Skins

I watched the first four episodes of Skins last night. I'd been thinking about watching the show for over a year, since some of the crew in my small group told me to watch it. They loved it.

I wasn't feeling overly excited about the show, I thought it might just be a depressing show about sex, drugs and teenagers, designed to shock and titillate rather than say anything worthwhile. I was prepared to not watch much.

But the show isn't half-bad. It's kinda like a naughties, TV series of Trainspotting but less depressing. Each episode focuses on one of the characters in the group. It's teenagers dealing with eating disorders, falling in love, dysfunctional families, making dumb decisions. Pretty typical teenage stuff, if not a bit heightened in frequency and density for television.

And while there is a lot of talk in the show about sex and drugs, they seem to be just aspects of the character's lives, rather than the focus of the stories, or just devices to get people to watch. The show doesn't feel exploitative or deliberately provocative at all.

What's really cool is that the show's writers have an average age of 21. So it's written by people who know what it's like to live the reality of these characters. The age of the writers does explain some of the humour and surreal characters that pop up through out the show. Every now and again it's gets a little HSC Drama. But it's never too much to be anything more than a mild distraction.

So I'm a fan. I'm not sure how quickly I'll work my way through the show but I reckon I'll at least get through the first season.