Awkward. is to My So-Called Life what Happy Endings is to Friends; that is, one in a long line of copycats but the one that has copycatted successfully. It’s got a great title, complete with punctuation, for starters. That made it worth checking out in my book.

The writers want you to know right off that Awkward. is not like other teen shows. One of the protagonist, Jenna’s, first lines sounds like a direct dig at the soapy AMC Family hit, The Secret Life of the American Teenager: “This wasn’t the inciting incident of some sappy teen special about how I got knocked up on the last day of summer camp.” It does open with our heroine getting it on in a utility closet adjacent to a gym with a blue-eyed popular hunk of hormones. You can practically smell the Axe Body Spray. Continue reading →