Yes! I’m so glad that someone else watches Gossip Girl.
Some of the characters also smoke pot (Nate and Chuck) without any negative consequences. Teenage sex is also portrayed fairly neutrally: bad things only happen when you, say, sleep with your best friend’s boyfriend (or your boyfriend’s best friend). And even that isn’t that big a deal.
Did the kids on Beverly Hills 90210 ever drink normally? I remember in season one there are a couple of parties where they all drink (in one episode) which culminates with Brandon driving drunk and wrecking his car, Mondale.
From then on, Brandon pretty much never drinks. Well, I remember one episode where they’re on spring break where he gets drunk and says some stupid things in front of important people. Dylan of course never drinks. Were the others drinking when they were hanging out in clubs and at parties, raves and the like? Steve was in a frat, after all…
As for other drugs, I remember David getting hooked on…meth? And the shorthand for showing that Valerie is a Bad Person is having her smoke pot at the end of her first episode.
Here’s one that surprised the heck out of me:
The Fly
The 1950s movie with David/Al Hedison (and a sparingly used Vincent Price) is set in Canada, and in one scene Hedison is having dinner with his family. He pours his son (who must be about 7) a bit of wine in a glass. He dilutes it with a lot of water, but still, you’d never have seen that in a flick set in the US from the 1950s.
Because the government pays them to show this propaganda:
Damnit! now I’m addicted to Freaks and Geeks.
Gotta say, though, they handled drinking well. (Granted, they were drinking non-alcoholic beer at the party so I suppose it wasn’t really drinking…well, except for Bill.) I was completely expecting the parents to come home early or find out and go apeshit on them, but they seemed to get away with it. Nice take on it.