In the days of my early youth, before high school, I didn’t care for stories about kids in high school. There will always be a series of shows for preteens about all the drama and excitement that the last 4 years of school brings. Shows like “That’s So Raven”, “Drake & Josh”, “Boy Meets World”, or others found on Disney, Nickelodeon, or Broadcast Primetime. And while I had plenty of fun watching “Boy Meets World” over the years, it had little to do with the show and more to do with a combination of hormones and Topanga. Maybe it’s because they weren’t “serious” or “real”, but other more serious dramas like “My So Called Life” felt just as empty despite dealing with real issues on a regular basis. And then, in my junior year, the mock heard round the world was sounded.

“Welcome to the O.C., bitch!”

When “The O.C.” aired, I finally realized what I was looking for in teen drama; complete fantasy. And not the mish-mashed, based-on-a-true-story masquerading as gritty realism like “Dangerous Minds”, but 100% flash-in-the-pan teen fantasy that cuts right into the heart of a soap opera, leaving the tired husk behind. One that gives all the kids full-fledged adult agency with the fallback of having parents to protect them and a very minor amount of school to deal with, despite going to some elite institution and being an honor student. No work, all play. Twenty-five year old actors in the role of fifteen year old kids. “Beverly Hills 90210”, but with some real spice, where the consequences are made out to be monumental until they actually happen and somehow the inevitable courtroom appearance ends with a mistrial and the person who all the kids “accidentally” murdered deserved it in the end. Or maybe they didn’t, but the kids move on anyway, brooding only when the story requires it.

From there, I graduated to “Gossip Girl”, a show whose cell phones were always 3 years removed from the present but still somehow captured the imaginations of tweens, teens, and “adults”. The show somewhat centers around a mechanic in which the entire upper-east side’s elite teens flock to a single website for all of their upper-east side gossip. Which basically implies these elite teen’s lives are so exclusive, even their internet usage is. It was Facebook and Instagram wrapped up in a gossip rag that actually determined how these people lived their lives. Back in 2007,  there was no single website, social media, or app, that made up your entire social atmosphere. But in Gossip Girl, it was like the site could eat up all the oxygen in the room and doom you to a social death. It was pure fantasy. WAS. Today it almost seems Nostradamic, but in a much more small, silly way. I loved it then and I love it now.

Then the age of vampires and werewolves was ushered in, and teen shows flocked to a more supernatural fantasy. “Teen Wolf” and “Vampire Diaries” drew in big numbers, but for me, it was the wrong end of fantasy. My inner teen went into hibernation until, like a lightning bolt striking my heart, from the depths of ancient comics rose “Riverdale”. The show would take a simple, slice-of-life americana icon “Archie” and breath every ounce of modern teen melodrama throughout its very old skin. In its very first episode, it took every surprise from every long running teen series and plotted a course for insanity. We get the new girl in town arch, the father is an incarcerated businessman arch, the mother moves back to her hometown arch, the teen having sex with a teacher arch, the divorced parents arch, the incestual twin arch, the teen prodigy arch, the overbearing parent arch, the sibling with a nervous breakdown arch, the childhood love arch, the character narrating the story as an author framing device arch, and most importantly the murdered teen whodunit arch. I perfect storm.

Honestly, after the release of “Gotham”, I should have seen “Riverdale” coming. I am now thirty years old and still emotionally involving myself in the world of fake adult teenagers. My connection to these shows always boils down to a single question. “Why?” Why do they do any of this? Who are these people? In what universe do people parent in this disconnected yet oddly involved way? Why am I watching this? Because I was forged in the fire of Rumiko Takahashi and Clamp? Because Doug Funnie never got the girl? Because Clarissa never did explain it all?

Why?! I don’t know. I love it. And if I die tomorrow, the title of this article would ring true. Cheers.