I don't think it means what you think it means

[author_by_night]

So I went on a bit of a John Hughes kick, probably because of Community. One of the movies I decided to watch was Sixteen Candles. I knew in the BSC books, Mary-Anne loved it.

Holy cow, that is not a movie a sheltered twelve year old should know. There's implications of date rape, alcohol, teen car sex... Richard Spier would never have let his

Comments

[darth_firefly]

I'd like to point out the missing shout-out in that no-one ever mentioned The Brady Bunch. All those divorced and remarried couples and their kids and no one mentions it once from what I recall.

Apparently they had The Parent Trap for that. How is that Dawn's favorite movie anyway? You'd think it be The Goonies or something similar.

Then again, none of the baby-sitters have a chance of attaining Goonie status. With the possible exception of Abby, if she stopped drinking the kool-aide.

I've not seen Sixteen Candles - but I think AMM got drunk one night and switched Stacey and Mary Anne's favorite movies.

[thtsgoodsquishy]

I'm in the process of copying my snarks elsewhere and literally just did #36; The Brady Bunch gets mentioned in that because Jackie wants to make a volcano for his science project, just like the Bradys did.

I'll give you that it should have been mentioned, like, every book past #6. Thomas-Brewers? Barrett-DeWitts? Come on.

[nellswell]

Stacey might have watched a re-run in the hospital in Stacey's Emergency -- but I might just be making that up, too. I can't think of any other mentions. Which, yeah... how many years did that air faithfully on TBS?

[author_by_night]

For me, it's more that every other character has seen the show. I actually of love the idea of one character being a retro person and liking old stuff, and my friends and I have a few shows or artists we watch/listen to even though they were around long before any of us were born. But it's not like we all love Bob Dylan or all love Leave it to Beaver.

[kakeochi_umai]

This. I loved taping and listening to my parents' old records when I was in middle school, and now have a lot of that music in my iTunes (in fact, this has just reminded me that I need to grab the tracklists of some compilations before I move out in a couple of months), but the point that I think a lot of us are making is that that's not what every kid an any given town listens to. Ann just slapped her interests onto the characters rather than researching what kids were really into at the time she wrote the books, and that smacks of lazy writing to me.

[cassandraclue]

In a way I don't mind it so much, because it helps the earlier books seem less dated. Like, at the end of the series they started making references to Hanson and grunge and stuff, and while I like that because it was my era, it seems more strange now in a way than Wizard of OZ seemingly being the number one movie in Stoneybrook.

[katdvsgf]

I could see Mary-Anne having caught the movie on TV where its been cleaned up a bit. I know my brother and I both watched it a lot when we were 12-16. It does seem like an odd one for Mary-Anne though.

[fairest1]

*nod* Like how it was only when I bought the DVD as an adult that I realized I had only been familiar with the television edit of Ghostbusters.

[glitterberrys]

My guess has always been that AMM just never saw the movie, had a vague idea of what it was about and thought it sounded Mary Anne-ish.

[efface]

Describing Leicester Lodge as looking like the hotel in The Shining. Dawn saw The Shining? And did AMM really believe that ANY of her readers would understand that reference? I'd be horrified if my little children saw that movie.

[author_by_night]

I actually read another book series - "Making Friends" or something like that - where the characters were the same age, and two of them were huge Stephen King fans and mentioned loving The Shining. It might be that people assume since Stephen King writes some fantasy, The Shining is fantasy (and it might be, although AFAIK it's more supernatural horror), they'd be appropriate for teenagers. Many people do still think anything with fantasy or sci fi elements is for kids or at least young teens. I don't know if I buy my own weak explanation though, because SK has never been marketed towards kids, and you don't hear of first graders who hated reading until Stephen King.

[thtsgoodsquishy]

I'm pretty sure Stacey reads a Stephen King book while at Camp Mohawk in SS#2. I suppose that's AMM's way of showing how sophisticated she is. Truthfully? I was about that age when I started reading King, yet (even at the time, I thought this) it wasn't age-appropriate. I'm thinking specifically of It, as I think that was my first King, and...no. I would not want my kid reading that.

[bonclyde149150]

I checked my SS#2 and Stacey does read a Stephen King book at camp but she doesn't tell what the title is.