One Tree Hill

Post date: May 16, 2023

By Carina Larocca

Ever watch a show that makes you physically smile for a full forty-five minute episode? Or a show that makes you sit in silence once it’s finished because of the absolute shock the last thirty seconds put you through? Or one that makes you scream “no” involuntarily? If you answered “yes,” then you’ve most likely watched One Tree Hill.

One Tree Hill is your classic teenage drama. However, it started in the early 2000’s so it was actually good. Teenage dramas now are always so predictable and a lot of the drama is pretty far-fetched. With One Tree Hill, I will not lie, some events can be a little bizarre, but it’s never something you’d expect. This show follows a group of teenagers throughout high school and into their adulthood. Instead of the cliche football jocks, we have the basketball jock/bully Nathan Scott. There is the cheerleader girlfriend who is not a true cheerleader, Peyton Sawyer. Then her best friend, the cheerleader who truly is a cheerleader at heart, Brooke Davis. We have the half-brother of Nathan, Lucas Scott, who also plays basketball but not professionally because his father abandoned him for Nathan. And finally, we have Haily James, Lucas’s beautiful nerdy best friend. What an odd and complicated group of people. But don’t you fret, they all go through loads of character development and become the best of friends.

This show's best quality is its ability to have the audience completely flabbergasted at the end of the episode. Without giving any spoilers, this show does a great job introducing a whole new character, making the audience already love the character in only thirty minutes, and by the end of the episode, be left with your mouth wide open in utter shock when they reveal the character’s true intentions, or kill them off, or show they were never alive to begin with. I won't lie, that last really surprised me. Typically, I find dramas to be too predictable and therefore, less enjoyable. If I already know what’s about to happen, it’s less fun to watch. However, I have never been able to guess One Tree Hills' next course of action. Even now, in season seven, I am left dumbfounded by the plot altering reveals. Just the other day, this show successfully made me cry over a character I had only met twenty-five minutes prior. You know a show is good when it can have you emotionally attached to a character within the first twenty-five minutes. This is something that entire movies have not been able to accomplish.

All in all, One Tree Hill is a 10/10 show and a must watch. It might seem quite long with nine seasons, but trust me, the seasons go by faster than one would want. It feels like just yesterday I saw young Brooke Davis do something a little promiscuous for attention. And now, she is all grown up as a successful business woman. It brings a tear to one’s eye to see someone grow up so fast with so much character development… even though they are completely fake and never existed.