On July 8, the first episode of the show "Gossip Girl" appeared on the HBO Max streaming service, a reboot of the series of the same name, which went on air for five years, from 2007 to 2012.
Students of the elite New York school again found themselves in the center of the story.
Some of the juicy details of their private life are becoming known throughout the Internet thanks to an anonymous blog on Instagram.
The first viewers share their impressions on social networks - many have liked the restart, and they predict the success of the original project.
“Based on the first episode, Gossip Girl is definitely going to be one of the best teen series of our generation.
Characters, setting and atmosphere are perfectly woven together to create a story that you will watch with bated breath.
I look forward to continuing, "writes one of the bloggers.
Another writer pointed out that the writers are well versed in the life of adolescents.
“References to contemporary pop culture or to the realities of our generation do not look foreign.
The Gossip Girl writers are clearly in their element as everything fit together perfectly, ”he notes.
Shot from the TV series "Gossip Girl"
© imdb.com
Bloggers also liked how the central characters interact with each other.
“Julien is such a sweetheart.
I like her relationship with Zoya, "- said a Twitter user.
Another spectator highlighted the musical accompaniment to the new project.
“Whoever chooses the songs for the soundtrack deserves huge praise.
Every time I started playing a song, I felt a real ecstasy, ”she shares her impressions.
Some of the users consider the first episode to be the best opening episode in recent years.
Not everyone, however, liked the idea of making the elite school teachers the same Gossip Girl.
“So, a response to the Gossip Girl reboot.
I like it, really, but the plot twist “the teacher is trying to shape the minds of a new generation”, becoming a Gossip Girl, is not for me ... There was no need to show us who it is, but simply to increase the tension as in the original.
In any case, I'm looking forward to new episodes, ”notes another viewer.
He revealed that in the first episode of the restart, he was delighted with polyamorous relationships, rivalries between sisters, bitchy heroines and fashionable character images.
But the images of representatives of the older generation raised questions from users of social networks.
“Why do these teachers, who are already over 35, allow 16-year-olds to terrorize themselves like that?”, Reflect on social networks.
Some viewers, on the contrary, expect a kind of retaliation for teachers who have chosen a non-pedagogical line of behavior.
“These teachers are leaking information, engaging in cyberbullying and creating false tension between their students ... I can't wait to be fired,” they wrote on Twitter.
Shot from the TV series "Gossip Girl"
© imdb.com
Shortly before the premiere, professional critics shared their impressions of the film.
IndieWire editor Ben Travers gave the show a 3-minus.
He considers the lack of vivid emotions to be the main drawback.
“The new Gossip Girl has a serious problem with drama: it’s almost nonexistent,” writes Travers.
According to the critic, the tension is lost in the details of the lives of glamorous adolescents, and the problems of social inequality are not obvious - although this issue is especially relevant for the United States.
However, the scriptwriters tried to avoid difficult topics in terms of both social and interpersonal relations.
“The new Gossip Girl is surprisingly neat, the questions she raises are too restrained, predictable, and banal.
The show is reluctant to tackle the topic of social stratification in high school, which made the original so vital, and does not at all seek to understand how these 'awakened' teens interact with a world that is suspicious of the power they have by virtue of their origin, ”notes expert.
Also, according to the critic, the filmmakers have chosen a strange approach to the image of the main character Julien: the audience sees only what the girl shows to the public - but not her true face.
The rest of the characters are too positive: they tend to be friendly, empathize with others and forgive mistakes.
In general, criticism lacks many things around which the world of the old project was built.
"Gossip Girl" turns out to be a series that characterizes what is not in it: there are no Serena and Dan, which means there is no central romantic line;
there is no confrontation between Serena and Blair, and with it a central conflict ... "Gossip Girl" 2.0 seems as glossy, buttoned up and boring as her Instagram influencer page, "Travers sums up.
In the opinion of the author of the portal Decider.com, Kayla Cobb, the new series, on the contrary, has a certain potential.
The critic notes that the heroes perceive the media in a different way: if in the original picture they were afraid of increased attention to their person, now they crave it.
The expert considers the dignity of the tape to be the courage with which the filmmakers show sexual relations.
Another strong point of the picture is the careful selection of stylish and relevant outfits for the characters, which has remained unchanged since the late 2000s.
Among the shortcomings, Cobb highlights the rejection of the ironic tone of storytelling inherent in the original series, as well as the desire of the creative team to make the characters almost perfect.
“The creators of the new version of the series are afraid to endow their main characters with at least minimal imperfections.
Even the most brutal plan of revenge comes with a tearful backstory.
The result is a teenage drama about vicious, intriguing schoolchildren who, in fact, are not so vicious and generally feel guilty about their tricks, ”the author writes.
The critic believes that if the writers manage to move away from this practice, the new "Gossip Girl" can become a vibrant cultural phenomenon.
Daniel Feinberg of The Hollywood Reporter saw the project as "a half-faded attempt to reimagine the soap story from the original series, and half a bewildering and moderately ambitious reworking of the original, for which the new project is not yet very ready."
Shot from the TV series "Gossip Girl"
© imdb.com
He notes that very little attention is paid to supporting characters during the first four episodes.
The dynamics in the narrative, in his opinion, are brought in by three components: the presence in the plot of the analogue of Chuck Bass from the original series, the appearance of a newbie girl (and at the same time the half-sister of the main character), as well as the return of Gossip Girl with the voice of Kristen Bell.
The main question, unlike the original film, will not be the personality, but the essence of Gossip Girl - this move "raises important sociological questions about the use of social media as a tool of public control."
Feinberg also believes that the creators of the tape did not realize the potential inherent in the decision to make a series about the times after the pandemic.
According to the critic, it would be interesting to see how the restrictions associated with the spread of the coronavirus have changed the lives of schoolchildren, even from the privileged strata of society, and with what attitude they have returned from distance learning to traditional lessons and live communication.
In addition, the expert criticizes the cast: the male part of the cast looks too mature and is not able to create a feeling of emotional closeness with their on-screen partners.
In general, Daniel Feinberg was unhappy with the fact that “in the first episodes, a lot of unworked love triangles are introduced;
countless unconvincing and ridiculous misunderstandings that would not have led to a heat of passion if the characters had learned to communicate normally;
and the same Gossip Girl provocateur as in the original series. "
Variety author Caroline Framke speaks of the tape overwhelmingly favorably.
She believes that the filmmakers have taken into account the merits and demerits of the original series in the new work.
In her opinion, all the storylines are presented in a bright and balanced way.
In addition, the critics liked the performance of actors Jordan Alexander and Thomas Doherty.
“It doesn't matter if Gossip Girl has a blog or an Instagram account: the more changes, the less differences we see,” the expert concludes.
Both the new and the original series are based on the books of the American writer Cecily von Siegesar.
In the old project, the central roles were played by Leighton Meester, Blake Lively, Ed Westwick, Penn Badgley and others.
Producers Leslie Morganshtein, Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage, as well as showrunner Joshua Safran, worked on both versions of the story.
In addition, actress Kristen Bell returned to the image of the narrator.
Other roles are played by young artists Jordan Alexander, Evan Mokk, Thomas Doherty, Whitney Peak, Eli Brown, Adam Chanler-Berat, Emily Elin Lind, Zion Moreno.
The new tape has a lot more non-white characters (and therefore actors).
As Joshua Safran previously explained, the show was conceived to be more inclusive in line with current trends.