Freaks and Geeks

Freaks and Geeks

In 2013, I watched a show filmed in 1999 about the early 1980’s.  Yes, I’m a Time Traveler, because that’s over 3 decades of history being covered.  Not only that, but this time travel allows you to see many stars when they were young, such as Seth Rogen, James Franco, Jason Segel, and my favorite John Francis Daley (Dr. Lance Sweets from Bones).  The best episodes of the show were written by Judd Apatow, who has written many great comedies since then, including “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.”

The show focuses on the Weirs, Lindsay and Sam.  Lindsay is a junior in high school, while Sam is her younger brother as a Freshman.  After a hinted at traumatic event, Lindsay starts burning out from school and hanging out with the “Freaks” of the school.  Sam himself is a geek, and is just trying to get used to school.  While there were some anachronisms, the show seemed to be pretty true for an era that I held in high regard despite not being in High School at the time.

The show starts off as if its a bunch of after school specials.  Episodes about premarital sex, drugs, skipping classes, and all those evil things high school students say.  Everything is given the hype that was instilled in the age, such as the father repeatedly saying “I know someone who did X, and you know where they are now?  Dead!”  Most episodes has Sam having to live in the fear of whatever X is, and freaking out, while Lindsay is being forced to deal with it.   As Lindsay is one of the main character, she rarely directly does any of the bad things, but has to deal with her friends and their actions and how they reflect on her.

Its cute and fun...for awhile.  Unfortunately, mid-season, I started getting bored.  The shows, while not formulaic, were predictable.  Lindsay’s friends are going to do something stupid, Lindsay is going to get dragged into it, and Sam is going to deal with a related problem.  The after-school specialness drug on, and I almost left the show.

I stuck with it though, and the let set of episodes is worth it.  Judd Apatow takes over the writing, and it dramatically gets better.  The issues are no longer just “don’t do drugs,” but actual real issues, such as finding out your best friends father is cheating on your best friends mom, and how to deal with that.  Sam and Lindsay’s plot lines are no longer parallel, and the side characters begin to learn and change.  The show also stops being so episodic, and more serial.

The show was cancelled after only 19 episodes.  I understand why it was; it simply got boring in the middle.  It was in competition with That 70’s Show at the time, which while much more silly, was also much more consistently entertaining. At the same time, I find it unfortunate that Freaks and Geeks did get cancelled.  Middle of the show I was ready to quit, but that final episode made me want so much more.  I wanted to know where the characters were going.  The issues they started to deal with were real and not just a bunch of silly stoners.  Under Apatow, I could see the show having been as good as The Wonder Years.  But, it didn’t learn to fly until it was too late.

My recommendation level for this show:  If you’re bored, or really want to see a young Dr. Lance Sweets.  It was entertaining, it was cute, and it had potential to be super cute and emotional... but it never got the chance to develop that way.  It could have been a show that would get me to cry, like The Wonder Years or Scrubs’ finale... but it wasn’t.  So it ends with cute, it ended up being worth my time to watch.  I also understand why it got cancelled.