Review – Skins (US)

Skins – MTV – 10:00/9:00pm Monday – USA

Remember that time when we all drove that SUV into the river? That was such a mental night. It was right after we’d dropped that crazy girl off to pee in the bushes. Remember her? We’d rushed her to the hospital because we thought she’d OD’d on drugs but then she came too and said she had to pee. It was so hilarious. I can’t even remember where we got that SUV from… oh that’s right, we stole it from that rich chick’s house. Remember how we crashed that rich snobby Gossip Girl party and we totally tore that shit up, those losers didn’t know what hit them. That was insane. We were all there trying to get Stanley laid, right? And he’d bought a massive bag of weed that we then had to sell to those snobby rich kids, but they weren’t buying any. Cause they were such losers. Anyway, it was totally like the best most craziest night ever. We really are the coolest teenagers in the world! Let’s walk across this bridge in formation that shows we’re all part of the same group whilst wearing clothes that show how we’re also individuals with distinct personalities.

Skins is a little shit of a program. I haven’t seen much of the British Skins but this American MTV adaptation seems to be just as obnoxious as the original. Front and centre of this gang of teens who fuck, take drugs and generally be way more cool than everybody around them is a dickweed named Tony. Tony was played by the generally agreeable Nicholas Hoult in the original but is injected with an extra dose of smugness thanks to James Newman in this version. Every moment Tony is on screen he deserves to be punched square in his face for being such a little shit.

Tony is embarrassed by fact his friend Stanley is sixteen and still hasn’t lost his virginity yet, so he makes it his mission to help Stanley get laid. Tony says things like “you get to present Mr. Happy the key to the furry city” instead of “you get to have sex” and then offers up his friend Michelle as virgin bait, only he doesn’t call her Michelle, he calls her Nips because she has funny nipples and she hates him calling her that. Stanley is pleased by this news and says “I’m going to park my Chevy in Michelle’s garage?” instead of “I get to have sex with Michelle?” because MTV is happy to air a show about kids fucking it just wishes that they’d talk about it like they’re in a Carry On movie.

Tony is a twat and his seven friends would be fairly indistinguishable if they didn’t all come with easy to read labels: Virgin, Girlfriend, Crazy, Muslim, Asian, Lesbian, and Shaved Head. Skins is of the firm belief that this crew are the coolest people on earth, except for Stanley who’s still a lame-ass virgin. A party isn’t a party until they rock up and show them how it’s done. Sitting in a van isn’t sitting in a van until one of them says something like “I need to zone out, like, bad” indicating that they should probably smoke some marijuana right about now and “zone out”, “like”, “bad”. Rich kids are lame. Parents are lame. Teachers are lame. Everything is lame except for these dropkicks.

Skins has been copping a lot of crap in the States from the Parents Television Council because they believe its depiction of teenage sex could violate child pornography laws, which has since prompted a bunch of advertisers to pull their ads from the show. This is both nuts and hilarious. It’s nuts because the advertisers were perfectly happy for their products to be associated with a show featuring teenagers having sex, that was advertised heavily as featuring teenagers having sex, and which has aired in its original incarnation for four seasons of teenagers having sex, but bail on it after somebody calls those “teenagers” “children”. On the flipside it’s hilarious because the first episode featured no sex and it even censored a couple of swear words yet the PTC want to censor more! More! More! Until all of television is nothing but a beige a-sexual piece of a wallpaper!

Ridiculous accusations aside, Skins is still a shitty show. So while I don’t think you should watch it, I just want you to know it’s not because I’m a puritan, it’s because it’s a piece of shit.

Good, Alright, Bad Or Ugly?
Bad