Pros and Cons

My Review

Debbie Allen had a reduced role in the first half of this season, while she was off on Broadway starring in "Sweet Charity", so it's really nice that she finally gets to take the lead in an episode.

I disliked this episode when I first saw, not because the Lydia story but because Ian and his Father play leading rolls in it. I really struggled with Ian so to see more of his home life made it even more difficult to watch. However on re-watching it I don't think it's as bad as I first thought. At least Mike Preston who plays Ian's Dad really is British so he's not putting on a fake accent. The B story with Ian and his father is familiar territory for Fame where one of the kids doesn't really get on with one of their parents. Here Ian believes his father is trying to crowd in on his life and take over his friendships. However he soon discovers that's not the case and his Dad just wants to have a relationship with his son.

The songs in this episode do absolutely nothing for me and I still dislike these parts of the episode. It just seems to continue the British stereotype that we're all Cocknets going around singing these Cor Blimey Guv'nor songs!! Personally I want to see Debbie singing a big ballad and would have preferred the duet between Ian and his Dad to be a more modern song, with Ian's Dad showing he's willing to try to perform Ian's kind of music to get to know his son better.

I do love opening of the episode as we see old pictures of Debbie Allen, also there is some wonderful continuity with Billy Waters because back in episode 2 of the season where Nicole and Jesse are breaking up, Lydia tells Nicole about her first boyfriend Billy Waters. It just goes to show that sometimes the writers and producers did pay attention to what they had written in previous episodes. It's just a shame they didn't do this more often.

Lydia's story is okay, although it's not very fame like, with the exception that is a new twist on the doomed love stories that we have seen so often. Here Lydia's old boyfriend who she's apparently never been able to let go of is back and she's in love all over again. Only he's a crook defrauding people out of their money. He tries to justify it by saying he's only stealing from nasty people who have swindled other people. So pretty much he sees himself as a modern day Robin Hood, but Lydia is having none of it. She wants him to change but deep down she knows he wont so ends up reluctantly turning him in to the feds at the end. On a side note I do love the chemistry between Debbie and Eric Pierpoint and think they work really well together.

Once again we seem to be a little lite on cast members with Leroy, Danny, Maxie, Dusty and Jillian missing and some of the others with little to do9 apart from fill the scenes. I mean Dick Miller is a now a cast member but we saw more of Lou when he was just a guest star.

I was also a little thrown by the time line. This episode aired in 1987 at which point Debbie Allen was 37 and I'd always assumed Lydia was supposed to be a similar age to Debbie. It's 15 years since her High School graduation, so if they were of a similar age Lydia was 22 when she left High School! They refer to it as being 1971 which actually would have been 16 years ago but I assume the episode was actually written in 1986 and they didn't pay attention to when it would air. I always assumed Lydia had gone on to college after High School and in the past when she and Sherwood talked about what they were doing in the 60s, I assumed her student protest days were while she was at college.

Episode Pictures