GORTIMER GIBBON - La vita a Normal Street

This is a type of show that you could say is rare now a days. It is quite family friendly and fun. But it definitely has a heart. You feel how the characters grow up and makes you miss your old friends too. I would've liked if it continued for another season but how they did they ending is quite outstanding. Everything just gets real. The acting is OK but the storytelling in terms of the writing is well done. Great show! They should make more shows like this. Family friendly and light hearted. A must watch!

After 14 episodes of the first season, I am now comfortable in saying: Gortimer is smartly written, well acted, and solidly produced.

It transports one to a simpler, happier time, while still meaningful and relevant to the younger viewers. Each episode is a stand-alone tale that evokes the mysteries of childhood and--in what seems a lost art--manages to teach poignant and valuable lessons. Some episodes are more powerful and magical than others, but each one is satisfying in its own right.

This show is one-part "Eerie, Indiana," one-part Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and one-part its own wondrous thing.

There comes a point in most TV viewer's life where mainstream TV just decides it doesn't want to cater for you any longer. Either you got too old or you've finally wised up. Or you want something different.

One could be forgiven for assuming Gortimer Gibbon is presented as another run-of-the-mill children's show with an improbable plot/sequence of events and a load of incredibly irritating characters who don't talk but shout at each other across some garish looking set (ie any recent Nickelodeon production). Your worries are unfounded because in Gilbert nobody's irritating, the sets are vast majority exterior and any indoor sets are quite nice looking. And the plots are improbable (but grounded in reality) and wouldn't have been too far out of place in Eerie Indiana anyway.

While I am reminded of Eerie Indiana, Gortimer isn't quite as dark as Eerie was, not quite as surreal in various areas as Eerie was and is clearly not trying to be Eerie in new colours. Gortimer at least ties the premise and location down to a street or a specific town maybe, as opposed to Eerie which effectively suggested the entire state was off its trolley.

I hadn't realised when I first wrote this review that this show is not a series of self contained episodes, but each episode runs on after the other with references to past events. Therefore the characters develop beautifully with the programme as they absorb details of whatever happened to whichever kid this time. The three main leads are written from the off as having been best friends forever and a day and it shows here in the writing. No spoilers but the relationships of the kids are regularly tested throughout. One event in one episode in particular (I won't say which one) in any other mainstream show would have ended up in a major bust up that would typically last 90% of the episode. Here it was given something different - a beautiful heartfelt resolution that didn't take up anywhere near that amount of time.

This is not a bad little production, this is the sort of live action stuff Nickelodeon used to churn out in the 1990s, so its nice to see there is still a place for something like this. I must sum up with what creator David Anaxagoras wrote as a comment on his blog in 2016 that I agree with for this show: "I never thought of it as a kid's show. I wrote it for the kid in all of us".

This show is all about friendship and well behaved kids. It's decent and balanced and has no fuss. Every episode has a moral and being an adult I still enjoyed the kids show.

A show that straddles reality and fantasy, it appealed to this adult, too. The fantasy comes in two packages: the first is that there is magic in this small town, mostly in misbehaving artifacts. The second fantasy is that it is a multicultural, poverty-free small town where everyone treats each other decently. It is not the real world, but it is the world I think we all wish we could inhabit.

While there is magic, there is plenty of science too, and science always trumps magic in the show. I was especially delighted that it is the girls who are whizzes at math and science. The boys are pleasant, funny, and have their own talents. The parents are loving, but also flawed, and with agendas of their own.

Emotional topics are brought to the fore a couple times, particularly issues of grief. But comedy reigns....comedy and a good heart.

Nice work from the kid actors, and I'm keeping an eye on David Bloom, who played one of the recurring secondary roles. I saw real depth and range in him.

I'll miss the kids of Normal Street. When Amazon gets it right, as they often do, they excel.