00:01:47.080You know, and though I will say, and I'm sure we'll get into it more like my so-called life is unbelievably realistic and so different from 90210. But I still sort of like remember the awe of seeing 90210 for the first time, whereas this was more like, oh, this just seems like this quiet show about this regular girl, which it is. That's what's so cool about it. But at the time, maybe it maybe there's a reason we often have these like sparkly 30 year olds playing teens because they're they inspire awe.
00:02:15.700They inspire so much awe. And I will tell you, look, I was a 90210 girl because they were older. So I mean, I was born in 80. I'm 45 now. Angela Chase was exactly the same age as I was. And that's not sexy, right?
00:02:30.840Oh, no, no, no. It's not. It's not as sexy. It's not as sexy, as you said, as watching 30 year olds do ridiculous things in the state.
00:02:39.720I guess I kind of do get it. It's like, you know, we don't there.
00:02:43.520There's a reason this thing wasn't like taking the culture absolutely by storm at the time, because it's just apparently we just like our teens sexy and not really teen.
00:02:53.280And not teenagers at all. My high school boyfriend was super obsessed with Beverly Hills 90210.
00:02:59.820out he drove a maroon mustang convertible he had dylan mckay's exact haircut i'm not going to post
00:03:06.300that for people because that's not cool to him but it was the same as dylan and brandon okay
00:03:12.040and i thought it was the hunkiest i mean i had a i had their pictures on my walls my boyfriend also
00:03:21.160had that haircut in high school um it just it was like ubiquitous it was like as soon as this hit
00:03:27.940like everyone wanted to be 90210. So iconic. So iconic. And in fact, my high school superlative
00:03:33.620was most likely to be Brenda Walsh. I don't know what that means. I don't know what that means
00:03:37.940either. That's crazy. But I guess congrats. So yeah, we need to do a 90210 rewatch. For sure.
00:03:45.360For sure. You haven't written a book on 90210. I feel like you've written a book on like every
00:03:48.720show that I love. So I just have to double check. Not. No, I think it would be interesting,
00:03:53.620but I won't get into the weeds on this. You know, these books are at least partially based on like
00:03:57.680interviews with the people behind them. And I think that would be quite the feat to wrangle.
00:04:04.520It really would. Although I think Jenny Garth would be into it. She's very accessible these0.93
00:04:09.420days. Yes. And I don't know if you watched that weird 90210 revisit. Of course I did.
00:04:16.000That was truly one of my favorite things that's happened of the past decade in pop culture. Like
00:04:20.640it was so bananas that I could not get enough. And it was so bad. It was so bad. Like it was
00:04:26.600not good but it was just so watchable nonetheless i know it truly was so okay back to my so-called
00:04:33.660life although again you'll come back and we'll we'll dig in dig into the bev uh it is about a
00:04:40.540normal girl and i think that that was it also felt like a little bit of an antidote to 90210
00:04:47.160for sure because she was so much more accessible to me i'm like oh like i'm not a rich kid and i
00:04:53.280do live in the suburbs of Pennsylvania her life is actually more like mine than those people so I
00:05:00.380did I did love it but and we said this when I was talking about the first two episodes I actually
00:05:06.360think I got more into it when the reruns were on MTV when they were on death all the time correct
00:05:11.260me too that's exactly my memory as well and I've revisited a couple times since then just as a
00:05:19.740television critic and expert. And I kind of feel like it just it gets better with age. And I don't
00:05:25.620know if that's my age or if it's a sensibility that we've come to in television that now we
00:05:30.720really admire. But I think back then it was like hard to break through when you had those splashier
00:05:36.780teens elsewhere. Truth. And in fact, I would almost compare my so-called life to like 30
00:05:43.480something except for 14 year olds no it's no there was we don't do this vibe and i wish i could tell
00:05:49.980you what it is it's the 30 something vibe it's like they put a 30 something filter on these shows
00:05:55.200and they just become that and i remember this being such i guess it makes sense 30 something
00:05:59.460was a sensation this was kind of almost its own genre back then and i always liked it it's kind
00:06:04.880of the sort of cozy semi-realistic still a little gauzy drama like take i mean takes on some subject
00:06:13.460but at the same time it just it felt a little homier instead of glitzy right yes when and
00:06:22.700anytime I rewatch it especially I think it strikes me more it's like I guess it makes me nostalgic
00:06:27.600and it really like you said even though these exact things didn't happen to me it always makes
00:06:32.340me think about my own high school time granted it was also in the 90s so there you go um and it
00:06:38.140really feels I'm just like it just immediately evokes that time for me. And I guess 90210 does
00:06:44.420in its own way. But this feels like I'm watching my own life somehow, which I clearly they were
00:06:49.480going for, which clearly they were going for. And I think I got to say, to me, it feels like it
00:06:55.300holds up. It's still enjoyable to me. How did a rewatch feel for you? Oh, I every time I'm telling
00:07:02.200you, I don't know if I just forget and then remember again how good it was or if I genuinely
00:07:07.240feel every time I watch it like it gets better to me because honestly I was like almost screaming
00:07:13.320at times this time because I was just like I'm mad that this is so good I just think and really
00:07:18.940of course I mean I'm not even a parent and yet like so identified with the parents now right
00:07:24.600oh my god that stuff is incredible like I don't think I understood that I don't think I understood
00:07:30.260how well done no I thought the parents were so boring right it was always like oh god can we
00:07:36.100fast forward through this part but the mom stuff especially i mean both really in the first couple
00:07:42.320episodes is so so good and real and is you know the way they're sort of like part of her sort of
00:07:50.060system of life but also not is so interesting and that talk that mom has with her about like
00:07:58.080are you having sex with jordan my god i know all right we have to recap what the episode is about
00:08:03.120really quickly and I found this episode really interesting to re-watch I've watched re-watched0.97
00:08:11.200the pilot a few times and I don't know if I've re-watched this one as much as I have the other
00:08:16.220ones because the gun stuff really punched me in the gut because we live with gun violence
00:08:22.540every day it's right now right yeah and we talk we talk about it as if it's a new thing
00:08:29.160but this is a whole episode about a gunshot going off in school and like all of the repercussions
00:08:38.180of that and i'm like oh my gosh i mean of course of course this was still a thing back then i mean
00:08:43.340and also there's the famous gun episode of 90210 right so they weren't that's isn't it interesting
00:08:48.400though because i have the same feeling of like as if we never spoke of guns in schools before
00:08:53.360Columbine. When Columbine seems like it was more inevitable, it was like now that I'm sort of
00:09:00.540rewatching this, you know, these snippets of pop culture history, I'm like, this was clearly on
00:09:04.880everyone's minds. So I think it built to Columbine. But that feels like such a flashpoint test that
00:09:10.580we forget that we ever talked about it before. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And so we open in a
00:09:15.980classroom where the kids are watching this video of President Kennedy's inaugural speech. Angela
00:09:20.700chases voiceovers i said this i said this in the last episode but i'm like all of her voiceovers
00:09:25.880could be the lyrics of a taylor swift song oh it's that's she is she's so taylor swift this
00:09:31.500is really true she is so taylor swift and so she's just like oh this big thing happened when
00:09:37.520president kennedy was assassinated nothing big ever happens to me also very i was like wow that
00:09:45.980is such a nostalgic 90s sentiment we would never no one alive now well it's also you know as a 90s
00:09:54.420baby someone that was you know 14 and 94 then here comes 9-11 we would never get a break after
00:10:01.680that and so literally never get a break you would never ever say now like oh i wish something big
00:10:07.460like an assassination would happen that's such i mean and it's not it's not wrong that they said
00:10:11.560that it's like such a it's exactly the state of mind then it's exactly the state of mind of 1994
00:10:16.960absolutely absolutely and so you know this this is cuing us up to be like something big is
00:10:23.920happening to you girl right something big and something big is happening to the whole school
00:10:29.780and then also to angela so the whole school is that you know they're a gunshot goes off and you
00:10:36.780know all of a sudden everyone is being questioned and it sends ripples throughout the whole school
00:10:41.260But then for Angela, personally, people are gossiping that her and Jordan Catalano had sex and not just sex, but complete sex.0.63
00:10:51.980There's so much going on in this episode.0.89
00:11:09.980Whereas this, I was like, how is there like a gunshot?1.00
00:11:14.880You know, we're kind of starting to deal with the gay stuff.0.96
00:11:17.740We start to deal with the gay stuff, with Ricky's being queer and the bisexuality is finally coming to a forefront.0.82
00:11:25.740I mean, we saw it in the first couple episodes where Angela's mom is like, why is he wearing eyeliner?0.99
00:11:34.040And I'm like, just wait until you meet J.D. Vance, girl.
00:11:37.300I loved it because it is all accurate to the time. And, you know, it's like and she's Angela's answer is like, well, he's bisexual. She's like, bisexual. Why are you talking about this stuff? Right. What word did you just say, my friend?
00:12:05.180I mean, it's actually so well done and so beautiful. And one of the first times, truly, that we saw a bisexual teenager on television.
00:12:13.480Yes, it really. I actually I did a big cover story in the late 2000s for Entertainment Weekly that was gay teens on TV that had to do with Glee.
00:12:26.460And we looked at the entire history and I ended up talking to Wilson Cruz, who plays Ricky.
00:12:31.700And he's a real like, you know, it's hard to say first first because there's always somebody who's going to be like, well, actually, there was this other one first.
00:12:39.800but in terms of just like it really was a huge watershed moment um for this this was not we did0.99
00:12:47.580not maybe we had some gay teens on like soap operas because they were always doing stuff first
00:12:52.040sure but this is really new at a time network tv yeah exactly exactly and when we had you know we
00:13:00.760really were still mostly watching network tell you know you didn't have a ton of options somebody
00:13:04.580was watching it that now these numbers the ratings numbers seem good for the show at the time it was
00:13:10.000not considered a success but like enough people were watching that this was important oh my god
00:13:14.280totally all right let's take a quick break and then we're gonna get into the sex stuff yes
00:13:21.040okay we are back i'm still looking up those ratings numbers but
00:13:32.900because we started out talking about Beverly Hills 90210, I do want to say that I think sex
00:13:39.100on My So-Called Life is handled very differently. It's, I mean, it's all a piece of each of their
00:13:45.060aesthetics, right? I mean, my God, 90210 was obsessed with, like, the virginity.
00:13:53.020Obsessed with virginity. That whole plot line.
00:13:57.140the whole she's gonna lose her virginity at the prom and i gotta tell you it made me think i'm
00:14:03.620like should i lose my virginity at the prom and just i just the whole idea i think a whole book
00:14:09.920could be written on the storylines of virginity in television since the beginning of television
00:14:15.960absolutely there's absolutely no doubt about it and this like i had to re-watch recently the donna
00:14:22.340loses her virginity scene um for being on a a different podcast and my god the like mellow
00:14:31.400drama and the sort of like you know what i mean like the sort of glamorization almost and i don't
00:14:36.820mean i mean glamorize losing your virginity but you know like i i guess it is glamorization it's
00:14:43.500like almost this weird thing of like well you probably shouldn't lose your virginity but if
00:14:47.160you are going to you should totally have like white candles totally and if you don't it's a
00:14:52.140massive failure and go to the this fancy hotel yeah yeah exactly and i mean i i mean i think
00:14:58.780this is this episode with sex is so great i am very i'm like a big fan of you know pro-sex
00:15:05.360kind of content i would loved the show sex education that was on until like last year
00:15:09.940such a leap forward from the stuff that we're talking about and you know the frankness with
00:15:16.600which this is handled many girls have been through some version of this which is like a rumor that's
00:15:23.780not true really about your sex life i went through something exactly like this you know that i had
00:15:31.260like french kissed a boy i think and maybe maybe some above the belt petting and then there were
00:15:39.980rumors going around school that that we had sex i was called a slut meanwhile i'm like in middle0.88
00:15:44.600school. Like eighth grade, right? I don't even know. I don't even know what any of this means0.64
00:15:51.580per se. I'm being called all of these names. And it was just it was a feeding frenzy. It was so
00:15:57.680fun for people. Yeah. And I think we see that in this episode. Exactly. Like how the gossip
00:16:04.900becomes currency in Angela's school. Yeah. And I'm struck all the time watching this show by
00:16:11.700There's something really unique about, and I'm getting back to this, this ties back to what we're talking about. There's something really unique about the social structures here. This is not your typical like teen movie of the 80s where somebody is trying to jump from like a dork to the popular kids by Cook or Crook.
00:16:29.680Yes, that is a whole, whole other genre. Right. This is like very much more normal and subtle. We're not she's not really she's not popular. She's not unpopular. She's so normal. She's so normal that it's almost painful.
00:16:43.780She's so which I guess is, again, the kind of the point she's right in the middle and she kind of like makes minor waves in her life by essentially switching friends in the pilot from this sort of dorkier, nerdier, smart girl to, you know, Rayanne, who, again, she's just fun, but she's not she's not popular.
00:17:04.140she's not this she's not and they're not really worried about their popularity status and you
00:17:08.540can't really tell where jordan is on that ladder they're not this school is much more normal in
00:17:14.460my opinion this was kind of my experience is like we did not have these incredibly you know enforced
00:17:21.500strata like some same like when we look at a lot of the 80s or 90s teen dramas it's like here's
00:17:28.000the popular table right or or if you look at the mean girls world which you're very familiar with
00:17:33.200It was very much this hierarchy of who is cool.
00:17:37.000And in Angela's school, it's like, I can't tell.
00:17:40.360Like, there seem to be the alternative cool kids, the kids who drink, the kids who don't.
00:17:45.760And it doesn't seem like the yearbook kids are uncool per se or unpopular.
00:17:51.720They're just a different, different crew.
00:17:55.400And I mean, this for and again, like sometimes my friends will make fun of me when I talk.
00:17:59.900They're always like, well, then you were popular.
00:18:01.620um because I'm like no no no I I was like kind of the yearbook girl you know we didn't it wasn't
00:18:08.200yearbook in my case it was the newspaper um but like I feel like I really relate to this where
00:18:14.400it's yeah you just kind of like are doing some things that you like I was on newspaper but I was
00:18:18.740also a cheerleader but cheerleaders weren't that cool at my school um and it just you know being
00:18:24.420kind of in that middle where that's not her main anxiety her main anxiety more comes from first her
00:18:30.360longing for jordan catalano and then her whatever this you know her anxiety over on we oh my god
00:18:39.300if if anyone my god if anyone has just perfected on way is it one we're on way on we i just said
00:18:46.980it weird i don't know why because i was laughing oh no i could be wrong i could no it's on we
00:18:50.820um no it's like that's exactly in the way i mean and frank is obviously very you know serious but
00:18:59.300I think it's an interesting that they bring in Anne Frank, like comes up repeatedly.
00:19:05.480And I think that's so interesting because it's another sort of like we all know it's another touchstone where we're like, oh, she's she's kind of a smart kid, really, Angela.
00:19:14.640But like, that's not the highlight here.
00:19:16.600But I don't think she's in remedial classes.
00:19:23.360She likes being smart, too, but she doesn't know if she wants that to be her whole personality.
00:19:27.520I mean, everything is about her trying to figure out what her personality is.
00:19:31.580That's right. And I really that's what I liked about it is this is about social change.
00:19:36.060You know, she's changing her social status, sort of, but I don't like the word status there.0.94
00:19:40.920She's trying to change her group. And she says it in the pilot, something about like, you know, like I can't remember how she says it.
00:19:47.160But she basically says, like, she can't believe how much drama there's been over the fact that she, like, decided to pick different a different friend, a different best friend when she hadn't really given it a lot of thought previously.
00:19:59.980And then in hindsight, as an adult, you look back and you're like, that was the defining moment of my life.
00:20:06.400And this reminds me a little bit of it's hard to talk about the show without going back to 90210 or forward to Freaks and Geeks.
00:20:12.980Yes. And Freaks and Geeks is very, very similar.
00:20:15.880And it's another reason I loved that show was like in both cases, I really related to this because like I changed schools in my sophomore year.
00:20:23.980So I had to make all new friends and I made choices so quickly that ended up kind of it did really define the rest of my high school time.0.97
00:20:32.020And in my case, I hung out with a bunch of jerks and I was fine with it.0.97
00:20:35.420But, you know, it's so it is so hard to just like decide, oh, you know what?0.98
00:20:41.140Now it's this person and it can cause ripples no matter who you are.
00:20:45.760at that age. And it's so interesting how this that really did. I think that's the point of
00:20:51.460the show is it kind of did change her life. It completely changed her life. It's funny for me
00:20:55.480because I switched from public school to all girls Catholic school for high school for ninth
00:21:01.320grade. And because I was kind of a junior high delinquent and I was I was already like not full
00:21:08.980ran, but much closer to ran in in in some ways. Or I wanted to be the Angela that already hung out
00:21:14.820with rayon yeah maybe like that's the thing right yeah and so i get to the all girls catholic school0.55
00:21:19.940and i had to make all new friends but i was like holy shit i am cool as all out compared to these0.99
00:21:26.600bitches um i say that i say that lovingly because i'm still friends with most of them right i'm like0.99
00:21:31.120oh no i know how to do this that it's that's the thing is like if you change schools one thing i0.96
00:21:37.440like i always had boyfriends from other schools and that gave me this like crazy mystique because
00:21:42.580they didn't know yeah like people have like people would be like oh we got to go to the basketball
00:21:47.220game to like see jenny's boyfriend yeah like i had a public school boyfriend right and it's like
00:21:52.980whoa and he was and he was a little bit older and he was also from my camp i'm just like check check
00:21:57.440check and he's got this convertible mustang oh yeah yeah just yeah like even though he was the
00:22:03.840dorkiest human on the planet well that's the that's what's funny too is i was just thinking
00:22:07.860of how, like, I had this whole cachet at my own, you know, at my own school, and then0.96
00:22:15.540it, you know, then, like, but he was not particularly cool at his school, but it didn't
00:22:22.000matter. They don't know. It didn't matter. They don't know. Exactly. Exactly. Well, which is
00:22:26.620interesting because this episode really dives into what creates social status. And so Raeann
00:22:33.460starts saying to angela hey i know you're kind of upset about this rumor but this could be good for
00:22:39.620you that's right and i think that that's really interesting and i think that's really interesting
00:22:47.140to me as someone who thinks about personal branding and influencers all the time of like
00:22:53.760the idea that's embedded in this show about high schoolers about projecting the kind of thing even
00:23:00.640if it's not true that might increase your status in the world yeah and i don't know about you but
00:23:06.920i feel like she's sort of she's sort of starting to figure it out for real by the end of this episode
00:23:12.720that this has happened to her like and then the weird i mean the way that it flips the power
00:23:19.080dynamic when he's like has this kind of creepy proposal like well we might as well do it anyway
00:23:25.120um which i laughed at as an adult because i was just like he's not wrong i mean why not just get0.87
00:23:31.160it over like points have been made i'm just saying but but also jordan is so dumb oh my god it's i
00:23:39.020am obsessed with this too like when you re-watch it as an adult because i do remember the impression0.95
00:23:43.440that he made on me when i was younger it was intense i was in love with him yeah like he's
00:23:48.160stunning he's stunning and he's so like a specific type of kid who totally went to your school
00:23:53.860yeah he did yeah every like every school has this kind of dumb really hot guy where you're like i
00:24:02.280think he might actually be mostly nice but you haven't had to try at anything and maybe you
00:24:08.340never will stunning and like the detail i feel like you will appreciate this more than most as
00:24:14.520like a novelist the detail that he has to he keeps putting eye drops in his eyes oh yes oh my god
00:24:21.180and and also i still like worship always the passage where she i think it's the first episode
00:24:27.720where she talks about him leaning oh my god thank you for bringing it up because i think about it
00:24:31.440all the time how she's just like i just like the way he leans i was like god it's if only i could
00:24:37.380be so self-aware at that age that that's why i liked a guy that's why i know i know totally
00:24:43.080yeah i mean he is he is like stunning and an enigma the way that you know a senior old boy0.97
00:24:50.580can be but but but watching as a and as an adult you're like you're so dumb yeah like everything1.00
00:24:58.260that comes out of your mouth is literally from stupid town oh my god isn't it wait oh i know0.99
00:25:05.780we're not supposed to be talking about the first episode but the first episode the first words he0.99
00:25:10.220ever says to her is something like it doesn't feel like friday yep yep and then she goes it's
00:25:16.440thursday and he was like really and that's like their whole conversation that is their entire
00:25:21.480first conversation and then she's just swooning i just swooning it's like this but it's so
00:25:29.520relatable because it's it's clearly like that thing that you're just not in control because
00:25:34.860you're just so hormonal at that time i know i know i'm not saying it doesn't go on well into
00:25:39.860your 30s either but i mean i would i was i was catalanoing well into my 20s yeah i i i think i
00:25:48.100was too actually i think that's actually true that especially it's just like for certain times in
00:25:52.360your life but you know better you kind of know you're doing it when you're doing it later you
00:25:56.200start it like starts to like tickle the back of your brain and you're like oh yeah say that but
00:26:03.220yeah no i mean if every every word that comes out of his mouth i'm like it would be best if you
00:26:07.620didn't speak oh it's and that's what's brilliant is like this show is not trying to hide any of
00:26:13.240this not at all not at all because as we know Jared Leto is a wonderful actor right we learned
00:26:18.460this much later like he had to overcome this overcome this but like the writers did his
00:26:23.360dialogue on purpose yeah it's not him and he's it's just he's so good and we hadn't seen him
00:26:28.180before that this is what you and also it just feels right it just feels like a guy who looks
00:26:32.600like that exactly well it is you know it's interesting I've been thinking about the
00:26:36.660different haircuts of the moon in these shows because you did have the brandon and dylan but
00:26:43.460then you had the catalano dicaprio those are very similar yeah it's really really true and i'm
00:26:49.640thinking too while we're talking about him of the difference between him and you know the guys on
00:26:54.42090210 in terms of personality like of the character like those guys are complete fantasies
00:27:00.160you know because brandon's like smart and also basically sensitive like he has some
00:27:05.540faux pas moments but like he's the school newspaper guy who for some reason looks like that
00:27:10.380school newspaper is always like the smart serious guy right right exactly he's gonna grow up and0.67
00:27:16.340like win a pulitzer instantaneously so but then like dylan is one of the most ridiculous and i
00:27:23.080remember just like dying for him but i love him but oh my god he read it like the beats yep he
00:27:30.100read the beat poets his mom was living up in um oh my god where was she the peacock the place with
00:27:36.380the peacocks right out of la right where my my like really rich friend has a house now uh that
00:27:42.140i'd never that i'd only heard about because iris mckay lived there yes exactly yeah they were they
00:27:47.960were a different like class of heartthrob i think i mean that one was that one's going full old
00:27:53.980school like rebel with they were they did not pull any punches on the rebel without a cause of
00:27:57.900that all but it is sort of like that the literary bad boy is oddly prevalent in the lineage of
00:28:04.600teenship oh my gosh it's so so is um i do want to say that i found the ratings okay during its
00:28:12.080original run it was averaging 10 million viewers a week holy crap that's high right like as a person
00:28:18.300who talks about tv a lot can you like kind of put that in perspective yeah that's that would be very
00:28:22.940I actually was guessing more like five. And even so, that would be respectable numbers for a show now. By the same token, you know, we had 40 to 80 million watching something like Seinfeld.
00:30:42.980So you got to talk to Wilson Cruz about Ricky's character.
00:30:45.760what did he have to say um you know he this was this was probably 10 years ago and um he just was
00:30:55.480so proud of this like he was one of the people it was actually really easy to get him on the phone
00:30:59.820and i remember kind of like doing a dramatic lead about him you know um as the as the like poster
00:31:07.220boy for this whole concept of gay teens on tv because it really was this you know important
00:31:13.460moment um you would see later we all we kind of all but consider this standard issue for a teen
00:31:21.160show at this point that of course you're going to have at least one gay character right probably
00:31:25.180more and the fact that we would also probably even acknowledge there are multiple ways to be queer
00:31:30.760right um back then this was a really big deal and i think you know he it's like this happens with a
00:31:37.660lot of actors who end up playing these important roles which is they kind of just become that
00:31:42.780you know what I mean so I think it was not super easy for him to sort of get out from under it and
00:31:47.800then he eventually um really embraced it and I know he has continued to be you know outspoken
00:31:55.440in addition to by the way he has worked a bunch of you know woke up his IMDb oh I did I did he
00:32:00.740is a working actor he is a working actor not an easy thing to be yeah you know and I've seen him
00:32:07.860play gay characters a lot um the good news is we need a lot more of them now and i think it he1.00
00:32:14.720really became one of these people who i've seen this it reminds me a lot of um jonathan i cannot
00:32:23.200think of his last name uh the guy from from mean girls who was not playing a gay character then
00:32:29.900he played aaron samuels but he has kind of gone on to be the guy in the hallmark movies um and so
00:32:37.920i think a lot of them from this time end up going through this struggle of like first resisting it
00:32:42.720or kind of being like oh god now i'm just playing this one guy all the time to kind of really
00:32:47.100embracing it and realizing i mean most of them have gotten letters and letters and letters and
00:32:52.020messages saying you know seeing you on tv saved my life so it was really that important then
00:32:57.520Yeah. Yeah. And and still important. I mean, more important now than ever before.
00:33:04.580Yeah. That's the other thing about it, isn't it? It's like we sort of almost started to take this stuff for granted.
00:33:09.620I think we did. I think we genuinely did. And that's that's what the rewatch brought back for me.
00:33:15.820Yes. That we had started to take this for granted. And now I don't think we can take it for granted and we have to continue to work hard.
00:33:22.440yes exactly and this just reminded me just talking about this reminded me of this funny thing that
00:33:29.120it's not funny funny um that happened when i did that piece like i said again that was what like
00:33:33.86010 or 15 years ago the gay teens on tv thing but um you know i talked to the trevor project i talked
00:33:40.000to all these people and then when it came out there was some person somewhere whose reaction
00:33:45.300online was like they or i got a message saying like um complaining that i hadn't quote told the
00:33:50.920other side and it was like so baffled it was like almost I had to take a beat and be like what are
00:33:55.400they oh they wanted me to talk to an anti-gay person oh who doesn't think this is good and
00:34:02.080it's so funny that like in that moment I was so was being so liberal I was being such a liberal
00:34:10.640media New Yorker that like I was like what do they mean the other side oh oh like I would call up0.86
00:34:18.820a bigoted person you would call up a bigot yeah and i'd be like do you hate that there are gay
00:34:25.180teens on tv please tell me why and that's just to me like suddenly doesn't like that doesn't
00:34:31.660sound like a crazy story to me that doesn't sound from the current moment from in this in this day
00:34:36.820and age yeah like i do i i get requests like that too when i talk about trad wives and things like
00:34:45.180that they're like well why aren't you presenting the conservative point of view i'm like i called
00:34:49.420them no one wants to talk to me yeah can you even imagine i mean what even would that look like and
00:34:54.360i'm not gonna start a problem you know what i mean i'm not gonna like call up the anti-gay people
00:34:59.060and be like would you like to protest this right nice progress that we've had oh my god but no it
00:35:07.240is it is just such a stark reminder again that like and the show is now i mean so it was 94 i
00:35:13.740can't do math I'm like 30 years old yeah 30 years old yeah uh and yet we're still going through so
00:35:19.740many of the same things and Ricky's arc with the gun is that people immediately suspect him
00:35:25.960for really no reason other than they think there's something a little different
00:35:30.240about him that they're like you're making me uncomfortable I can't pinpoint why or I don't
00:35:36.120want to say why out loud and so maybe you're the one that did this bad thing yeah and I think I
00:35:43.260I actually wondered if you sort of, quote, couldn't get away with some of what goes on here now, which is to say his super interesting point of view on this in the end is that he wants people to think he had the gun because they would be afraid of him.
00:36:00.620Right. Right. Because he is in such a precarious position.
00:36:04.240and he he is afraid every day he is he is scared every day that just by being him he could be in
00:36:12.500danger and he is not wrong i thought i was like wow i truly believe that like someone would twist
00:36:18.660that into a problem now um but i think right i think they do such a good job with it so i was
00:36:24.640like a that's i i was really struck this is this is us talking as writers here to some extent but
00:36:30.960Like, I was really struck by the fact that we essentially had two incredibly subtle, huge twists on what you expect in this episode.
00:37:00.960because then he's safer so brilliant and this is also they're they're so subtle with like the way
00:37:07.020they start seeding in his queerness oh yeah right because they never they don't say i mean they said
00:37:13.280the bisexual thing so i guess they say stuff but like it's not some big like he's gonna come out
00:37:18.120moment or whatever it's just there and we and we never see him coming out right thing because when
00:37:24.160we saw gay characters on television up until this point there was typically a coming out
00:37:29.940Yep. What year did Ellen come out literally out of the closet? I mean, that's a good question. I can ask. Oh, my God. Ninety seven. So this is before that. So this is pre Ellen. Yeah. And that that's actually huge. It really it really, really is. That's such a good marking point for this, because, yeah, after that, you'll start to get even something I think related is that it occurred to me only recently that like Clueless, for instance, which is1.00
00:37:59.82099 has a gay character but they actually don't really totally say it no they don't no they do
00:38:06.520not um i re-watched it because it's great you know not that long ago and it was the first time i
00:38:11.320totally clocked that they were i was like oh they're doing this they sort of like started this
00:38:17.520to some extent in movies that you know the girl's gonna have a gay best friend right but it really
00:38:22.680it's i guess i clocked away they right i i clocked it because of mean girls because i was like what
00:38:28.720am I going to say about this character who is truly gay you know and was a really big deal at
00:38:35.480the time and I realized like well clueless did this but they didn't you know what year was mean
00:38:41.100girls mean girls is 2004 okay so full 10 years after full 10 years later yeah it's really it's
00:38:49.360so I don't know it's very interesting to see the evolution of certain you know all this stuff keeps
00:38:55.020coming up in i mean mean girls wasn't doing gun violence which is probably for the best
00:38:59.280um best in that situation but you know a lot of the shows end up
00:39:05.780treading the same basic themes which makes sense and it's interesting to sort of like
00:39:11.680then you can you can chart them by these you know by how these shows handle it and then there's also
00:39:18.080like two axes of teen shows like we've been talking about there's the like glitzy rich ones
00:39:24.020and there's the grounded regular ones and the normies yeah and they're really very very different
00:39:30.760and this is obviously in the grounded regulars along with like freaks and geeks and you know
00:39:36.440one of my favorites Degrassi the next generation um you know those are they they handle all the
00:39:42.860same issues but like well I don't think freaks and geeks did good pilots either if they were on
00:39:48.380longer um but you know i think that's it's so interesting to see how they handle these things
00:39:54.200and this one just really seems like it was ahead of its time i don't know what i would have made
00:39:57.880of this back when i originally watched it yeah no i mean i don't i actually like i said i don't
00:40:04.180really remember watching this episode the way that i remember watching other ones which is
00:40:09.460which is very interesting to me am i having a total mental block did was there a gay character
00:40:14.960on 90210 in the bed i'm sure somewhere i don't really remember there was probably at least like
00:40:21.760a kid who was like maybe this there for a little bit maybe you know how they would off like a lot
00:40:27.020of shows would do this they'd they'd have like a token a token kid on yeah it'd be like my cousin
00:40:32.320is visiting and then they'd be like oh my god he's gay and then he could leave and then he can leave
00:40:38.020and it's not not a cool storyline would i just yeah i don't know if that's something that the
00:40:42.24090210-iverse really dug into a lot. I mean, it was a lot more virginity, although they had the
00:40:50.020Scott episode with the gun. Right, right. You know, I just feel like I would remember if there
00:40:56.100were a prominent gay storyline. Yeah. But we should be wrong. This is a thing that I have
00:41:03.020not read. Oh, you know what? There was this is so classic there. I believe there was one kid
00:41:07.880who was a quote friend of dylan who quote worked at a youth center okay yes it's very just like
00:41:15.060classic you know i mean where they just sort of like we like we just said you know it's this
00:41:22.180scrappy kid from the wrong side of the tracks and he brings up an issue and we can talk about it and
00:41:27.560then it's over and then we're done and then we're done talking about it right focus on brenda's0.94
00:41:30.880virginity again right right if we're if anyone was going to be pregnant it was going to be like0.80
00:41:35.140a cousin visiting and that's totally so we don't have to see it let's not see it no right no that
00:41:40.420is not that's not how we're gonna do this show um yeah no i just i i love ricky's storyline i
00:41:46.700think wilson cruz plays plays him so well so well and i i i do think that this is one of ricky's
00:41:55.540best episodes to be honest i think yeah i totally agree there's i do feel like at times and it's
00:42:00.700just because it's because of the time and like no one had been this was so groundbreaking i feel
00:42:05.180like at times it can get a little heavy-handed later later on oh yeah yeah yeah you know the
00:42:10.620christmas episode was yeah i don't i don't know what that that felt like i don't know what they
00:42:15.820were doing it's so funny that it was it's burned deeply into my brain um sometimes somebody just
00:42:22.880wants to do something and they're gonna do it and it doesn't even really match the rest of the show
00:42:28.900I think that way about every bottle episode of every television show.