I've been re-watching Boy Meets World since ABC Family resurrected the show. It airs at 7AM & 7:30AM. I DVR them. I've seen every season and every episode multiple times; however, I find myself liking the show less and less this summer. Not the show in general because seasons 2-4 are great; however, the show gets rotten well before the trainwreck that is season seven. For the sake of the brevity of this column, I'll merely say season five has its fair share of flaws that mostly concern the season arc for Shawn Hunter. Also, the Cory/Topanaga break-up arc is pointless and the show spent way too much time on it. Plus, they retcon Frankie AND Joey. Unforgivable. But season five earns a solid three on the scale from one to five.
Season six, however, is a complete mess. No long-running show transitioned to the college years easily. Boy Meets World did not break the trend. In the college world of Boy Meets World, students do not lock the doors to their dorms. The reason? THERE ARE NO LOCKS. People simply turn the doorknob and they are in. No students carry their keys with them. The 'No Locks' policy of Pennbrook extends to the apartments Eric, Jack and Rachel occupy. The actual class part of this college makes zero sense. GEORGE FEENY CAN GET A JOB TEACHING FALL CLASSES EVEN AFTER THE SEMESTER HAS BEGUN?!? He can get away with teaching his class about some crappy poem that Shawn Hunter wrote?!? The registration process can make one's head explode. Students mill around the student union and sign up for classes. If Cory Matthews wants to take Calculus 3 as a freshman, apparently he can because anything goes at Pennbrook. If he wants to take more classes he's clearly unqualified for, and would be unable to if he had an actual advisor and a system which prevented students from taking certain classes without the proper requirements, HE CAN. I should mention that he has a guidance counselor, who performs his job poorly and constantly tells Cory that he's in the real word now. Should Cory regret his enrollment in this difficult courses, he somehow is bailed out by his friends who are able to sign him up for every class they themselves are in. Fantastic. Remember that "Things Change" episode in season five? Glad the writers spent 22 minutes on that when nothing actually has changed in the following season.
If I was the showrunner of Boy Meets World for the entirety of season six, here's a few changes I would make:
I'm completely okay with Mr. Feeny's desire to teach. He is a teacher and that's the only way his character is functional in this series: as the teacher; however, I would not bring him to the college to teach poorly written poetry written by 18 year olds. Instead, I would return Mr. Feeny to John Adams High; however, when he returns to the school, things have changed. Mr. Feeny's retirement opened up the Principal job. The news of this brings Mr. Turner back from the other side of the school where old characters went when their contract ran out with the show. Mr. Turner wants the Principal job. He doesn't yet have it nor does anyone because the person who has the job is merely an interim principal. This interim principal would've been portrayed by Tony Danza, from the beloved film The Garbage Picking Field Goal Kicking Philadelphia Phenomenon. It'd be a three episode arc. No one likes Danza as the Principal. I should establish the emotional place that Mr. Turner is in. He's no longer the fun loving biker he once was. Not since the coma. Not since Shawn moved out of the apartment for no reason. How did he get out of the coma? We're not sure. Maybe a Smoke Monster helped him to awake from the coma. Perhaps this new Mr. Turner, with a ton of Iago in him, is INFECTED. But, perhaps, this infection is not a literal, physical infection but rather a state of mind due to a period of time when people said to him "you are bad." Maybe Mr. Turner is Sayid-lite, in case the LOST stuff was lost on you. All that matters is Mr. Turner is a bad dude now. He's enlisted his buddy Eli in the coup. HE WANTS DANZA'S JOB. The first episode establishes this new story. In fact, the Turner story is the A plot of the episode. The engagment stuff between Cory and Topanga has been resolved off-screen. The B story is Cory being a moron and flying to Jackson Hole to blame Feeny for all his problems. The C story, which would've been one scene because of tv length, would establish Eric's job as a zookeeper at the Philadelphia Zoo. The three episode arc featuring Danza as interim principal would be a sprawling narrative of SHAKESPEAREAN proportions eventually leading, predictably enough, in the removal of Danza's character from the principal's office and the MURDER of Eli because Mr. Turner is a bad, bad dude. The audience wouldn't see that coming. Actually, they probably would. By the end of this three parter in which Feeny teaches many lessons to the college kids about college, he finally is ready to return to John Adams High just before Turner's promoted and THAT sets into motion the big story for season six.
Yes, Cory and all of his friends would have their stories. There would've been plenty of hijinx like an episode when Cory goes to brush his teeth and a band of 14 people, dudes and girls, exit the men's bathroom, leaving behind seven fans blowing at the highest speed or the episode when Shawn goes to brush his teeth and a fight breaks out between rivaling floors which, for some reason, would lead to a heartfelt story that would remind the viewers for the 3,478th time of Shawn's childhood in the trailer park. There'd be the episode when Topanga, Angela and Rachel band together to put peanut butter on the shower heads and the episode when Cory freaks because his floor has to talk with the RD about dropping apples down the stairwell, lighting wine boxes on fire in the bathroom and Cory would freak because HE HAS NO IDEA WHAT WINE IS. These would be stand-alone episodes to distract viewers from the intense Shakespearean-esque plot of John Adams High. In the episode before the winter hiatus, Mr. Turner WOULD BLOW UP FEENY'S HOUSE and the Matthews would remain completely oblivious to this because Mr and Mrs Matthews would have sent Morgan to a private all-girls school so that they could live in Moscow, Russia. There would've been an epsiode featuring Alan Matthews, in an episode directed by William Russ himself, in which Alan falls into the murky world of the East Europe underground meaning that the Matthews house is no longer their house and is, in fact, INHABITED BY JIM ABBOTT, the former Yankee who appeared in a season one episode. Returning to the Alan Matthews centric episode for a moment, I don't want to say it would be the plot of the movie of Taken but it WOULD'VE been the plot of Taken with the same exact ending and as Morgan is at private school, the Maggie Grace character would've been portrayed by HARLEY'S SISTER. You may know her from Halloween 4 and 5 and the terrible Rob Zombie remakes. We'd discover that she was a wreck following the end the brief time she and Cory dated and has never been able to get over Cory Matthews so she decided to test out the illegal sex trafficking rings that exist in Eastern Europe.
The final five episodes of season six would've been emotional and intense. Shawn would realize his former mentor IS EVIL which would lead to an emotional episode in which we find out Mr. Turner never forgave him for leaving the apartment without a goodbye note nor forgave him for failing to visit him in the hospital while in a coma. Mr. Turner explains in the third act that Shawn Hunter is the reason why he's no longer a good man and has been plotting for a way to get Feeny's job. Shawn Hunter would be sent reeling after this. But then SHAWN WOULD WRITE A POEM FOR MR. TURNER and Mr. Turner would return normal after hearing the poem. And we'd have the collective epiphany, after a staggering 7 minute soliloquy by Mr. Feeny about the nature of good and evil, that Mr. Turner was not evil at heart but merely had the bad habit of listening to people give him lousy advice about how to become principal of John Adams High School. Cory would've been jealous because Shawn didn't write the poem for him which would plant the seeds for the possibility of Cory becoming the Big Bad in season seven.
Basically, think Macbeth MEETS the actual sixth season of Boy Meets World. It would be terrible but it would be SHAKESPEAREAN. The season ends happily with everybody singing "Enjoy Yourself" By The Jacksons. Even Eli returns because he NEVER died. He got better. And Feeny's blown up house was merely just a small model of the house. His real house turns out to be just fine. And, of course, I'd be fired following the conclusion of the season and the new showrunner and the rest of the writing staff, who no doubt turned on fictional showrunner during the middle portion of the season, would retcon each and every character to deliver the seventh season as it actually happened.
Now, it is time to for RECOMMENDATIONS FOR LIFE!
This is a gimmick I'm stealing from myself. I introduced Recommendations early into my podcast run and I don't plan on using this gimmick on the podcast anymore so it's being moved here. Basically, I just recommend things to watch/read/do etc. HERE WE GO:
The new Louis C.K. show premeired on FX last night. I was one of the few Americans that didn't actively hate his short-lived HBO comedy, Lucky Louie. It aired after Entourage and I never turned the channel so I wound up watching the entire first season. His new show, Louie, is different from his HBO comedy. Louis C.K. plays himself. Time is devoted to his stand-up act as well as small vignettes, or very short films (as Alan Sepinwall described), that illustrates, or brings more life to his stand-up acts. He's a divorced father of two. The second episode is pretty good especially the story about Louie reconnecting with a girl he once knew. The show, as mentioned above, just debuted but I imagine the mere fact that I'm recommending this show be watched will mean that people actively avoid watching the show. If you want to give it a shot, it airs Tuesdays at 11PM.
THE YOUTUBE CLIP OF THE DAY
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