The Season 11 Discussion Thread: Now? Never? How about a week from next Tuesday?
 

So.....I don't think we've ever really had an in-season discussion thread before, but with so many episodes happening at such a quick rate Nicole and I thought it would be a good idea if we could have one general place where we could all take it in so to speak and discuss what we've seen so far.

We had a quite a start to Season 11, there was......

Drew, Bianca, Anson and the unfortunately named Vince
Sav and a famous only in a Nick world singer
Clare and new guy Jake. And their parents. And Zombie Eli.
KC, Jenna and baby Tyson Chicken
Anya learning why you should apply to more than one University. And then learning just how much Dr. Chris was (or not) really into her.
Anya and Owen doing their thing
Dr. Chris and Darcy shacking up in Kenya
Fiona and her Charlie.
Connor and her panties.

How do you think the season is going so far? Which of the above have you enjoyed the most? Least? Anything really surprise you?

That's just a few suggestions, anything from this season is fair game, although let's try to avoid the 'ship wars. :cool:

Drew, Bianca, Anson and the unfortunately named Vince- Love this storyline, I'm really excited to see where it goes. Should be a really good season long arch.

Sav and a famous only in a Nick world singer- I'm just gonna try and forget this ever happened. Thankfully the show seems to be doing the same thing.

Clare and new guy Jake. And their parents. And Zombie Eli.- Much more interesting than when Clare and Eli were together. I really loved them together during The Boiling Point but as soon as the fall episodes started they annoyed me. However it seems like their plots as a broken up couple could be really good. Plus I already adore Jake, "And... scene." I love it.

KC, Jenna and baby Tyson Chicken- Jenna annoys me to no end, but she's been better so far this season. I wanna kill KC, but I guess that makes him a good character. This plot is a lot less annoying than I though that it'd be.

Anya learning why you should apply to more than one University. And then learning just how much Dr. Chris was (or not) really into her.- Oh Anya. I don't think the storyline is particularly compelling so far, but I do think that it'll lead to good things to come so I'm looking forward to it.

Anya and Owen doing their thing- See above.

Dr. Chris and Darcy shacking up in Kenya- They should just have a spin off series of everyone who they send to Kenya. It'd be like, what? half the cast now?

Fiona and her Charlie.- Blah, not super interested. Which is odd because Fiona's generally one of my favorites.

Connor and her panties.- Oh Connor.

I'm curious...for the past 2 summers Degrassi kicked off with a movie. How do you think Spring Fever held up against Degrassi Goes Hollywood and Degrassi Takes Manhattan? What makes a successful premiere? And what works best with the format of the show?

(I've been meaning to ask this all week. I just kept forgetting.)

^ Despite some of it's shortcomings, Spring Fever's A-plot was my favorite of all three films. It was well paced, well acted, and set up ongoing storylines for the whole season. Although Ellie's storyline in Degrassi Goes Hollywood was also beautiful and probably one of my favorites of that season.

Season's going good so far. Decent mix of characters starting things off, the new characters were introduced gradually and the dangling plotlines...I actually have confidence they'll be settled.

I am not concerned about the summer episodes, however, I am concerned with the fall episodes after the second half of the season seemed to flatline and I know that last season's finale especially was really overhyped by the powers that be to the point that no matter what happened it was going to be disappointing. I also would like to see less Kenna and more storylines and screen time for the graduating seniors who haven't gotten much screen time this season and since they've been on the show like Chantay for example. I also think that it would be good to see how Bianca is handling the aftermath of Anson's death. I think that would be much more compelling than having to sit through this Jenna/KC/Marsol love triangle where KC will be blamed for everything and Marisol will forever be written off as a homewrecker and it will I am sure take a couple seasons for Marisol to ever be allowed to get past that especially given how the writers treated Manny who was in a similar situation with Craig.

It's so weird switching from the near daily episodes to the once a week ones. Maybe it's just me but I found myself having to remind myself of the time frame; the episodes during Now or Never generally capture what happens in the students day (I think, the uniforms make it hard to track time sometimes) to the weekly episodes where sometimes days or weeks are lost. It's kind of hard to keep everything in perspective. Like how long have KC and Jenna been new parents? Are they growing frustrated much too soon? How long is Anya's coke use going to go on and when should we consider that it's a serious problem?

I think it doesn't help that we have 60 some odd episodes making up a school year. That's actually more episodes than weeks in a year. Plus since episodes cover more than one day and if we subtract the uncovered summer months and the two(?) weeks between theboiling point and In Too Deep plus the unknown missing days between S10 and S11 than Degrassi could effectively be adding several weeks to the 365-day calendar.

But hey! There was no 2009 in the Degrassi world either so there's that.


Watching this season my main concern is for the lower grades. All three new kids are juniors coming in half way through their second to last year of school. That isn't a good start. I honestly don't understand why Katie and Marisol couldn't have just been in 10th grade. They interact a lot with the 10th graders and last season I was pretty sure Marisol was a 10th grader anyway. It just seems like right now the grades are so unbalanced that the majority of the cast will be gone soon.

I had already mentioned this on tumblr but I started thinking about it again after seeing Jess in Connor's 10th grade media class in tonight's episode. Is Jess now a 10th grader? That's a shady move to pull since she was clearly wearing a yellow uniform last time we saw her. I thought it would have been a better transition to have her be in Sadie's grade. We know Fi is staying back and since Jenna will be out of school for so long, I’m guessing she’ll repeat a year too. That leaves us with this group for the fall episodes:

12th Grade: Drew, Eli, Fiona, Jake, Bianca, Katie, Marisol, Imogen, Owen, and Mo(?)

11th Grade: Alli, Clare, Adam, KC, Dave, Wesley, Connor, and Hannah(?)

10th Grade: Jenna, Liam, Sadie, and Jess(?)



Now if Jenna and Jess are going to be in 11th grade next year that's even more unbalanced. I have to admit I find that a little odd. Shouldn't they be bringing in new 9th and 10th graders now instead of adding new characters we’ll only see for a season or two? I feel like constantly bringing in older kids and not developing the younger kids early enough is part of the reason some characters feel underdeveloped. I do think keeping Jenna back could ultimately benefit her character though…

I dunno, this is just something I'm thinking about as season 11 moves forward. Seeing Jess in a grade 10 class really threw me for a loop.

It's frustrating to watch them add all upperclassmen and no underclassmen. Not only because it leaves characters underdeveloped, but because there are a few kids in the higher grades that I really like, and I'm not ready for them to leave any time soon. Yet their time on the show will be shorter than it should have been because they were introduced as Juniors. It makes me sad. :(

As for Jenna, I'm not sure how I would feel about her sticking around. Part of me might okay with it because, like you said, her character needs more development. But part of me isn't okay with it because I don't really like Jenna much and I want her gone as soon as possible. :lol:

I thought that this year's graduating senior class was as a whole underdeveloped other than Holly J and I would've liked to have seen Anya get her own storyline way before now. I also think that it would've helped Sav and Riley a lot if they were given more than just one issue to deal with for a large majority of their time on the show. I would rather see someone leave early than stay on this show because the writers just don't generally speaking make it worthwhile for the character or the audience. As for Jenna, she's really just a bad combination of Mia and Craig and so to me there will always be some excuse for her bad behavior and poor choices. It would be different if Jenna could actually be a believable supporting character like Alli or Holly J are and can be but she isn't. I also think that if the writers actually like a character that they won't put them in such an isolating storyline like Jenna is. I want her gone as soon as possible because I think that instead of actual character development that Jenna will just get new excuses for getting away with treating other people badly.

@Nekoshoujo:
I agree about the time thing. And how much is Degrassi covering now? 3 marking periods? So will this season end at the end of the first semester?
Oh my gosh, yes. The grades are so awkwardly unbalanced, especially considering all the juniors of season 10 were new. This reminds me of how the writers kept adding new characters (Hazel, Craig, Marco, Ellie, Jay, Alex) to the class of season 5 but they did nothing for Emma's class.
Who's Liam?
My guess for Jess's new grade is that Jess and Sadie are both pale skinned brunettes in the same grade, so they don't want to confuse anyone or they want diversity.
And I don't mean to burst anyone's bubble but on her personal Tumblr, Alex said she didn't know if she was coming back/she'd love to if they ask and so on. Maybe she has an agreement to stay quiet until the new promos?

And I would never believe Marisol as a senior. She looks too young.

And on another note, am I the only person who likes Jenna? :P

I had a random thought. If anyone is injured or killed during the shooting at the dance, what's the possibility that it could be Mr. Simpson? I'm not saying this because I don't like him (however I liked him more as a teacher). I'm wondering this because it's obvious that Brogren is working more and more with production. I feel like he's slowly making a transition from in front of the camera to behind. And I've really been noticing it on screen. I'd like a principal who is more involved with the students. Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to excuse his character from the series. I don't know if I'd like it to be by death, but then again I'm not sure if I'd want any character to die. I actually think Brogren wouldn't be opposed to the idea if it was dramatic, unexpected, and shook up the fandom. He's like that...remember that was his reasoning for the Spemma wedding?

Oh! :lol: I remember what brought this on. It was Christine and I talking about Joey dying to bring back Angie Jeremiah.

^oh, wow that could be really good. In the new teennick promo it's a girl/woman saying the police are on their way (did manipulate the voice? I couldn't place it) and that would have been a line for Simpson so if he was injured that would make a lot of sense. I would miss him but I also don't think it would be the worst idea. Unlike a majority of the students, he would be someone the whole school could mourn.

The only thing with that idea is that it would feel really incomplete without Emma and Spike. Although I would be okay if the follow up was Darcy returning from Kenya, and killing herself over Snake's grave in sorrow. :look:

So...what do you guys think of the seniors' storylines this season? I'm really upset because the good (Anya) was outweighed significantly by the bad IMO. I could have done without every Sav storyline this season, the HJ adoption thing, and Farlie. (side note: for some reason Fiona has just lost her appeal to me this season....I think she's boring and it's sad because she was my favorite character. Same with HJ. However, maybe spending time with grade elevens will revitalize Fiona, IDK)

Anya's storyline would have benefited from a little more screentime (main plot moved me to tears, follow up...did not) and Riley didn't get much resolution at all. I actually liked his one plot but it was early in the season and didn't really give a feeling of finality.

Truthfully I just want more Anya cocaine storyline.

What bothers me is just that there are so many good things about this season, so this stands out

I'm pretty sure this voiceover was from the wes car thing.