I fell down quite the rabbit hole the other weekend. I don’t tend to love watching scripted shows. They’re often stilted and awkward, and I’m the worst at suspending disbelief while watching actors on the screen. I’d rolled my eyes at the announcements for High School Musical: The Musical: The Series when it was announced in 2019, mostly based on the ridiculous name. Even though I was a Disney kid through and through, I’d always been more of a Hannah Montana/Suite Life/Wizards kid than High School Musical. So I ignored the existence of the show for the last 2 years.
And then “Drivers License” flew up the Billboard charts straight to Number 1 with Olivia Rodrigo at the helm. As I dug into how someone with a debut single could have millions of Instagram followers already, I realized she’s also an actress. Her music proved intriguing, especially because she’s been working with one of my favorite producers, Dan Nigro, but I wasn’t as totally enamored with “Drivers License” as everyone else seemed to be in January. And then she released “Deja Vu”.
For some reason, her newest single off her upcoming album, SOUR, totally swept me away, and I started to look into what other music she’d released. All her other music was from HSMTMTS, and in the thick of my approaching finals burnout, diving into a new series didn’t sound like the worst idea.
I logged into Disney Plus at ten at night, fully ready to turn the show off in 15 minutes, but I found myself… charmed? The show is shot in more of a reality TV-style than a sitcom like Riverdale. Characters give confessionals to fill you in on the intricacies of what’s playing out on screen. They’re sarcastic, funny, and actually authentically feel like teenagers. Speaking of authentically teenagers, all the actors are actually aged within a couple years of their characters, especially the lead actress, Olivia Rodrigo, who just turned 18 in February, and Sophia Wylie, who plays Gina, who recently turned 17.
HSMTMTS also quickly dispelled my preconceived notions about a show coming from Disney. It never felt overly sanitized or limited. Gina wears a number of crop tops, one of the guys wants to play Sharpay and gets the part, and they actively critique some of the pitfalls of the original movie. From the use of Instagram as a major part of the plot to the open dialogues throughout, the show genuinely feels like high school in 2019.
If you loved Glee, either when it was on or from stumbling into it on Netflix like I did, this show will definitely check the same boxes. While (probably for financial reasons) the cast only sings Disney songs and originals, there’s the charming, random musical sense to it, messy relationships, a lot of mutual love between the teen cast, and an intense subplot with a dedicated drama teacher and a STEM teacher set on dismantling the drama department for funding purposes (Coach Sue anyone?). But HSMTMTS manages to improve on many of Glee’s flaws and is less interested in implausible plot twists than its predecessor.
With the long-awaited second season dropping May 14th, with a trailer out now, there’s no better time than the present to escape from finals season stress and go back to high school with this show. It looks like the major question marks from the season finale will only get more intense as the second season rolls out.