This review contains spoilers, click expand to view.
A show like "The Wonder Years" always must walk the fine line between "nostalgic value" and "cheezy". The Second Season of the show walked that line perfectly. For the most part, so did Season Three...but (for perhaps the first time) a few clunkers thrown in.
For me, the highlights of this season included:
-Kevin (Fred Savage) meeting an "older woman" (played by Holly Sampson) during summer vacation.
-The episodes with math teacher Mr. Collins (Steven Gilborn).
-Kevin reluctantly taking chemistry lab partner Linda (Maia Brewton) to a school dance...and learning a big lesson in the process.
-Jack Arnold (Dan Laurie) giving his now-infamous "taxes" speech to Kevin.
-Karen Arnold (Olivia D'abo) graduating high school.
There are other funny/dramatic moments in this season too, but those were what really stood out to me.
The reason I give this season four stars instead of five, though, is because I think for the first time in show history they began running out of top-notch stories to tell. The writers were so good for this show that they could even take a stinker and polish it up a bit, but there were a number of episodes that lacked that "tightness" of earlier seasons. Two episodes--where Winnie Cooper (Danica McKellar) gets stage fright; and where Kevin joins a rock-and-roll band--were just very disappointing. There were also a handful that were truly great (most of the ones I listed above). Then some (like the treehouse, Grandpa's dog, the family car) were good but not great.
Overall, though, "The Wonder Years" remained a very funny, yet also very touching show all the way through this third season. The writers had to reach a little bit deeper into their baskets, producing a few "bruised apples", so to speak, but I still enjoyed watching the show. Nothing here that makes me want to turn away, that is for sure!… Expand
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