Jim on Film: Disney Thermometer
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Jim on Film: Disney Thermometer
by Jim Miles

In what had to be one of the lowest of lows, Disney-owned ABC once aired a show—one I can honestly say I never, ever watched—called Are You Hot. I may not have my own sleazy reality show, but now, as a self-proclaimed Mickeyologist (that’s supposed to be a play on the term meteorologist), I get to decide what in Disney is Hot or Not.

The Lizzie McGuire Movie
(c) Disney

85 degrees
That’s So Raven—Even Stevens, Lizzie McGuire, Phil of the Future, and a number of the other Disney Channel original series are entertaining and safe romps for children. It’s fun to watch them because, in some ways, the talented teens who star in these shows are the Mousketeers of today. They are very talented kids whose careers have been nurtured by Disney, and just as in the days of Annette and Bobby, I’m sure they are being provided a safe place to play and develop as performers. For me, part of the appeal on the occasion that I watch one of these shows is that it is fun to watch kids succeed, and for them to have the opportunity to do so in a safe environment is exciting.

Like the other Disney Channel shows, That’s So Raven features a talented cast of youngsters and tells stories about life in high school and dealing with best friends and relationships. What sets it apart, however, is that That’s So Raven often feels ready for network television. Its teen focus, of course, would prohibit it nowadays from being able to air in network prime time, but it is a show that typically provides a solid thirty minutes of laughs, something none of the handful of network sitcoms I’ve seen lately have been able to do regularly.

The premise concerns the life of Raven Baxter, an average teen girl with average teen problems who also happens to be gifted with random visions into the future. The visions can be what will happen or what could happen, and the plots often focus on Raven’s attempts to alter that future, which, of course, usually leads to the future she hoped to avoid.

Much of the appeal of the show has to go to the immensely talented cast. Raven, formerly Raven Simone, has grown up from being the cute and precocious Cosby kid into a beautiful and talented young woman. She plays Raven Baxter as a funny girl who knows she’s funny. The rest of the cast is equally talented. Kyle Massey plays her conniving little brother who, unlike siblings on Lizzie McGuire and Phil of the Future, is pleasant rather than malicious. Equally adept at comedy are her best pals Eddie, played by Orlando Brown, and Chelsea, played by Anneliese van der Pol, who always manage to get caught up in Raven’s schemes. Raven’s loving and fun dad is Rondell Sheridan, and her mom is T’Keyah Crystal Keymáh.

One of the key strong points of the series is the often hilarious scripts which can take on Laverne and Shirley proportions, resulting in many great physical comic feats worthy of Laverne and Shirley or Lucy and Ethel. In one episode, Eddie buys an expensive ring for his girlfriend, which Raven and Chelsea accidentally lose in the school store’s soft serve ice cream machine. Raven and Chelsea go in after it, and break the machine, sending the three friends scrambling to do something with the quarts of ice cream pouring out. In another episode, Raven and Chelsea need to get word to Eddie while he’s taking a test. They climb the side of the school building on a window washing machine. It goes haywire, leaving the two girls to try to send Eddie the message as they swing back and forth past the window, right behind the teacher’s back.

The show also utilizes the kids’ talents in disguises. When Raven’s little brother Corey finds himself having to impress a group of skateboarder friends by doing a dangerous stunt, Raven disguises herself as a tough skateboarder chick to save the day (which results in her performing the dangerous stunt herself). In another episode, when a boy band promises that they’ll do whatever they can do to help Raven and then ditches her, she, Chelsea, and Eddie disguise themselves as the Boys in Motion and put on a concert with a lot of smoke machines.