Skins UK

“Just say NO to the American version of Skins.”- Afterlife. Similar criticisms and hesitations have been written about the U.S remake of the UK television series Skins, a TV show set in Britain about a group of young friends who enjoy the occasional party, drugs that are a little more intense than weed, and having sex for the hell of it. The U.S. version is set to premiere on MTV in January 2011. When contrasting between the two different versions of the same series, some critics have been concerned with censorship. The U.S. has guidelines that are far more strict than in the UK because lets face it, America is lead by a bunch of prudes telling us what is and isn’t good for us. With fans of the original taking to the internet to bad mouth the upcoming remake, it makes one who has never seen the original curious and wanting to know what the big ‘effin deal is?

Season one, episode one begins with lady’s man Tony waking up to terrorize his father and help his sister, who looks cracked out, sneak back inside undetected. Just by the demeanor of this character you can tell he is a wise cracking smart-ass. The rest of his day is spent going to class and attempting to help his best friend Sid lose his virginity before he turns 17. What a good friend, right? Not quite. The purpose behind such a task is due to if Sid doesn’t have sex before his birthday, he will lose Tony’s friendship because “it’s embarrassing.” With the help of Tony’s girlfriend Michelle, who Sid is in love with,  they pawn him off on a girl named Cassie who isn’t crazy, she’s just “not allowed to handle knives.” Such details make for an exciting plot that you want to be as twisted as the storyline of Larry Clark’s Kids, but the entire 60 minute comes up short until the near end of the episode when Cassie takes a shit load of pills. Something about this show makes you want to turn it off from boredom, but won’t because you’re desperate for it to get better. Small perks of the first season are recognizing small characters such as Anwar, played by Dev Patel who broke out in the movie Slumdog Millionaire.

One shouldn’t judge a whole series by its first episode, but first impressions can be lasting as well as deadly. The UK version of Skins first episode didn’t start the series off with a bang. Boo-hoo, a young kid is still a virgin and is wanting to have sex. That’s nothing we haven’t heard back here in the states with a movie like American Pie. With the characters changing each season, the show is reminiscent of our own Degrassi that has its own constant changing list of characters. With the content of the show dealing with reckless young adults, it is hard to see how a network like MTV who loves to exploit the more fucked up side of today’s youth with such reality shows as 16 & Pregnant or Teen Mom could butcher such a show. With someone like John Waters being added to our own U.S. version of Skins, that has to give viewers some hope.