Melrose Place: The Next Generation

Melrose Place premiered tonight on the CW. premier

Much like the origional Melrose Place the story centers around a group of young and very attractive people living in LA. The plot follows the various tenants of an apartment as they experience various degrees of scandal and corruption while looking very pretty.

On the Surface everything about Melrose Place is great. The TV show is filled with beautiful people, great wardrobe, beautiful locations, a fun soundtrack, and the cinematography is quite good. Yes, with it's focus on all things pretty it's somewhat understandable that the creators of such a shallow and pointless remake could forget to add some things which give a show depth.

The writing is questionable. It almost seems like the writers came up with a bunch of sexy and or scandelous things for the characters to go through, and put little thought about how or why they made sense. Early in the show a person is found brutally murdered in the swimming pool. Miraculously by the end of the day the cast seems to have completly recovered and not be the least bit shaken up by the murder. Of course it's easy to understand how some people might be a tad distracted by getting engaged, or plotting to steal a priceless work of art, or making the decision to whore themselves out to pay for medical school. I know that soap operas work by throwing improbable scandal over improbable scandal, but couldn't they have showed the characters a bit more upset and perturbed by the murder. I don't mind when shows have crazy amounts of drama, so long as characters react appropriately and it makes sense in terms of plot and character development.

Of course maybe I shouldn't blame this all on the writers. Maybe the script called for the actors to be acing a bit more scared, on edge, or pensive on the state of their own mortality; but the actors just didn't deliver. I sincerely doubt that the cast of Melrose Place could collectively act their way out of a paper bag. Ashlee Simpson-Wentz should quit trying to be an actress, the ability to lip-sync and the ability to read lines are very different things. In fairness to Ashlee most of the cast was pretty terrible.

I see few if any redeeming qualities about this show. Watching Melrose Place is like looking into the eyes of Paris Hilton, sure she is beautiful and stylish but there is something missing in her cold vacant stare that tells you she has no soul.

History tells me that many people enjoy the shallow mindless fun of a soap opera. If you don't mind bad acting and improbable plots, so long as it leads to sexy scandals; then by all means do watch this show. It's airs on The CW Tuesday nights at 9.

Honestly I'd recommend holding out for a different guilty pleasure show to come around this fall.