Skins OR holy shit, the English really are better than us at everything...

So, I feel like a bit of a loser writing about a TV show that's been on the air for two years and acting like it's some rad new discovery, but I feel like I can be excused because I didn't have BBC Canada until recently.

It's also a little embarrassing to admit that I'm a 28 year-old man and have an inexplicable love of teen dramas, but I'd like to leave that on the shelf for a minute, if I could.

So, I've spent the last week watching the entire first season of E4's teen drama Skins. I'm now well into season two, and I have to say, it may be the best TV show I've come across in a long while. Don't get it twisted, it's not The Wire good, but only The Wire is The Wire.

If you've read anything about Skins, you're probably aware that British and Australian TV critics have raved about how "realistic" the show is. That's actually a little bit bullshit. When the critics say "realistic," they actually mean that it acknowledges that most teenagers have sex for the first time around age 15, that they smoke pot, take pills, and drink, and that more often than not the kids turn out OK, in spite of all their debauchery.

So it doesn't turn teenage experimentation into an after school special like 90210, or paint the kids who like to party as inherently evil (think Chuck in Gossip Girl.) That doesn't make it realistic. In fact, if anything, Skins is the most surreal teen drama I've ever seen.

Think back to your high school days. Did you and your friends ever drive a Mercedes into a harbour? Get felt up by a BBW Polish exchange student? Lose three ounces of dope that you purchased on credit from a sociopath named the Mad Twatter? No? Didn't think so. This is just what goes down in the FIRST EPISODE of Skins.

In short, it's a great show. And in terms of how it deals with things like eating disorders, sexual orientation, drugs, religion, and identity crises, it's pretty damn realistic, but the plot devices owe more to John Hughes and Monty Python than they do to Larry Clark.

Oh, also, it has some OUTSTANDING music in it, but apparently if you watch it on BBC Canada/BBC America, you don't get to hear any of it due to rights issues, so watch it illegally on the Internet instead.

Here's the musical outro for Season One.


Skins - It's a Wild World Video - Watch the best video clips here