Reviewed by Stuart O'Connor
Stars Jason Priestley, Shannen Doherty, Luke Perry, Jennie Garth, Tori Spelling, Ian Ziering,
Brian Austin Green, Joe E Tata, Gabrielle Carteris, Carol Potter, James Eckhouse | Created by Darren Star
UK certification 15 | UK RRP £49.99 | DVD Region 2 | Runtime 1386 minutes | Directed by Daniel Attias & others
With the brand new spinoff — cleverly named 90210 — about to hit American TV screens (and then computer hard drives around the world), it's the perfect time to take a look back on one of the longest running and most best-loved teen dramas/soap operas ever (an astonishing 10 seasons) and one of the most popular TV shows of the 1990s.
For those who came in late, Beverly Hills 90210 began when the Walsh family — twins Brenda (Doherty) and Brandon (Priestly) and parents Jim (Eckhouse) and Cindy (Potter) — move from Minnesota to LA when accountant Jim gets a new job. They settle in Beverly Hills and the kids start attending West Beverly High, where they befriend an assorted bunch of beautiful people — loner/philospher and wannabe James Dean, Dylan (world's oldest teenager Perry, who was almost 30 when the show began); the stunning blonde beauty with a bad rep, Kelly (Garth); the spoiled son of a Hollywood star, Steve (Ziering); superbraind Andrea (Carteris); the wannabe rap star, David (Austin Green); and the perpetual virgin, Donna (Spelling). The dealt with all the trials and tribulations, highs and lows, loves and laughs of growing up and being a high school kid ... almost as realistically as Buffy the Vamnpire Slayer did!
The first three seasons were set at high school. Come to Season 4, and the kids have all graduated and are off to college. Over summer, Kelly and Dylan (together now after Brenda and Dylan were a couple for much of the first three seasons) have travelled to Europe, but come back seperately; Brandon and Steve rent a Malibu beach-house for a spot of end-of-summer partying. And so to college, where Dylan and Kelly make up, then break up, then make up again before finally breaking up and Kelly throws herself at Brandon. Donna and David (who are yet to "do the nasty") break up, then make up, then break up again, as David wrestles with drug addiction. Brenda moves back to Minnesota to go to college, but moves back to LA a couople of weeks later. Donna's fellow virgin-in-arms, Andrea, pops her cherry with her dorm supervisor before falling for a law student, falling pregnant and marrying him after about a month together. Brenda, too, falls for and gets engaged to a guy she's known for just a few weeks; but they cancel it after the fly to Vegas to get married and come to their senses. Steve joins a fraternity and gets accused of date rape. Dylan learns he has a younger sister (or does he?). Brandon has a fling with an older woman before finding himself fending off the advances of a high school girl who's taken a shine to him. And Brenda and Kelly fall out and make up, over the most minor of things, about 157 times over the whole season.
It's sounds absurd and melodramatic; and it often is. But Beverly Hills 90210 is also a very addictive, fluffy piece of entertainment. Like the best soap operas (including the even sillier Melrose Place, which spun off BH90210) it's like a car crash — you just can't look away. It's a guilty pleasure, and Season 4 was one of the show's best years (by TV standards, it's a long season — 32 episodes). The cast were all stupidly good looking, particularly Garth and Priestley. But none of them were particularly over-endowed with acting talent (although I always thought Priestley had a certain amount of screen presence, while Spelling was only there because her daddy produced the show). It's interesting to note that none of them have gone on to stellar Hollywood careers. In fact, two of them — Garth and Doherty — are reprising their characters for the new spinoff. I predict that by the end of its first season, the entire gang may be back on board.
EXTRAS ** Just a few featurettes — The Moms of BH90210; The Loves of Season 4; A Look Back with [executive producer] Charles Rosin; 7 Minutes in Heaven; and Everything You Need to Know About BH90210 Season 4. There's also a couple of fake trailers compiled from episode clips. Disappointingly, there's no commentaries, or deleted scenes, or gag reels. And no interviews or input from any of the main cast members. A shame, really.