Anybody remember Degrassi?

So then, you're an asshole.

I remembered Degrassi Junior High, which I remember being par excellence.

r2 Gosh, this site has so many old fuckers

I must have watched SCHOOL’S OUT fifty times on recorded VHS, mostly for the soundtrack (Gowan! Harem Scarem!)

I think I’m the only person to ever live who thought Joey Jeremiah had better chemistry/compatibility with Tessa (Fucking Campanelli!) and should have been with her long-term instead of boring Caitlin.

I also maintain that Spike was truly a lesbian who was just confused as a teen resulting in her pregnancy. Apparently Snake is married to Spike and is the school principal in the latest series, which for me feels wrong on so many levels.

I think the only gay story line in the original series was when Caitlin was having erotic dreams about Ms. Avery. I really wish they had the sorta hot teacher Mr. Walfish run into Wheels or Joey trying to buy porn in an adult book store.

r4 As a young person who grew up watching Degrassi TNG and later watched the original series, they fit perfectly. They are a very realistic married couple.

Emma grew up to be one of the biggest cunts on tv though. She caught an STD sucking a random guys’s dick in a dirty van yet was a holier than thou bitch.

You should watch the first seven seasons. They are excellent. Although they rehashed a lot of plot lines from the original series(which was very surprising to see when I watched OG degrassi), I think the TNG is the better series. The production quality is higher with slightly better child actors yet it maintains the authenticity. It covers every thing from minor topics like puberty, academic and athletic performance, social status, etc. to STD’s, abortion, school shootings, rape, mental illness, LGBT youth, poverty, etc. They even allowed the teen actors to style themselves. The show became a silly soap opera after all of the original 7th and 8th graders graduated high school in season 7 but is otherwise the most realistic teen show I’ve ever seen. Most other shows are too extreme on the purity or salacious scale.

r5 Marco goes through an entire journey from an 8th/9th grade closet case to a confident openly gay adult.

He has several major storylines on his life as a gay teen such as dealing with gay bashing, begging one of his female friends to maintain a fake relationship, slowing coming out to each of his friends, his first date/boyfriend, coming out to his extremely homophobic Italian dad, etc. He also had a lot of storylines completely unrelated to his orientation so he wasn’t just a token.

He was the school president, the valedictorian, one of the most popular kids in the school, and one of the most popular characters of the series .

In seasons 6 and 7, the show runners decided to follow the original 8th graders into their first year of college while finishing up the final year of high school for the original 7th graders. He had some decent plot lines there too.

I stopped watching after the 7th/8th season. I was still in high school but the show became so silly with the next group of kids, I’d already aged out. I still followed the show off and on for a bit and the only gay main character after Marco that I remember is Riley. He was an awful star athlete closet case that treated his boyfriend like shit his entire run of the series. He was shitty but arguably realistic.

There were multiple really well done Lesbian and bisexual female characters.

He’s the White one.

I do.

Pussy power is not enough power to make a 15 watt light bulb glow.

R6, lmao I didn't know there was an gif for that, wow.

Emma became really attractive after being incredibly hideous to look at in her first few seasons. I didn't see Manny becoming slutty. That was surprising to me. Or the fact that she got knocked up by some guy who already had a girlfriend. And I never thought Paige would end up bi.

I loved Marco.

Fuck you OP.

Marco did suck, but I more-so blame the costume designer and the writers. After his breakout storyline he kind of just became nothing more than a GBF, and his fashion sense just got more and more atrocious.

I think my favorite character was Sean. Even as a kid I knew he was a prime cut of canadian beef. Spinner is a close second, I'd let him bully me any day of the week.

No love for Wheelchair Jimmy?

The perv coach was really hot.

The kid who played Spinner was a horrible actor. Even worse than Drake.

And Emma and Spinner ending up together made no sense at all. Sean should’ve come back. He was cute.

I’m still mad they offed J.T.

R17 I always found JT's death and the aftermath oddly funny. The mascot gets stabbed by a student from a rival school and Degrassi's administration kind of just shrugs it off and says "well, shit happens".

Someone on here said they fucked the actor who plays Marco. Is that guy still here?

R6- I disagree. The original show was about a bunch of kids struggling to get thru each day. It felt like an ABC After School Special- in a good way. The TNG show was slicker the actors were MTV attractive and all the teens were SO ACTIVE in all types of school activities. NOT realistic.

R19 Adams Ruggerio. He turned out hotter as he aged.

R17, you're right, it made 0 sense. The show went off the rails during the 7th or 8th season as people above had said. It became a soap opera instead of a teen show with soap opera elements.

I discovered Degrassi at a low point in my life (no, not the day I joined DL), and it really spoke to me. Watched from D:TNG through the seasons on Netflix. Crushed hard on Craig and Peter, loved the evolution of Clare, and was shook when J.T. died.

I could watch Degrassi Goes Hollywood everyday.

All of the episodes are on the official Degrassi channel on Youtube for free.

r23 Peter was a sociopath and a failure at all, he wasn’t even a good meth addict. You have terrible taste.

I'll admit that Marco's one time beard Ellie was one of my favorite characters. I liked her much more than Emma and Manny.

The last season of Degrassi on Netflix that good looking straight acting rich kid is boyfriend to that queeny gay. That was FAKE.

Progressive points for making a Black girl the smartest and most ambitious student in the school.

Negative points for putting her on the autism spectrum(undiagnosed), making her a teen mom, killing her BF off with a random gang violence plotline, and making her “best friends” the school’s biggest cunt and the school’s biggest slut.

She was only HALF black.

R28, they really tried to make Liberty as ugly as possible in the earlier seasons.

Does anyone remember the girl who played Hazel complaining a few years back about how she was treated on Degrassi? I think she felt the creators were racist.

Liberty was a total cunt like Emma.

Liberty should’ve gotten with Toby after JT died.

Did that guy ever get any?

r29 I’m not sure about the actress but the character was full Black, just lighter skinned. Her parents and little brother were

r30 I was fine with her looking ugly in the early seasons as a lot of kids go through awkward growing pains. Emma literally looked like a frail rat and she grew into a very pretty young woman. It fit Liberty’s character too. She deserved far better plot lines in her sophomore, junior, and senior year.

Does anyone remember fat Terri? She got skinny.

R34, oh yeah! She had a kid a few years back.

r31 The show runners/writers for TNG definitely had issues with Black girls. The writing for their Black female characters was very poor across the board. Hazel only had one episode where she was centered and they made her character a Islamophobic during it. She was Hazel’s black best friend the rest of the time. The writing for Liberty was quite shit too. There was another character called Chantey that served no purpose for multiple seasons. If you look at Degrassi fans top 6-7 most hated characters, they’ll probably name Emma, Ashley, and multiple Black girls. It’s hard to make an argument that it’s a coincidence.

It’s ironic that Lucy from the original Degrassi was better written and given more screen time than every single Black female character from Degrassi: TNG. You’d think there would be more racism in that time. The school setting also looked more racially diverse in the 80s/90s.

The best place to stop on a Degrassi rewatch

I thought Jay was the most realistic. He played the guy "who is a mopey dick in high school but kinda attractive" pretty well.

r33 I read that Toby was supposed to have a plot line where he lost his virginity to Spinner’s little sister. The actress’s parents were extremely uncomfortable and took her off the show. That’s why the character suddenly disappears at the beginning of season 3/4 and is never mentioned again. I don’t think the writers knew what to do with him after that.

Toby aged a lot better than JT post Degrassi.

R38, the actor said he actually wanted to play Marco originally. He was very gay friendly.

The original series was awesome but it became the Caitlyn and Joey show too quickly. Both were good but the rest of the ensemble was outstanding too and should've been given more air time.

r20 When you compare it against any other teen show, Degrassi: TNG is very realistic. It devolved into CW bullshit after season 8 but the originally cast started as awkward looking, normal kids and all of the issues they dealt with were normal for teens. They were age appropriate, untrained kids from around Toronto just like the original show.

Skins, Euphoria, The O.C., One Tree Hill, etc. seem silly in comparison. The lifestyles are far too insane for kids with 25+ year old professional actors playing 16 year olds

Poor Wheels

What did DL Homos think of the gay storyline with the husky , butch greek-canadian football player?

r36 *Paige’s Black best friend

Ryan Cooley who played JT is in his early 30s, but looks closer to 40.

Ryan Cooley who played JT is in his early 30s, but looks closer to 40.

Skins is one of the most insane shows I've ever seen. Pure craziness. It nails the feeling of "wtf" that goes on in high school but it's obviously very unrealistic.

I have met Adam a few times. Nice guy. Good looking.

Tristan was such an obnoxious character.

The actors who played Drew and Zig grew up to be hot.

R6 in real life Miriam McDonald really seems like an escort based on her Instagram

In college a dorm floor-mate was dating an actress from the show. I don't think her character was the most central. People got not-so-secretly drunk one night, in my room, when she was visiting on break from shooting, and she was on my bed going on about how I - because I'm also gay of course - should come visit the city and set and she'll introduce the actor for Marco etc etc. I didn't take her up on it because I assumed she was only humblebragging, just as I am sort of doing right now.

I somewhat regret it now, because who knows, right? At least publicly, today Adamo seems great.

Marco was a bit annoying but Ugly gays like Mayo Pete are types that make me homophobic, not fictional canadian teen gay characters.

Eclare, anyone? Probably just me.

Eli’s character is a very interesting one, in that he’s a gothic loner from a deprived background who is not bitter & rude (well, not for long) but sweet & hopeful & conscientious. Similarly, in being with him prim straitlaced ambitious Clare came to terms with her shadow side. They were very well-matched in dramatic terms.

I liked Clare’s miscarriage story for its fresh approach and the fact she was the least likely female for that to happen to. Both actors really showed up for the storyline.

Eclare was one of the better parts of the later years.

Anyone remember Shenae Grimes? She also starred on the reboot of 90210. She was attractive but she literally had maybe one or two facial expressions in her arsenal.

Who else was gay in real life outside of Adam Ruggerio?

The show had so many characters and I got the impression the writers struggled to give them all decent storyline. I can also imagine that the actors (their parents and maybe even the kids' managers?) rejected stories and the writers didn't bother to come up with new stories for those who refused previous stories.

Some poster insisted that when TJ got stabbed and sunk to the floor he sat in a puddle of piss from the bully who peed on TJ's car. For some reason that made me laugh.

Loved Marco and Dylan. There was a comic book series (about four books?) and one of the books featured Marco and Dylan and what they did between graduating and moving into the dorm with Ellie and Paige.

Shane Kippel's Spinner had the most horrible haircut I've ever seen on a TV show around season 4, I believe.

R57, and it didn't help that he seemed to temporarily gain weight back when he had that haircut.

Talking about Degrassi the Next Generation and just calling it "Degrassi" is like comparing "What's Happening" to "What's Happening Now."

R5, Wheels' had a gay brother.

RIP wheels

It wasn't Wheels who had the gay brother, it was Snake (Archie Simpson played by Stefan Brogren). His brother's coming out didn't go well (the parents didn't approve) and he just left. I believe it was a one episode arc.

Link for comment at r62.

r59 Only if you’re an old, used up Canadian whore. TNG was more popular with American teens than the original run.

RIP to the actor but Wheels is one of the most annoying characters in television history.

R65-His character was such a DRIP!

I liked the stoyline with Ashley's gay dad.

Lucy from OG Degrassi was the subject of a very interesting article about her unconventional childhood.

r68 She has a very interesting childhood but gosh, she was a hideous child. I don’t feel bad about saying that because she at least grew into her face. She was one of the few decent/attractive looking kids in a school full of uggos.

*had

R55 all I remember is countless articles about her and Jessica Stroup having eating disorders during 90210.

My favorite episode of degrassi.

I watched Degrassi as a kid in the early 90s. I remember pieces of it, and I remember discussing it at school. It was discussed in hushed tones as though we were sharing dishy gossip. I would love to rewatch it with fresh eyes. Where does DL believe I should begin?

Nina Dobrev (The Vampire Diaries) was in Degrassi TNG as well. She played the teenage mom who dates TJ.

I LOVED Degrassi: The Next Generation. I grew up watching it and it was a very important show to me as an adolescent/young teen. I didn't hate Marco at all; his relationship with uber-cunt Paige's brother was kind of sweet (I also like Paige, even though she was a cunt). The show made sure to hit on a lot of social issues, and was a bit edgy in doing so in the early-mid-2000s.

I remember there being an episode where Ashley found out her dad was gay, and another where Ellie was cutting herself; then there was the disturbing early episode where Emma was almost assaulted by a pedophile she met online, in a hotel room. I also distinctly remember Terri getting her head smashed on the rock by her abusive nerd boyfriend, who ended up a pariah-turned-school-shooter who put poor Drake in a wheelchair. Ah, so many memories. I need to go back and rewatch the series. It'd be a trip down memory lane.

Go to fucking Reddit.

I am 30. I remember Degrassi. I liked it. But this isn’t why I fucking go to Datalounge.

I go here to talk about 1950s Musicals, 1970s sitcoms, nice ass threads, and to make fun of fat women.

Keep Datalounge unique and Elder Gay in spirit! None of this “Do you remember something that was on the air 15 years ago” bullshit.

[quote] Keep Datalounge unique and Elder Gay in spirit! None of this “Do you remember something that was on the air 15 years ago” bullshit.

Two words, bitch: Golden Girls.

Who can forget when Coach Carson was grooming K.C.?

Man, I so wanted to be K.C.

I recall that stupid episode where Manny thought there was something going on between Liberty and a male teacher.

R5 Caitlin’s lezzie daydream is still a seminal moment in gay Canadian lore.