Has GMW gotten too "preachy" lately?

[TMC]

Or on a "social justice warrior" vibe w/ that seemed (depending on your point of view) to deal with or even celebrate feminist propaganda ("Girl Meets STEM") and socialism ("Girl Meets Money", which implied that Mr. Minuks/Stuart/Farkle's dad was somehow wrong for making a lot of money)? I don't know how much influence Rowan Blanchard has on the writers, assuming of course she 100% agrees w/ the root messages of said episodes.

But the way that GMW has handled such subjects it just comes off as awkward and heavy-handed. For example, Maya starts the show essentially bragging about how much she doesn't want to be in school (which I realize might just be a mechanism deflecting her feelings about her performance in school) and then ends by saying she's going to get an education to make her life better.

I don't recall Boy Meets World having virtually every episode being like a "very special episode"/glorified public service announcement. It doesn't help that the kids get everything they want when they preach like this, no matter how unrealistic it is.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Actually, I think they've been holding back from falling into that trap. As long as they don't let her have more creative control next season they're good with straddling the line like this. It feels like they're trying to be balanced on two sides of one issue.

But I do agree that I would like more normal episodes like the Texas episodes. This has been a pretty long season.

[TMC]

This Girl Meets World seems to be a little too sentimental. Granted, Boy Meets World had its share of sentimentality too but for some reason, GMW makes it feel so forced. On GMW, they are often making bigger deals about stuff that is otherwise so insignificant. It's only going to set impressionable younger kids up to think that at 14 years old, everything radically changes and suddenly you're an adult with ISSUES!

It's like Boy Meets World's influence on this show's drama has been maximized, and nothing else matters. What I mean is that we're at Season 3 of GMW now, and the kids are still sitting around, talking about life, instead of actually living it. They're best friends only because the script says so, not because they actually hang out like they're supposed to, before they grow up and face the problems they're forcing right now.

You can weave in life lessons and still have a believable setting. BMW did it for the most part.

[mets82]

I was thinking the same thing last night watching GMW. I mean they sound like an afternoon special by the dialogue. They talk too old for there own good and honestly they lose me. Why can't they have simple problems? What kids talk like that?

[TMC]

Originally Posted by mets82

I was thinking the same thing last night watching GMW. I mean they sound like an afternoon special by the dialogue. They talk too old for there own good and honestly they lose me. Why can't they have simple problems? What kids talk like that?

Depending on your point of view, the nostalgia of BMW wore off after the first three episodes. The show tries WAAAAYYYYY too hard and goes overboard with trying to produce a meaningful message. In effect, it started off fun but veered towards ultra-dramatic and pretentious REALLY fast.

What made Boy Meets World so good was that it had an ability to balance between goofy fun and getting heavier and teaching life lessons. Girl Meets World started off the same way, but somewhere in the midst of Season 2, Michael Jacobs and company completely took it off the cliff into dramaville. Boy Meets World also got into the more deep stuff organically over the course of its run, whereas GMW went from 0 to 60 out of nowhere in the middle of Season 2. The original had a great balance to it and it worked. This one is forcefully trying to be deep and preachy, and it sure seems to have turned people off

The last dozen episodes have basically been "Riley and the gang find themselves and grow as people", only with the drama turned up to about a 13 on a scale of 1-10. Now bare in mind, that episodes about Riley and friends finding themselves aren't bad in general per se, but the super heavy way they talk makes it even worse. Like how many times an episode do they mention how glad they are that they're all friends and how special the world is in some hamfisted way? It's like they have all this dialogue for stuff that's like latter season BMW, but because it's on the Disney Channel, their situations aren't as deep or earned.

Another prime example there being too much forced drama is the Lucas/Maya/Riley thing. It seems really forced and also feels like it's been going on forever. GMW unfortunately, arguably fell victim to the same thing that killed iCarly. You had really fun, quirky show that eventually became about who was going to wind up romantically with who, to the exclusion of everything else.

[mets82]

That's very true. I've missed some of the recent episodes. Have they been any good?

[JO Sweet Heart]

If the show is preachy, it doesn't bother me any considering how most shows on the TV are these days.

God bless you always!!!

Holly

[TMC]

GMW especially the current season, does the exact same thing over and over: Cory talks about a topic in front of the classroom; Riley & the gang completely miss the point; they reflect on the school lesson (keyword being "school", not "life"), and all of a sudden they do understand, and start preaching pretty much directly to the audience.

There is absolutely no catalyst to the topics being handled in GMW. They are bluntly shoved in, in the hopes of having something meaningful to say the way BMW did. Sure, there are some exceptions (and those are usually the stronger episodes too), but even those fall short because of lackluster writing.

[ThomasE]

I like it just the way it is. I think the show is doing fine.

[loaferman]

It is easy to get these SJW stories on TV. Put something they disagree with on and watch their tolerance explode along with their heads.

[mets82]

SJW?

[TMC]

Originally Posted by mets82

SJW?

Social Justice Warrior.

[TMC]

Originally Posted by mets82

I was thinking the same thing last night watching GMW. I mean they sound like an afternoon special by the dialogue. They talk too old for there own good and honestly they lose me. Why can't they have simple problems? What kids talk like that?

BMW certainly had it's fair share of preachy episodes, but they were allowed to frame those plots in reality. Even if they had allowed Girl Meets World to continue, they wouldn't have allowed it to mature like Boy Meets World did.

[TMC]

Take this if you will, but one comment that I recently read is that GMW, especially as it went on, was like a cheesy, Christian-produced show aimed at small children that has a lesson about Jesus and the Bible at the end of each story, except instead of religion it was about being caring and supportive of each other.

In other words, most episodes had to end with such a Disneyfied heavy-handed moral lesson, where everyone is super morally supportive of each other and talking about their feelings.

[JO Sweet Heart]

^^^ That right there is what I loved about the show. I love when there is a message in what I am watching.

God bless you always!!!

Holly