Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Saved By The Bell: The New Class, which ran on NBC from 1993 to 2o00.  The show is currently on Prime.

This week, we start the 2nd season of Saved By The Bell: The New Class!

Episode 2.1 “The Return of Screech”

(Dir by Don Barnhart, originally aired on September 10th, 1994)

After the disappointing reviews and ratings of the first season, Saved By The Bell: The New Class rebooted itself for the second season.  Robert Sutherland Telfer, Isaac Lidsky, and Bonnie Russavage were all fired and the characters of Scott, Weasel, and Vicky were dropped from the show. (No mention was ever made of where they had gone.  They just vanished.)

Suddenly, Megan and Lindsay’s best friend was Rachel Meyers (played by Sarah Lancaster, who appeared once during the first season).  Meanwhile, Swiss exchange student Brian Keller (played by a German actor named Christian Oliver) became the new head schemer while Bobby Wilson (Spankee Rodgers) became the new annoying sidekick with a crush on Megan.  From the start of the second season, everyone acted as if Brian and Bobby had always been there.  As for Lindsay and Tommy D, they continued to date.  And because Brian had a crush on Rachel, there was no longer anyone around trying to break the two of them up.

Mr. Belding was still the principal but now, he had a much bigger office with a window.  He also got a new administrative assistant, an education major who was on a work/study program with Cal U.  As you probably already guessed from this episode’s title, that administrative assistant turned out to be Screech Powers (Dustin Diamond).

Now, to give credit where credit is due, neither Screech nor Diamond are quite as annoying in this episode as they would eventually become.  By the end of the series, Diamond was giving such a broad performance as Screech that it almost came across as being deliberately self-destructive.  In this episode, though, Diamond just plays Screech as being overly earnest and too eager to please.  He may get on everyone’s nerves but at least he’s not doing the weird voices or the twisted facial expressions that would later come to typify his performance.

As for the plot of this episode, it’s dumb.  Rachel needs $700 so she can replace the jacket that she borrowed (without permission) from her mother.  Brian throws a party and sells tickets to help her raise the cash but when it turns out that Bobby’s house is not available for the party, Brian tricks Screech into unlocking the gym and allowing the party to be held in there.  When Belding shows up and demands to know what’s happening, Screech takes the blame and decides that he should return to Cal U.  And, really, he probably should have.  I mean, after all the years he spent with Zack, Screech should have been able to see that he was being manipulated.  What a moron.

But Brian does the right thing and tells the truth to Belding.  Brian and the Gang all get two-weeks detention.  Belding tells Screech that the students respect him and that he taught them an important lesson about the telling the truth.  I’m not sure how accurate any of that is but the important thing is that Screech stays at Bayside.

This episode was actually not as bad as I was expecting it to be.  Brian is a bit more likable than the first season’s Scott and this episode didn’t feature any of the mean-spiritedness that seemed to typify so much of the first season.  Even Screech was tolerable!

Don’t get used to it, though.  The season’s just getting started.