Utopia Falls

It's definitely cheesy, and has teen levels of drama, but I think if you're the target audience it's pretty great.

I definitely preferred the sci-fi, and the distopian elements of the series to the teen drama. However the idea that teens are saving the world with Hiphop through a talent show style competition I'm weirdly here for.

But I think the characters talking about the history of how music has affected history is pretty great.

It definitely has potential. The actors are decent, some episodes are average, but it has some good points. Don't get all the bad reviews that haven't even watched 2-3 episodes, it picks up after episode 2, it's not a great series, but it has potential.

I'm really eager for Season 2! It took a little bit for the show to find it's footing, but it's very enjoyable. The 1984-esque Authority environment in New Babyl sets a dark tone that, in some ways, is distressingly similar to our current world, all in the guise of a Utopian society.

To address some of the complaints I've seen here:

The singers are pretty good, the actor who plays Bodhi is a great performer, and the dancers are incredible.

If you continue the show, you'll see that it absolutely makes sense to elevate dance/song/music to such heights--I mean, it always struck me a bit odd that in Hunger Games, it was essential to be combat trained and ready to participate/succeed in the games. If you're going to oppress a people, why on earth would you encourage them to know how to kill people and to be capable of doing so?

Meanwhile, art performance can certainly be used to distract, shift focus, control a narrative without making your populace combat-ready.

Overall, it's a show that can really suck you in within an episode or two--I binged the whole thing in three nights. I *really* hope it gets picked up for a second season!!!

This series is like Divergent and Hunger Games with a little HipHop culture. It is not meant for everyone, believe me I was suprised when they started dancing and singing for the first time. Once you get past the first couple episodes you realize the story is actually pretty good. I truly hope that they do a 2nd season to allow me to see where they were going with this.

Trying to parent in a digital age, I found this series great to sit down and watch with my 11 year old.