Ryan Brown | Through the Shattered Lens

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, an old friend makes an appearance.

Episode 1.4 “Home Shopping”

(Dir by Don Barnhart, originally aired on October 2nd, 1993)

With the entire school freaking out about midterms and Scott and Lindsay working in the school store (which apparently is just a cardboard sign set up next to a trashcan in the hall), Scott comes up with a brilliant idea. Why not start a home shopping network on Baywatch’s TV station? And why not sell a special memory tonic that is basically just chocolate syrup and fish oil?

Soon, the entire school is drinking Chocolate Memory. Evil old Dr. Hammersmith (David Byrd) announces that he’s going to make his midterm even more difficult as a way to combat the use of Chocolate Memory. Scott recruits James the Actor (Mark Blankfield) to pretend to be a Harvard professor who is willing to offer Dr. Hammersmith a job but only if Dr. Hammersmith gives an easy midterm.

James the Actor, I should mention, appeared in a handful of episodes of the original Saved By The Bell. He was a waiter at the Maxx and an actor who would happily put on a fake beard whenever Zack needed to fool someone. It’s not a surprise that he would come back for Saved By The Bell: The New Class. What is a surprise is that Scott — a transfer student from another school — somehow knows who James is. In fact, how do any of the members of the new cast know James as well as they do? James was Zack’s friend and now, suddenly, he’s Scott’s friend. It seems like James, a grown man approaching 50, just liked hanging out with high school students and helping them with their zany schemes. Red flag! Red flag!

Oh, this episode was dumb. Presumably, everyone flunked their midterms, except for Megan who was so worried about fooling Mr. Hammersmith that she actually studied for them. What’s funny is that the “difficult” questions that Mr. Hammersmith asked weren’t that difficult. I mean, if you can’t remember the year that the Boston Tea Party occurred, maybe you should be held back a grade or two. (1773, by the way.)

One of the more familiar complaints about the first season of Saved By The Bell: The New Class is that it didn’t do much to differentiate itself from the original series. It just brought in a bunch of new people and had them act like Zack, Slater, Kelly, and Weasel. That’s certainly true in this case. As I watched Scott go through the motions with his wacky scheme, I found myself suspecting that the episode’s script probably just had a line marked through “Zack” and “Scott” added in pencil.

At the end of the episode, Megan and Scott share a smile and agree that they make a great team. “Whooooo!” the audience shouts. I guess they make an okay team. I mean, they managed to get everyone in the school to drink a potentially lethal combination of fish oil and chocolate syrup. If Megan wants to become a professional con artist, I guess she’s found her man.

Welcome to Late Night 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 Pacific Blue, a cop show that aired from 1996 to 2000 on the USA Network! It’s currently streaming everywhere, though I’m watching it on Tubi.

A serial arsonist is setting Malibu on fire so, of course, the bike patrol is called in.

Episode 1.11 “The Phoenix”

(Dir by Charles Siebert, originally aired on May 11th, 1996)

Fires are breaking out all over Malibu. Whoever the arsonist is, he seems to be targeting a shady businessman named Curtis Bilson (Michael Cavanaugh). TC and Chris decide to start investigating the arsons themselves, even though neither one of them is in the arson division. “Bike patrol?” the arson detective asks, when he first meets them. However, because everyone respects Lt. Palermo, TC and Chris are allowed to investigate. Chris, being a former jet pilot, is naturally an expert on accelerants. “Smells like jet fuel.” Wow, really?

(Basically, this is the equivalent of allowing a school crossing guard to head up the search for a serial killer.)

A surfer named Suicide (Sam Hennings) insists that he saw the fire being set by The Phoenix, a legendary arsonist who the police consider to be dead. His real name was Willoughby (Tim DeZarn) and the official story is that he got caught in one of his own fires and his body was reduced to ash and that’s why he disappeared without leaving a trace behind. That seems awfully convenient and really doesn’t make much sense when you think about it but, then again, Malibu has their bike patrol investigating a serial arsonist. We’re through the looking glass here.

(Myself, I’m concerned by the fact that no one seems to find it weird that their source is nicknamed “Suicide.” I’m going to guess that’s a surfer thing but still, I cringed every time TC said, “My friend, Suicide….”)

TC and Chris’s investigation leads them to Dr. Anton (Dennis Christopher), an arsonist who is currently in a mental hospital. They try to do a Lecter/Clarice thing between Anton and Chris. Dennis Christopher is a good actor and it appears that he was having fun playing a thoroughly demented character. Jim Davidson and Darlene Vogel were very bad actors and it seems almost unfair to force them to share a scene like Dennis Christopher. It’s like giving me a chance to play tennis on national television and then telling me, right when the cameras start rolling, that I’m going to be playing against the Williams sisters. It’s just adding insult to injury.

Anyway, it turns out Willoughby is still alive and he’s targeting the businessman and he also kidnaps Lt. Palermo for some reason. Chris and TC are able to save Palermo and the crooked guy from the inferno and Willoughby once again vanishes. Because, of course, he does….

Meanwhile, Cory tries to catch a man who keeps bringing a snake to the boardwalk. At one point, she accidentally gets doused in a wet t-shirt contest. She’s win the trophy and then come back to the station without bothering to change shirts, which kind of goes against everything we’ve seen about Cory’s personality up until this point. For some reason, Palermo also puts Cory in charge of catch a mouse that’s running around the station. The snake, once captured, eats the mouse but then gets lost in the station. That made me laugh just because I like it whenever its acknowledged that the bike patrol is totally incompetent.

Next week …. Chris has a new boyfriend! Dr. Anton, maybe? We’ll find out!