REVIEW: UNSUPERVISED “YOUNGBLOODS”

Episode Synopsis: Gary and Joel get fake IDs so they can donate blood. Original Air Date: Mar 22, 2012

Spoilers Below

Gary and Joel really want to give blood so that they can save other peoples’ lives but they don’t meet the minimum age requirement. As a result, Gary, Joel, Danielle, Darius, and Meg all decide to go over to Dirk’s house and get fake IDs to try and circumvent all the age requirements in belief that way they can make a difference, or to get in Meg and Danielle”s case an attempt to get into the local rave joint. While there, Dirk gets stoned and tries to hit on Meg but she’s head over heels for Jojo until he jumps his drug dealing cohort over a deal gone bad which  ends up getting the cops called on everyone.

Meanwhile, Principal Stark and the baseball coach feel like their best years are behind them, so they coerce the science teacher Ms. Petters into performing a blood transfusion so that they can be stronger. First, they hook up Gary and Joel with documents to help them get emancipated in exchange for their young blood, but Ms. Petters bows out at the last second as she felt way too under qualified to perform the procedure in the first place.

Other than Russ trying to saw his own cast off, there weren’t a lot of high spots for what could be the series finale of Unsupervised. The show overall is a decent affair, but at times the writing gets sacrificed in exchange for some sort of “good deed” type situation. Which is a shame because there are a lot of funny characters here, Russ is awesome and heck I thought even Principal Stark was great tonight and I would not mind to see her in more story arcs.  On one hand there were some episodes this season where I think Gary and Joel were really great, examples being the pilot and even last week’s episode, on the other hand Gary and Joel sometimes lose that thing that make them adorable in exchange for ideas and agendas that get pushed just a tad too much. I mean, them trying to do well in a science fair or trying their best to support their local baseball team, that’s one thing, but when given scenarios like the guys wanting so desperately to give blood come up, I can’t help but think that the writers tend to lose their focus and somehow believe that there are kids that are out there like this. When you have characters most people can’t relate to, it can be tough to gain an audience and could even  hinder the show’s ability to be successful.

The ratings weren’t great but they were consistent and even comparable to Archer’s first season which makes me think this show comes back because FX has a knack for sticking with new IP’s in an attempt to let it build an audience and it working. This was RCG’s first season with an animated series and there’s a lot to build on here, and am really looking forward to a season 2 to see what these characters have in store. This episode gets a ‘meh’ rating, we will have a more detailed write up for the whole season when the DVD comes out.

 (7.0 out of 10)