"Do I have to do splits? I'm a Christian." - Mary Cherry (Leslie Grossman) at cheerleader tryouts
Popular: First Impression, First Season DVD Review
By A.J. Carson
The Sharks vs. the Jets in West Side Story? Kid's stuff. The Outsiders' Greasers against their arch rivals, the Socs? A cakewalk. To see real action, get a load of the Glamazons vs. the Outcasts at Jacqueline Kennedy High School in Popular: First Impression, First Season. When the perfectly manicured nails and tufts of meticulously bleached hair start to fly, you'll know what truly vicious fighting is all about.
Brainy Sam McPherson (Carly Pope) is the editor of the school newspaper, The Zapruter Report, and the unofficial leader of the outcasts. Carmen Ferrara (Less Than Perfect's Sara Rue) is bubbly and optimistic. Maybe too optimistic: she dreams of being a cheerleader despite being overweight. Lily Esposito (Tamara Mello) is a budding activist who takes on each and every cause that pops up during the course of a day. Her vegetarian beliefs are put to the test, however, when she is forced to help out her family by taking a part time job at a chicken joint. Harrison John (Christopher Gorham) is a cute nerd who is hopelessly in love with someone out of his social caste.
The object of Harrison's affection is Brooke McQueen (Leslie Bibb), the beautiful head of the school's pep squad, the Glamazons, and the most popular girl in school. She has a seemingly perfect life. She's dating Josh Ford (Bryce Johnson), the school's handsome quarterback. She also hangs with an extremely tony crowd, including rich-bitch Nicole Julian (Tammy Lynn Michaels), weird (but super rich) transfer student Mary Cherry (Leslie Grossman), and football player "Sugar Daddy" Bernadino (Ron Lester).
Sam and Brooke are archrivals. Sam thinks that the Glamazons are superficial and petty. Brooke resents an expose written by Sam that nearly resulted in the disbanding of the squad. It's about to get a lot harder for the two to avoid each other, though, since Sam's widowed mother (Lisa Darr) and Brooke's divorced father (Scott Bryce) just met while on vacation and have decided to combine their families. Neither girl is quite ready to wave a flag of surrender, though. No, this battle has just begun, and it's about to turn ugly.
Popular is, to put it mildly, a little schizophrenic. Some episodes, especially early ones, are heavy on teen angst. Some of it is effective. Brooke's diary entry in the series' first episode, for example, subtly and efficiently makes us aware of her eating disorder, her self-esteem issues, and her status as a fallible person with real problems. When she writes that "everything I've worked hard for is happening [so] isn't this the part where I'm supposed to be happy?" we realize that she isn't the stereotypical mannequin that most popular TV teens are portrayed as. This is pretty deep stuff on par with such classics as My So-Called Life and Freaks and Geeks. The drama is often undercut, though, by bits of oddness like the episode in which Nicole farts every time she bends over. At times like these, the series cannot seem to decide what it is trying to be.
This is partly explained by creator Ryan Murphy in the commentaries included as extras in this set. He wanted to do the TV equivalent of the movie Heathers while the network wanted a standard teen drama. As the season progressed, he became bored with the show's serious tone and pushed for changes. Later episodes, in which the drama is played down in favor of campy fun, are much more enjoyable. In "Caged!", the boys lock the girls in Kennedy High's bathroom when their raging PMS threatens to erupt in violence. The episode is a deft send-up of women-in-prison flicks, complete with rumbles and catfights. One memorably kooky moment involves the revelation that Mary Cherry has webbed feet.
"All About Adam" is a riff on All About Eve. Hotshot new kid Adam Rothschild-Ryan (Wentworth Miller) befriends the Glamazons in an attempt to become the school's first male cheerleader. When he meets resistance (Mary Cherry thinks it wouldn't be Christian to have a guy touching her butt and looking up her dress when forming a pyramid), Adam decides to get on the squad by any means necessary.
The season's final episode is also its funniest. "Two Weddings and a Funeral" starts off with Nicole and Mary Cherry listing the hackneyed plot devices and stunts they hate to see in the season-ending episodes of their favorite teen dramas: weddings, pregnancies, deaths, gratuitous nudity, appearances by boy bands, etc. The episode then proceeds to use each of those plot devices with gleeful abandon. This is the hysterically over-the-top soap parody we wish the entire series would be. With its frequent musical numbers, parodies of and tributes to musicals and craptacular films (Grease and Chicago in "Two Weddings," Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? in "We are Family"), and wacky humor, the series often excels as high camp.
Popular is extraordinarily gay friendly. In addition to its overall camp attitude, Harrison's mom (The Wonder Years' Alley Mills) is gay ("Wild Wild Mess" and "Ch-Ch-Changes"), Lily admits that she has questioned her sexuality ("Caged!"), and Nicole learns that calling someone "Homo" isn't very nice ("Booty Camp"). Biology teacher Bobbi Glass (Northern Exposure's Diane Delano) is so butch the kids call her "Sir." Delano brings sexual ambiguity to new heights when she takes on the roles of Bobbi's more feminine sister, Jessie, and their brother, an Army drill sergeant. The excellent "Ch-Ch-Changes" centers on the gang's shop teacher, Mr. Don (Louis Mustillo), who one day announces that when the kids next see him, he'll be Ms. Debbie. This stellar episode manages to be funny and heartfelt, sometimes at the same time. For a show that wears its gayness on its sleeve, however, it's disappointing that none of the students are gay. Sure, Adam Rothschild-Ryan is gay-ish, but he only shows up in two episodes.
Several familiar faces guest star in Popular's first season. Chad Lowe (Life Goes On) plays Sam's journalism teacher in the show's first few episodes before disappearing with no explanation. Party of Five's Mitchell Anderson guests as a gay teacher in several episodes. Clea DuVall (Carnival) plays Wanda Rickets, a mental patient from Adam Rothschild-Ryan's past in "All About Adam" and "Ch-Ch-Changes." Robert Gant (Queer as Folk) becomes the school's new vice-principal in "Lord of the Files." Former Twin Peaks cast mates Peggy Lipton and Ray Wise appear as Brooke's runaway mom and her new husband in "What Makes Sammy Run."
The best guest casting, however, has to be Delta Burke as Mary Cherry's mom, Cherry Cherry. Playing the role as an extension of her Designing Women character, Burke is perfectly cast. Mary Cherry is a weird and vivid comic creation (one character even asks if she's retarded), and it makes perfect sense that her mom would essentially be Suzanne Sugarbaker. Things become even wackier when Cherry Cherry becomes engaged to CHiPS' Eric Estrada (playing himself). Their wedding ceremony ("Man, I haven't felt this jittery since I was on the People's Choice Awards back in '77") is one of the comic highlights of the season's final episode.
The twenty-two episodes that make up the first season of Popular are divided onto six discs. The discs are housed in three clear keepcases. The discs snap onto hubs on the inside front and inside back cover of each keepcase. When the keepcase is closed, they lie face to face. The discs have a difficult time staying attached to the hubs, so viewers should take great care when opening (or even transporting) this set. The front covers feature photos of the cast - Josh and Brooke on disc one, Sam and the outcasts on disc two, and Brooke and the other popular kids on disc three. The backs of the cases feature episode titles, plot synopses, and writing and directing credits. Because the cases are clear, the double-sided coversheets show through to the inside of the case. The interiors are simply decorated with bold, solid colors. The discs themselves feature headshots of the actors backed with bold colors. The three keepcases slide into a cardboard outer sleeve. The front of the sleeve features a picture of Brooke and Sam.
The DVD menus feature static pictures of the cast as well as music from the series. Viewers can watch individual episodes or use the "play all" feature. The episodes are divided into chapters, but there are no scene selection menus.
