I’m so sorry for the lack of updates. I’m currently working on revamping the site, so stay tune.

There is little to be shocked by here in this new redux, but at least you’ll enjoy the eye candy along the way
Grade: C+
Stars: Katie Cassidy, Stephanie Jacobsen, Jessica Lucas, Ashlee Simpson-Wentz, Michael Rady, Shaun Sipos, Colin Egglesfield
Release Date: Sept. 8, 2009

I’ll give MELROSE PLACE this: They sure do know how to pack the hotties into one show. Holy crap. The show is wall-to-wall hot chicks. Look at the breakdown of talent they have on the show – Katie Cassidy (hot off looking smoking on HARPER’S ISLAND), Stephanie Jacobsen (the hot Australian bird from BATTLESTAR GALACTICA and TERMINATOR: THE SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES), Jessica Lucas (one-time member of CSI and the exotic chick in CLOVERFIELD) and Ashlee Simpson-Wentz, the singer, sister of Jessica and gossip favorite turned actress.
Just one of these chicks on one show would be a nice find, but all of them in one show? That’s a goldmine. And that’s probably some of the thinking involved in the re-boot of the show. Think about what we had in the original: Daphne Zuniga? Josie Bissett?

There may very well be some beefcake here too, but unfortunately I don’t really have an eye for it. Maybe you can tell me?

Now, I probably don’t fall into the demographic of MELROSE PLACE. I’m too old. I’m not that old, mind you, but I’m older than probably the teen/early twentysomething audience they are going after. So based on that, it’s safe to assume that I find a hard time relating to not just one or two of the characters but all of them.

The “Pilot” episode revolved around one of the “oh my God” moments that the show in the first run was so commonplace. Yes, a murder in the opening moments of the show. Oh, I’m so shocked.

You know I wonder if the days of shocking moments on scripted dramas that supposedly push the edge of the genre is over. Back in the day when the original MELROSE PLACE was blowing sh** up and making people vegetables and whatever other crazy plotlines they came up with, it was cutting edge stuff. Now, it’s all been done. And putting a murder in the opening moments of the pilot episode no longer has the impact that it might have had a decade ago.

The subplot of the episode dealt with the engagement between Riley (Lucas) and Jonah (GREEK’s Michael Rady). Will they or won’t they. See Riley is torn because she really wishes that Jonah would just grow up instead of having a box of Legos in the closet and thinking a night on the town is a special screening of RESERVOIR DOGS at the movie theater.

Jonah, meanwhile, is struggling with his career as a budding filmmaker and is paying the bills by filming kids parties. When he gets a gig for a big time producer he asks him to take a peek at his short film and is rejected hard core. However, he just happens to stumble upon the same producer getting busy in the closet with someone other than his wife. That prompts the producer to throw everything in his face he always wanted – a feature film, to buy his short film for $25,000, whatever. He just wants the tape deleted.

Meanwhile, we are treated to a number of “suspects” as to who might have killed Sydney (one of the few links to the original series), the chick who was murdered in the opening of the episode, through a series of reasons. Let’s just say that Sydney wasn’t the nicest person in the whole world, blackmailing people left and right and just being a mean bitch in general. Who wouldn’t want to off her is the better question.

At the end we discover who it is, although we received no indication it was him as they alluded to others as the killer for the reasons mentioned above. It was the same guy that toasted Sydney’s death at what was a gathering of the apartment dwellers to honor her death. Shameless!

MELROSE PLACE isn’t that bad. In fact, you won’t be bored probably watching it because I wasn’t. But it just is another one of these shows where the beefcake isn’t in the story telling, it’s in the good looking people that are on the show. And as I stated before, they will be hard pressed to shock anyone these days with everything that has transpired on TV since the original debuted. But there’s no denying the eye candy here and that may have more people coming back than the milquetoast storylines that we are given about shallow people all with hidden secrets and shallow aspirations.