So it’s that time where we don’t just reflect on the fact that it’s near the end of the year but that it’s 2019 which means next year three whole digits on the calendar change and people reflect their best of decade lists, even though the decade technically ends after 11:59 pm Dec 31 2020 so....
Also this is my first long post on phone, it’s the only practical way I’m gonna have the time and energy to do this anymore. But some features are gonna be limited because Blogspot/Blogger is hot garbage (like this weird bug that, if you try to apply text edits or formatting it defaults to the freakin' title bar) so...so now the like three of you know....
I’m starting the “decade” by rolling it back to 2009 since that’s a pretty important year for both networks (if you check out NickAndMore on Twitter - which I hope you do - the Google search metrics suggest 2009-2011 was the peak for both networks). This was also a good three years before I actually started watching either network so this is going to entirely be second hand info, or shows I watched as reruns after-the-fact (with the exceptions of shows still premiering when I watched of course, , but even those episodes were different from the first seasons for a few technical and creative reasons). Speaking of which, a big technical reason was HD - 2009 was when both networks more or less totally switched to 1080p.
But 2009-2011 was a huge watershed period for both networks - but let’s talk about what shows had been running up to that point first.
Disney Channel and Nickelodeon shows were very different, true, but I think more similar than people might realize. Phil of the Future, That’s So Raven and Cory in the House, along with Drake and Josh and Amanda Show has already left being solidly on the Dubya era, as great as most those shows still are today. Hannah Montana, Suite Life on Deck, Wizards of Waverly Place, and iCarly were such long-runners they started well in the era prior to HD and the latter two would even extend beyond the era covered here, albeit just barely.
I don’t think it’s easy to overstate how immensely important these shows were to the networks or even tween pop culture in general at the time, and to their credit I think few people do. But it’s important to realize how these shows changed, and how the shows that came after differed (and how those shows were influenced by newer shows of this era) but how they’re still influential today, maybe even more so.
But the fact is, these shows were solidly in the tween demo, smack dab in middle school. In fact I don’t think Hannah Montana and SLoD made any effort to grow from there at all - but we’re jumping ahead a bit. I’m not saying a 7th grade tweener show can’t be great - I’m literally talking about some now - but they’re very hard to take seriously from a “this culturally matters” standpoint. They were culturally *relevant* but relevance is fleeting. To *matter* is to be enduring, and endearing.
And HM can’t help but come off as cynical towards its tweener demo. Very much after school special plotlines, very white bread lessons on schoolyard crushes that deep down the afflicted lovers know has the permanence of a gnat - I’m sorry but while I do find the show legitimately entertaining and even good, I can’t blame people for giving this show such a cynically harsh reputation as it has. Likewise JONAS which was more or less a single cam gender swap version but...again a little ahead of ourselves.
And SLoD was...well.... It’s early episodes carried over a charm that ZaC had, particularly Monster Mash(?) and International Date Line are ones that stick out. But in the final season they went all A.N.T.Farm and doubled down on tweener lowest common denominator humor.
WoWP and iCarly on the other hand grew with their audiences and screwed real street cred in the process. I’m not saying actual *teen* shows had it any easier getting “does this culturally matter” recognition, but these two shows made it seem like it. I mean, Emma Stone at the height of Emma Stone. Just showing up randomly more or less just to claim she’s on iCarly. And just to be clear this wasn’t a stunt *Emma Stone legit just wanted to be on iCarly.* And Shakira on WoWP, along with Jeff Garlin (including not just with Shakira but as it turns out actually as Shakira), Rob Reiner, I want to say Dwayne Johnson maybe? All of this from a show apparently on the bubble right after its first season and derided as just cashing in on Harry Potter mania.
Because both those shows bothered to grow, in more ways than one. They transitioned from mid tweener at best to late tweener/early high school and even into teens and saw major success and are fondly remembered to this day a decade later. And this would be hugely influential on shows just coming out this period and into the next, although I don’t know if you can really say which had influence over what.
But it was clear Disney Channel and Nickelodeon were gonna go upmarket and up-age.
For Disney Channel it was hedging bets to still have massive middle tweener appeal and split the difference with more overall family appeal too. Sonny With a Chance (the network’s first multi cam show to be shot and aired in HD from the first episode) was still very much a tweener show at heart and because of circumstance didn’t get an opportunity to grow. Shake it Up likewise - but it *did* have a Chance (that’s intentional capitalization because I’m calling back to Sonny...oh nevermind). Plus it’s very premise - not so much the song and dance but the two stars as friends, and the diverse, hip ensemble built around them even up to Caroline “wtf that’s actually her name/wtf she actually works for Trump now” Sunshine - has massive growth potential in terms of demo age. But also not without controversy - even from Demi Lovato who had just barely left the network at that point.
Good Luck Charlie would have no trouble avoiding that controversy, practically by design. An immensely charming and endearing show, it remains to this day one of my most favorite shows period, and even most important. Arguably more of a throwback to the family programs that defined ABC’s TGIF block and Wednesday night in the 90s, the show had solid writing to appeal to all ages and compared to practically all else was well-grounded almost to the point of, again, charm. GLC was a celebration of family and just being a normal teenage girl - a multi cam Lizzie McGuire almost a decade later, or an updated Disney Channel Clarissa Knows Best some two decades later. It was almost groundbreaking for how relatable it was - and while it doesn’t have the diversity sensibilities of today it still stands true (and while we do have similar shows with better representation we’re still lacking that age and maturity Bridgit Mendler brought to her role, exuding not only that relatability but that whole, I’m Really A Cool Girl vibe - but we’re jumping *way* ahead into the decade now with Sydney to the Max and a return to going “young-market”).
Nickelodeon, on the other hand, wasn’t going to waste time with super-broad appeal. They dominated in the two decades prior by being super focused towards boys - but moreover by appealing to their inflated sense of maturity - and at the start of the 2010s they were determined to repeat history with being the go-to network for older tween and teen girls with iCarly’s Dan Schneider showing the way.
Dan Schneider - for all his faults, and not the least of which the allegations against him, something that as my long time readers (all three of you) know I insist on making a big deal of - well, you have to say, he had an insanely uncanny knack of understanding cool at this time. I mean, he outright *mastered* it. iCarly was leading the way after all - but it paled in comparison to the distaff counterpart to his own Drake and Josh, Zoey 101. Now mostly remembered for controversies specific to Jamie Lynn Spears which today are painfully unfair and unwarranted, this was Nickelodeon’s perfect answer to Good Luck Charlie even before Good Luck Charlie. Removing the parents entirely, the show concentrated on “relatability through coolness.” Zoey was relatable because despite being forced to endure through such antics not so much zany as outright insane, and even being socially disadvantaged, Zoey managed to do so while being just so damn cool.
Schneider doubled down on this with his next show as Zoey 101 bowed out near the beginning of this era, with what could arguably be considered his crown jewel - a show with its title stylized as VicTORious. Practically a John Hughes flick perfectly updated for 2010 as a multi cam comedy on basic cable, the show utterly oozed cool. Tori Vega is probably one of the most relatable characters in the history of either network for the same reasons Zoey had been, but supercharged - the plots were zanier and sometimes the whole world was against her, and rarely did she ever totally win, but even drenched in rain, trapped in a parade float or dragged by dogs she and her diverse entourage of friends always came off as the coolest teens on the planet. Schneider just got it.
Not just Schneider, it turns out. True Jackson, VP (a show I just literally started watching) - the show that launched Keke Palmer’s career - also exuded and oozed cool effortlessly. Effectively a mini-me-ized version of the late 90s/early 2000s solidly adult sitcom Just Shoot Me (incidentally a fave of mine back in the day - man I’m old) but with a diverse cast of teens, it leveraged its actors and setting to make the world seem much, much cooler than it actually is.
And of course you can't forget about animation - although Phineas and Ferb (premiered back in 2007) and SpongeBob Squarepants (which dates back to the prior millennium) had dominated Disney Channel and Nickelodeon, respectively, as far as animation goes - something that P&F would continue to do so well beyond this era and SpongeBob...well, quite possibly forever, practically. That said I cannot underemphasize their impact on both networks or the wider pop culture - there's a reason why SpongeBob has lasted so long, with at least three theatrical movies and a freakin' musical. And Phineas and Ferb ended up being a big reason why I even ended up watching either network in the first place, so I owe it quite a hefty piece of personal nostalgia. We also can't forget Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender - arguably something that should've been more influential than it already had been. Unfortunately I ended up missing The Last Airbender boat - but don't worry, I'll have more things to say in the next era to be covered.
When examining the shows from Disney Channel and Nickelodeon from this era, there’s a lot to consider - especially since this is arguably the most influential era of either network’s entire histories, or at least in relevance to today’s live-action programming. Hannah Montana has raw popularity to be a cultural force, WoWP, SiU and GLC carried a lot of force deep into the decade and iCarly showed that these networks can be cool even to an older demo - much, much older in fact - and again we can't forget the raw popularity and brilliance of Phineas and Ferb and, yes, SpongeBob (and at least for cartoons P&F far away takes my vote for this era)...but if we’re determining the greatest of this era, and possibly the whole decade, I think it’s going to have to be VicTORious. Being a sort of middle child, and by the end of its run being seen as something of an already bygone era with some behind the scenes issues that have only now come to light, it wasn’t as influential as iCarly or the shows at the crosstown rival, but to this day it still feels the coolest, the freshest and even the most relatable. A very close second, and taking first for Disney Channel is Good Luck Charlie, but I can’t understate how huge almost any of these shows were back then - or even today.
Next time we’ll look at 2011-2014 and both networks’ extended foray into an expanded, older demographic (while still being tween-friendly, if not relapsing into focus) with A.N.T. Farm, JESSIE, Austin & Ally, Dog With a Blog, and Liv and Maddie on Disney Channel and, let's face it, the network's first real serious cartoon of the decade, Gravity Falls. And on Nickelodeon we'll be looking at the short-lived School of Rock, Sam & Cat...well, 2011-2014 ended up being a very rocky period for Nickelodeon for reasons arguably largely self-inflicted (if you're wondering why people had a problem with Cyma...). As well as their few standout huge successes, namely TMNT, Korra, Big Time Rush...umm, that's pretty much it. And we'll be looking at DisneyXD for the first time with Kickin' It, Pair of Kings and Lab Rats.
