10 Ways To Make A Teen TV Show Hella Awesome

Just like the Colonel's secret recipe, it takes a special mix of herbs and spices aka storylines and plot devices, to create a memorable teen show.

Before you ask, yes I watched a lot of teen shows to write this blog—all in the name of research. How's that for dedication?

10. Budget for Buckley.

Got a great cast, and great script? Next step: hire Norman Buckley to direct. 

Buckley's been busy working on upcoming
anticipated series starring Bella Thorne.

He makes the kind of television episodes where you press pause to go get a drink, and end up pausing yourself and thinking wow, this shot is art and could be printed as a still and framed.

To see this guy's resume of teen TV, check out episodes of The O.C., Gossip Girl, and Pretty Little Liars for starters. Such a great eye. #UneedNorm

9. Understand The Allure Of The Talkative Dork.

WORD. It’s all about the banter. An awkward character who says the wrong things at the worst time is #adorkable

Chrismukkah anyone?

While first place goes to Seth Cohen from The O.C. for making his own holiday, Willow Rosenberg from Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Stiles Stilinski from Teen Wolf almost took the title.

(This type of character often proves more popular than the legit star. I know the leads are supposed to be relatable, but the girl next-door/boy next-door tropes are dulllllllll af. #quirkyisbest)

8. Be Intense, Teenagers Are Complex Creatures.

Run the gambit of emotions. Get melodramatic: tormented teens are misunderstood by THE WORLD. Humiliation, heartbreak, screaming, and sobbing are only Step One. 

Prime examples? My So-Called Life (even the title is emo), Degrassi (any version), Switched At Birth, and Dawson’s Creek. Although Pretty Little Liars with its conveyor belt of murders and follow-up funerals definitely takes it to the edge.

7. Going Superhero Or Supernatural? Whatever. Be Sure To Super-Run With It.

Teen shows love unnatural creatures (idk maybe a metaphor thing?) If you’re going there, revel in the Supe World. Work that weirdness!

Scream Lydia. Scream!

Teen Wolf wins this category for creative modern takes on wild myths. (I like the look of The Wild Hunt in the upcoming final season. They make people forget you ever existed... metaphor for a teen life crisis or what?)

Misfits is a gritty and powerful paranormal series. Buffy The Vampire Slayer is an obvious classic. On the alien front (super-space?) Roswell is standout for the Ultimate Outsider.  #starcrossedlovers4real

6. Find Your Chuck and Blair So We Can Ship It

Aw, the mismatched couple that hate each other a little yet end up an OTP as the show progresses… Good times.

Who didn't want to have sex in the back of a limo after this?

Snappy dialogue, sexual tension, power struggles, and a complicated, ever-shifting couple dynamic are key. Note: Sizzling onscreen chemistry a MUST.

Popular ships that spring to mind include:

-The wasted ship of Caroline and Klaus in The Vampire Diaries (God damn spin-off). 

-The rediscovered ship of Alison+Emily on Pretty Little Liars.

-The will they/won't they ship of Lydia+Stiles in Teen Wolf.

-The lost ship of Clarke+Lexa on The 100 (RIP).

5. Address Bullying

Most teen shows do mention bullying at some point, but longer, more complicated plots are better; look past the “baddie” portrayal of a bully and try to unravel the motivations while also following the victims as they deal with the consequences.

 

Best buds/bromance goals.

Korean teen drama Cheer Up! aka Sassy Go Go follows academic and non-academic students forced to become a cheerleading squad. This brilliant series seamlessly blends humor and intensity while tackling bullying, abuse by parents, cutting, and teen suicide.* 

Glee was another show that approached bullying head on and tried to make audiences understand both sides of the equation. 

 *For more great Asian tv shows, I review them on Instagram @watchawatching 

4. Offer Complex Villains We End Up Loving.

Who could compare to Mona Vanderwaal from Pretty Little Liars? A nerd made over into a glam mean girl, revealed to be the first “A” blackmailing/threatening the leads. (Let's not talk about the show fake-killing this gloriously layered character for a short time. #winteriscoming )

Glamping for Mona's bday, where she snuck off to run over her bff
with a car. (Mona's mind=a complicated place.)

You admire the intelligent, dastardly ways of these charming evildoers while being appalled by their choices. Other standout villains that evoked empathy over the years include Lex Luthor from Smallville, and Damon Salvatore from The Vampire Diaries.

3. Create A Sexy Rebel.

Never forget to include a misunderstood character with a chip on their shoulder.

My subconscious blocked out Brandon's nickname for Dylan.
Apparently Google is having the same problem.

The winner here is Dylan McKay from the original Beverley Hills 90210. Only supposed to be in an ep or 2, he won over audiences and kept the part because, hello, textbook rich kid rebel. #showusthemoney

Second place is a tie between James Franco’s Daniel Desario in Freaks and Geeks, and Eliza Dushku’s legendary slayer-without-a-surname Faith in Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel.

2. Write Female Characters That Don’t Suck.

Here’s looking at you, Veronica Mars. My girl V is the obvious choice when it comes to resourceful, clever, and kindhearted teen female characters who also make mistakes. #represent

A teen tv hero has to be flawed in some ways to be relatable,
so Veronica has a few chinks in her armor. 

Clarke Griffin from The 100 is created in a similar vein, and of course Buffy Summers from Buffy The Vampire Slayer is an iconic example. What’s interesting is how all three shows brim with multifaceted female characters; it's not just the leads who rock.

1. Keep It Quippy

A show that has sass is a winner. In high school you wish you could be witty 24/7. When you did think of a comeback it was rarely as funny as you imagined. Standout teen TV dialogue has a touch of could-have-been wish fulfillment happening. 

 

A wild night of braiding and Bollywood movies. #teenlyf

The best scripts brim with pop culture praphrasing. Joss Whedon set a new standard in the nineties with Buffy The Vampire Slayer while Rory Gilmore in Gilmore Girls wins the random references award. 

Recent sitcoms Suburgatory and Awkward are a little hit and miss, but occasionally make a person LOL with their acronym-saturated sarcastic teenspeak.

Bonus Point: I Gotcha Back. Life Is A Friend Fest.

Remember, every lead needs back-up: if not a whole crew, then at least an awesome best friend. Teen shows thrive on INTENZ friendships.

For Buffy Summers it was the Scooby Gang, Scott McCall has his pack, Veronica Mars will always have Wallace Fennel, Dawson Leery had Joey Potter, and Lane Kim will forever be the bff of Rory Gilmore.

Even Dan Humphrey had, um, his cabbage patch doll Cedric. O_o

XOXO

W and its Two Worlds

*Please note this blog contains
spoilers for episodes 1 and 2.

Global sci-fi fans should tune in and check out new TV series W—Two Worlds. Storytelling genres like science fiction, speculative fiction, and slipstream fiction can cross language and cultural barriers: exploring meta concepts, wild ideas, and out-there possibilities in engaging, intelligent, and emotive ways.

The concept of the imagination fascinates me, and I think in the future there will be a test to measure a person’s imaginative capabilities. For a long time I didn't understand people who said they couldn’t “get into” a strange story. Once a friend tried to explain what happens when she reads a fantasy or futuristic novel: how the words on the page don’t create a clear picture, let alone a place that feels real in her mind.

Loving the lighting/set design/cinematography
in both worlds.

For me, and many fans of strange stories, what’s happening in a book, television, or film setting is as real as what’s happening somewhere in the world. I’ve been like that since I was a kid, while mistakenly assuming everyone around me is having a similar involvement with storytelling. To only be able to truly experience the place you live and the life you have is a limitation I can’t comprehend.

When the female lead recognizes a character
from the webtoon, this happens.

W—Two Worlds extrapolates that feeling. For a while, the audience isn’t clear who in the show is “real” and who is fictitious. Viewers are presented with two narratives to follow (albeit one more dramatic than the other) and before long we’re invested in the lives of the male and female leads. By the time it’s revealed one is a webtoon character, this supposedly important fact seems oddly irrelevant.

That moment when you realize your life is now surreal af.

The Korean series screens two episodes a week until September. More meta elements are mixed with intrigue, romance, humor, tragedy, and comedy. To heavily summarize the plot, our female lead Oh Yeon Joo is in the real world, and our male lead Kang Chul is the main character in a bestselling webtoon created by her father. 

When dad decides to kill off the webtoon’s famous hero, Oh Yeon Joo is pulled into the story to stop his death. This places father and daughter at loggerheads, as dad is determined to exterminate the imaginary Kang Chul one way or another.

#writerGodcomplex

 Our female lead Oh Yeon Joo is a bit of a ditz. Strange, considering she’s a surgeon? But her confusion on entering the webtoon world is well played. What could be more traumatizing for a pragmatic person than this experience?

Korean TV often utilizes the linear elements of a location.

At heart she’s a good person, and actress Han Hyo Joo conveys empathy and kindness with her performance. The character’s calling is to save lives even if the blood on her hands came from an illustration program. I love that she’s a terrible liar, and not really creative, so having to come up with plot points and dialogue on the spot inside the webtoon isn’t working out so well for her…

The supporting cast are fab.

When you're the only one outside the time lapse.

Kang Chul is a larger-than-life webtoon character: a teen Olympic gold medalist framed for murder, who grows up to become a rich tech genius slash playboy. Actor Lee Jong Suk is considered beautiful by Korean standards, in that he has very white skin and is tall and slender (previously a model). He’s got the right look and onscreen charisma for the role, but he’s also a great actor, and manages to humanize this exaggerated ideal.

Surgery, webtoon-style.

Obviously we’re on the road to romance, but at this point Kang Chul treats Oh Yeon Joo as more of a puzzle piece he needs to see the whole picture, and she treats him more like an idea she’s protecting, rather than a person. It’s a nice setup.

Girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do
(to get out of a webtoon).

Dad is like a wrathful Old Testament God here, determined to wipe out the character he’s created. For some reason he believes Kang Chul is “eating him up” and wants to destroy him first. You get the feeling dad’s been in the webtoon as well, and knows more than he’s letting on.

Webtoon workplace worries. 

The first two episodes are fabulous at world building, partly because they abide by the created rules, and also because the writer has thought a lot about "reality" within the webtoon, and how the imagined world would interact with the "real" world. Maintaining that framework is so important with fantastical narrative, and writer Song Jae Jung's quality world building stands out.

I think the show won me over when Oh Yeon Joo was sitting at a bus stop in the webtoon for half an hour, while months went by high speed in the webtoon. The story was moving to the next plot point (i.e. after Kang Chul recovered from the latest assassination attempt). So while it had been months for our male lead, only thirty minutes passed for our female lead, adding an unexpectedly comedic element.

Spinning watch hands are never a good sign.

Omg awkward.

The edits between the webtoon and the real world in the show are well done. The music fits nicely, and the cinematography is as lovely as ever. (Korean television takes a lot of care with the technical aspects.) I’m expecting to see an offshoot W manga hit shelves in the next few months—why waste the fabulous illustrations?

Very cool.

Only two episodes in and the show sets up many interesting ideas to mull over. Why is dad determined to kill Kang Chul? How come Oh Yeon Joo is the one crossing over? Is the webtoon like a storytelling version of AI, what with rewriting itself in the computer to keep the webtoon's lead character alive? Most of all—can Kang Chul cross into reality? And if he comes to Oh Yeon Joo’s world, is he officially “real”?

Or is he already real enough?

Yes, he's on a newsreel being watched
in a webtoon inside a tv show. Any questions?

Outcast

“You wanna fight the devil, start by cleaning your ****ing act up.”

*References events in episodes 1-4.

As neither a fan of The Walking Dead or horror in general, I'm probably not the target market for this series. But viewing a show that’s a departure from your usual tastes—albeit during the daylight hours—can be an interesting, thought-provoking experience.

My "scary" viewing preferences lean toward mixed bag supernatural reluctant hero tales, over the more encompassing darkness commonly found in the horror genre: shows like Buffy TVS and Supernatural, where bouts of humor and friends/family-gotcha-back moments balance out the dark, gory elements.

While still a reluctant hero story at heart, Outcast is more in the vein of traditional horror because our lead is living in a state of despair. Demonic forces have screwed with his life to the point where he doesn't really have one: Kyle Barnes is barely functioning.

From the beginning the soaring, unsettling opening credits set the tone (maybe drone work?) with occasional upside down visuals and a cold blue cast.

Sound editing is important in shows that unnerve viewers. Horror and thrillers rely on the use of silence as much as sharp, sudden sounds; even commonplace audio like footsteps or slamming doors become unnatural in the hands of a good sound editor. Outcast combines haunting melodies with jarring amplified noises and oddly placed silences.

Set-wise, washed out interiors and worn, dirty surfaces make it seem as if the town is wasting away, quietly rotting behind closed doors. Even the lives of the normal couples feel unsettling and claustrophobic. 

A lot of scenes take place indoors or at night. The lighting is very limited, in a carefully planned way. Even on a sunny day that shadowy sense of foreboding still hovers, as if sunshine isn't enough to penetrate the darkness at the heart of this town.

Every Man Kyle Barnes is played by Patrick Fugit, who exudes a desperate understated intensity. Turns out our lead attracts demonic forces who possess the people around him, notably the women in his life.

The role of women in this series is probably the least appealing element. Most only exist in the story as extensions, or in relation to, the male characters, and are generally victims in some way. 

Kyle's mother's state, whether in the past or the present, disturbs her son: possessed or vegetative, she is still trapped in her body and unable to communicate. Flashbacks return us to the lead’s childhood quite often, and flashbacks are also used in other parts of the narrative. (Quite a popular storytelling tool with the writer’s here.)

Kyle is helped by the Reverend, and this brings up an interesting point in the show's world building: humanities inability to accept the supernatural is what really allows demonic forces to gain a foothold. How can our leads fight a war that most of the town refuses to acknowledge? Faith is a weapon for one side, while denial aids the other.

And of course the characters battle their inner demons—pun intended—as much the supernatural variety. 

Just a few episodes in, and great guest stars like JR Bourne (Teen Wolf, Arrow, Stargate, UnREAL, basically an endless CV of awesome shows) and Scott Porter (Hart of Dixie, The Good Wife, Friday Night Lights) start appearing. Brent Spiner rocks up as the nefarious character, playing the part with relish.

Outcast leaves an overall impression of decay and despair, with psychological horror prevailing over physical horror, although there are gore porn elements, including mutilated animal parts, possessed people, and dead ones. Everything is shadowed, including the hearts and minds of the town.

Kyle and Reverend Anderson have their work cut out for them, but the Reverend recognizes Kyle as a weapon capable of pushing back at the dark, and Kyle now knows the supernatural entities have a reason for their fascination with his life—one he's determined to discover.

The real question is, can Kyle and the Rev keep it together long enough to push the enemy back? Exorcism seems to bring out impulse control issues; both are coming unglued at the psychological seams, and the pressure will only intensify.