Saved by the Bell: The College Years

If you liked the original "Saved By The Bell" series, then you probably watched this follow-up series, and found it to be more of the same. This short-lived program was marginally more intelligent than the original, and it followed many of the same characters who made SBTB a Saturday morning hit. I can't really explain why I watched the original series, and I can't offer any better explanation as to why I watched this one. If you grew up with these characters, I would think that "The College Years" seemed like more of the same likable stupidity. If you didn't watch the first show, then this second "Saved By The Bell" will probably just seem like stupidity.

I remember watching (and recording) the last episode of the original "Saved by the Bell" as a nine year old and seeing the special announcement during a commercial break that there would be a college version of the show starting in the fall. I practically counted the days until the series premiere, and I truly enjoyed the few episodes that aired. It was canceled not because it was a bad show, I think, but because the truth is that lighthearted shows like "Saved by the Bell" just do not belong in a competitive prime time environment. This show was ridiculed just because, what, it was getting beat in the ratings by "Full House"? Come on! Expectations were way too high. It would have been safe on Saturday mornings like the original, never mind that it was about college students. We fans would have watched regardless.

This is the third show in the SBTB series and while it is way better then "Good Morning, Miss Bliss" it isn't better than "Saved by the Bell." SBTB is a cult hit (almost a classic) and it is hard to make a great follow-up and by the looks of it they didn't try very hard and that's why this show falls short. There were some good episodes but the majority fell short. If you're a SBTB fan then you should check it out but it really isn't that good.

Where I live, this show airs once a week at four in the morning, so I don't exactly make a point of watching it, but since I was awake, I decided to.

Actually, I remember when the dumb thing first aired, since I believe I saw the premiere episode. For some reason I watched--and loved--the monstrosity "Saved By the Bell," but even THEN I didn't like "The College Years." I thought it was boring.

After my most recent viewing of it, I still found "The College Years" quite dull. Many of the characters from the original reprised their roles: Mark-Paul Gossellar as the annoying "blond" lead Zack Morris; Tiffani Amber Theissen as "desirable" Kelly Kapowski; Mario Lopez as "athletic" A.C. Slater; and Dustin Diamond as Screech Powers, about the most irritating character on television. For some reason their friends Jessie and Lisa have gone onto other pursuits, so replacing them are Alex, some lady who looks in her thirties and has a whiny voice, and is suposed to be Slater's girlfriend; Leslie, who is so charisma-free I didn't even remember her existence until I saw her name listed among the credits; and the also charisma-free man who is in charge of their dorm, who is supposed to be like a "cooler" version of the high school principal Mr. Belding. The situations were also similar to the high school series. Selfish Zack cooks up a scheme in order to benefit himself somehow and wacky hijinx occur as he goes about fulfilling it. In the particular episode I saw, he wanted to take Kelly to Mexico, along with Slater and annoying Alex, so he decided to hold a rave and charge twenty dollars a head for it. Who'd pay twenty dollars to go to some party, especially when the purpose of it is to fund somebody's vacation? (Interestingly, an "I Love Lucy," with a very similar plot was on the same night, meaning "Bell" can't even come up with its own creative storylines. Plus, "Lucy's" was a lot more funny.)

Anyway, the big conflict is, where can Zack hold his rave? After all, they're illegal. Hijinx galore, as he outwits some Dean of Students character played by "The Pratice's" Holland Taylor(who probably hates to admit she was in this show.) Plus some subplot about Kelly recovering from a break-up with a professor was dull, and the prof. was very childish and unappealing. So was the show. I am not surprised it was cancelled after a season, because this is the epitome of some series that should have stuck to daytime TV, not tried its hand at primetime, where it was killed by "FULL HOUSE." What probably beat them both, or should have at least, was a competing series on CBS (since I remember this was an NBC show) for anyone over the age of 13.

I'm only born in 1994, so Saved By The Bell was a bit before my time, however I used to watch it on Nickelodeon as a kid and vaguely remember the college years from ages ago. Now I'm in uni I figured it would be interesting to revisit the whole Saved the Bell thing, so I've recently watched more or less every episode from start to finish, and I can see why you might say this is a bit stupid. For people that watched Saved By The Bell, its a nice continuation so you see how the characters grow up, and gives you a bit more of the same. And true, the issues raised are similar, and at times I'm like "why would he go through the same thing again!!!" but it didn't bother me too much. Overall I'd say its nice for people who watched the original series, but I doubt it would hold its own as a stand alone programme.