Britannia High - Episode 3

With its ratings slumping ITV desperately dragged Britannia High to the primetime slot of 7pm this past Sunday, to little effect. The problem isn't the timeslot here, the problem is the show itself. What may have looked like a great idea on paper isn't working on television and I'll be absolutely amazed if it goes further than the 9 pre-filmed episodes of this series.

With no mention of Danny's dyslexia from last week we jumped straight into the singing and dancing disaster with Jez's story, quickly realising that he was lying to his new found fame seeking friends about who he was and where he'd come from. I didn't much care to be honest. It soom emerged that his father wanted him to go to business school, Jez had enrolled at Britannia High without saying anything and soon everything came pouring out into the open with many tears and angst ridden songs. The only refreshing thing here was that his father made no bother about his son being gay, it was a given, it hadn't been brought up in a negative or positive way, it has just been let be. Where as most stories surrounding gay characters tend to be geared towards their sexuality it was encouraging to see that here it was Jez himself that was the focus, not which side he batted for. However, that said, this is not enough to save this quickly sinking ship (though I fear it's already beneath the waters). With lack lustre and somewhat obvious storylines, characters that fit into the classical stereotypes but don't actually live up to them, and some pretty bad acting, I think its perhaps time for Britannia High to close.

Britannia High - Episode 2

Much as some of the modern series have done with format, one character development per episode is at Britannia High's musically explosive centre. Last week's pale, traumatised and naive Lauren quickly fell into her place with fello students this week as our viewers' eye was firmly focused at Danny, Lauren's new muse and Britannia High's answer to Troy Bolton.

The musical numbers continued though sometimes they felt more out of place than the cast's obvious age difference from their characters and the undertones of the peripheral cast were continued with Claudine's bitchiness to Lauren (in real life she is an absolute sweetheart) and the random, trying to live up to ditzy skin's classic Cassie, character of Lola.

It was all a bit obvious to be honest. Last week we had naive, country girl with massive talent trying to fit into the vicious world of celebrity, dance and music and Episode 2 went along the lines of - top high school hunk with incredible gifts for dance fails in everything else. As the program progressed Danny (Mitch Hewer) became more and more resentful to his fellow classmates and teachers trying to help him, pushing away Lauren whilst at it, and generally being a complete pain. Taking his attention away from his actual failing grades he launched himself into showcasing himself, completing the oddly placed musical numbers and becoming the school's newest rep. It all came to a crux when Girls Aloud's Nicola and Kimberly came to give the school a "Q & A" session and Danny, being the school's rep was asked to read out the hand picked questions. With a frantic flurry of brow furrowing it became obvious that something was wrong and after storming out of the hall, humiliated and upset, it was revealed that Danny had dyslexia and couldn't read a thing. Five minutes later he was sent off to a residential reading and spelling course and that was the end of that.

I'm sorry to say that this show is very quickly flagging. I was very up for being impressed and hoping that one of ITV's new forefront entertainment programs would indeed be that, forefront and ground breaking. Instead you wish the ground would open up and swallow what is likely to become a great big failing mess as the series continues. I will continue watching, Mitch is a fitty, Sapphire Elia was lovely in real life, and I want to believe that it can better but with only a run of 9 episodes and 2 already down its going to have to do it fast.

Britannia High - NEW SERIES

Making a welcome debut and exciting addition to the Sunday night schedule came “Britannia High”, ITV’s blend of fame meets high school musical. Set in London, Lauren (Georgina Hagen) rocks up for her first day of the new term and the stereotypical talent school genre starts to roll off with quiet boredom. Claudine is the obvious bitch, who takes immediate offence to Lauren as she was talent spotted rather than having to audition, Danny is the “hot” guy who tries to be nice to everyone, and Lauren is the girl who really doesn’t understand what she’s doing in a place like this. I had a feeling it was going to be very obvious, middle of the road and uninspiring.

I gave it five minutes, then ten, and by fifteen I was actually quite enjoying it. With Arlene Phillips & Gary Barlow behind the choreography and musical numbers it started to change my opinion from just another talent show to something that actually had an edge. It was still pretty plain sailing from the writers with few risks taken but it still worked, our climax to the episode had us wondering will she, won’t she, as Lauren and dance partner Danny performed their first group dance showcase night. Lauren, not be the natural dancer, had not yet completed a difficult lift sequence and though she made it on the night, it still had us wondering if she might fall into a heap of embarrassing awfulness in front of the audience, teachers and worse still her fellow students. She then promptly fainted, was talked around from quitting by teacher Frank Nugent, and Claudine surprisingly showed that she had a heart inside that icy exterior.

Concluding the episode was a kiss between Lauren and Danny and another musical number, this time danced across the roof tops, and a feeling that I’d like to see where this show takes us. I love that it’s set in London and we actually get to see the city, I love Mitch Hewer aka Skins fame (though I’m not sure about his new buffon hairstyle) and the musical number between bitch Claudine and uncomfortable newcomer Lauren really got me into the show. The website is also interesting with video’s, character perspective biographies and blogs & behind the scene’s information so you can get inside the students world. Can’t wait to see more.

Mitch Hewer & Georgina Hagen play budding romantics Danny & Lauren

ITV - Sundays at 18.15