Saved By the Bell:New Class:S2

First of all, I'm an adult and don't really watch shows like this anymore but I did watch this show growing up and am reviewing it from the perspective of someone who can view this series with the nostalgia factor working for it. If you didn't grow up watching this show (and I admit, there can't be many people interested in this product who didn't), stop reading now and DON'T buy this set.

Saved By the Bell was a cheesy teen show with mediocre to bad acting, lazy (sometimes preachy) writing, and storylines that were seldom believable. That being said, as a kid, there was something about the original Saved By the Bell that hooked you in. There was just something about it that made even the preachy stories entertaining and as a kid you never noticed that the acting was subpar.

But all good things (and in this case, mediocre things) must come to an end and when the original series ended, the producers looked for a way to milk the Saved By the Bell franchise for all it was worth. Enter The New Class.

The concept was relatively simple. Mr. Belding remains at Bayside High and a brand new group of students emerges to seek adventure and fun. The first season began with a group of new kids....but somehow these kids didn't seem so new. Basically, all of the characters from season one of The New Class (sans Vicki, who doesn't seem too similar to any of the original characers) were clones of characters from the original. Scott was the new Zach. Tommy D was the new (dumber) Slater, etc. Right from the start, it was clear to all concerned that something wasn't working. No one wanted to see recycled storylines with clones in place of the originals. And I don't think I'm alone in thinking that Tommy D and Lindsay were terrible actors, even by teen show standards.

So, when season 2 rolled around, the powers that were decided to fix things up. Though in doing this, some of their "improvements" were certainly questionable. Scott, Weasel, and Vicki were all let go, never to be mentioned again. Strange choices, considering Weasel was probably the most tolerable of the clones, and Vicki was the only character who seemed original. Even Scott, while no Zack Morris, was at least adequate. Of the cast members who remained, only Megan Jones was halfway decent.

But some of the people brought in to improve season 2 actually proved to be quite good. Brian seems to be the closest thing to a central "Zack-like" character, but was less of a schemer. Bobby was the comic-relief of the new group, but wasn't a complete nerd like Screech. And Rachel was Brian's love-interest, sort of like the Zack and Kelly of season 2. And, to fans of the original series, the biggest pleasure was seeing Dustin Diamond returning to again play Samuel "Screech" Powers, who returned to Bayside High to work as Mr. Belding's assistant.

While still not as good as the original (which, of course, was also just a teen show and therefore far from perfect), season 2 did prove to be an improvement over the first year of The New Class and probably stands as the best season this series put out. In later seasons, Screech would get weirder and zanier until finally even people who loved him on the original series would have to be annoyed by him. But here we still have the somewhat human Screech we remember from the College Years.

By season 3, the cast would change again (and incredibly, the producers still chose to keep the terrible Tommy D and Lindsay over the semi-decent characters of Brian, Bobby, and Megan...all I can figure is that other kids responded much differently to these characters than I did), and it was clear that the producers had not learned their lesson from season one. They created a new Zach-clone in Ryan, and season 3 saw them again directing ripping off the original series. Screech also began to get more obnoxious at that point.

It was also around this point that it became obvious that the producers were never going to be happy with the cast. They seemed content to fire half the cast each season and just hope somehow lightning would strike twice and they'd find a new group with the appeal of Zack, Slater, Screech, Kelly, Jessie, and Lisa. Strangely enough though, they might have succeeded if they had just left well-enough alone after season 2. Sure, the somewhat different characters of season 2 might not have been an immediate success, but people might have grown to like them had the audience been given time to accept them. Instead, on The New Class, characters were gone as quickly as they came so each season has a different feeling.

And for that reason, I think this season wins the gold. The characters weren't the direct knock-offs we saw in season one, nor was Screech as obnoxious as he would become in season three and onward. This was as close to a winning-formula as The New Class would ever come, so if you are going to shell out money for a set, this is the one to get. But don't buy this if you are just looking for a 90's series about growing up. It boggles my mind that all seven seasons of The New Class have been given a DVD but yet The Wonder Years (a series that was actually GOOD) hasn't seen the light of day. Oh well, I guess we can't win 'em all!

As I noted in my review of season 1, some major cast changes were made for this season and it's noticably better than the first season as a result of it. Gone are the 'copy' characters of Scott Erickson(Zack Morris clone), Weasel(Screech clone) and Vicki Needleman(Jessie Spano clone). The characters of Bobby Wilson, Brian Keller and Rachel Meyers(played by the STUNNING Sarah Lancaster) were introduced in their places and they were definitely more original and easy to stomach characters. Incase you didn't already know, this is also the season where Screech Powers(Dustin Diamond) is brought in as an "assistant" to Mr. Belding. Fortunately he's not too annoying this season(opposed to the near parody of himself he becomes in later seasons) and helps bridge the gap between The New Class and The Original Series. On the negative side, the writing continues to be rather silly and often times far fetched with some glaring plot holes and very formulaic stories. But frankly, it's still no worse than the previous season or any season of The Original Series. The acting also leaves something to be desired, but this is Saved by the Bell. It was a Saturday morning show targeted at young teens. It's best to shut your brain off before viewing and just enjoy the show for the cheesy entertainment it is.

As for the video and audio quality; it's pretty much in line with the season 1 set. It's what you would expect for a show of this nature. The show was shot on video with a very limited budget, but is bright and colorful, and the DVD transfers by Image Entertainment do a fine job with this. The episodes are a tad better than how I remember them looking during their original broadcasts. No bonus features to speak of, but did you really expect any?

In some good news, Image Entertainment just announced season 3 for a June release, so get ready(and there are 4 more seasons to go after that. whoosh...). Also, to the user who was inquiring about how many discs the set contains. It's 3 discs. This season contains a whopping 26 episodes(with the addition of the 'summer run' eps at the resort club), so 3 discs are needed to contain them all without severely over compressing. Amazon simply goofed and hopefully they'll correct this error.

When you stop to consider the Saved By The Bell franchise spans 15-seasons across multiple spin-offs (Good Morning Miss Bliss, The College Years, The New Class and so on), it can be a bit confusing to put a sense of order into the many releases.

That said, The New Class Season 2 is, as the name suggests, the second season of The New Class and the eighth season of Saved By The Bell if you're using 1988's Good Morning Miss Bliss as a starting point.

Season 2 originally aired between 1994-1995 Saturday mornings on NBC and is typically regarded as a low point of the whole franchise. When the original gang moved on, NBC had contracted just two seasons of The New Class as well as two seasons of The College Years for prime time. When fans rejected the first season of The New Class, some pretty drastic changes were made during the off-season. In fact  of season one's cast were swapped out and the big addition was the original show's geek Screech (Dustin Diamond) was brought on board in effort to bridge the gap between The New Class and The College Years; where he was simultaneously starring.

I have to admit that the first few episodes of Season 2 are downright painful to behold, even now where the sting of losing the beloved original gang has long since faded. The acting is downright abysmal, the performances stiff and the jokes pretty forced. Many lines are butchered or fumbled yet remain in the final production cuts; leading one to suspect that dozens of retakes must have been standard fair in the show's filming.

Fortunately by about the midway point of the season, the acting (and perhaps more important, interaction between characters) really starts to find its rhythm. It's absolutely critical to stick with the show before judging it, as the early episodes are undeniably the weakest!

Interestingly, the show's writers had gone so far to steer clear of creating a Zack Morris imitator lead character that season 1's Scott Erickson (played by Robert Sutherland Tefler) was dropped in favor of fictitious Swiss expat Brian Keller (Christian Oliver) as a much less cunning protagonist. Gone for the first time in the show's history was the rivalry element made famous by Zack and Slater originally in favor of a friendlier group dynamic.

Perhaps the most controversial of all the new elements brought to Season 2 of The New Class was the integration of the Samuel "Screech" Powers character as a college-going administration assistant doing his internship at Bayside. As most Saved by the Bell fans can attest, the Screech character's demise from a scientifically oriented geek and cohort to Zack's clever scheming to a bumbling fool with the most annoying way of speaking this side of Steve Urkel was nothing shy of obnoxious. Sadly by the time the second season of The New Class came about, the character was in the depths of the latter (perhaps explaining why, outside of Saved by the Bell, Dustin Diamond has been unemployed).

Looking back, the 26-episodes that comprise this season are by far and large the most classroom free of the entire series. Summer job episodes at a country club, excursions to dude ranches, dance parties even ski resort getaways all surface in between school days. For a show supposedly centered on school, The New Class Season 2 does all it can to keep the learning-related situations to an absolute minimum. Making matters worse still is it appears as though Belding (Dennis Haskins) isn't only the solitary administrator in the school; he's with the kids at each and every excursion. Perhaps the most notable of this ridiculousness comes when he dishes out detention at Tommy D's surprise birthday party.

Well in conclusion, as someone who was around when these shows were originally airing, the sensation that the show was struggling to find itself isn't quite as apparent now. I have found that trying to view the New Class in its near constant cast rotation and writing transformations taking place across its 7-season run as a replacement to the original series is the quickest way to become disappointed. Rather, it's a sort of silly cousin to a good show that, because of its lack of popularity in syndication, is a new experience to many long-time fans of the franchise.