WARNING: THIS IS A KID'S SHOW.
The cast and plot are set in a prep school but don't be fooled, dear friends, the targeted audience is obviously tweens between the age of 8-13 years old. I feel cheated (and wayyyyy too old for this). But hey, my loss is, perhaps, your gain. I'll give a digest of each episode and you'll be the judge if it's worthy of your time, assuming you don't fall in the 8-13 year old pool, because if you do, then this series is sorta awesome. Sorta being the keyword here. Anyone above the age of 13 would probably rather watch Glee, Gossip Girls, Skins, The Inbetweeners (I'll bring this awesome series in a bit) and/or more mature shows than Tower Prep. It reminds me of my halcyon days when Mighty Morphing Power Rangers was all the rage. Tower Prep is more sophisticated than Power Rangers but come on, it's 2010, that little bit shouldn't come as a shock to anyone. Unfortunately, Power Rangers has better theme song whereas Tower Prep's rock background music is so annoying and unnecessary.
A quick Google search shows that it's a Canadian-American live action series that's been picked up by Cartoon Network and created by Paul Dini, who famously produced a few DC animated series including Batman Beyond. I don't know know how Canada factors in here because as far as I know, the main cast are all Americans but maybe the shooting locations are in Canada *shrugs* or the investment money is funded by Canadians.
The main guy, rebel I-fit-nowhere Ian Archer, is played by Drew Van Acker who no doubt has a very Drew-Van-Acker face, if you know what I mean. At first glance, he looks somewhat like Bradley James of Merlin fame (the Prince Arthur guy) but few seconds later, that resemblance is all gone except for the moobs. Yes, they both have moobs. Bradley James is a much better actor but it's probably due to age difference, experience and basically, uh, scripts.
So, Ian gets suspended for uppercutting a bully at his former school and when he channels his energy at the multi-player online game he regularly plays, a new player by the name "Whisper 119" comes online, spooks him a bit, logs off, then Ian hears a buzzing and passes out. He wakes up in a dorm room with three uniformed dorm mates - Don, Ray and Zach - who are strangers to him. Nobody knows how he gets there, or how anybody else did for that matter, and the staff - headmaster, coach, teachers, administration Whisper 119 - refuse to enlighten anyone. All he knows now is that his parents know where he is (hokay), that the institution is called Tower Prep, that it's a school for kids to hone their specific unique ability - kinda like the mutant school in X-Men, and that he wants to escape. BADLY.
That night, he sneaks out of the school into the surrounding forestry, only to find that he is atop an island with dangerous cliffs on all sides and the forest is infested with human-sized something dressed in cockroach/insect costumes and helmets with night-vision goggles that emit green and red rays, resembling poisonous praying mantises in the dead of the night!
But Ian isn't alone. Three other students execute their escape plan that night:
Suki - technology-giant's daughter who can imitate people's voices to the T;
C.J - supposedly a hot, popular girl (I don't find her attractive at all), can't remember anything before her life in Tower Prep;
Gabe - bespectacled goofy guy who is shorter than the girls but can talk his way out of anything, an ability called hi-persuasion?
Together with his three new accidental friends, Ian explores a little bit of the forest before deciding that for now, the campus is the safest place to stay and besides, their escape plan needs major refining.
Drew Van Acker is a decent actor for such a series. My only complaint about him is the way he runs. He's supposed to be a quick-tempered athletic dude but he runs through the wood like a little girl going on a morning jog with her puppy - NO SENSE OF URGENCY WHATSOEVER. Has anyone watched Prison Break before? The running/escaping scenes are the best I've seen. However, Van Acker's fighting chops are amazing. He definitely has trained in martial arts before so that's worth watching.
Ian Archer's three mean and immature roommates provide the comedic doses in the show. They may have very short filming parts but the three are wonderful, me thinks. lol. I always like the bad guys. In the first episode alone, they have a scene where they run naked from the shower room to chase after the person who stole their robes. That takes some guts!
Everyone loves a laugh.
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| the night-google helmet. |
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