Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Mondays, I will be reviewing Hang Time, which ran on NBC from 1995 to 2000.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

The season has finally begun.  Julie won one game.  Michael lost one game.  Danny and Sam are now a couple.  Will Deering High continue its winning/losing ways?  Let’s find out!

Hang Time!

Episode 1.5 “Oh Captain, My Captain”

(Directed by Howard Murray, originally aired on September 30th, 1995)

In order to shake up the team and hopefully have a winning season, Coach Fuller decides to switch around everyone’s positions.  I have to admit that, while watching this episode, I was forced to reflect on how little I actually know about basketball.  For instance, I was stunned to discover that the players have specific positions.  I honestly thought that everyone just ran around the court and tried to steal the ball.

Chris isn’t happy about having to switch positions because he thinks that it might make it more difficult for him to get a college scholarship.  (Chris is like 5’7 so maybe it would be a good idea for him to at least consider other options.)  Chris resigns as team captain.  Coach Fuller appoints Danny as the new team captain.  Teams have captains?  I’m learning a lot from this show.  Eventually, Chris learns to put the team first and Danny hands the captainship (or whatever it’s called) back over to him.

In the B-plot, Michael gets a job working at Earl’s farm.  Chaos ensues but Michael learns an important lesson about how difficult farm work is.

This episode had one good joke, in which Mary Beth sent Coach Fuller a legal summons because her father gave her an attorney for her birthday and she figured she should make use of her presents.  

Otherwise, this episode had a bit too much basketball for me, which is obviously kind of a silly complaint to make about a show that’s about basketball.  I have to admit that this show doesn’t do much for my rebellious spirit.  The main lesson was always to listen to the coach and put the team first.  Bleh.  BE A REBEL!

Episode 1.6 “Earl Makes The Grade”

(Directed by Howard Murray, originally aired on October 14th, 1995)

Deering High has a game coming up against their hated rivals, Valley High …. oh wait a minute. Sorry, Valley High was Bayside’s rival. Deering High is going up against Dover High. Earl, however, is flunking history. He has to pass his big midterm if he’s going to play. Unfortunately, a new girl is distracting Earl from studying. She’s making him stay up late and kissing him whenever he tries to study. It turns out that it’s all a plot to keep Earl from playing in the game, like that time Valley stole Screech’s lucky beret right before the big chess match. After Earl’s new girlfriend framed him for cheating on the test, Coach Fuller declared, “You let your team down, Earl.”

Good Lord, is it a team or is it a cult?

Anyway, everything works out due to the TNBC law of people always doing obviously stupid stuff. Immediately after Earl gets kicked off the team, Earl’s fake girlfriend started making out with a player on the other team in Deering High’s gym, right in the middle of the Deering/Dover game. Anyway, once it becomes clear that Earl was framed, he’s allowed to rejoin the team and Dover gets destroyed. Yay!

The B-plot dealt with a prank war between Julie and Danny. Remember the Bayside/Valley prank war?

My point is that this was pretty much a Saved By The Bell episode that got reused on Hang Time. That said, Robert Michael Ryan gave a pretty good performance as Earl and you actually did feel sorry for him when he discovered how cruelly he had been treated. Earl was just too innocent for this world.

Will Deering continue to win their games? Check back next week to find out!

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Mondays, I will be reviewing Hang Time, which ran on NBC from 1995 to 2000.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

Finally!  It’s time for the Deering Tornadoes to actually play a game!  Will Julie and the rest of the team live up to the hype?  And when will the show realize that they need a better theme song?

I’ll always remember me and my friends at Hang Time!

Episode 1.3 “Full Court Press”

(Directed by Howard Murray, originally aired on September 23rd, 1995)

The season is about to begin and the press are invading Deering High, all so they can report on Julie Connor, the first girl to ever play basketball in high school.  (At least, that’s the way the story is reported.)  The press is only interested in talking about Julie.  All of the fans are only interested in getting Julie’s autograph.  Julie has strangers walking up to her and telling her that she’s going to be a huge star.  The rest of the team starts to get jealous.  Coach Fuller is forced to close the practices to the public.  “Connor, get the stars out of your eyes!” he says.  He also reminds her to always mention her teammates while being interviewed.

Unfortunately, the fame starts to go to Julie’s head.  “Big decision,” she says, “do I go on Leno or Letterman?”  On the day of the first game, she’s late because she has to go to a photoshoot.  Coach Fuller punishes her by putting her on the bench.  “Ohhhhh!” the audience says.

Julie is forced to sit on the bench until the third quarter or half or whatever it is that they play in basketball.  However, when the Tornadoes start to lose, Fuller puts Julie in the game.  At first, the team still snubs her but then Julie calls a timeout and apologizes.  Then the boys call another timeout to apologize to Julie.  Then Danny calls a third timeout to apologize personally.  Despite all of the timeouts, the team goes on to win by one point.  That point was scored by Julie.  So, apparently, Julie was totally correct about thinking that she was the most important player on the team.

Meanwhile, Mary Beth saved Earl from choking to death so Earl gives her a pig.

Episode 1.4 “Will The Real Michael Maxwell Please Stand Up”

(Directed by Howard Murray, originally aired on October 7th, 1995)

Deering High won their first game, by one point, thanks to Julie.  However, they lose their second game, again by one point, thanks to Michael Maxwell.  Michael misses not one but two free throws!  He then makes the mistake of saying, “I choked” while in the presence of reporters.  The next day, guess what the headline on the front page of the newspaper is!

Anyway, Michael loses his confidence but then he’s given a pep talk by his idol, Grant Hill, who I guess was a real basketball player at the time.

Meanwhile, Danny is still trying to work up the courage to ask out Julie.  Samantha tries to help him out, mostly because Samantha likes him.  At first, Danny is too stupid to understand this but, by the end of the episode, he and Samantha are a seriously cute couple.

My thoughts on these two episodes is that I don’t know a thing about basketball and the first season was all about basketball.  As a result, the first season was uneven (for me, at least) but the show would eventually develop its own weird charm.  At this point, I’m just waiting for the theme song to change and for the Tornadoes to actually win or lose a game by more than one point.

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Mondays, I will be reviewing Hang Time, which ran on NBC from 1995 to 2000.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

Hang Time!  I’ll always remember my friends at Hang Time!

Imagine California Dreams if it took place in Indiana and if, instead of music, everyone was obsessed with basketball.  That’s Hang Time!

Produced by Peter Engel, Hang Time followed the adventures of the Deering High School basketball team.  Somewhat notoriously, the cast regularly changed from season to season, with only two members of the cast sticking with the show for every season.  The first season featured:

David Hanson as Chris Atwater, the star of Deering High’s basketball team,

Daniella Deutscher as Julie Connor, the newest member of the team,

Chad Gabriel as Danny Mellon, the quirky member of the team who had a crush on Julie,

Megan Parlen as Mary Beth Pepperton, the materialistic head cheerleader who was dating Chris,

Robert Michael Ryan as Earl Hatfield, the dumb country boy who loved basketball and worked as a mall security guard,

Christian Belanvis as Michael Maxwell, who had a lot of talent and an ego to match,

Hillary Tuck as Samantha Morton, the hyper organized team manager,

and

Reggie Theus as Bill Fuller, a former pro player who returned to his old high school to coach the team.

Season one of Hang Time also had an absolutely horrid theme song, one that was luckily abandoned after the season ended.

Episode 1.1 “The Pilot”

(Directed by Howard Murray, Originally aired on September 9th, 1995)

Oh my God, this was bad….

I mean, pilots are usually bad because the characters aren’t as nuanced as they will later be and the initial storyline usually tries to hard to establish everyone’s role in the show’s hierarchy.  Veteran retro television viewers know better than to expect anything good from an episode with the dreaded title of “The Pilot.”

That said, the pilot of Hang Time was really, really bad.  The show itself was never exactly good but it did eventually develop an oft-kilter charm.  But none of that charm is present in the first episode of the show.

Julie Connor (Daniella Deutscher) transfers to Deering High and tries out for the school’s basketball team.  A girl playing basketball!?  GASP!  Anyway, Julie turns out to be a slightly above average basketball player and wins a place on the team and …. well, that’s about it.  It would probably seem like more of an accomplishment if it appeared that there was any real competition when it came to getting on the team.  Instead, only a handful of people seem to be interested in playing basketball and at least a few of them seem to be …. well, kind of short.

I understand that Reggie Theus was a former basketball player-turned-actor.  Judging from this pilot, as an actor, he was a very good athlete.

Episode 1.2 “Trouble in Paradise”

(Directed by Howard Murray, Originally aired on September 16th, 1995)

“You should be home, baking a Cake!” a drunk basketball fan yells at Julie when she and Chris attend a pro basketball game.  Julie challenges the jerk to a game.  Chris tries to maintain calm.  Unfortunately, it gets both Julie and Chris on TV, which leads to Mary Beth and Danny getting jealous.

Bleh.  This was a dumb episode.  Mary Beth, who doesn’t care about basketball, was the only character to whom I could relate.

The first two episodes of Hang Time felt like California Dreams, without the music.  Hang Time would eventually develop a style of its own, with Megan Parlen especially proving herself to be a capable comedic actress.  But that style really isn’t present in much of the first season.

Next week: The Deering Tornadoes finally play a game!