Musical Mondays Week 10 High School Musical 1 & 2...maybe 3

[Cameron H. 23786]

She's a pretty, intelligent girl with a sweet disposition and a mother that just wants to see her succeed. He's a pretty, kind-hearted boy and the school's star basketball player with a father that just wants to see him succeed. Will they be able to maintain their social status when everyone else finds out that they're both really good at singing and dancing, too?

 

Buckle up, nerds. We watched...

 

 

[Cameron H. 23786]

First of all, great pick!

 

I think my biggest question, right off the top, is why are the people who already know who they are (e.g. Sharpay, Chad, and Taylor) presented to be the antagonists of the movie? Ostensibly, isn't finding out who you are and what you want to be the whole point of the movie? Yet the people who already know who they are are treated like monsters.

 

It feels like a really mixed message.

[Cam Bert 8145]

As a non-American I find it very confusing how important sports are to everyone in school. I played rugby and wrestled in junior high school and at the start of high school. First off, we enjoyed winning but it wasn't the end of the world if we lost, and nobody really came out to watch out games or matches. One guy I wrestled with wanted to go to the Olympics but other than that we did it because we enjoyed it. Those who were more serious joined outside of school leagues. When I told them I was stopping to get more involved with the theater program everyone wished me luck. In every American high school movie and show I see it seems like sports are the most important thing ever and I don't get it. I mean it's a school. You're there to learn things but instead of being like "We have the highest SAT average in all of the state!! Woo!!!!" it seems to largely be about supporting the sports teams and if they bring home the championship. Is this because sports scholarships are a viable way to get an affordable post secondary education? Do schools receive more money for championships? Is this just something played up in movies or are movies and tv not that far off from real life?

 

Also isn't the last game the championship match? Isn't the musical happening after the season? Why should his team care what he does in the off season? I get Sharpay and her lover brother wanting to be the leads, but why does his team care? They seem to be okay with doing a musical number at the start of the film.

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

I have a heap to say about this movie but in a rush now so will hold off on getting in deep right now.

 

All I wanted to stay, right off:

 

Kelci + Zeke 4 lyf

 

(not as a couple, just as my favourite characters by far)

[Cam Bert 8145]

I have a heap to say about this movie but in a rush now so will hold off on getting in deep right now.

 

All I wanted to stay, right off:

 

Kelci + Zeke 4 lyf

 

(not as a couple, just as my favourite characters by far)

Wha? They get together in the sequels? What about Zeke and Sharpay?

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

Wha? They get together in the sequels? What about Zeke and Sharpay?

No, no, I said NOT as a couple. They don't get together ever. I just really like both those characters, so they're 4 me 4 lyf.

 

Zeke gets together with Sharpay and Kelci with Ryan, who is going to have a fabulous awakening at university and send Kelci regretful 2am emails about breaking her heart.

[Cam Bert 8145]

No, no, I said NOT as a couple. They don't get together ever. I just really like both those characters, so they're 4 me 4 lyf.

 

Zeke gets together with Sharpay and Kelci with Ryan, who is going to have a fabulous awakening at university and send Kelci regretful 2am emails about breaking her heart.

I totally see that happening.

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

Also, will anyone be bummed if spoilers from HSM 2 and 3 come up in our discussions? I watched all three on the weekend so I'm pretty sure I'll be referring to things that happen later sometimes. Can I assume that no one here is going to be mad, like that one guy who hasn't seen 'Inception' yet and doesn't want anyone to spoil it?

[Cameron H. 23786]

Also, will anyone be bummed if spoilers from HSM 2 and 3 come up in our discussions? I watched all three on the weekend so I'm pretty sure I'll be referring to things that happen later sometimes. Can I assume that no one here is going to be mad, like that one guy who hasn't seen 'Inception' yet and doesn't want anyone to spoil it?

 

As far as I'm concerned, that's fine...since I've seen them all before anyway.

[SaraK 1980]

I'm sure I could talk about props and set dressings in this movie all day, but I'd really like to just talk about Zeke. He's my absolute favorite person in this movie. Once he decides that he's coming out as a baker, he just leans into it. Doesn't seem to care at all that his friend made fun of him. Prior to him just carrying around bags of baked goods everywhere he goes, what was he doing with all of it? And where is he getting the time to bake ALL of these different things?

 

 

Also - I have a terrible television so I watch everything with closed captioning. This exchange came up before Troy saw Gabriella at the school -

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

I'm sure I could talk about props and set dressings in this movie all day, but I'd really like to just talk about Zeke. He's my absolute favorite person in this movie. Once he decides that he's coming out as a baker, he just leans into it. Doesn't seem to care at all that his friend made fun of him. Prior to him just carrying around bags of baked goods everywhere he goes, what was he doing with all of it? And where is he getting the time to bake ALL of these different things?

 

Yesss team Zeke!

 

It's really interesting that Zeke's revelation in 'Stick to the Status Quo' is, as you say, followed by him saying 'i don't care, I bake, live with it'. In the same song, Martha ('I love hip hop') is shunned by her nerd pals for loving to dance, but in HSM 3 Martha is head cheerleader (big props to the series for the plus size cheerleader!), so the message of the song is ignored at all sides. Not sure we get more of a payoff from the burnout cello player. It's just interesting that the overriding message (stay in your lane) is immediately ignored (as opposed to the conventional approach which is a message song about 'be your own person').

[taylor anne photo 11311]

First of all, great pick!

 

I think my biggest question, right off the top, is why are the people who already know who they are (e.g. Sharpay, Chad, and Taylor) presented to be the antagonists of the movie? Ostensibly, isn't finding out who you are and what you want to be the whole point of the movie? Yet the people who already know who they are are treated like monsters.

 

It feels like a really mixed message.

I'd say they're antagonists purely because their entire mission seems to be keeping Troy and Gabriella away from each other and thinking ONLY about the one thing. So by keeping them unhappy they are then seen as the "bad guys."

 

But so this movie came out in 2006 while I was in my second semester of sophomore year. That's absolutely not what was going on in high school let me tell you. The captain of the drill team was also captain of the show choir so already there is an example of sports and performing arts mixing. Softball girls were also singing with me (I quit softball to focus more on art but I wasn't really that great at it anyway lol). The only things that really kept people from doing everything was just scheduling. All of this takes an immense amount of time and effort to be really good at - sorry Troy and Gabriella if you've never sang before in your life you're not going to immediately understand how to site read music - but absolutely no one was making fun of people for wanting to do decathlon AND the fall musical.

 

The only thing I can think of is that it would have been different for guys. I wasn't friends with anyone on the football team or basketball team so I can't speak for how they would have been treated if they wanted to do the musical or join choir, but there were a couple of soccer guys in choir and they seemed to be just fine (I think because of the amount of girls they were surrounded by - if I had to pinpoint a reason lol). Again I think the football schedule would have just been too much for any of them to really join the performing arts because our schedules were just as crazy.

 

Now, to answer Cam Bert's question about America and sports, I went to a Texas school and yeah football is a fucking HUGE deal in high school. Basketball is a little more meh but if we had a good team that was actually going to State (the real version of the "championship") then I bet we would have been more inclined to get behind them. Then again, our soccer & volleyball teams actually did WIN State and while they were celebrated and got giant photos of themselves on the wall for the rest of eternity, can't say that anyone in the school respected them more than our mediocre football team lol. We had huge ass pep rally's on home game days that were met with all of the senior girls dressing in customized overalls and then depending on who we were playing the teachers would decorate their doors to support them as well. In Texas most money goes to the sports programs and it doesn't matter if they are winning or not - they'll just find an excuse (like building a new field house where the Dallas Cowboys will come practice while their own field house is being built) to give them more money. But I had to pay the art program for a fuckin' music folder. That's the system lol.

[Cameron H. 23786]

I'm sure I could talk about props and set dressings in this movie all day, but I'd really like to just talk about Zeke. He's my absolute favorite person in this movie. Once he decides that he's coming out as a baker, he just leans into it. Doesn't seem to care at all that his friend made fun of him. Prior to him just carrying around bags of baked goods everywhere he goes, what was he doing with all of it? And where is he getting the time to bake ALL of these different things?

 

 

Also - I have a terrible television so I watch everything with closed captioning. This exchange came up before Troy saw Gabriella at the school -

 

 

Lol--I was watching it this morning and I caught that "Pink Jelly" line for the first time. I was like (high pitched voice), "What the fuck is going on right now?"

[taylor anne photo 11311]

 

Yesss team Zeke!

 

It's really interesting that Zeke's revelation in 'Stick to the Status Quo' is, as you say, followed by him saying 'i don't care, I bake, live with it'. In the same song, Martha ('I love hip hop') is shunned by her nerd pals for loving to dance, but in HSM 3 Martha is head cheerleader (big props to the series for the plus size cheerleader!), so the message of the song is ignored at all sides. Not sure we get more of a payoff from the burnout cello player. It's just interesting that the overriding message (stay in your lane) is immediately ignored (as opposed to the conventional approach which is a message song about 'be your own person').

I didn't get that it was immediately ignored. Zeke seemed to be the only one who was like "this is me and I don't care what you think" because they still spend the rest of the movie being shitheads to Troy and Gabriella. Martha doesn't get her moment to shine until the credits start to roll!

[Cameron H. 23786]

I'd say they're antagonists purely because their entire mission seems to be keeping Troy and Gabriella away from each other and thinking ONLY about the one thing. So by keeping them unhappy they are then seen as the "bad guys."

 

Yeah, I mean I get their rationale, I just find it weird that the mission statement of the whole movie is "find that thing you love and pursue it with all your might" and the three characters who have already discovered that "thing" for themselves and are already living that message at the start of the movie are the three characters that are set up as the "bad" guys. So when Troy and Gabriela decide that music is their passion, are they going to be shitheads to everyone who doesn't share their passion?

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

 

Yeah, I mean I get their rationale, I just find it weird that the mission statement of the whole movie is "find that thing you love and pursue it with all your might" and the three characters who have already discovered that "thing" for themselves and are already living that message at the start of the movie are the three characters that are set up as the "bad" guys. So when Troy and Gabriela decide that music is their passion, are they going to be shitheads to everyone who doesn't share their passion?

I think part of the issue is that Sharpay is unwilling to share the spotlight, and sees Troybriella as a threat to their dominance of the school. If Sharpay went, 'oh nice, our musical will be even better now with these two talented people', there's not much conflict to work off.

 

Most interesting from this: given that this movie is set in the protagonists' junior year (given that number 2 is the following summer and number three is subtitled 'senior year'), WHERE ARE ALL THE SENIORS IN THIS MOVIE? Why is there no fuss over graduating students? Why are there no older students in the musical? Why are there no older students in the basketball team? In number 3, there are younger students (a basketball player, 'Rocketman', and an aspiring musical theatre girl, 'Tiara Gold' - oof to both names) who aspire to take the place of Troy and Sharpay after the older guys graduate. Why are there no older students in this movie? It seems like the juniors run the place.

[JammerLea 2070]

Is this because sports scholarships are a viable way to get an affordable post secondary education? Do schools receive more money for championships? Is this just something played up in movies or are movies and tv not that far off from real life?

 

I'm still half asleep, so I won't say too much on the movie yet, but for this... I think it's that the US society is obsessed with sports. I'm not, but I know a lot of people who are, and it really IS that crazy and SOOO much money goes into it. If you've ever heard the phrase "the arts are the first to go", putting more money into sports is often painfully the reason for that. I'm not saying sports are bad. I was on a few teams here and there, and for kids I think they can be good extracurricular activities for students to learn and grow from. However, even at my tiny school I would see a "sports first" sort of attitude. We would have pep rallies before big games (just basketball and football), where we were pulled out of the classroom to sit in the gym to watch the team and cheerleaders try to get us pumped up for the game.

 

 

I cannot say that the enthusiasm the entire student body in HSM has for the championship game is legit, as in reality there are plenty of students who just do not give a shit (i.e. me), but the overall "this game is the most important thing ever" pushed by people who are so sports obsessed that they only put value in a student's sports ability (i.e. Troy's father, Chad), is kind of realistic. It's pretty magical that they come around in this movie.

 

 

Ahhh, I see Taylor Anne kinda beat me to this, but I'll still post mine, since I'm from a different part of the country. It's pretty much like this all over.

[taylor anne photo 11311]

Yeah, I mean I get their rationale, I just find it weird that the mission statement of the whole movie is "find that thing you love and pursue it with all your might" and the three characters who have already discovered that "thing" for themselves and are already living that message at the start of the movie are the three characters that are set up as the "bad" guys. So when Troy and Gabriela decide that music is their passion, are they going to be shitheads to everyone who doesn't share their passion?

I think it's more that that those are not the only things that T&G are passionate about and liking more than one thing just seems craaaaazy to literally everyone else. It's a shocking revelation that humans are multi-layered 3 dimensional beings! Troy is passionate about basketball and then discovers he also likes to sing but all of his basketball people are like woah does this mean you're not gonna be our star player anymore??? While Gabriella is crazy smart so Taylor (great name) thinks she'll stop studying as hard if she's busy with performing. But you don't just suddenly lose all those skills and brains just cause you just start singing like wtf people.

 

Also don't forget about Chad! He was a shithead too!

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

Also, I'm just gonna say now that I kind of wish Jammer had picked HSM2 as the MM this week. Same concept, WAY better movie.

 

Plus it would be an epic troll move to pick a sequel, thus making everyone feel like they have to watch the first one...

[taylor anne photo 11311]

Also, I'm just gonna say now that I kind of wish Jammer had picked HSM2 as the MM this week. Same concept, WAY better movie.

 

Plus it would be an epic troll move to pick a sequel, thus making everyone feel like they have to watch the first one...

Ugh no the second one was the worst! The literal only good thing to come out of that was this scene -

 

[JammerLea 2070]

Most interesting from this: given that this movie is set in the protagonists' junior year (given that number 2 is the following summer and number three is subtitled 'senior year'), WHERE ARE ALL THE SENIORS IN THIS MOVIE? Why is there no fuss over graduating students? Why are there no older students in the musical? Why are there no older students in the basketball team? In number 3, there are younger students (a basketball player, 'Rocketman', and an aspiring musical theatre girl, 'Tiara Gold' - oof to both names) who aspire to take the place of Troy and Sharpay after the older guys graduate. Why are there no older students in this movie? It seems like the juniors run the place.

Maybe their school system is worse than mine and the seniors were kept in a separate building.

 

 

This was my dumbass school system, all different buildings btw

Elementary school: Pre K ~ 4th grade

Middle school (North): 5th grade

Middle school (South): 6th ~ 7th grade

Junior High: 8th ~ 9th grade

High school: 10th ~ 12th

 

The junior high and high school were eventually joined by the building of a gym between them (ca. 1993), before that they had to walk to the middle school to use the gym.

 

[JammerLea 2070]

Also, I'm just gonna say now that I kind of wish Jammer had picked HSM2 as the MM this week. Same concept, WAY better movie.

 

Plus it would be an epic troll move to pick a sequel, thus making everyone feel like they have to watch the first one...

I have not seen either of the sequels, despite how much the cheesiness of the first one has grown on me.

[SaraK 1980]

I didn't get that it was immediately ignored. Zeke seemed to be the only one who was like "this is me and I don't care what you think" because they still spend the rest of the movie being shitheads to Troy and Gabriella. Martha doesn't get her moment to shine until the credits start to roll!

 

He wasn't part of the Status Quo song, but Troy seems to adapt very quickly to being known as the jock who sings. He briefly gets upset that people found out, and then just seems to constantly tell people that its not going to be a conflict. Aside of course from when he tells his friends what they want to hear so they'll leave him alone, but he doesn't seem like he's actually going to bail on the audition at all after that. He also seems very level-headed/earnest - when the other jock tells him about Zeke's baking, he seems really into it immediately. When Gabriella wants to audition and can't alone, he barely hesitates to help her out. He's super nice to Kelsi immediately after (re?)meeting her. His jock friends keep telling him he can't do both, and he basically just says sure I can.

 

Also - I quickly want to mention how much I hate the drama's teacher refusal to recognize any sport terms. She sees a basketball and calls it hockey. She refuses to use the word 'team'. Its not that hard to remember basic terms.

[Cakebug Tranch 6873]

Ugh no the second one was the worst! The literal only good thing to come out of that was this scene -

 

 

RESPECTFULLY disagree. The second one was the first time they'd put any money or effort into the franchise when they realised it was a hit. Much better numbers (although terrible denouement). Ridiculous, but way more fun than the other two.

 

TERRIBLE, mind you. Still TERRIBLE. But the one I enjoyed most of the three, easy.

 

Maybe their school system is worse than mine and the seniors were kept in a separate building.

 

But the seniors and the rest of the student body mingle freely in the third movie.

 

Unless it's a new school, and Troy etc's grade were the first class of freshmen when the school opened, and so they're the first graduating class. But that's not right because Coach says that West High have beaten them in the championship game every year for 4 years. UNLESS the reason they kept getting beat was that West High's seniors were crushing the freshman team at East High?

[taylor anne photo 11311]

RESPECTFULLY disagree. The second one was the first time they'd put any money or effort into the franchise when they realised it was a hit. Much better numbers (although terrible denouement). Ridiculous, but way more fun than the other two.

 

TERRIBLE, mind you. Still TERRIBLE. But the one I enjoyed most of the three, easy.

I think I always liked the 3rd one the best but I also hate this whole series a lot and that was the one that I joined my friends to see in theaters and tried to give it a chance so my cynicism was put at bay.

 

This still makes me hate musicals.