Facts of life Reboot

[KMan101]

 

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Yeah, she's definitely checked out the last few seasons, and frankly, who could blame her? The show was coasting on fumes by the end.

[DramatistDreamer]

 

 

All of the girls had the potential to be interesting personalities.  It's easy to see why the show went with the Blair vs. Jo dynamic but whenever I look back at the original iteration of the series, I see shades of the Blair/SueAnn dynamic and find it to be quite interesting.

Nancy was sort of a Type A personality but I guess that may not have been enough to distinguish her from Blair?  I think this was a case of the sheer number of characters may have worked against Felice Schachter. 

It's weird but when I look back Cindy's tomboy tendencies seemed different from Jo's tomboyish-ness.  But again, television doesn't really allow for many subtleties and FOL decided to go with a more "on the nose" version of tomboyish-ness in Jo's working class "grease monkey" to Cindy's version, that might have introduced the idea of complex sexual identities that the show/network clearly wasn't ready to deal with. 

One thing that was evident from the beginning was the bond between Natalie and Tootie and the fact that they took those ridiculous rollerskates off Tootie's feet in the 2nd iteration of the series could only be described as a good thing.

Molly Ringwald's character was cute as a button but again, there were so many characters as to render the show chaotic and Molly just didn't seem to be a character that was suitably developed. It all worked out for Ringwald, who went on to be the 80s movie teen queen though. 

[John]

Why did they make it seem like Jo didnt know Nancy, Sue Ann & Cindy in the season 8 reunion episode, The Little Chill

[Khan]

 

Because, the writers of that episode hadn't watched the show from the beginning, and they were too lazy to do the research.  Plain and simple.

[Fevuh]

I have not seen this - thanks so much for posting!

[DramatistDreamer]

 

Wasn't there that episode where Tootie had found a small group of black students at a nearby campus and was trying to discover her blackness, began to wear dashikis and had temporarily isolated herself from the rest of her Eastland colleagues?

I realize that I've really only seen it once in reruns during a FOL marathon last year.

[Khan]

 

I think there was.  But, you know, it never hurt reminding the audience of Tootie's feelings of isolation at Eastland.

[DramatistDreamer]

 

Oh, IA.  I meant that there was definitely a reference point to draw on with a whole entire episode about it.  Even if it was meant to show that her Eastland colleagues accepted her, that would be a different idea from how Tootie actually felt-- that she needed something more culturally.  The seeds were there because there was an entire episode about it. It would've been valid to have an expansion on those ideas and reflect on what it truly meant from Tootie's perspective. 

[KMan101]

 

That ALWAYS irritated me. That and a lot of other things about the episode. But to be fair, when the 'other girls' interacted with the girls I don't really ever remember much of them interacting with Jo, but I could be forgetting about small scenes. It still irritated me though and as Khan said, clearly they had no familiarity with the earlier version of the show, or didn't care. It was a plot point for Jo, as it had become "The Jo Show" for a while at that point. Everything revolved around her.

 

I forgot about that episode. But yeah, that's a good point. Would have been nice to follow up on that, especially when Tootie is so dismissive of Eastland in the series finale.

[Gray Bunny]

 

I hated that too 

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  It made no sense since all those girls were technically "there" the entire time at Eastland and frequently popped up in the first few seasons. 

 

Looking back at the first year, I always thought Molly Ringwald was the weakest link, ironically. Her delivery of her lines was terrible, like she had a mushy mouth. She was a bad actress at the time. 

 

Of the original cast that was discarded, I liked Felice Schachter (Nancy) the most. 

[KMan101]

 

I mean, Molly was cute. I thought she delivered some of her lines well but yeah I can agree. But you can see star in her regardless, IMO. Though I have to admit I think she's a bit overrated.

 

I agree about Felice. I liked her the most too. 

 

And, maybe not a popular opinion, but I found Kim Fields was fairly bad at times. Her mom was too.

[John]

If the Langley Spinoff with Jo & Blair had gone to series, I believe FOL would have had Mrs G stay at Eastland with Tootie & Natalie and would have added Alex (Heather McAdam) full tiime

[Fevuh]

I am a Gay Man - and I remember an episode with Cindy and someone told her not to hug a girl like that.  That girls shouldn't hug a girl that way.  I still remember thinking...is that me?  That's me.  I want to hug a guy like that.  And someone saw Cindy touch a girl like that and - what does that mean about me?  It's so weird that I remember something like that, which may not have happened.  I just remember something like that.  

[Gray Bunny]

 

That happens in the pilot episode right off the bat. Cindy hugs one of the girls and Blair makes strong inferences that Cindy likes girls. 

[Fevuh]

I need to watch this show again.  I remember Cindy hugging someone and someone telling her not to hug another girl like that.  I remember it being cindy so it was the first season.  I had no idea it was the first episode.