Retro Television Review: Malibu, CA 1.5 “Photo Shoot”

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Posted on June 27, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Thursdays, I will be reviewing Malibu CA, which aired in Syndication in 1998 and 1999. The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!



I meant to review this episode last week but it was so bad that the prospect of writing about it just filled me with an unending depression. This week, I’m feeling a little better so let’s give it a shot!

Episode 1.5 “Photo Shoot”

(Dir by Gary Shimokawa, originally aired on November 8th, 1998)

It’s been a while since I posted a review of Malibu, CA and I realize that the show is not a particularly well-remembered one. It only aired for two seasons and so few people watched that it pretty much ended producer Peter Engel’s reign as America’s top producer of teen sitcoms. So, here is a quick recap:

Scott (Trevor Merszei) and Jason Collins (Jason Hayes) are twin brothers from New York. When their mother takes a job in Saudi Arabia (like, seriously, what the Hell? Is she doing Bin Laden’s taxes?), Scott and Jason move in with their father, Peter (Edward Blatchford), who owns a restaurant in Malibu. Scott and Jason both have a crush on their next door neighbor, Sam (Gina May). Sam is friendly but doesn’t seem to really think of either of them in that way. Sam’s best friend is a lifeguard who is nicknamed Stads (Wendi Kenya, who deserved better than this show). Stads has a crush on Scott but Jason is the one who she kissed at the end of the previous episode. Meanwhile, on the beach, Murray (Brandon Brooks) owns the surf shack and Traycee (Priscilla inga Taylor) wears a bikini.

All caught up?

Great! Let’s talk about episode 5.

Or maybe we could just skip episode 5 because God, did it suck.

Basically, the theme of episode 5 is that Scott and Jason are the two worst human beings who have ever lived. Scott finally asks Sam out on a date. Sam accepts, for some reason. But then a photographer named Devon (Simon Clark) asks Sam if she’s ever done any modeling and soon, Sam is more interested posing for Devon and going to Paris with him than in going out with some smirky frat boy from New York. This is actually a great opportunity for Sam but Sam’s success would mean Scott not getting what he wants to Scott and Jason spend the whole episode trying to sabotage Devon’s attempts to get a decent picture of Sam.

If this sound familiar, you may be remembering when the exact same thing happened with Zack and Kelly on Saved By The Bell. On Saved By The Bell, Zack learned the important of not being selfish and supporting Kelly’s dreams. Kelly went to Paris to be a model but she was back the next episode and no mention was ever made of her time in Paris for the rest of the show. On Malibu, CA, Scott acts like a possessive creep but he gets lucky in that Sam decides not to go to Paris because Devon tries a line on her about how she’s Cindy Crawford “without the mole.” Scott gets what he wants but just because Devon turned out to be equally skeezy.

Ugh. This episode. There’s a real sense of entitlement to Scott and Jason that is very off-putting. Entitled teenagers were a mainstay on Peter Engel’s shows but he usually able to temper that by casting likable actors. With Malibu, CA, he went with two actors who both came across like two smirky, mentally dull frat boys and, as a result, Jason and Scott really do come across as being the worst two people in the world.

As for the rest of the episode, Jason and Stads continued to pretend as if they didn’t like each other while Murray used various new age techniques to cure Peter’s headache. Even One World had better B-plots. Bleh all around.

Oh well — at least there’s only 47 more episodes to go….