Saved by the Bell
 

Our fellow GC'er Steve Hoffsteder's new Observational Humor is out this week (available at www.collegehumor.com). This weeks installment had me rolling on the floor at work. I am sure it will do the same to you. Especially if you have ever even seen the show.

Enjoy all. Steve, again, you have outdone yourself.

When Worms Have Ears
By Steve Hofstetter

I grew up in New York in the early '90s. And like almost anyone else anywhere, when I got home from school, I watched TV. I watched a lot of TV. Mainly, I watched Saved By the Bell.


This was when the WB was still WPIX--the home of the early '80s Harrison Ford movies and Sunday PBAs. I didn't watch channel nine, mainly because Kate and Allie reruns weren't my style. And this was Fox in the days before World's Blankiest Blank specials. By 5:00, the news was on all the good channels, so we were left with no choice. And the Channel 11 programming whizzes, after canning both Charles in Charge's new and old families, hit on something--take NBC's horrible attempt at a high school comedy and show it twice a day. And it worked.


"When I wake up in the morning, my alarm gives out a warning, I don't think I'll ever make it on time. By the time I grab my books and I give myself a look, I'm at the corner just in time to see the BUS FLY BY!" And I sing along. We all sang along.


At some point during every episode, you'd get enough sense to think, "Why the hell am I watching this?" But you couldn't turn it off. After just a few minutes, you were sucked in by the sheer stupidity of the plots, the complete absurdity of the stereotypes, or the fact that Kelly always wore something skimpy. No one knows why they watched it, yet it seems everybody did. No one cared how bad it was.


I admit I know almost every episode by heart (granted half of them use the same recycled lines, making each episode a mere half-hour string of tired clichÈs), but I also readily declare my disgust at the glaring inconsistencies of the show. No matter how low-budget a project may be, it still needs some reality.


Do you remember when Bayside was a junior high school in Indiana? Remarkably, it quickly became a Southern California high school, in the same building with the same principal and most of the same students.


Zack should be in jail. At the very least, he's committed grand theft auto, kidnapping, forgery, mail fraud, and destruction of public property, yet Mr. Belding seems to think detention is the answer. How obviously effective.


Family members only exist for one or two episodes. Like Mr.Belding's hipper, younger brother, Rod. Slater's only friend and pet chameleon, Arty. Screech's prize beagle, Hounddog. Kelly's infant brother, Billy, whom her parents allow her to take to school and whom Zack promptly loses. Jessie's illegitimate half-brother from New York, Eric. Tori. The well-dressed homeless girl that Zack met in the mall, Laura. Slater's tomboy-turned-bombshell sister, JD. Kelly's love-crazed sister, Jamie, who had it bad for Nitro from Teen Line (didn't Kelly only have brothers?). Lisa's mother. Lisa's father. Veronica, Jughead, Dilton Ö You get the point.


Bayside can afford a football team, a track team, a cheerleading squad, oil rigs, an auto shop with a real car the gang can take apart, a water polo team, a wrestling team, a radio station, and a restaurant, but has only five teachers. Mr. Tuttle, for example, has taught drivers ed, music, art, and world history.


Mr. Belding has a secretary he keeps paging, yet the door to his office opens directly into the hallway. The office is apparently never locked either, because those wacky kids always seem to be switching the files. And a single three-drawer file cabinet holds all the school's records, which is probably possible, because the only other students are Moose, the twins, Wendy the fat girl, Homecoming finalist Muffin Sangria, and six nerds. The rest of the school consists of one hallway, two locker rooms, two bathrooms, a gym, a boiler room, the radio station, two classrooms, and a staircase leading to a non-existent second floor.


The show is a half hour of inane crap, but there have been dozens of imitations since then that just haven't caught on. Was it how ridiculous everything was? Was it how easy school seemed? Was it the muscle-bound Latino with a brillo-pad haircut? Or maybe Max's magic drew us in so completely that we're still fondly reminiscing a decade later.


Sometimes, class gets a little tough. Papers pile up, exams approach, and that annoying kid in the front row just won't shut up. And when that all comes to a head, it's nice to know that it's all right because we are, have been, and always will be saved by the bell. Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo ... Chikaboom.

wo...flashback! i can remember all of this stuff. i loved saved by the bell. GOOOOOOOOOOo BAYSIDE!!!!

yeah ok I was in college and I still watched that show-I admit it!!

My kids think this will be like our "Happy Days". Just watch-give it a little time and it will be a staple of every oldies channel and game show trivia. It really was a cute show...until Sreetch(sp?) grew up.

LMAO! I'm having flash backs as well...and you know it's bad when you can remember the college episodes too. Don't forget about the one-hour special vacations to Hawaii and Vegas.

Where did all the reruns go? Its not on anywhere around here. The college years were hilarious too. But we all knew that Zach and Kelly would get married...

Real life Bayside...
 

Speaking of Bayside High...my parents live in a town called Palm Bay, I went to junior high and high school there. I guess it was 3 years ago that they built a new high school because the town was growing so much. After nominations and voting, it was decided that the name would be Bayside High. (Funny, considering there is no bay in Palm Bay, and therefore the school is not beside a bay.) I wonder how many people think they are kidding when they say they went to Bayside High?! Oh, and they are not the bengal tigers, or whatever it was on SBTB, they're the bears.

I loved that show! I remember coming home everyday from school and the reruns were on TBS from 5-6pm. I'd sit in front of the TV and watch it. The shows are classic! :D

Lol, I used to love that show! They re-run it here at like 6 a.m., and when I'm getting ready for rotations at the hospital, I watch it as I get dressed. It's so cheesy now, but I still know all the episodes. My fav has to be the one where Jesse gets all stressed out and she's taking pills to stay awake, and at the end she's like, "I'm so excited! I'm so excited!! I'm so....scared/tired!" sob sob. Love that show.

I love SBTB...

Can you imagine that there will be a time when no kids will know what Saved by the Bell is? :(

It's just such a generational touchstone - I can make fun of someone's cell phone by calling it the Zach Morris phone and everyone knows what I'm talking about...

Hmm I think I'll do some reminscing before I study...

hahahahah. I thought I was the only one who used that. lol...

I loved this show, and still do for that matter. I am pretty confident in saying that I know every episode by heart. I always thought Zach was a cutie. ;)

ROFL.

My friends and I are always going

"I'm so excited, I'm so excited, I'm SO SCARED"

And everyone knows THAT line. Too damn funny

I loved this show! I thought is was so funny that Screech was the only one that continued into the "new generation" which for some reason just never caught on at all...(I personally hated it!) This gives me such flashbacks, I can't believe there are no reruns on TV now..

When I was 22, I was a summer nanny to 3 kids.
The kids told me about SAVED BY THE BELL, and after a few weeks, I was hurrying the kids home from the park so that I could watch it at 4:30 just as much as the kids wanted to! LOL :D

That was my fave show of all time...and yes, I'll admit....on occasion I will still watch the reruns!:) I loved all the movies (the Hawaiian one...and my fave Zach and Kelly getting married!) and even the College Years were great! LOL!:D:D

BIG SBTB fan here!:D

For all you die hards out there you can catch Saved by the Bell at 7:00 am on TBS. I can't watch it because I have to be to work at 8:00 and it is a 45 minute drive :(

how great!
 

This is hilarious! Of course I loved the show, it still comes on around 530am or 6am in Gainesville and my boyfriend and I would always watch it after being out at the bars all night! In fact it comes on right after Gilligan's Island reruns...another of my favorites. :)

Tara

HAHAHA I loved that show and yeah it was pretty dumb but it was just hilarious!! the college years were so funny too...man it needs to come back on!! :)


Nichole

Bayside High
 

first off....I just saw an episode last week, while out of work with the flu, when kelly and zack broke up, cause kelly wanted to date her college guy boss at the max..... anywho!
I am also from Palm Bay!! too weird, I still dont know why they named it that, but they did, only they are the bayside bears not the bayside tigers. ..... and it is true, palm bay has no bay, and oddly enough more pine trees than palm trees!

I must be the only one that didn't like the College Years! I never got into it...perhaps I had started to outgrow their stupid Plots! :rolleyes: But I admit I loved Saved By The Bell! My brother and I would sit down to watch it. It was like a really great day if there happened to be a back-to-back episode on TBS!!! :D

Hootie

Like everyone else, I was a big SBTB fan :). Boy I miss that show - they were showing re-runs for a while, but I haven't seen any as of late.

So imagine my suprise when I came upon this thread. Thanks for the promo, life saver. And it's good to know that everyone else is just as obsessed with SBTB as I am. :-)

(As for the Zack Morris phone thing, how'd he keep it in his back pocket? You'd think the guy wouldn't be able to sit down without falling over)

Zack was "the man" ! You guys remember how he was able to stop a scene by giving the time-out signal so he could talk to the "audience". And then when he was done, he'd call time in,and the scene would continue like nothing happened. If he could stop time, I'd suspect that Zack had other magical powers that we didn't know about---like how he was able to keep a phone in his pocket without breaking it and falling over. :D


I've have a question for all my SBTB fans. Remember the season with Tori? What happened to Kelly,Jessie,and Lisa that season? Were Kelly and them doing a co-op somewhere that we didn't know about? It was like they disappeared for half a season and Tori showed up. Then Tori left just as suddenly as she came and Kelly and them were back. I had always wondered about that.

ps. My favorite eposide was also when Jessie got strung out on No-Dose. "I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so....scared"! followed by a gut renching sob. classic classic stuff:D :o ;)