boykewich; a
naïve pregnant teen just beginning to understand what life is all about. The series also stars Molly Ringwald (Pretty in Pink) as Amy’s mother, Anne,
who herself hasn’t quite figured out what she wants from life; having children
early in life and being unhappy in her marriage.
The Secret Life of the American
Teenager chronicles
the life of Amy and her friends as they go through the hardships of teen life
at Grant High School. There is not much
more to it than that. With Season 1 being 11 episodes long, the
story of the ridiculously dramatic teens slowly evolves to explain where each
character is coming from and how they are all involved (overly involved) in each
others’ lives. The series is well acted,
but the scripts, whereas occasionally realistic, are more so overdone.
To read
more about GRΣΣK – Chapter One
please follow the link below:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6804/GREEK+%E2%80%93+Chapter+One
The
technical features on these two television series are nowhere near as dramatic
as the storylines. The picture on both
sets is presented in a 1.78 X 1 Anamorphic Widescreen that has bright colors,
solid blacks, and an overall crisp image.
The only complaint as far as the picture is that there is on occasion is
some apparent grain and brief light/dark issues. The sound is presented in a Dolby Digital 5.1
Surround Sound that mostly comes from the front, as neither series has much
action and is primarily dialogue based.
The sound is adequate for what both series require.
The
extras on both series are not very impressive, either being too sparse or too
boring. Greek offers up a total of four special features including
Bloopers, Flashback Episode: “And so it
Begins,” a Music Video – Natural
Disaster by The Plain White T’s, and some not so exhilarating Audio
Commentaries. The Secret Life of the American Teenager has even less special
features than Greek only offering
one featurette entitled On Set with the
Cast, which gives a simple look behind the scenes of the new drama
series. Overall, both these ABC Family
series fail to impress with their lackluster special features.
I heavily
criticized Greek last season for
being like a ‘bad straight to DVD American
Pie sequel’ and not much has changed.
The series is a light and airy, teen comedy that is uninspiring in every
way (including laughs). The Secret Life of the American Teenager is
slightly better with its solid cast and a more in depth storylines, but still
has many shortcomings as it just ends up being drab. Both series seemingly have a good following
with high ratings, but with the television scene being over saturated with
other teen dramas like 90210 they
better watch out or these players may just lose their pledge pins.
- Michael P. Dougherty II
