Guest-Starring Milla Jovovich

My favorite TV series of all time finally came out on DVD yesterday and you know I had it pre-ordered on Amazon for 30% off. I was a little worried that it might not be as good as I remembered, which is the case sometimes when revisiting childhood. Not so with Parker Lewis. It's aged just as well as Ferris Bueller's Day Off, which it openly references and then improves on through "a surreal, living-cartoon-like quality and clever camera angles and filming techniques" (from Wikipedia). If you read my Benjamin Button review, you know those two elements are my top two favorites on film. Parker Lewis isn't just a rip-off of Ferris Bueller though, and while he goes on to become the most popular guy in school, in the first three episodes Park just seems to be popular with the school principal. That may still sound like a rip-off, but what I mean to say is that you don't see other students going ga-ga over him from the beginning like they do with Ferris. Watching the pilot episode by itself, you just might confuse Lewis with every other teen rebel who has stereotypical accomplices as his "best buds."

There are more obvious differences between Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Parker Lewis Can't Lose. In terms of setting, there's a big difference between the Midwest's real-life Chicago and Southern California's fictional Santo Domingo (with California's car culture, it's kinda backwards that Bueller has the car and Lewis is always on foot). In terms of theme, Bueller plays on generational conflict while Lewis works through it and even collaborates with his authority figures (difference between Gen X and Y?). In terms of character, the antagonistic sister goes from being older to younger, the principal changes from male to female, and the buds go from Bueller's reluctant best friend who secretly likes his girlfriend (a love triangle) to Lewis' Luke Perry/Corey Haim/Corey Feldman mash-up of a best friend and a devoted nerdy freshman who secretly likes his sister (future brother-in-law?). This last tidbit brings up a good point - Parker Lewis is all about the future whereas Ferris Bueller is so in the present. In terms of plot, most episodes revolve around Park trying to help classmates with college plans (Episode 2) and "careers" (Episodes 3-5, 8, 12-15, 24).

Before wrapping this up, I better return to the title of the post and my actual review of the pilot episode. Some of you may remember Milla Jovovich as the 15 year old bad girl with nude scenes in Return to the Blue Lagoon (replacing Brooke Shields as the series' lead). Others may only recognize her as the badder grrrl from the Resident Evil series. To me, she will always be the knocked up girlfriend from one of my favorite movies of all time, Kuffs, and "genetic perfection" in The Fifth Element. Until this week, I had no recollection of her guest-starring on Parker Lewis Can't Lose (Season 1, Pilot Episode,1990) or Married With Children before that (Season 4, Episode 6, 1989). She plays the object of affection in a twist on the classic Cyrano de Bergerac plot in that she chooses neither Parker Lewis nor Mikey Randall by the end of this (her only) episode. Lewis tries to help Randall woo her with a hidden earpiece the likes of which only NASA has. This brings back to mind the comparison above because what Ferris Bueller does with answering machines and doorbells, Parker Lewis improves on using security camera footage and audio/video splicing. If you watch this series for no other reason, watch it for the these fantasy twists on pop culture references (like Jerry Steiner pulling anything out of his trenchcoat à la Mary Poppins, but explaining that it's held in place using Velcro).