Losin' It

After Leroy falls during a dance rehearsal his leg is hurt and there is concern that he may not be able to dance again. The leg itself heals well but Leroy is left feeling scared and uses the accident as an excuse not to dance. When Lydia confronts him about the situation and he does take the plunge back into dancing he falls again making Leroy decide to quit the school and dancing all together.

Meanwhile a nervous Reggie has a crush on Max and seeking Kate's support ask her to accompany them on a date, in hope that she won't be so nervous. However this backfires when she worries that Max likes Kate more than her.

I really like the idea of the Leroy story line for this episode. Leroy losing his confidence in being able to dance when he becomes injured is a great story. However, as with many episodes that deal with health issues the story really is too big to be told in just one episode.

This story needed to be spread over a number of episodes for us to get the full impact of what Leroy is feeling. Here things seem rushed and we leap from one major aspect of the drama to another. Leroy is back in school for minutes when we are shown that he is having doubts. Then when Lydia has a go at him to get back dancing, he does and falls again. So it just feels that everything happens too quickly, which is a great shame because it upsets the flow of the story.

To do it properly I feel the accident and if Leroy’s knee will heal properly should have been in one episode. Then his doubts and fight with Henry Lee, when he returns to the school in another. Then finally the realization that he is a dancer and can dance should have been in a 3rd episode, giving Leroy a great story arc for that season. Sadly that is a missed opportunity.

With Leroy’s story running along side Reggie’s crush on Max, and Henry Lee being at the school for a short period makes the events seem to happen even more quickly.  We do get a sense of time passing with the montage of clips while he’s recovering, which is supposed to be 6 weeks but the dance class is still working on the same piece it was before the accident and Henry Lee is still there so this all seems to counteract the sense of time passing.

Reggie’s story is less interesting and to me she seems like a completely different character to Reggie in season 6. I guess they do address this when Kate says it’s not like Reggie to be able to speak to a guy and they come up with some feeble excuse that it’s because she likes him but I don’t really buy it. Out of the new characters from season 5 and 6 Reggie was one of the better ones but that doesn’t come across here. Instead she just comes across as shallow. Personally I think the story would have worked better had it been Kate who needed Reggie to help her with her love life.

Anyway where has Max come from? Reggie bends down, sees him and is instantly in love. Kate then mentions she can’t be in love as it’s the first time they have seen him. Did he just materialize into the room? Surely they would have noticed him around school before now or even in the very classes they are in? Maybe it’s the first time they have really noticed him but that’s not what they say. Surely we haven't had another round of auditions to admit new kids into the School as both Kate and Reggie have only been in school for a couple of months after the last auditions. 

Most of the music is great and “Man in the Mirror” work really well for Gene. Sadly there is no credit for who is singing “The Spirit is Alive” but I really like that song too. Only Carrie singing “Catch Me” seems a little weak to me.

One thing that does let the episode down a little is that quite a few cast members are missing like Carlo, Billy, Loretta and Graham and Nia, Ann and Jesse are in really reduced roles so things do feel a little empty.

I do have a number of nit picks:

- Lydia’s first teacher is said to be Madame Rochette, but in Season 2’s   “Homecoming” we are told it is Louisa Stefanowicz and there is actually a story in  that episode of Lydia worrying that the teacher won’t like the show they are putting   on so yet again I’m not impressed by the continuity.

 - Henry Lee is back so the show can do continuity as this is the second appearance of the season and they continue with the rivalry between him and Leroy. However  Lydia mentions that she knows Henry Lee tried to influence Leroy last year. What    does she mean last year? It was only 7 episodes ago in “Choices” when we first saw   him. Choices aired in January and this episode aired in May so Lydia’s comment    makes no sense. Henry Lee refers to the previous encounter being during mid terms  so the writer was actually aware of the previous episode which makes Lydia’s    comment even more frustrating.   I believe Producers were considering having Henry Lee as a regular on the show.

The footage of Leroy’s audition from the original Fame film is a nice nostalgic touch but at the same time does jar a little. The film and the TV series had always been seen as different. The TV series was a new take on the film. Naturally there was crossover between the too but Leroy’s character was much harder in the film and we had different characters and obviously different actors playing some of the characters that didn't transfer to the TV series. So now making Leroy’s audition in the film part of TV Leroy’s life too does cause a whole load of questions and continuity errors in my head!  

Original  air date in U.S.A 17th May 1986

Original  air date  in U.K. on The Children's Channel  Broadcast early 1993.

Original air date in Italy 02nd October 1987

Original  air date in France 07th March 1996