Deadly Class

Deadly Class takes a beloved genre and offers a new take. With touches of humor, layered characters and creativity to spare, this is a series that resonates.

There’s certainly a spark from time to time. But for now, Deadly Class is failing to live up to its potential. It’s messy and hollow.

Deadly Class doesn't make much sustained sense, either as practical reality or pointed satire. (It is, in any case, no way to run a school.) But it has rude energy (and many bad words) and a certain conviction, and possibly what seem like bugs in its system will prove to be features instead; the creators do not seem unaware of internal inconsistencies in their creation. And many viewers won’t see a problem.

The pilot, which also introduces the animated flashback sequences that represent easily the series' best element, presents enough potential plot avenues and appropriately satirized '80s targets to offer hope that Deadly Class would turn out to be more than a bloody high-school goof with the profundity of a freshman's depressive diary scribblings. It mostly does not, though I wholly expect that to be more than enough for some viewers.

It’s a frustrating run of intoxicating highs and off-putting lows, at least in the early going. ... As it stands, uncertainly, at the starting gate, it’s poised somewhere between pass and fail.