Britt's On

Okay kids, I've been adding steadily to my drinking game for Degrassi the Next Generation in my previous post, but I thought it was time to repost here as I finish up with Season 6. I promise to simply update the date next time around, but since I fundamentally changed the layout of it I figured it was worth a repost.

So my friends, take a sip, or a shot, every time:

IN GENERAL
- There’s a confrontation in the bathroom (a bizarre replacement for ‘confrontation in the stairwell’ of the original series)
- Characters talk about one another using their full first and last names
- Kid Elrick is mentioned
- A teacher is totally incompetent at catching a misbehaving student
- An original series cast member makes a guest appearance (unless they're credited as regulars)
- Somebody gets stuffed into or slammed against a locker
- Downtown Sasquatch or Studz plays
- Whenever someone brings up Heather Sinclair
- The show goes meta and uses internet slang (as per Palex) or talks about how 'West Road' has 'terrible writing' and is so 'issue of the week'
- There is a reference to Bollywood
- Someone brings up how something didn't happen on school property
- Someone says the word Lakehurst
- A dance is held
- A Degrassi couple breaks up
- Dream sequences!
- A new character with speaking lines shows up
- Somebody dies
- The Spirit / Power Squad needs or gets new uniforms

EMMA, MANNY, JT, TOBY, LIBERTY & SEAN
- Emma protests something
- JT wears a top hat
- JT pretends to be gay
- Sean talks about being poor
- Sean wears a wife beater
- Toby mentions his bubby (grandma) or being Jewish
- Manny uses the term 'Coo coo bananas'
- Someone makes a joke about how slutty / skanky Manny is
- Emma talks about the environment
- Liberty is at a student council meeting / involved with morning announcements

PAIGE, ASHLEY, TERRI, HAZEL, ELLIE, SPINNER, JIMMY, & CRAIG
- Paige says ‘hun’
- Paige & Spinner call each other Honey Bee
- Spinner gets a new hairstyle
- Paige changes her mind on whether she's interested in men or women
- Someone calls Ellie 'Frosh'
- Ellie calls Jesse 'Boss Man'
- Anytime Marco or someone else talks about Marco being gay
- Terri has a storyline or scene regarding her weight
- Spinner misuses a word
- Ellie does something related to journalism
- Jimmy develops a new talent
- Jimmy wears something from Triple 5 Soul

DARCY, ALEX, JAY, PETER
- Darcy does something deliberately un-Christian (see: breaking Paige's leg, drinking beer, running an online semi-pornographic site)
- Peter has a camera with him

The NEW Next Generation Kids (Season 7 Onwards)
- Holly J has a clipboard in her hands
- Clare talks about her faith and morals
- Bianca wears hoop earrings
- Alli and KC demonstrate why they don't belong in the advanced Grade 9 class
- KC makes a reference to his shady past / halfway home situation


Finally! Drink if anything on the show happened to you!

- Britt's on!

I’ve talked about Degrassi way, way too much in here lately, but I will say that I’ve been rewatching the earlier seasons of the new series (you could call it V1.0 of The Next Generation, we’re now in V2.0) and have been working on a drinking game to accompany my original series drinking game. If you google ‘Degrassi Drinking Game’ the majority, if not all drinking games, are dedicated to the new series. I haven’t looked at any of them in eons (last time was when I was trying to find an original series game), so my list is as original as I can be based on my own observations. I plan to update this list in future posts as I continue to spot patterns on the show.

So my friends, take a sip, or a shot, every time:

- There’s a confrontation in the bathroom (a bizarre replacement for ‘confrontation in the stairwell’ of the original series)
- Characters talk about one another using their full first and last names
- Emma protests something
- Kid Elrick is mentioned
- A teacher is totally incompetent at catching a misbehaving student
- An original series cast member makes a guest appearance (this excludes regular cast members like Snake, Mr. Raditch, and Joey, but includes Emma’s mom Spike / Christine when not credited as a regular)
- Paige says ‘hun’
- Somebody gets stuffed into or slammed against a locker
- Downtown Sasquatch or Studz plays
- Whenever someone brings up Heather Sinclair
- Sean talks about being poor
- Anytime there is a reference to Bollywood
- Someone brings up how something didn't happen on school property
- A dance is held
- Someone makes a joke about how slutty / skanky Manny is
- Emma talks about the environment
- A Degrassi couple breaks up
- Paige & Spinner call each other Honey Bee
- Spinner gets a new hairstyle
- Anytime Marco or someone else talks about Marco being gay
- Terri has a storyline or scene regarding her weight
- A new character with speaking lines shows up
- Ellie does something related to journalism
- Jimmy develops a new talent
- Holly J has a clipboard in her hands

In other news, my other random summer fixation is a pretty terrible one. I’ve become addicted to TLC’s “Say Yes To The Dress”. Although I find the show mostly horrifying – capped off most recently by a Jersey bride buying a HIDEOUS $27,000 dress – it does make me want to go wedding dress shopping. Just not at New York’s Kleinfeld’s.

I tend to like the Atlanta incarnation a little better. Although the two main stars of the show, Monte and Laurie (?), keep on using the same phrases, primarily “Jack Her Up” (to describe when they throw on a veil and some gems to give people a glimpse of the bride to be), I generally find the people that work at Laurie’s place a little more relatable. Also the prices are far more reasonable – most of the people come in with budgets of $1000 to $2000, while only a handful have spent closer to $5000, and nothing over that (again, unlike some of the horrifying episodes I’ve watched of the original series).

This isn’t the place to get into it, but I’m pretty ambivalent about the wedding hoopla that exists out there these days. I feel like its become such an ‘industry’ and that you only do all these crazy things because there’s this expectation that it’s ‘what’s done’. I went from wanting to be a wedding planner as a kid to recoiling at the thought of being a bridesmaid at least 2 or 3 more times in my life. Other than shopping for a pretty dress, getting married to my boyfriend, and having some hot damn photos, I’m not really excited about the whole wedding thing. I’ll admit though, of all the wedding concepts TLC has tried to float over the last decade (remember that terrible “do your wedding on $5,000! And your friends will plan it for you!” one?), Say Yes To The Dress is the only one that makes me the tiniest bit excited, if simultaneously repulsed. At least their staff is probably paid pretty damn well.

- Britt’s On

This summer, bored by reruns and with no real TV on DVD to watch, I PVR'd the Degrassi: The Next Generation (hereby TNG) movie set in Hollywood...and kind of fell in love with the show all over again.

I remember coming home after school in junior high and high school and watching the original Degrassi series on CBC and being proud to have seen every single episode when all was said and done...and this was BEFORE the days of PVR people. When TNG started up around 2K, my family was all over it - we used to sit down and watch it together every week, even as the involvement of the original cast dwindled.

Unfortunately, Degrassi TNG entered into some sort of weird partnership with US teen channel The N whereby the scheduling went completely out of wack, and Degrassi became very difficult to track down on the tube. We lost touch at the end of Season 6. That is, until I watched the movie this summer and promptly ran out and bought Seasons 7 & 8 in anticipation of the currently running 9, and indeed I love the show, even though I miss the original TNG cast.

Anyway, amongst all of this TNG excitement, it also made me pine for Degrassi of yesteryear. I asked my two best friends to join me on a thrilling journey back to the late 80s where we would rewatch all of the original series and follow up with TNG.

One of my friends mentioned there used to be an awesome original Degrassi Junior High / Degrassi High School drinking game but alas we couldn't find it, the site that seems to have published it has since taken it down. So...based on her faint recollections and our overall enjoyment of the first two seasons of Junior High, here is the KLM version of the Degrassi Junior High / Degrassi High School drinking game (with additions to come I'm sure).

Take a drink everytime...

- Stephanie gets changed in the bathroom

- Yik & Arthur engage in an overtly nerdy activity (ex: using walkie talkies, renting swamp porn)

- Someone places a phone call in a phone booth

- Mr. Raditch is magically immediately on the announcements right after class

- There's a confrontation in the stairwell (including physical fights, arguments, or chase scenes) or in the high school years, on the wheelchair ramp

- Mr. Raditch abandons his teacherly duties (ex: not breaking up a stairwell confrontation)

- Joey gives a new meaning to the middle initial of his name

- Lucy's parents are negligent and leave a phone message ("There's sushi in the fridge!")

- Students are either signing something or handing something out in the hallway

- The word 'broomhead' is used

- An exterior shot is repeated within an episode or between episodes (easier if you watch them back to back)

- Someone shops at the local pharmacy

- Someone sings 'Everybody's Got Something'

- One of the twins (Heather & Erica) is NOT wearing something black or white

- Dream sequences or memory flashbacks occur (note the soft focus around the edge of the screen)

- A non-major character has a speaking role (ex: the chubby girl Nancy, the red-headed girl with freckles, the guy who enjoys carrots and makes a horrible speech on watching TV)

- The girl in the wheelchair defies the lack of wheelchair accessibility of Degrassi (or alternatively, when you notice there is no possible way for her to get up those front stairs as students stream in)

That should have you nice and buzzed within an episode, and nice and hammered within two. Until I continue onwards, this is definitely a great start to the Degrassi High / Degrassi Junior High drinking festivities!

- Britt's On