Awkward. (TV series)
Encyclopedia
Awkward. is an American comedy-drama
series which premiered on July 19, 2011 on MTV
. The show revolves around the life of 16-year-old Jenna Hamilton (Ashley Rickards
), who is struggling with her identity, especially after an accident is misconstrued as a suicide attempt.
The show is based on the high school, Palos Verdes High School
, in Southern California
. MTV renewed the series for a second season in 2012.
, which assigns a weighted mean
rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the TV series received an average
score of 74, based on 13 reviews, which indicates "generally favorable reviews". Entertainment Weekly
wrote Jenna "navigates the sharky waters of high school, friends, mean cheerleaders, and cute boys with a snarky voice-over that makes her--and Awkward.--easy to fall in love with." The Wall Street Journal
s Dorothy Rabinowitz
explained Awkward is a "series about a high-school girl that's neither maudlin nor alarming nor conceived with intent to preach or to shock. It's further distinguished by its focus on entirely recognizable teenage pains, as endured by an entirely recognizable teenager, Jenna (Ashley Rickards). Its other distinction: strong echoes of an older kind of storytelling, the sort whose characters grow and acquire depth. This is a lot to expect these days from TV writing of any kind, much less a series about teenagers—it's relief enough when it's not about vampires." Hank Stuever
of The Washington Post
praised Ashley Rickards' performance by explaining "Following the well-trod path of Molly Ringwald’s “Sixteen Candles
” and Claire Danes
’s “My So-Called Life
”, she effortlessly manages to elevate the unfresh premise of MTV’s new Tuesday night comedy series, “Awkward,” to something that is tawdry yet honest. It’s even funny, which is a pleasant surprise from MTV, the maker of so many lame teen comedies that I’ve lost count." David Hinckley of the Daily News gave the show a four stars rating out of five and wrote "Awkward is very good". He explained "For all the times we've seen the high school outcast who feels alternately ignored and humiliated by her peer group, she has rarely been played better than Ashley Rickards plays Jenna Hamilton. " and went on "If the dramas are exaggerated, Jenna makes the trauma feel legitimate, and her narration gives everything a knowing undertone of humor and self-awareness that keeps the most uncomfortable moments from being painful." The New York Times
called Awkward as "a wry show about longing — for love, certainly, but also for consistency, that great intangible in the ever-morphing world of high school life". The Huffington Post
wrote "Awkward. was the sleeper MTV hit that no one saw coming. (...) Without a doubt, Jenna's witty voice-overs make this high-school dark comedy stand out from a crowd of stereotypical high school prime-time soaps."
Linda Stasi of The New York Post
gave the show a three stars rating out of four commenting "aside from the gratuitous sexual stuff, "Awkward" is a really good, funny, fun show". However, Stasi mentioned "this just isn't the kind of thing you'd want to watch with your kids -- nor want your kids to watch." She then compared Ashley Rickards to Juno
actress, Ellen Page
: "Rickards is a great teen actress of the Ellen Page variety -- the kind of kid whose pretty face and adorable bearing is swamped by her ability to look awkward and offbeat."
According to The Philadelphia Daily News
, "Awkward like Glee
deals gently and semicomically with issues of sexuality and bullying but never really draws blood". Variety
s Brian Lowry was less enthusiastic about the show: "While the premise is refreshingly gimmick-free compared with "RJ Berger" or "Teen Wolf
", the situations aren't compelling enough to make this much more than a latter-day "Doogie Howser, M.D.
" with a gender switch."
John Kubicek of BuddyTV
website appreciated that the show's "villain", Sadie is an overweight cheerleader who is popular only thanks to her parents and is in that way different from the typical perfect skinny girl." He also wrote "Just like Easy A
, Mean Girls
or other strong, female-centric teen comedies, Awkward has a quick wit and a very distinct vision of the world. It's the perfect blend of comedy and painful teenage awkwardness, and in the end, the title says it all. He concluded "The result is one of the most enjoyable and earnest teen comedies TV has produced". HitFix
's Daniel Fienberg gave the show a B rating commenting "Not only are high school horrors pretty universal, even if the specifics change, but I can find a way to fit "Awkward" into a tradition of hyper-literal high school comedies like "Pretty in Pink
" or "Heathers
" or "Mean Girls" or "Juno". It's not as good as any of those, but it's not as bad as "Jawbreaker
," which is in the same tradition."
Comedy-drama
Comedy-drama is a genre of theatre, film and television programs which combines humorous and serious content.-Theatre:Traditional western theatre, beginning with the ancient Greeks, was divided into comedy and tragedy...
series which premiered on July 19, 2011 on MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
. The show revolves around the life of 16-year-old Jenna Hamilton (Ashley Rickards
Ashley Rickards
Ashley Nicole Rickards is an American actress. She has been in various films and television shows portraying a wide variety of characters, most notably Fly Away, in which she portrayed Mandy, a severely autistic girl. She is also the lead character, Jenna Hamilton, in MTV's Awkward...
), who is struggling with her identity, especially after an accident is misconstrued as a suicide attempt.
The show is based on the high school, Palos Verdes High School
Palos Verdes High School
Palos Verdes High School is one of three public high schools on the Palos Verdes Peninsula in Southern California, USA...
, in Southern California
Southern California
Southern California is a megaregion, or megapolitan area, in the southern area of the U.S. state of California. Large urban areas include Greater Los Angeles and Greater San Diego. The urban area stretches along the coast from Ventura through the Southland and Inland Empire to San Diego...
. MTV renewed the series for a second season in 2012.
Plot
The series is based around social outcast Jenna Hamilton who, following an accident that rumors misconstrue as a suicide attempt, starts being noticed by all the students at her school. By making changes and embracing her misfortune, she becomes well-known by her peers. While dealing with her love life and her relationships with other peers she still has to manage the daily drama that comes along with being a teenager.Main cast
- Ashley RickardsAshley RickardsAshley Nicole Rickards is an American actress. She has been in various films and television shows portraying a wide variety of characters, most notably Fly Away, in which she portrayed Mandy, a severely autistic girl. She is also the lead character, Jenna Hamilton, in MTV's Awkward...
as Jenna P. Hamilton, a 16-year-old "invisible" girl in high school, wise beyond her years, with an irreverent, optimistic outlook on life, she just wants to fit in. Things go from bad to worse when she gets a mysterious "care-frontation" letter in which Jenna's reaction leads to a misunderstanding of epic proportions causing everyone to believe that Jenna's accident was a failed suicide attemptFailed suicide attemptFailed suicide attempts comprise a large portion of suicide attempts. Some are regarded as not true attempts at all, but rather parasuicide. The usual attempt may be a wish to affect another person by the behaviour. Consequently, it occurs in a social context and may represent a request for help....
. She loses her virginity to Matty, but he doesn't want to take their relationship public, which causes complications in their relationship. Jenna is best friends with Tamara and Ming. Jenna is the nemisis of Sadie Saxton. Later in the season she begins a relationship with Jake Rosati.
- Beau MirchoffBeau MirchoffWilliam Beau Mirchoff is an American actor, best known for starring as Danny Bolen on the sixth season of ABC's Desperate Housewives . He also appeared in films such as Scary Movie 4 and The Grudge 3...
as Matty McKibben, he is the main love interest of Jenna and is the best friend to Jake Rosati. He isn't the typical popular jock and has complications of his own and tends to keep quiet about his family life and his relationship with Jenna. He and Jenna had sex at the end of summer camp in a supply closet, but he doesn't want to let anybody know how he feels about it, or what he did with her. Matty has shown to be very self-conscious and to have true feelings for Jenna, although at times he does not show it. At first he tells Jenna that he doesn't think he's ready for a relationship, but eventually confesses that he wants to be more than friends with her and as the season progresses he begins a short-lived relationship with Jenna.
- Nikki DeLoachNikki DeLoachAshlee Nicole DeLoach is an American actress known as Nikki DeLoach.-Life and career:DeLoach was born in Waycross, Georgia. DeLoach was a member of the Georgia 4-H Performing Arts group Clovers & Company from 1991 to 1994. She then joined the The New Mickey Mouse Club in 1993.In 1998, she became a...
as Lacey Hamilton, Jenna's mother, who is clueless about raising a child. A superficial plastic surgery fanatic, she had Jenna when she was a teenager and gave up on her dreams of going to college, using the funds to get breast implants instead. In the season finale, Jenna finds out that she probably wrote the "care-frontation" letter.
- Brett DavernBrett DavernBrett Davern is an American actor best known for his role as Jake Rosati on the hit MTV Series Awkward.- Early Life :He was born on March 16, 1992. Raised in Edmonds, Washington. Brett attended Edmonds-Woodway High School. During his summers, he would travel to Stagedoor Manor Theatrical Training...
as Jake Rosati, who is class president. He is popular, smart, and outgoing. Jake is best friends with Matty and started off dating Lissa in the beginning of Season One, but eventually broke up with her due to his feelings for Jenna and the way Lissa and Sadie treat him. Unlike Matty, who thinks with the team, Jake thinks for himself. He leads, rather than follows, and is a sensitive guy with a heart of gold. Jake and Jenna grow closer, leading him to develop a crush on her. At first Jenna does not reciprocate these feelings, but she eventually realizes that he is kind, honest, and thoughtful towards her. He doesn't mind being seen in public with Jenna, unlike Matty, and he doesn't care about what other people think of him. In the Season One finale, Jake and Jenna become a couple at the Winter Formal.
- Molly Tarlov as Sadie Saxton, Jenna's nemesis. Sadie becomes the most popular girl at school thanks to her parents buying her influence, yet ironically is the one with the biggest weight issues of the "popular kids". Despite Sadie's popularity and power, Jenna senses that Sadie feels she never measures up. Sadie makes excuses for her bad behavior because she feels entitled; she thinks the world owes her for having to suffer a fat gene, that she has everything except the perfect body. She also has a secret crush on Matty which is mainly the reason why she hates Jenna.
- Jillian Rose Reed as Tamara, Jenna's best friend. She is always there to pick Jenna up and lie to her when things get really bad, their friendship has a few difficulties throughout the season but they patch things up. Tamara wants to be noticed and popular and tries really hard to impress others including her crush Ricky Schwartz.
- Desi Lydic as Valerie Marks. One of the school counselors, she clearly has her own problems as she tries too hard to be like the teenagers she is there to help. She's a lonely person who feels her gift in life is helping people. She crosses boundaries and acts inappropriately around students; when Valerie is assigned to talk to Jenna once a week, their relationship becomes increasingly unprofessional as Valerie comes to think of Jenna as her best friend. On Jenna's sixteenth birthday, as a present she gives her the movie Sixteen CandlesSixteen CandlesSixteen Candles is a 1984 American film starring Molly Ringwald, Michael Schoeffling and Anthony Michael Hall. It was written and directed by John Hughes.- Plot :...
and also quotes the famous movie lines from the film.
Recurring cast
- Jessica Lu as Ming Huang, Jenna's other best friend. She is portrayed as a down-to-earth indieIndieIndie is a shortform of "independence" or "independent"; it may refer to:*Indie art, fine arts made by artists independent of commercial fine arts establishments*Indie design, for handmade products by independent artisans...
-style teenager with a strict ChineseChinese peopleThe term Chinese people may refer to any of the following:*People with Han Chinese ethnicity ....
mother. Ming gets mad at Jenna for telling Tamara secrets instead of telling her and because of that she feels left out, but still remains supportive of Jenna.
- Greer Grammer as Lissa, Jake's ex-girlfriend. She is abstinent but told Jake he could have anal sex with her because that didn't count. She is quite ditzy and also best friends with Sadie. At first she doesn't like Jenna, because she begins to notice that Jake seems to prefer Jenna's company to her own. Later she realizes Sadie destroyed her relationship with Jake and goes against her.
- Mike Faiola as Kevin Hamilton, Jenna's father. He is shown as being the more responsible parent as opposed to his wife and to be caring and supportive to Jenna through rough times.
- Barret SwatekBarret SwatekBarret Swatek is an American actress and comedian who has appeared in movies such as The Forty Year Old Virgin, Lethal Weapon 4, and On Edge. She has also appeared in TV shows such as American Dad, Just Shoot Me, and currently recurs as hilarious teacher Ms. Sommers on10 Things I Hate About You...
as 'Aunt' Ally, Lacey's best friend who is a wild party girl. She has always referred to Jenna as Lil Bitch.
- Jillian MurrayJillian MurrayJillian Leigh Murray is an American Actress. She perhaps best known for her role as Portlyn on Sonny With a Chance and as Heather in An American Carol .-Life and career:...
as Olivia/Jenna Plus, Introduced as the girl Jenna thinks to be Matty's girlfriend after he told her he wasn't ready to be in a relationship. But later on she finds out that she is in fact the girlfriend of Matty's brother.
Reception
Awkward. mostly received positive reviews. At MetacriticMetacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
, which assigns a weighted mean
Weighted mean
The weighted mean is similar to an arithmetic mean , where instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others...
rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the TV series received an average
Weighted mean
The weighted mean is similar to an arithmetic mean , where instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others...
score of 74, based on 13 reviews, which indicates "generally favorable reviews". Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
wrote Jenna "navigates the sharky waters of high school, friends, mean cheerleaders, and cute boys with a snarky voice-over that makes her--and Awkward.--easy to fall in love with." The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
s Dorothy Rabinowitz
Dorothy Rabinowitz
Dorothy Rabinowitz is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American conservative journalist and commentator. She was born in New York City, and was educated at Queens College and New York University...
explained Awkward is a "series about a high-school girl that's neither maudlin nor alarming nor conceived with intent to preach or to shock. It's further distinguished by its focus on entirely recognizable teenage pains, as endured by an entirely recognizable teenager, Jenna (Ashley Rickards). Its other distinction: strong echoes of an older kind of storytelling, the sort whose characters grow and acquire depth. This is a lot to expect these days from TV writing of any kind, much less a series about teenagers—it's relief enough when it's not about vampires." Hank Stuever
Hank Stuever
Hank Stuever is an American journalist who writes about popular culture for the Style section of the Washington Post. In 2009, he became one of the paper's TV critics. He is a two-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing, in 1993 and 1996...
of The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
praised Ashley Rickards' performance by explaining "Following the well-trod path of Molly Ringwald’s “Sixteen Candles
Sixteen Candles
Sixteen Candles is a 1984 American film starring Molly Ringwald, Michael Schoeffling and Anthony Michael Hall. It was written and directed by John Hughes.- Plot :...
” and Claire Danes
Claire Danes
Claire Catherine Danes is an American actress of television, stage and film. She has appeared in roles as diverse as Angela Chase in My So-Called Life, as Juliet in Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet, as Kate Brewster in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, as Yvaine in Stardust and as Temple Grandin in...
’s “My So-Called Life
My So-Called Life
My So-Called Life is an American teen drama television series created by Winnie Holzman and produced by Edward Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz. It originally aired on ABC from August 25, 1994, to January 26, 1995 and was distributed by The Bedford Falls Company with ABC Productions. Set at the...
”, she effortlessly manages to elevate the unfresh premise of MTV’s new Tuesday night comedy series, “Awkward,” to something that is tawdry yet honest. It’s even funny, which is a pleasant surprise from MTV, the maker of so many lame teen comedies that I’ve lost count." David Hinckley of the Daily News gave the show a four stars rating out of five and wrote "Awkward is very good". He explained "For all the times we've seen the high school outcast who feels alternately ignored and humiliated by her peer group, she has rarely been played better than Ashley Rickards plays Jenna Hamilton. " and went on "If the dramas are exaggerated, Jenna makes the trauma feel legitimate, and her narration gives everything a knowing undertone of humor and self-awareness that keeps the most uncomfortable moments from being painful." The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
called Awkward as "a wry show about longing — for love, certainly, but also for consistency, that great intangible in the ever-morphing world of high school life". The Huffington Post
The Huffington Post
The Huffington Post is an American news website and content-aggregating blog founded by Arianna Huffington, Kenneth Lerer, and Jonah Peretti, featuring liberal minded columnists and various news sources. The site offers coverage of politics, theology, media, business, entertainment, living, style,...
wrote "Awkward. was the sleeper MTV hit that no one saw coming. (...) Without a doubt, Jenna's witty voice-overs make this high-school dark comedy stand out from a crowd of stereotypical high school prime-time soaps."
Linda Stasi of The New York Post
New York Post
The New York Post is the 13th-oldest newspaper published in the United States and is generally acknowledged as the oldest to have been published continuously as a daily, although – as is the case with most other papers – its publication has been periodically interrupted by labor actions...
gave the show a three stars rating out of four commenting "aside from the gratuitous sexual stuff, "Awkward" is a really good, funny, fun show". However, Stasi mentioned "this just isn't the kind of thing you'd want to watch with your kids -- nor want your kids to watch." She then compared Ashley Rickards to Juno
Juno (film)
Juno is a 2007 comedy-drama film directed by Jason Reitman and written by Diablo Cody. Ellen Page stars as the title character, an independent-minded teenager confronting an unplanned pregnancy and the subsequent events that put pressures of adult life onto her. Michael Cera, Olivia Thirlby, J. K....
actress, Ellen Page
Ellen Page
Ellen Philpotts-Page , known professionally as Ellen Page, is a Canadian actress. Page received both Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations for Best Actress for her role as the title character in the film Juno...
: "Rickards is a great teen actress of the Ellen Page variety -- the kind of kid whose pretty face and adorable bearing is swamped by her ability to look awkward and offbeat."
According to The Philadelphia Daily News
Philadelphia Daily News
The Philadelphia Daily News is a tabloid newspaper that serves Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. The newspaper is owned by Philadelphia Media Holdings which also owns Philadelphia's other major newspaper The Philadelphia Inquirer. The Daily News began publishing on March 31, 1925, under...
, "Awkward like Glee
Glee (TV series)
Glee is an American musical comedy-drama television series that airs on Fox in the United States, and on GlobalTV in Canada. It focuses on the high school glee club New Directions competing on the show choir competition circuit, while its members deal with relationships, sexuality and social issues...
deals gently and semicomically with issues of sexuality and bullying but never really draws blood". Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
s Brian Lowry was less enthusiastic about the show: "While the premise is refreshingly gimmick-free compared with "RJ Berger" or "Teen Wolf
Teen Wolf (2011 TV series)
Teen Wolf is an American television series that currently airs on MTV, and in reruns on TeenNick. The series premiered on June 5, 2011, following the 2011 MTV Movie Awards. Teen Wolf is a supernatural drama series that follows Scott McCall , a high school student and social outcast who is bitten by...
", the situations aren't compelling enough to make this much more than a latter-day "Doogie Howser, M.D.
Doogie Howser, M.D.
Doogie Howser, M.D. is an American television comedy-drama starring Neil Patrick Harris as a 16-year-old doctor who also faces the problems of being a normal teenager. Created by Steven Bochco and David E. Kelley, ABC aired the show from 1989 to 1993 for four seasons totaling 97 episodes.-Plot:Dr....
" with a gender switch."
John Kubicek of BuddyTV
BuddyTV
BuddyTV is an entertainment-based website based in Seattle, Washington, which generates content about television programs and sporting events. The website publishes information about celebrity and related entertainment news through a series of articles, entertainment profiles, actor biographies and...
website appreciated that the show's "villain", Sadie is an overweight cheerleader who is popular only thanks to her parents and is in that way different from the typical perfect skinny girl." He also wrote "Just like Easy A
Easy A
Easy A is a 2010 teen comedy film written by Bert V. Royal, directed by Will Gluck, and starring Emma Stone. The screenplay was partially inspired by the novel The Scarlet Letter. The film was shot at Screen Gems studios and in Ojai, California. Screen Gems distributed with a release on...
, Mean Girls
Mean Girls
Mean Girls is a 2004 American teen comedy-drama film directed by Mark Waters. The screenplay was written by Tina Fey and is based in part on the non-fiction book Queen Bees and Wannabes by Rosalind Wiseman, which describes how female high school social cliques operate and the effect they can have...
or other strong, female-centric teen comedies, Awkward has a quick wit and a very distinct vision of the world. It's the perfect blend of comedy and painful teenage awkwardness, and in the end, the title says it all. He concluded "The result is one of the most enjoyable and earnest teen comedies TV has produced". HitFix
HitFix
HitFix, or the HitFix.com is an entertainment news website that launched in December 2008 specializing in breaking entertainment news, insider information and providing reviews and critiques of film, music and television...
's Daniel Fienberg gave the show a B rating commenting "Not only are high school horrors pretty universal, even if the specifics change, but I can find a way to fit "Awkward" into a tradition of hyper-literal high school comedies like "Pretty in Pink
Pretty in Pink
Pretty in Pink is a 1986 American teen romantic comedy-drama film about teenage love and social cliques in 1980s American high schools. It is one of a group of John Hughes films starring Molly Ringwald, and is commonly identified as a "Brat Pack" film...
" or "Heathers
Heathers
Heathers is a 1989 black comedy film starring Winona Ryder, Christian Slater and Shannen Doherty. The film portrays four girls in a trend-setting clique at a fictional Ohio high school...
" or "Mean Girls" or "Juno". It's not as good as any of those, but it's not as bad as "Jawbreaker
Jawbreaker (film)
Jawbreaker is an American black comedy satire film, directed by Darren Stein. It was released February 19, 1999. The film stars Rose McGowan, Rebecca Gayheart, Julie Benz, and Judy Greer as girls in an exclusive clique in their high school. Charlotte Ayanna has a non-speaking cameo role as a...
," which is in the same tradition."