There are indeed a lot of good points about quarterlife: the production values, the cast. Herskovitz & Zwick let the script pander too much to stereotypes about 20-somethings, true.
I find this show personally offensive. Everything about this show is so wrong about people in their mid-twenties.
Purely by chance, not knowing that clips had been available on the net, my wife and I watched the broadcast premier of Quarterlife. We were just about to turn in, but flipped to a show we didn't know and gave it a chance.
This show got a lot of bad press, which seemed to be from people who either watched a few minutes of one segment, or didn't watch it at all but got their information from other reviewers.I was ready to hate this show as being inauthentic and dull, but...
So I was genuinely surprised by this show. I wasn't expecting such a high quality show.
Firstly, the scripting is terrible - very clichéd, very old-fashioned, not what people are looking for in their TV anymore.Secondly, the guy from Greek (Scott something) was OK, some of the others seemed to have just phoned it in.
Made to contrast the average, glossy style of young American television, Quarterlife stands alone. The show is brilliant; using unknown actors, subtle, seemingly improvised dialogue, and characters that are familiar to all of us, this show gives feels like a reality show that is actually good, actually real.
While those who have seen "Once and Again", "thirtysomething", "My so-called Life", "War of the Worlds", etc etc certainly will recognize a lot of stuff, patterns and type, it surely isn't a bad show. The writing is excellent, and there are pearls of wisdom, of life's insights splattered throughout each episode.
"Groundbreaking" is what the network spin-meisters are calling it. Tiresome is my name for it.
