I have to start off by saying this is a really well made docu-series, especially in the age of the Netflix mass-produced homogeneous everything looks and sounds and is presented exactly the same doc. I'm so sick of those, as someone who has always loved a good documentary, those have really put me off it lately, because I feel like I'm getting an overproduced over-dramatized & narrativized version of an event. I did NOT feel that way at at all watching this, and I have to give props to the editor & director because they really were able to make what was likely a seemingly infinite amount of filmed & social content into a concise story with excellent pacing. That's another trap that this gracefully avoids, it doesn't move too slow to bump up the content time, nothing overstays its welcome and I really appreciate that. There are also very clever ways of integrating the social media aspects of these stories we are telling and it's something you would expect from a much bigger project. A lot of talent involved in this and I bet they'll be successful at whatever they do next!!
So why just a 7.0/10.0? Well, for as great as the editing, direction, production, storytelling, etc is, they just kind of screwed up a bit with the subject matter. This is framed as a look into how growing up completely within the age of social media has affected this generation, for better, but mostly for worse. However, what we get is a small slice of life within a privileged LA magnet school's social circle. That's fine if that was the intent, but it didn't really seem to be. So, what we see is really not the experience of the average high schooler growing up in this world, it's about the life of rich kids and a couple others who aren't at this elite school. It's basically an LA story, with some crossover into the mainstream. As someone in the urban Northeast US, I'll say that while some of this crosses over here, most of it does not. I would really have liked to have seen, if the goal was to explore this topic I mentioned above, following kids in a couple different parts of the country. Maybe that's asking too much, and I would get that, but then why not just follow a more average group of individuals? I'm sure there are hundreds of possible locations within a 60 mile radius of this school.
I guess what I'm saying is that it felt like this was interesting, but way too specific, which made any conclusions drawn from it a lot less impactful, bc it's really hard to tell what is a broader trend growing up in the digital age, and what is more so just life in LA, in the shadows of the entertainment capital of the world.
What I will say though is that A) this is still 100% worth a watch bc of how well done it is and B) I don't know what's next. By that I mean if you're going to tell me they'll follow kids in urban NJ or rural FL or a combination of different areas within a region next, and this was just the first exploration of a series of profiles, then I will feel different from finding out this is just a one off, so you could say this review is incomplete for now.
