I'm so excited! I'm so excited! I'm so scared!

February 5, 2015 6:49 AM

Jimmy Fallon re-unites the alumni of Bayside High.
posted by Chrysostom (47 comments total)

Criminy, those people have not aged at all.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 7:00 AM on February 5, 2015 [7 favorites]

Well, Dennis Haskins looks pretty rough. Considerably heavier than when he was on Mad Men a year or two ago; I wonder if something is wrong with him?
posted by Chrysostom at 7:07 AM on February 5, 2015

I really wanted to like this but oof... it just felt really weird to me. Sort of uncanny valley, I guess?
posted by kmz at 7:08 AM on February 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

I used to start my mornings with actual Saved By The Bell episodes. While getting ready today, this had me smiling all the way through.
posted by AloneOssifer at 7:17 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Speaking of Elizabeth Berkely, "LeBeau" just did a retrospective of Berkely's career arc a few days ago for his "What the Hell Happened To..." series.
"What the Hell Happened to Elizabeth Berkley?"
posted by Auden at 7:19 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

If Fallon really wanted fireworks, he could have had Dustin Diamond as a surprise cameo.
posted by dr_dank at 7:25 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

kmz: "I really wanted to like this but oof... it just felt really weird to me. Sort of uncanny valley, I guess?"

I thought the attention to detail was impressive. YMMV, I guess.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:30 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Faced hurts from smiling too much. Dang that was crazy. If I weren't at work my latchkey sister and I might sneak into the kitchen to get another Koolaid Burst or maybe a pack of Gushers ("Those are for your lunches!") before my mom got home from work.
posted by resurrexit at 7:33 AM on February 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

I'm guessing Screetch burned too many bridges to be welcome back on the show ?

(but, yes, uncanny how they look exactly the same, some 20 years later .. )
posted by k5.user at 7:41 AM on February 5, 2015

I'm guessing Screetch burned too many bridges to be welcome back on the show ?

Seems likely, but he's also awaiting trial in connection with a barfight, and that's probably a bigger impediment.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 7:46 AM on February 5, 2015 [6 favorites]

I like that Jimmy Fallon is using his show as a medium to live out all of his childhood dreams.
posted by leotrotsky at 7:55 AM on February 5, 2015 [32 favorites]

Props for the extras conversing in complete silence in the background.

(The producers of SbtB were loathe to shell out unnecessary SAG wages. That's why one-off characters would sometimes communicate with the gang in nothing but gestures and grimaces.)
posted by Iridic at 7:55 AM on February 5, 2015 [13 favorites]

Faced hurts from smiling too much.

SO Good. They all really committed and were having fun. Every time I see Fallon's skits I think, that's a guy who's just having a great time doing what he loves and it rules. I love the tortured comedians who laugh through the pain too, but it's awesome that that's not the only way to do Comedy.
posted by zutalors! at 7:56 AM on February 5, 2015 [4 favorites]

I actually cheered. That was adorable. The clothes, the hair, the set. Just perfect!
posted by mochapickle at 8:05 AM on February 5, 2015

I get no Screech, but no Lisa Turtle? What's the story there?
posted by waitingtoderail at 8:06 AM on February 5, 2015

I get no Screech, but no Lisa Turtle? What's the story there?

Mental Illness
posted by leotrotsky at 8:08 AM on February 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

Wikipedia claims she may have some mental health issues. It looks like her last role was voice work in 2008, and last acting role was in 2002.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:09 AM on February 5, 2015

But, Lark, Voorhis, did, write, a, book, and, in, the, process, broke, her, comma, key.
posted by stltony at 8:10 AM on February 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

But, Lark, Voorhis, did, write, a, book, and, in, the, process, broke, her, comma, key.
That Amazon page has the most disturbing list of other items customers bought I've ever seen.
posted by cottoncandybeard at 8:20 AM on February 5, 2015 [10 favorites]

Such fan service, but it's chock-full of so many of the best ongoing gags, and way better than I expected from a reunion. A+ would watch again.
posted by likeatoaster at 8:25 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

That Amazon page has the most disturbing list of other items customers bought I've ever seen.
Holy shit. Now regretting being logged into my Amazon account when looking at that that. Can't wait for them to start suggesting maybe I'd like a fetal pig, too.
posted by TwoStride at 8:26 AM on February 5, 2015 [5 favorites]

Oh, that's awful.
posted by waitingtoderail at 8:33 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

I don't have the adjectives to state just how much I enjoyed this. Suffice it to say, I was losing my shit at each appearance of a recognizable SBTB castmember as hard as the audience was.

The only thing that could have possibly made this better would have been a merging of the two SBTB universes and had Tori show up.
posted by The Gooch at 8:35 AM on February 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

Criminy, those people have not aged at all.

SERIOUSLY. Give me some of whatever Mario Lopez is taking, he looks great.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 8:35 AM on February 5, 2015 [5 favorites]

That Amazon page has the most disturbing list of other items customers bought I've ever seen.
Ashton Drake Playtime With Charlie Happy Handfuls Of Fun Monkey Doll
posted by zutalors! at 8:48 AM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Criminy, those people have not aged at all.

SERIOUSLY. Give me some of whatever Mario Lopez is taking, he looks great.

Melanin is pretty great at keeping skin looking young. All the white people I went to high school with look ten years older than me. However, everyone in that cast is looking pretty ace except yeah Screech and Lisa have both fallen on some hard times.
posted by zutalors! at 8:50 AM on February 5, 2015

I like that Jimmy Fallon is using his show as a medium to live out all of his childhood dreams.

Jimmy Fallon is almost exactly one month older than me. Trust me, this ain't a dream from his childhood.
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:11 AM on February 5, 2015 [6 favorites]

A dream from his stoned college years?
posted by Doc Ezra at 9:22 AM on February 5, 2015 [4 favorites]

Intellectually, I know it is wrong and silly to associate an actor with a specific role he or she played, as if the role was actually an extension of the actor's personality. That said, a few years ago Mark-Paul Gosselaar appeared on an episode of "Weeds" where he engaged in a BDSM scene where he spanked and then had very rough sex with the lead character played by Mary Louise Parker. With any other actor, it would have been just another scene on a boundary pushing TV show. With him, I wanted to wash my eyes with bleach.
posted by The Gooch at 9:28 AM on February 5, 2015

What if it had been Mr. Belding?
posted by Chrysostom at 9:55 AM on February 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

Well I guess by child star standards 66% well-adjusted and 0% dead at age 40 are a respectable batting average.
posted by dgaicun at 9:58 AM on February 5, 2015 [7 favorites]

Auden's link about Elizabeth Berkely taught me that she was in a TV movie remake of Smokey and the Bandit with Varric Tethras playing the Burt Reynold's role, and now the world is a little more magical.
posted by bibliowench at 10:20 AM on February 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

Also, three out of six child stars still working good jobs on TV is better than respectable.
posted by smackfu at 11:20 AM on February 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

i would imagine dustin diamond not being there isn't related to the bar fight, but the book he wrote (although he claims it was ghost written and he's not responsible for what's in it), and interviews he gave, and his general decisions about life in the last 25 years. he has thoroughly burned pretty much all his bridges everywhere.

and yeah, the voorhies stuff is super sad. seems like lots of people have tried to encourage her to get help but she claims to be totally fine and there's not much else you can do at that point.
posted by nadawi at 11:47 AM on February 5, 2015

Jimmy Fallon + 90s hair = Mike Myers. WTF.

I will confess to a surge of t(w)een hormones when Mark-Paul appeared on screen. Oh Zach.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:56 AM on February 5, 2015 [6 favorites]

That Amazon page has the most disturbing list of other items customers bought I've ever seen.

Holy shit. Seriously.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 12:23 PM on February 5, 2015

But, Lark, Voorhis, did, write, a, book, and, in, the, process, broke, her, comma, key.

Has anyone read any of her books (three that I could spot)? They look like outsider art par excellence. For now it's saved to my wishlist.
posted by wyndham at 2:30 PM on February 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

And regarding the literature of mental illness, I wouldn't be surprised if this would fit in really well with The Diary Of Vaslav Nijinsky and Schreber's Memoirs of My Nervous Illness.
posted by wyndham at 2:38 PM on February 5, 2015

A dream from his stoned college years?

Jimmy Fallon would have been 24-25 when SBTB premiered. So, either a post-college stoned dream, a "satisfy the demo!" dream, or a synergy-laden NBCUniversal dream (SBTB was an NBC show).
posted by blucevalo at 2:51 PM on February 5, 2015

Jimmy Fallon would have been 24-25 when SBTB premiered. So, either a post-college stoned dream, a "satisfy the demo!" dream, or a synergy-laden NBCUniversal dream (SBTB was an NBC show).

SBTB debuted in 1989. Fallon was born in 1974, so he would have been a teenager when it premiered.
posted by The Gooch at 3:10 PM on February 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

The connection between that book and the other "related" terrible stuff is that they've all been featured on The Worst Things For Sale.
posted by wanderingmind at 6:45 PM on February 5, 2015

I have a sister who is seven years older than me. This made me think of a time she was going through the living room, & saw me watching Saved By the Bell. She said, "This is something you do on the regular, on purpose?" She was totally perplexed.
posted by broken wheelchair at 7:15 PM on February 5, 2015

I'm four years younger than Fallon and definitely watched a million episodes of that show, prob between 11-14? Something like that? It was on Saturday mornings just as you were waking up. I'm sure a lot of older teens were watching it as well.
posted by zutalors! at 7:47 PM on February 5, 2015

I'm almost exactly a year younger than Fallon and I watched a million of them, too.
posted by mochapickle at 7:38 AM on February 6, 2015

This felt more like an Oprah-style reunion and less of a skit. Lots of applause for the walk-ons, straight-up pastiche of nostalgia, and no new gag edge.
It got me thinking how hard it must be for Fallon and crew to try and maintain their "viral" streak, because after a 2nd viewing this seems like easy pandering.
posted by Theta States at 8:44 AM on February 6, 2015

But don't get me wrong: I was grinning cheek-to-cheek first time through.
posted by Theta States at 8:48 AM on February 6, 2015

It's weird. I've literally never seen an episode of Saved by the Bell. But somehow, by osmosis, I have learned enough of the show's injokes, that I think I actually got most of the jokes. I blame Dancing with the Star.
posted by jacquilynne at 12:54 PM on February 7, 2015