Degrassi Takes Manhattan Review

In one of the most highly anticipated Degrassi’s in recent memory, Degrassi Takes Manhattan premiered on Much Music Friday Night and if Twitter’s Trending Topics have anything to do with it, the ratings for the 2-hour TV movie should do fine in both Canada and the United States.

Although the movie premiered only in Canada, if you were lucky enough to catch a glitch on Degrassi’s United States affiliate, Teen Nick’s website than you were able to catch the movie in it’s entirety. This was able to be seen as early as 2:00 PM Eastern time and was accessible through a hidden link, which leads me to believe this was no accident.

The movie was clearly not any better than Degrassi Goes Hollywood, but was still full of drama, old characters and a Boycott the Caf reference. It was so good to see Degrassi with a telling storyline that I feel I haven’t seen since Season 5.

The movie begins with Janie and The Studz featuring Peter Stone playing outside Degrassi as everyone exits the school for the last time (Jane,Danny and Johnny). The Spinner-Jane drama begins in the first part of the movie when Declan throws a party at his house. Every storyline from this movie is drawn from the actions that took place at the party in some way or another.

…and BOOM goes the DYNAMITE

You have to feel for Spinner Mason (Chronic Stoner). At Declan’s party, he over hears Jane and Holly J talking about Jane’s relationship with Declan which obviously gets Spinner upset, so in anger he takes out Declan and decides to leave. In addition, Spinner, who had hired Emma to work at The Dot earlier in the day took the initiative and fortitude to burn down the restaurant in short order. Make an impression, right? Spinner’s world is crashing down on him and doesn’t know what to do. Meanwhile, Jane, who also is unsure what to do gets invited to New York to get away from her troubles along with Declan, Holly J and Fiona.

I was really glad to see spinner get a real intense scene. We havent seen him this intense since Degrassi used to “Go there” a few seasons back. The punch was fantastic; I was waiting and anticipating it and when it came It was such a good feeling. Declan had it coming, he even admits it.

This is New York-Holly J, bitch! -Best line ever.

If this movie proved one thing, its the love that Holly J and Declan have for each other. Fiona is dealing with another girl taking her brother away and would do anything to stop them from being with each other. Including taking the internship spotlight from Holly J. This was clearly the best part of the movie. I didn’t like Holly J’s bitchiness in the past seasons, but lately she has been way too nice. Something that definitely needed to change and it did in the movie. After Fiona’s extreme jealously, eventually leading to a kiss, comes to be too much for Holly J to handle,”Initial” throws Fiona into a room and takes the spotlight right from under her.

Degrassi Takes Manhattan was what I thought it would realistically be when it came to the “incest” storyline. Even though it was a power struggle, we see an emotionally distressed character. She is extremely jealous of Holly J or anyone that he has dated. Declan mentioned that she doesn’t have many friends, thus the reason they are so close. After saying that, she gets even more emotional.

Annie Clark sure played Fiona well. It was good to see her show tons of emotion and the fact that she played the scene perfect just adds to the effect she had on me as a viewer. Sometimes when actors show that kind of intense emotion, it tends to be awkward and not believable. Not in this case; She does a fantastic job.

Spinner rebounds. Gets drunk. Gets Married. I now present to you Emma and Gavin Mason. Sounds wierd and I’m wondering why they didn’t pronounce Emma’s last name as Mason. I thought that was wierd. After getting drunk and married, Spemma have thoughts about getting their marriage annulled but have a party at the end of the movie instead.

Jay: Sweet, Sweet Lovin’

Although they pulled it off, the whole Spinner-Emma marriage is so impossibly random. This couple just doesn’t work. They rarely talked in high school and all of a sudden they work as a couple on DTM? I simply cannot buy these guys as a couple. I did, however grow to fall in love with them, but it definitely will take some time to sink in. Its probably a given that Spemma fans are mad about this relationship.

When I heard that Degrassi was gonna have these two be romantically involved I thought they were going to over-do the character involvement and completely ruin the classic Degrassi characters. I was completely wrong. I do think that they rushed the storyline way too much. From what I’ve heard this was supposed to be the last of Emma and Spinner, who are staying in Toronto. Let’s hope the show doesn’t make those two disappear like Chris, Alex, Kendra and Paige’s H.I.V. storyline.

Now it’s time to move on to what has been marked THE BIGGEST EVENT IN DEGRASSI HISTORY. I am really looking forward to this season. IF any ONE season can rival the classic ones, It’s this one. Such build up and drama has been placed on Season 10. I really hope the 30th season in the Degrassi franchise lives up to the hype.