Imagine a teen drama for television, unhindered by broadcast-network censorship rules. Imagine as much graphic sex talk and imagery as the market will bear, beyond what passes for edgy on “90210” or “Gossip Girl.”
Now picture a teen drama that employs actual teens to play the parts, rather than the usual long-in-the-tooth 20-somethings pretending to be high-schoolers. (Corey Monteith of “Glee” is 28; Blake Lively of “Gossip Girl” is 23.)
Amp up the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, carry over the heightened realism from the British original, and you’ve got “Skins,” the new MTV version, debuting at 8 p.m. Monday.
This “Skins” also uses actual teens offscreen — in a writers’ advisory panel — to get the angst right.
While an undercurrent of humor runs through the character-driven story, there’s plenty of pain to balance it.
Sexuality. Drugs. The horrors of the high-school lunchroom. Masturbation and more masturbation. It’s all here, in an eagerly anticipated remake of the popular British series that captured a certain truth about the modern teen experience. Their lives are frightening, wild and misunderstood — and that’s just the legal part.
The imposing soundtrack varies wildly, from a cover of Tony Clarke’s “Landslide” to a cover of Marva Whitney’s “Wade in the Water,” plus Pepper Rabbit and Trackademics in the first couple of hours. (The theme song, “Lina Magic,” was crowd-sourced via a scoring contest.)
One convention that seems at odds with the focus on realism: Anyone over 30 is caricatured as a clueless fossil. The depiction of teachers is especially dismissive. Don’t we know from “Glee” that some teachers are way cool?
So far, the standouts are James Newman as Tony the self-assured alpha male; Daniel Flaherty as Stanley, his shaggy sidekick; Sofia Black D’Elia as Tea, the confident, gay daughter of an Italian with apparent mob connections; and Jesse Carere as Chris, a going-nowhere bad boy. Newman even gets to sing in a choir — clearly, the “Glee” ethos is contagious.
While the ensemble is large and the characters appealingly dysfunctional, the one subgroup that comes in for brutal ridicule is the preppies. Rich kids with cutesy names who drive fancy cars and wear cable-knit sweaters tied around their necks can apparently withstand taunting.
“Lights Out”
Boxing films are never really about boxing, and for that, some of us are grateful.
Unlike the film “The Fighter,” which is essentially a story of two brothers, “Lights Out” on FX is about a marriage, a family and an aging athlete at the point of desperation.
Both boxing stories center on redemption. Neither requires the viewer to be a fan of the sport to grasp the good drama, in and out of the ring.
“Lights Out,” running at 11 p.m. Tuesday on FX, benefits from the small-screen format, which allows the story to go deep, over an extended period (13 episodes), probing the demons surrounding the burned- out boxer who suffers a form of boxer’s dementia as he aims for a final comeback.
Patrick “Lights” Leary, beautifully played by Holt McCallany (“CSI: Miami”), is the former champ in the FX series.
Just as there’s a central lie at the root of “The Fighter,” there’s a shared delusion in “Lights Out”: Friends, fans and family like to say that the champ was robbed of a victory in his final bout.
The drama, from executive producer Warren Leight (“In Treatment”), effectively balances scenes of life at home with Lights’ wife, Theresa (Catherine McCormack), and at the gym owned by Lights’ father (Stacy Keach).
The series earns the highest compliment: It’s engrossing, even to those who don’t appreciate a left hook.
Joanne Ostrow: 303-954-1830 or jostrow@denverpost.com
