Skins (US)
MTV | MTV - Music Television | Release Date: January 17, 2011
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
57
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 17 Critic Reviews
Positive:
7
Mixed:
10
Negative:
0

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
People WeeklyTom GliattoJan 24, 2011
Season 1 Review: What keeps it from being exploitative--just--is the sense that these kids know such dangerous exhilaration won't, can't, lead to the happiness they're looking for. [31 Jan 2011, p.40]
75
San Francisco ChronicleDavid WiegandJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: While some plot elements and characters have been imported intact from the United Kingdom, the American show makes its own statement and will move away from its British roots in future episodes. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyDalton RossJan 14, 2011
Season 1 Review: While it may lack the charm (and perfect casting) of the British show, it's still worth a gander.
75
Chicago Sun-TimesPaige WiserJan 13, 2011
Season 1 Review: The episode feels contrived, as the characters are introduced and try too hard to prove their anarchic cool. The next three episodes, though, are surprisingly thoughtful and even a little punk poetic. Read full review
70
SalonMatt Zoller SeitzJan 18, 2011
Season 1 Review: Really, though, you don't have to know anything about the British Skins to get into the remake. Read full review
70
TimeJames PoniewozikJan 14, 2011
Season 1 Review: For all its cheekiness and raunch, Skins has more sweetness than snarky teen soaps like Gossip Girl. Read full review
67
Boston HeraldMark A. PerigardJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: Skins feels raw and gritty. The characters' pain is often palpable. Only the show's target audience will know how true its portrayal of adolescence is, but it should make many parents pay closer attention to what's going on in their teenagers' lives. Read full review
50
SlateTroy PattersonJan 25, 2011
Season 1 Review: The show--a sporadically excellent adaption of a British teen drama--is superlative teensploitation, enabling youth to rejoice in the fantasy of their corruption, among other things. Read full review
50
Slant MagazinePaul SchrodtJan 18, 2011
Season 1 Review: Skins is, alas, many types of teen drama to many types of teens--a raunchy good time and an Afterschool Special on The Way Youth Live Now rolled into one. It's a viewing experience akin to going to a coke party only to be given a lecture. Where's the fun in that? Read full review
50
NewsdayVerne GayJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: Skins is a bit clunky and even dated at times. Nor does it feel all that grounded in the real world, where it badly wants to be. Read full review
50
Philadelphia Daily NewsEllen GrayJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: Plopped down in Baltimore, the loose-living adolescents in MTV's seemingly line-for-line version don't actually feel American, no matter what their accents are, and the plots that always struck me as more teen movie than teen reality seem no more realistic than, say, "Gossip Girl." Read full review
50
San Jose Mercury News/Contra Costa TimesChuck BarneyJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: What's more bothersome about Skins from a critical standpoint is the thin plotting, the aimless narrative, and the generally flat and artificial feel of the production. Read full review
50
VarietyBrian LowryJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: Assembled through an open call, the cast (many of whom are 17 or 18) is extraordinarily natural. Where Elsley stumbles--especially in the opener--is the exaggerated dialogue, often more borscht-belt comedian than actual kid. Read full review
50
New York PostLinda StasiJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: The scripts are nearly line-for-line copies of the Brit version. But the scenes are over the top, the kids are too good-looking and seem to have spent too much time at acting camp. Read full review
40
HitfixAlan SepinwallJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: Surely, there are talented American writers not long out of their teens who could have helped craft a new group of characters and stories that reflected their own experiences - and with enough sex and drugs and mayhem to please MTV's need for extra attention. Read full review
40
TV Guide MagazineMatt RoushJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: What in the original incarnation was shockingly cheeky, in its graphic and profane depiction of teens indulging in sex-and-drug debauchery, has been neutered and tamed in a remake that is unconvincing, amateurishly produced and very poorly acted. Read full review
40
Washington PostHank StueverJan 17, 2011
Season 1 Review: Skins is so determined to relate to hardened kids--without sermon, theme or context--that it accidentally discovers a new frontier in phoniness and filth. Even if I could warp time and watch it as my teenaged self, I'm pretty sure I would have been bored by it back then, too--even with all the sex. Read full review
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