In thinking the people who write "skins" have a fantasy idea about what kids that age are like

[bananapeel]

I mean , FFS, I know quite a few kids that age (including my own) and also teach at a HE college. The students in skins are not the norm.

The most exciting it gets for my 17 year old is doing his evening run to the petrol station for sweets and hanging out in game and hmv.

yes, in fact i know someone who ran a teen focus group on skins for channel four and the message came back from the kids that it was bog all like their lives and actually rather intimidating. channel four looked at the numbers of thirtysomethings tuning in and didn't change a thing...

A series about what most real-life sixth-formers get up to would not have been commissioned for further series though, would it? Do you expect Desperate Housewives to portray a realistic view of life as a housewife (sorry, I mean SAHM)? It's TELLY! It's meant to be fantasy!

YANBU, The Inbetweeners was more realistic.

well no, actually, it's meant to be written by real life kids for real life kids. that's precisely how it was marketed. of course it's not the case, but it is most definitely how it was sold, and channel four were told that it was frightening kids and causing them to feel insecure and they said 'oh fuck it, let's carry on'.

Well we were a bit like this... but I don't think we were in the majority! We weren't quite as bad as that though.

Also, it has got more f*cked up as the series have gone on!

Agree frownie!!

My dd thinks that Skins is absolute bollocks. She still likes it though.

It is like This Life. I was in my 20s when that was on, that was fuck all like my life or anyone elses, but I still watched it avidly. How did they afford that fuck off big Georgian house?

yanbu

Reminds of that other crap programme 'shameless'.

Pure shit imo.

Yes the inbetweeners has it spot on

That may have been how series 1 was marketed, but these things evolve.

Have just read my post again and am slightly worried about how shouty and cross I sound. And as someone who hasn't watched 'Skins' since the second series (and didn't even like it much), I really don't know why I felt the need to wade in here and rant. Could it be because I've got dull chores and a pile of marking to do?

I know one of the writers from Skins. He is not, and never was, anything like the Skins kids. I don't understand what they based it on tbpfh.

Oh I loathe Shameless. I don;t think it is funny whatsoever. Just a load of middle class scriptwriters poking fun out of the underclasses.

actually i think there is a lot to like about skins, they did some really interesting stuff and created some thoroughly dislikeable characters (a good thing imo) but then there was the thirtysomething chap's hot teen wank fantasy stuff as well...

I must watch it, though I know I would probably find it very, very frightening! I am a William Blake sort of person, deep-down.

That said, This Life was very much like my life, and not really in a good way!

p.s. They could afford that Georgian house simply because they only rented as a flat-share.

I suppose it would be a bit boring if it was real..

Episode 3 - Liam

"Liam has a big test coming up and cant decide which to do: play his ps2 until midnight or study for the test. Things have been made worse by the fact his little brother has been messing with his electric guitar and his mother may be onto his "redtube" use on the family laptop. The only thing for it is to run down to the shop for a packet of sports mix. But will he succumb and buy the Dr pepper....?"

again... lots to like about shameless initially. paul abbott came back to write an anniversary episode recently and watching it you could feel that it was a return to form and see the possibilities again.

and then he fucked back off to LA and it was shiteola once more.

Well-intuited FourEyes, and also why am sitting here, commenting on a programme I have never actually seen ....

The thing I hate about Shameless is that whenever anyone has sex its always up against a wall/doggy style on the kitchen floor/ any way that is hard fast and brutal looking.
Because that is how poor scummers always have sex, Apparently.

hardcore bangin'? That's because they are usually ALL fucking their cousin/nextdoorneighbour/vicar/dog...

I liked the first series of shameless,it actually had a storyline back then.

I don't know about Shameless. Some things make me cringe (like the sex thing) but some things are good. I really like Mickey Maguire. Sometimes I think I would like to live on the Chatsworth, they look like they have a right laugh. :(

I watched up to series 5, then I stopped. Series one and two were good, but then it got silly.
I think I used to live on Chatsworth!

Which recent episode did Paul Abbott write?

Agree about shameless, it seems to have lost its point. Dunno about skins, my teenage years were nothing like that but my friend's DS said the early series' were quite realistic. He's an urban black yoot from tottenham though, I was a timid white girl in a Somerset village.

I loathe the assumptions made about working class people. All sex is just animal, they live on chicken nuggets and if they do actually work they must be on the fiddle somehow. I don't know about the teenage drama but around here, the teenagers main focus is having enough UCAS points to get themselves to a good university with a job at the end of it.

the one where the son wanted to become a policeman. very good dialogue between him and his dad on a hillside...

Ta. Agree, it was good.