I watched the pilot episode of Switched at Birth last night and I was going to stop there but then there was a scene where the deaf girl (Daphne?) owns a Papa Roach album and I decided that this was GOLDEN because haha, the first time Papa Roach gets a mention on television in the last decade and it’s by a girl who can’t hear their music. Anyway. It’s such a weird show! It’s not that bad, surprisingly, especially in comparison to other ABC Family original shows (and I watch too many these, we all know this). It’s definitely not subtle — like, one daughter is athletic like her real dad and the other is artsy like her real mom! One mother says grace, the other is an atheist! One family hates guns, the other is all fuck yeah 2nd amendment! It’s SO fucking on-the-nose, obnoxiously and awkwardly so. I watched the first two or three or nine episodes and I’m hooked. It’s cheesy and dramatic and it makes me cringe SO much because the parents’ acting is over the top, the dialogue is so clunky, and they completely threw the show-don’t-tell rule out the window (which is odd in a show with so many deaf people?). I might have a crush on that dude from High School Musical and I don’t know what to do about that. Also it makes you do strange things like stay awake until 7 in the morning marathoning a show you’re not even sure you enjoy watching until you find yourself screaming “ONE OF YOU GIRLS BETTER FUCK THAT CUTE DEAF KID WEARING THE LEATHER JACKET” at your computer as the sun rises and you think about how you should reevaluate your entire fucking life but instead you pass out with your head on the keyboard and wake up at 3 in the afternoon with Netflix Instant still open on the screen and immediately hit play before even thinking about brushing your teeth or wiping up the drool on your spacebar.
But yeah, it’s weird! The deaf scenes are so weird! Okay I mean, I don’t want to make fun of it because that’s pretty horrible though if karma ever makes me deaf because of how many times I’ve accidentally laughed at this show, you all have full permission to constantly sneak up and scare the shit out of me. Honestly, it’s actually very different and a little cool the way they’re approaching it. Well, sometimes they have people yell at Daphne when her back is turned and they had a scene where she’s angry at her mother so she’s sulking in her room listening to her headphones because, rhythms and that stuff is a little LOL and too much and you’re like “Oh, silly little ABC Family” but mostly I mean it’s weird because I’m not used to it on television. It’s jarring when the noise completely drops out and it’s just silent conversations between two people. Sometimes they have music in the background that’s supposed to attack your heartstrings I guess but mostly it’s just silence and sometimes they’re arguing so it’s REALLY angry rapid-fire sign language and they have to emphasize things via underlining subtitles and man, ABC Family is such a strange network.
ps, here are things I attempted to wikipedia last night while watching this: Switched at Birth, Veronica Mars, cochlear implant, Lucas Grabeel, poker, list of deaf drummers, Scrubs, donuts, Caroline in the City, Cathy.
