View Full Version : The Secret Life of the American Teenager
PrettyinPink55 06-30-2008, 11:14 PM I think that's what it's called anyway...
Is anyone else looking forward to it's debut tomorrow on ABC Family??
It's got Molly Ringwald playing the mom of a teenage girl who finds out she's pregnant.
It looks good. I was watching Live with Regis and Kelly this morning and she was on talking about the show.
I checked my listings and it looks like there will be two airings of the pilot, one right after the other.
Heidi 07-02-2008, 02:33 PM I watched it. What did you think of it?
PrettyinPink55 07-02-2008, 07:15 PM I liked it. I think I'll give it time to develop though...it seems more family-oriented. (Hence being on ABC Family lol!)
What do you think?
Heidi 07-02-2008, 08:22 PM I liked it enough to keep watching it. It does seem like it needs time to develop. It seemed like a lot of characters were introduced very fast, and some may need time to become more dimensional.
rosered 07-07-2008, 03:47 PM I really like it too! It did seem "family oriented" but it wasnt chessy at all...I liked her red haired friend and i really enjoyed seeing Molly Ringwald! Hopefully she'll have a bigger role in tuesday episode..
I think the really cristian couple will be interesting to watch, especially if the guy ditches her for the dark haired girl...
DSfan 07-07-2008, 05:45 PM At first, I didn't even realize it was Molly Ringwald but then I saw the credits.
It was all right, I might continue watching the show.
I agree with whoever said they were introducing characters too fast. I couldn't remember some of the names and it seemed kind of weird how the guy called her up and she's like "whoo?" and then she likes him a lot and they're at the dance".
Impressions 07-09-2008, 12:49 AM I like the show but I'd like to see how long the show could go without saying sex; how about nookie or whoopee?
:p
PrettyinPink55 07-09-2008, 01:31 AM I like the show but I'd like to see how long the show could go without saying sex; how about nookie or whoopee?
:p
:lol: :lol: :lol:
I love your avatar by the way!!!
SpunkiiMonkii7078 07-09-2008, 02:03 PM I've watched both the pilot and second episode and I do really like the show. I feel like we need the show to develop a bit more like all of you said and that will just take time.
I just found this out last night but the show will air Tuesdays at 8 and then Tuesday night/Wednesday morning there will be a repeat at midnight.
rosered 07-15-2008, 04:59 PM Yeah i think its definitely the type of show that will get better as it goes on.. Especially since i feel like there are a lot of characters so it will be interesting to learn more about them and their backstories and stuff...Especially Ricky, he seems like he's gonna be an intriguing character...
Looking forward to tonights episode!!
PlayOn 07-16-2008, 01:11 AM i caught one episode. where Ben (i think that's his name) finds out the preggers girl slept with her baby's daddy. i really enjoyed it. i missed tonights episode tho. hopefully, they'll rerun it tomorrow (altho here it's 12 am, so i should say today)
PrettyinPink55 07-16-2008, 02:51 AM I haven't gotten a chance to watch the latest episode yet...I have it DVRed. Does anyone know how many episodes the show is going to get for this season or even if it's been renewed?
SpunkiiMonkii7078 07-16-2008, 02:03 PM I'm not positive on exactly how many episodes there are, but there are at least eleven episodes so far this season with the eleventh episode being aired on September 9th.
rosered 07-17-2008, 03:19 PM Tuesdays was really good! The ben/amy kiss was absolutley adorable!! And the scenes with the sister were pretty touching, also glad that they showed more of Molly Ringwald..
How do you think Ricky will take the news that hes the father? Judging by his behavior thus far it seems like he'll be a jerk and deny it but i would love to see him surprise everyone and step up and take responsibility and be supportive. We shall see!
Pavan 07-17-2008, 03:42 PM It was ordered for 13 more episodes, with the first of those being aired Sept. 9 and the other 12 starts in January:
http://www.sitcomsonline.com/blog/2008/07/60th-annual-emmy-awards-nominations.html
rosered 07-18-2008, 12:00 PM Yeah i saw that!! Im pumped.. So do you think that means that she will have already had her baby in the January episodes? Im really glad that they ordered more episodes cause they're are so many different directions that they can take the show in.. Do you think she'll keep the baby or put it up for adoption? i would imagine she'll keep it, that would certainly be interesting.. And would definitely make the ben/ricky/amy love triangle pretty intriguing...
Chain Gang Member 07-23-2008, 12:16 PM This show is addicting.I watched the first episode and I was hooked on it
DSfan 07-23-2008, 08:14 PM I hope it lasts for a while, even after January. Too many shows recently have been axed with being given a proper chance but it seems to me that ABC Family is the beast of the teenage drama type shows now.
PrettyinPink55 07-24-2008, 01:26 AM I hope it lasts for a while, even after January. Too many shows recently have been axed with being given a proper chance but it seems to me that ABC Family is the beast of the teenage drama type shows now.
I agree...they have a lot of different teenage dramas out there, Wildfire, Kyle XY, Lincoln Heights, all of which have done really well. I don't think they'll cancell this show...I hope not, but it'll fit in well with the other dramas.
Schmoopie 07-24-2008, 04:19 AM I tuned in for this show only because of Molly Ringwald. I grew up with her, idolizing her in "Sixteen Candles" and "Pretty In Pink". I'm 40, and from the interviews I had seen with Molly on "Good Morning America" (and other shows), this is supposed to be something the whole family can watch together.
I beg to differ...:rolleyes:
I watched exactly four episodes and I am through.:mad: I agree, they are addicting at first, but after a while, the constant use of the word "sex" in every single sentence made me ill. And the entire show seemed to revolve around sex. Everyone wanted to have it; even the counselor talked about it (the one everyone thought was so "cute"). He seems like a jerk, the way he talks to the students. Counselors are supposed to provide support and guidance. I cannot believe that a station like ABC Family would allow a show to air that has a student walk into a counselor's office and tell him that he wants to lose his virginity to a girl. Worse, the counselor seemed to think it was okay. It was like the whole school is into sex (and the use of the word "Oral" is what made my jaw drop! :eek2: ). Since when does ABC Family need to stoop so low as to say that it's okay for kids as young as 15 to have sex? And one of the female characters openly admits to the counselor that she has an addiction to sex? I think she needs SERIOUS counseling for that addiction.
I've been in high school and although it's been over 20 years, I know that being addicted to sex at the age of 16 is not normal. If it is, then I shudder to think what will happen to these kids in the future.
I realize that the premise of the show is that the main character becomes pregnant, but I was hoping that the show would focus on other matters too. Even a show like Beverly Hills 90210, which had plenty of sexual situations, didn't make that the sole topic and it was certainly never said repeatedly. I cringed when I heard Molly Ringwald say the word.
With the exception of a few, the characters in this show are absolutely horrible. Terrible role-models:
We have a cheerleader who is "in love" with her 16 year old boyfriend and they are talking seriously about marriage? And then he gets mad at her because she says she wants to wait until after med school? Does he seriously think they will even be together by that time?
This same girl is the one who's parents are so un-trusting of her that they buy her a "Promise ring" and make her promise to remain a virgin until marriage? She's only 16! And they are so over-protective that her going to the fair with a boy (even if it was a scam) is considered "a rough place"? Since when? "Little House on the Prairie" had episodes in which Laura and Mary went to the fair with boys.
Then Grace is accidentally caught on camera with the guy who picks her up after she's stranded. A big spectacle is made from the fact that he has no shirt on :confused:, and them being on camera is enough of a media frenzy that it's shown repeatedly? Come on!
And then there's the guy who asked Amy to the dance and after only one date, he's convinced that he's in love with her. Infatuated is more like it.
The parents on this show are worthless. Molly Ringwald and Mark Derwin are totally clueless when it comes to their daughters. Their younger one is said to be thirteen, but looks like she's 17, and dresses like a street walker.
And I'm forgetting one very important subject here. The addition of religion into this show. Seems ironic that these sexually active kids are so into God and religion and going to church.
"Joan of Arcadia" was a wonderful show that dealt with interactions with God, but Amber Tamblyn's Joan never went to church. Therefore, the religion aspect wasn't shoved down our throats as it is in this series. The way this series reads, it's like "Joan of Arcadia" crossed with a sex-education class video.
Even Molly Ringwald can't save this show.
Andrea
PS: Here's a review from the LA Times that I found that states my point exactly...
'The Secret Life of the American Teenager'
'The Secret Life of the American Teenager' is one-track-mind adolescence as scripted by grown-up television writers.
By Robert Lloyd, Times Television Critic
July 1, 2008
What with the infamous teen pregnancies of Gloucester, Mass., and tween queen Jamie Lynn Spears having her baby, and the success of last year's “Juno,” a TV series about a pregnant high school freshman should not come as a shock. Television has been getting young girls pregnant for years, anyway.
Brenda Hampton, of the nearly unstoppable “7th Heaven,” is the creator of ABC's “The Secret Life of the American Teenager," which gives us half-gawky Amy (Shailene Woodley), who has lost her virginity at band camp to school Lothario Ricky (Daren Kagasoff). As the series begins, she returns home with a pregnancy test hidden in the bell of her French horn. Her waiting mother is played by Molly Ringwald, who was once famously an American teenager herself, and indeed played a pregnant one in the 1988 film "For Keeps." She is why some of us will watch this in the first place.
In tonight's opening episode, however, Ringwald is only a fleeting, sub-June Cleaver presence. She microwaves a pot roast, frets that Amy is spending too much time at band practice -- "You're only young once, you should have a little fun," she says as the irony bells ring out -- and agrees with her husband that their 13-year-old younger daughter (India Eisley) should not go around displaying her 13-year-old navel. (We are allowed to see it, however.)
The tone of the pilot careens between an after-school special and "American Pie," with a bit of "Pretty in Pink" grabbed along the way. It is almost all about sex -- and a little bit about family, but the subject there is largely sex, as well, and why it's not for the young. The sexually active kids we meet are either made unhappy by having it, or they're having it because they're unhappy. (Ricky's compulsion to sleep with every girl who crosses his path is shown to spring from his having been molested by his father.) Amy confides of her deflowering: "I'm not even sure it was sex. It wasn't fun and definitely not like what you see in the movies."
Or they're unhappy because they've never had it. In a most improbable conversation (in a show full of them, nerdy wiseacre Ben (Kenny Baumann) -- who has decided almost arbitrarily to pursue Amy by getting himself into the marching band -- tells his guidance counselor: "To be perfectly honest, Mark, it's all motivated by the fact that I'm 15, I'm a virgin, and if I want to have a sex life I've got to start somewhere."
Or, like guilty Christian football hero Jack (Greg Finley), they're unhappy because they want sex in the first place. Jack is distressed by the fact that his purity-ring-wearing cheerleader girlfriend Grace (Megan Park) won't sleep with him until they're married, and won't get married until she's out of medical school. (He inquires whether oral sex is sex, to which she sensibly answers that it is.) In spite of a prayer offered in a pregame football huddle ("Let us not be distracted by the women who are here to lead us into situations that will lead us into hell and destroy our souls forever"), he lets himself be seduced by Adrian (Francia Raisa), the school vamp and drum majorette. (She bites an apple at him, Eve-like.) Then he really goes to pieces.
Two performers stand out. Woodley is appealing as a kid in over her head. There is something quite touching in the way her face provisionally lights up as she hopefully grasps at straws. (No dice, though, she's definitely pregnant.) She's the girl you would usually cast as the little sister thrust into the big sister part.
The other is Park ("Life With Derek"), who makes a person out of a role that could easily read as a joke. She has a nice blend of daffiness, and is self-assured in a way that overcomes her being forced to assert and reassert her churchgoing and belief in Jesus. (It is supposed to make her a sort of brave oddball, I think -- "7th Heaven" was about a pastor's family, after all -- though the last I looked, there were plenty of Christians around.) Her father is played by John Schneider, who was a Duke of Hazzard and, more recently, Pa Kent, and her brother is played by Luke Zimmerman, who has Down syndrome.
For anyone other than a teenager looking for yet another mirror in which to regard a glorified version of themselves, "Secret Life" has, on the early evidence, little to offer. It feels thin, mechanical and confused. Even so, I am keeping my fingers crossed for the sake of Molly Ringwald. I would hope that once Amy makes her pregnancy known, Ringwald -- undoubtedly the only actress to have worked with both John Hughes and Jean-Luc Godard -- will have more interesting things to do, in a variety of flavors.
I have my doubts, though.
robert.lloyd@latimes.com
Andrea
Couch Potato 05 09-03-2008, 10:59 PM I'm in my early 30s & at 1st, I wanted to watch because I like Josie Bissett (from Melrose Place), but I do really like the show. I admit the show is too much about sex & if I had a teenage son or daughter, I wouldn't want them to watch, but I guess unfortunately, that's the ways of today's society: Promiscuity, drinking, partying, & other adults issues that teens do.
V8ebw6ofF_4
Hi everyone! Today I am launching a new series on my channel where I will do recaps of some of my favorite TV shows from my teen years! Today's will be an unhinged recap (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecnkbr2MkVE) of The Secret Life of the American Teenager. Let me know down below what you thought of the video, and subscribe if you like it! Part 2 will come out soon!
Intro: 0:00
Background info: 00:48
Characters: 1:23
Episode 1: 5:54
Episode 2: 13:29
Episode 3: 16:32
Episode 4: 18:17
Episode 5: 21:09
Episode 6: 23:37
Episode 7: 24:28
Episode 8: 26:04
Episode 9: 26:55
Episode 10: 28:14
Episode 11: 29:29
Episode 12: 30:46
Episode 13: 31:56
Episode 14: 32:48
Episode 15: 34:05
Episode 16: 35:27
Episode 17: 37:24
Episode 18: 38:06
Episode 19: 39:22
Episode 20: 41:05
Episode 21: 41:50
Episode 22: 42:47
Episode 23: 43:18
Season 1 overview: 44:20
Thanks for watching! 44:44
z1l9bmczrDg
Hey guys! Today's video is part 2 of my unhinged recap of The Secret Life of the American Teenager. I am covering Seasons 2 & 3, and Part 3 will come out soon, so be on the lookout! Let me know down below what you thought of the video. Also subscribe to this channel for more videos like this :)
Intro: 0:00
Season 1 recap: 0:40
Season 2: 01:13
Season 3: 42:12
Thanks for watching!: 1:17:28
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