Famous in Love Series Premiere Plot Summary:
Paige Townsen (Bella Thorne) takes time away from studying for her business degree to attend an open call audition for one of the biggest movies in Hollywood. Her world changes quickly when she gets the role.
The whole ABC Family to Freeform change was hard for me to take. I grew up with ABC Family’s light censorship of rerunned shows from other channels and Harry Potter marathons. As the years progressed ABC Family created more of its own content, resulting in classics like Pretty Little Liars and The Fosters. Freeform has now been slowly introducing more content that is a little more PG-13 than what has come before. I liken Freeform to The CW in its early to middle stage and MTV now, and it’s producing content of the same quality level.
Famous in Love is exactly what I thought it was going to be; a potato chip for your mind. It’s lazily written, poorly acted, and overly dramatic. But as with most “comedic dramas” featuring very pretty young people, it’s somewhat addicting (just like potato chips).
The demographic watching this show is probably going to skew very female, between the ages of 12 and 22. The plot is simplistic and plays well to the dreams of youngsters and oldsters alike. Who doesn’t want to easily get their big break with no work and become famous and rich? Yet it was really hard to watch from a reviewing standpoint, because the writing of the characters is so lazy and boring. Paige is fast talking, smart and talented. But she’s like also so totally quirky and relatable. She’s one of the guys and just doesn’t go for that drama *insert hair flip*. Paige is basic. She is a carbon copy of female characters across YA entertainment. She’s Bella Swan and Jenna Hamilton and even Katniss Everdeen. This critique, by the way, extends to every character on the show.
The acting does not save or carry the writing well. Everyone seems to have the same delivery for every line no matter the situation or emotion behind the words. I know blanket statements aren’t great, but the whole cast needs work. I’m not convinced by anyone doing or saying anything. Maybe they are all aliens imitating human behavior and movements in a giant research project for extraterrestrial beings light years away from Earth.
I listed overly dramatic as a problem, because it is. But it’s also what keeps the show compelling enough not to turn off. The dramatics are also what will cause the show to quickly fizzle and burn and lose the already tenuous relation it had to the rails to begin with.
Famous in Love is not surprising. It is not different. It’s not going to shake the entertainment world like Netflix’s newly released 13 Reasons Why. And yet, one night while doing laundry you’ll probably find yourself sitting open-mouthed watching episode after episode with a forgotten T-shirt hanging limp in your hand. It has the potential to be addicting, but it will never overcome forgettable.
