High School Musical: The Musical: The Series kicks off season three with a tone shift that’s reminiscent of old Disney Channel movies but without the heart that makes them so great.
The season follows Gina (Sofia Wylie), Ricky (Joshua Bassett), E.J. (Matt Cornett), Ashlyn (Julia Lester), Carlos (Frankie Rodriguez), and Kourtney (Dara Reneé) as they embark on a summer trip to Camp Shallow Lake. Obviously, the show is missing a lot of characters that were staples in the previous seasons which leaves an unfamiliarity to the show.
Season one is almost unrecognizable, due to the complete shift in couples and main characters. This obviously is because of the actors conflicting schedules but it feels like they’re missing the heart of the show.
Sofia Wylie and Joshua Bassett do an incredible job portraying their new characters. I say new because Gina gets a well-deserved character arc that launches her as the main lead in the show and Ricky experiences a shift due to the writers not being completely sure what to do with his character.
The rest of the cast feels a bit uncoordinated and that’s because the characters they usually interact with are no longer with them. Now, we have to see how Ashlyn, Gina, and Kourtney get along, which I will admit was teased in season two, as well as, E.J., Ricky, and Carlos.
As we see Ricky decide to go to Camp after finding out about Lily’s betrayal, we also get a loose tie on Nini’s storyline by sending her off to California. I will admit, the part that disappointed me the most is that we will not be seeing Miss Jenn and Mr. Mazzara have their moment after finally getting together last season.
We do get a snippet of the cast singing old High School Musical songs with E.J., Gina, Ashlyn, Kourtney, and Carlos singing “What time is it?” as they drive towards Camp. The strangest part was probably Ricky’s song as he drives himself towards the Camp. The song felt more like a music video than a part of the show.
After making a meta-reference to Disney+, Corbin Bleu (playing himself) helicopters off after declaring the summer musical as Frozen. This leaves the summer team struggling to find direction after expecting Bleu to be the one that takes charge. E.J. gets assigned the responsibility and promises Gina no one will get in the way of their perfect summer, and low and behold Ricky makes his belated entrance to announce that he will be joining Camp as well.
Let’s see what episode two has to bring to the table.
Muska Olumi is a columnist for the Boardwalk Times
