I have “How Do You Talk to An Angel” stuck in my head, but only the chorus part because I don’t actually know the rest of the song. I’ve been singing it on loop in the bathroom and my living room and in that fake-husky 90’s indie-rock voice. This is a song I have always known and never remember hearing for the first time.
As a kid in the early 90’s, I heard this song literally everywhere: At the mall. At the grocery store with the good candy section. At the McDonald’s where I got my coveted Happy Meal but with the boy’s toy because I had a bowl cut UGH THANKS GENDER NORMS. But I didn’t realize until more recenlty that this song is actually from a TV Show called The Heights.
As some of you may know, I write a blog about TV shows. Thus, I decided to turn this earworm into something productive. If only so I could say, “Oh it’s okay that I almost got evicted from my apartment for singing four lines of a song incessantly for several days because I reviewed this episode of The Heights for The VSB.”
Watching The Heights made me hate “How Do You Talk to An Angel” with a fiery passion. I would like for the universe to return to me the seven minutes I wasted watching this junk. Yes, that’s right. The show was so boring that I only lasted seven minutes. Since I obviously cannot review the episode, I bring you instead: The Heights – An Autopsy.
In short, The Heights is a show about a band called “The Heights” that lives in a neighborhood called, you guessed it, “The Heights”. They’re twenty-somethings and they’re “eclectic.” It’s like The Breakfast Club grew up and started a band, but instead of finding commonalities in their disparate social circles, they all crowded around in a rehearsal space and whined about whether they should sing hair metal or folk music.
For this piece, I did a lot of heavy research: I read a wikipedia page and googled “‘How Do You Talk to An Angel’ + ‘Touched by an Angel'” [There appears to be no overlap between the two shows.] I also vaguely reflected upon an episode of something that I saw on VH1 roughly ten years ago that briefly talked about this song and how lead singer, Jamie Walters, went on to play an abusive boyfriend of Donna Martin (Tori Spelling) on 90210, which the show seemed to suggest killed his career. (Like apparently he got type cast as a deadbeat, which is kind of a bummer).
According to Wikipedia, The Heights was canceled one week after Whitney Houston’s iconic “I Will Always Love You” knocked “How Do You Talk To An Angel” out of the number one spot on Billboard’s Top 100. This leads me to believe that the only reason this show wasn’t cancelled after three episodes was that the song fooled America into thinking that we might actually want to watch The Heights.
So what actually happens in this 44 minute episode? This band of Gen-Xers is just “keeping it real” and living day-to-day in “The Heights,” while they try to figure out their band’s “sound.” No one likes the conventional “establishment” looking dude with the Jason Priestly haircut. But when some other dude in the band doesn’t show up to practice, they let him sit in. In the span of thirty seconds he elevates their sound, nay he IS their sound. And they decide that what they really need to be is neither a past-its-expiration-date hair metal group nor a neo-folk band, but rather a vanilla pop ensemble that produces this schmaltzy song.
-Why are there so many people playing guitars?
-Is this the same studio saxophonist who gave Rob Lowe his “musical talents” in St. Elmo’s Fire?
-Why are there so many people in this band?
-OMG THAT IS THE TEACHER WHO WAS FRIENDS WITH MR. TURNER ON BOY MEETS WORLD PLAYING THE BASS
-Why does it turn into a music video in the end? Am I to believe that this song is SO good that it immediately made them music video famous? Oh wait. That’s what actually happened in real life, isn’t it?
Oh hey, I found the VH1 video. #ThanksYouTube
Oh well, at least these guys had fun for a few weeks in 1992. Also, any LA people ever call the paramedics and have Jamie Walters show up? I’d LOVE to hear about that.
A few weeks ago, 
Riley and the front-desk guy (Evan) are still talking on the window seat bench as the sunrises. Riley freaks out and says that her parents “can never know.” And then front desk guy says, “You can never know.” And then Cory and Topanga pop up from behind one of the ski lodge couches. Wait what?? This is is so creepy and I’m totally freaked out on behalf of Riley. I’ve heard of helicopter parents but this is some next level shit.
They too have stayed up all night talking. (Probably more like covertly whispering as they eavesdropped on their kid and her new friend.) They said they wanted to “see what the big deal was.” So Riley asks them how it was. And Topanga basically says it was great and now she likes Cory more. And so Cory says to Riley, “What about you, Riley. Is it a big deal?”
Alas, the only answer lies in the notorious book, “The Official Guide of Who Belongs With Who,” which Cory of course remembers from 20 years earlier. He urges them not to play, but for once these virtuous children do not listen to him. Good. This is getting more interesting. Also, this is the “next generation” edition of this book, so it’s not even the same one that Cory knows.
Eric to chaperone because I’m pretty sure that’s the only person I’m actually remotely interested in watching. But I guess Maya also knows she cannot date Josh since he’s an adult and she’s a child, and thus she and Riley both want to date Lucas. Ugh I don’t know. I don’t remember having a friendship where my best girlfriend and I both fell in love with our best boyfriend because I’m pretty sure friendships with those kind of stakes don’t usually last to long. But whatever. We should all know by now that this show isn’t very realistic.
So we head over to the Anderson home to meet the kids. But one of the kids, Brad, is like 15 years old and I can’t understand for the life of me why he’s not babysitting his little sister. In the opening sequence, we established that this is the kind of movie in which older male children babysit their younger female siblings. So like does one have to be 18 to babysit a younger sibling? Cause I’m pretty sure a 15 year old can make sure that an 8 year old doesn’t burn down the house. If this is not the case, then I think we all need to have a serious discussion about The Babysitters-Club.
Now, there are some obvious problems with this script. The most glaring of which I find to be an extended exchange between the Anderson children, in which Brad tells Sara that Thor is a “total homo” and Sara repeatedly tries to make him “take-it back.” My first thought is of my friend’s fiancee, who as a closeted person in 1987 went alone to the movie theater to see Adventures in Babysitting. Obviously, he already had to go to see this movie on the DL since it isn’t the most “manly” movie to attend and I imagine it must have felt pretty shitty to see a light-comedy shit on your sexual orientation within the first ten minutes. Plus Anthony Rapp, from Rent, shows up a little later on in the film in a major supporting role as Brad’s friend Darryl. I felt like homophobic lines in the script must have been tough for him as well, and actually he commented on it in his Reddit AMA, which you can check out 
While on the expressway, they have a tire blowout. First of all, mad props to Chris for safely navigating a station wagon full of children to the side of the interstate without full tire traction. Secondly, she’s forgotten her wallet and they have no money to pay for a tow. They’re all creeped out when a tow truck driven by a man with a hook stops to pick them up. I mean I guess it IS a classic horror story trope, but like they’re really rude to this nice man who’s just trying to help them. Finally, Chris realizes she’s been an asshole. She apologizes and the man, John Pruitt, offers to tow them and by them a new tire. Everything’s good until John Pruitt gets a call on his CB radio. His lady’s been stepping out on him, her lover’s car is in front of their place, and he thinks that driving around with a bunch of random kids in his tow truck is the perfect time to seek his revenge.
John Pruitt runs into a house with a gun and starts firing shots. A man with his pants open falls backwards out of a window and onto the porch. I seriously don’t think this would pass standards for a kids movie in 2016.While John Pruitt, chases his wife’s lover out into the street, Chris et al get into the lover’s car–which by the way has been carjacked. But it’s like carjacked by THE nicest carjacker on the planet. They ask him to let them off at the next corner and he’s like not going to do it because it’s a bad neighborhood. He’s going to take them to the train station instead. And then Chris is all like “Do you promise me you won’t hurt these kids?” which is like something a little rude and insulting to some dude who just promised to take you somewhere safe and like even if he’s NOT going to do that, then why the heck are you challenging him while he literally holds your life in his hands??
Brenda, in another idiot move, took off her glasses at the train station and is now legally blind. She mistakes a rat for a kitten and probably needs to get some rabies shots as soon as he gets back to the suburbs.
Then they pass a frat party and Darryl runs away from the group to join the festivities, which by the sounds of it involve a bad Huey Lewis cover band doing a bad cover of Soul Survivors’s “Expressway to Your Heart.” Also, Sara has to pee. So Chris is all like yeah you can use the bathroom at the frat party. Uh, okay. I mean yikes. I’d hate to see that bathroom. (Also, at the party there is a whole subplot about how Chris has been mistaken for a Playboy centerfold because she looks exactly like Miss March and yadda yadda yadda that’s all I’ll say about that.)
Also, remember that guy from the very opening scene? Yeah well Chris spots his car at the fancy French restaurant where he was supposed to take her for dinner. He’s with some other girl. Chris and her charges tell him off. He’s such a scum bucket so this is really rewarding to watch. Oh yeah and in the meantime, they’ve managed to misplace Sara–who wandered away from the restaurant to look inside a toy store window and is now scaling the side of the building in order to avoid the chop shop guys. Oh yeah and that building just so happens to be where her parents are attending a party which is the entire reason they hired a babysitter in the first place.
First of all, let me preface this by saying that I just finished a 3 day work retreat, but like the kind of “retreat” where tons of people come in from out of town and you’re the one coordinating how everyone is getting from point A to point B and making sure the restaurant has gluten-free options and didn’t forget your reservation for fifteen in the private room. So yes, I’m probably a bit tired. But to be perfectly honest, I love doodling and I love complaining and those two factors really drew me to this diary for children. But hey, Lisa Frank is making a comeback so I feel like we don’t need to feel like only children can benefit from this really cool doodle book. Also, I love cats. That was also a selling point for me.
The movie starts off with a beauty pageant. Sarah Michelle Geller (Helen) is winning, but I think we’re supposed to think that she thinks it’s a bullshit contest. We cut to Freddie Prinze, Jr. (Ray), Jennifer Love Hewitt (Julie), and Ryan Philippe (Barry) sitting not with the crowd but rather alone in the balcony, seeming to imply both literally and figuratively that they are “above” this small town pageantry. (Oh yeah, VS Readers, this is a critical analysis kind of post.)
Anyway, Barry gets so drunk that he can’t drive his BMW home. But rather than just chilling in the back seat and letting his friend drive his sorry drunk ass home, he sticks his head out of the sun roof and drops an open bottle of alcohol all over Ray’s lap–causing him to careen into a pedestrian, who admittedly was crossing a dark road on a curve but still… So because they are selfish bastards who don’t seem to be concerned as to whether or not this dude has a family that may be worried about his disappearance, they decide to dump the body in the ocean.
They all vow never to speak of the incident again, but that doesn’t last very long because about a year later Julie gets a note: “I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER!” (For you close readers, you’ll recognize that as the title of this film.) So she starts rounding up the team. Unsurprisingly, they don’t speak to each other anymore and they’re all miserable. They immediately think it was Max, so Barry beats him up. This is obviously just a red herring and my money is one of the four-some betraying the others.
More shenanigans ensue. Someone cuts off Helen’s hair in the middle of the night. Someone puts Max’s dead body with crabs in Julie’s car. And Ray gets a threatening note. Barry is convinced that Ray is terrorizing them all. Crap, that was my guess. But it’s too early so it’s probably another red herring. But even though this person is clearly willing to murder them all, they still want to track him down and talk to him? So Helen rides in the 4th of July parade on the pageant float while Barry sits conspicuously at the front, scanning the crowd for any shady characters.
You know what guys, I think Ray is up to no good. I do NOT trust him. Omg wait. Now I’m not sure. Some dude just punched Ray in the face because he was chasing after Julie and like then he told her to run to his boat and she did but it’s so obviously A TRAP. Ugh, yep. She’s like definitely on the killer’s boat now. But luckily Ray helps her out because he is in fact, not the killer. It was all very harrowing and I would recount it but I feel like this is already way to long and I did scream at a level audible to my neighbors at multiple points in this movie. So basically, the bad guy’s arm gets caught in some kind of like rig on the boat. (I don’t know boat things so I can’t explain better…) and then he like gets strung upside down by the rig and then lands in the water, presumably drowning (again). Anyway, when the cops show up they can only retrieve his severed hand still holding the hook. The implication is that he’s hanging around still trying to kill them. This is confirmed by the last couple of minutes in the movie in which he stalks Julie at school and leaves a threatening note for her on the shower door, “I STILL KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER,” which is a movie I probably will not be watching.
This post is a little bittersweet for me. As you may know, I’ve already 
Kelly Kapowski (who did not participate in said rap) runs in looking for Johnny Dakota, who has just departed on a tour of the school with Class President/Editor of the School Newspaper, Jessie Spano. Kelly is wearing, I kid you not, an orange unitard with a floral jacket, popped collar. This is weird even for 1991. Anyway, Johnny Dakota is smitten with orange unitard clad Kelly and therefore decides that he should film his commercial at Bayside.
Everything is great until one day, Zack and Slater smell pot in the boys’ room. (Hmmmm how do you innocent Bayside students know what pot smells like.) Soon after Zack has identified the mystery smell, Slater spots the culprit lying on the floor near the sink. They decide they need to hide it because if Johnny Dakota sees it, then he won’t film at Bayside. Unfortunately, Johnny walks in while they’re holding the joint. But he believes that it isn’t theirs, flushes it down the toilet, and offers them parts in the commercial.
All of this anti-drug talk leads Zack and Slater to enact some vigilante justice on a random guy they saw leaving the bathroom around the time they found “the roach.” But there turns out to be no reason to worry because it’s JUST a cigarette. After this Zack and Slater kind of let the whole Starsky & Hutch thing go for a little while. They’re also distracted by a party that Johnny has invited all of them to–even Screech, who somehow throws his back out. Slater’s going to take him home because none of the girls at the party will talk to him, which is weird because Mario Lopez is easily the most charasamtic person on the planet. This is played for laughs, of course, but it mostly just removes any shred of plausibility this show actually had.
While all of her friends are loading Screech into the car, Kelly is left alone with Johnny, who starts smoking and offers to share with Kelly. She’s totally destroyed that her anti-drug teen idol hero is just another casual drug user. Zack comes back in just as the entire room of party guests laughs at Kelly for “just saying no.” This was always my worst fear as a child. The crowd-mocking drug pushers masquerading as friendly people at a social gathering. And while the kids at my high school were most certainly no strangers to heavily mocking others, this never actually happened to me.
The Very Special Blog 