Lucas and Maya should really go form their own show - one completely without speeches. I’m particularly fond of Maya’s irrational desire to break him. The biggest laugh of the episode for me was, “You smell like pine trees!” “Thank you.” There’s just something amusing about his utter unpertubability in the face of the insanity all around him. Well, Lucas is growing on me, so there’s that.
No, But Seriously, There Are Good Things About This Show
#Isadora smackle skin#
Who in “Smackle” ever thought that beauty was more than skin deep? Who learns something? The end of the episode indicates that it’s Smackle, but if so, why don’t we get to see her learning? If you want your show to bend over backwards in service of the theme of the week, that’s fine, I guess, but if you can’t bring yourself to “show, not tell,” the least you can do is show and tell. But if you’re going to put the day’s lesson above character, plot, and everything else, the story has to at least bear out the theme. Actually, I love theme it’s one of my favorite aspects of narrative, and it’s one that I think most people don’t give nearly enough thought to. The best that can be said of it is that it’s better than the episode’s utterly irrelevant B-plot.īecause at its heart, “Smackle” isn’t a story. It’s an unnecessary and uncompelling story about the show’s least successful character. But Farkle never needed to learn that beauty was only skin deep! Farkle, if we’re to believe the last line of the episode, already knew that. The episode becomes about what Farkle wants and needs to learn. Then, halfway through, we learn that we can’t trust anything Smackle says, and that she never particularly cared about beauty one way or another.
The first half is about Smackle: her desires, her flaws, what she needs to learn. It’s an incredibly strange way to structure an episode of television. Things like, why did Smackle have to be pretty in order to appreciate Lucas’ appearance? What happened in between Smackle’s meeting with Lucas (after which she swore to Riley and Maya that she would never go back to being smart-but-plain Smackle) and the day of the debate that changed her mind? Was the sudden, Lucas-inspired stupidity all an act? How much of her makeover plan was an incomprehensible plot to win the next debate, and how much was a plot to get Farkle to like her? The second half of the episode just leaves me with so many questions. This is the girl Smackle enlisted to give her a makeover. Riley is wearing gift-wrap bows on her head and wrists.
She wins the debate, and makes it clear, in passing, that she really does like Farkle. At the debate, Smackle shows up in what apparently passes for high fashion on the Disney Channel these days, but surprises everyone by getting up and delivering an eloquent and impassioned speech about her experiences being pretty, and how appearances matter even though they shouldn’t. Farkle, feeling suddenly that this would be an unfair way to win, asks Riley and Maya to turn Smackle back, but they are unable to. Topic: “Is beauty really skin deep?” In order to thwart her, Farkle brings in Lucas, who compliments Smackle’s appearance, thereby turning her into the giggling preteen she had previously only been pretending to be. Farkle, upon seeing Smackle, guesses correctly that Smackle doesn’t really want a makeover, but is instead doing research in preparation for their next debate. Up to this point, we have a solid, coherent plot, if not a stunningly original one. Riley and Maya give her a makeover, and the next day, set up a meeting between Farkle and Smackle. Smackle, upset, asks Riley and Maya to give her a makeover, and Riley, who is a pushover with an obsessive need to fix things, agrees. After the debate, Smackle attempts to ask Farkle out, and Farkle rejects her. Farkle is soundly beaten by his Einstein Academy opponent, Isadora Smackle. The plot, as best as I can tell, is as follows: After a classroom scene that serves no purpose other than to lay out the episode’s theme, Riley, Maya, and Lucas head to watch Farkle debate against Einstein Academy.
That’s just part of the package.īut it’s not really the theme that’s wrong with “Smackle” it’s the execution. Sure, the show beats you over the head with a simplistic theme, but it’s a Disney Channel show. There are moments in “Girl Meets Smackle” that are way too on-the-nose for my taste (the tag scene comes to mind), and it’s important to remember that the same may not be the case for the show’s actual target audience. A month away from GIRL MEETS WORLD has made it harder to keep in mind that this show is for 10-year-olds, and it needs to be judged that way.