We already rounded up some of the best club scenes in feature films, and now we switch our focus onto television’s dodgier history of depicting club and rave culture. In television more so than film, raves and nightclubs are almost without exception the default settings for “a very special episode…” where didacticism about drug abuse trumps any notion that the creators understand the culture they’re dramatizing.
From sitcoms to hourlong dramas, the nightclub or rave has been used in American TV as an unsafe space where teens and children are victimized by drugs, alcohol and sexual predators. This has been going on for decades. Dancing is always coupled with drugging, and anytime someone takes drugs, there are dire consequences. It’ska all very condescending to the viewer.
Here are a the rules that TV writers use when constructing a lame club scene:
TV rave rule #1: we always see it through the eyes of a newbie.
TV rave rule #2: someone almost always overdoses or is drugged.
TV rave rule #3: everyone learns an important lesson about how dance culture can kill you.
So, be sure to tell your parents you’re staying at a friend’s house tonight, and double check you got the instructions for the map point. These are some of the best (and by “best”, we mostly mean worst) TV club scenes floating around YouTube.
Beverly Hills 90210 [@ 11:18]
“I definitely don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.”
“I don’t think we’re in LA anymore.”
“We’re definitely not in Beverly Hills.”
This episode of the 90s teen soap is a legitimate classic. In order to get access to the party, one must present an egg to a liquor store clerk and give him the special code, “I’m here to exchange an egg.”
Degrassi: The Next Generation
TV rave rule #4: Don’t step on the power strip by the DJ booth. If you do, say “sorey” like a good Canadian on this interminable teen soap that famously gave the world Drizzy.
Breaking Bad
In many ways, Breaking Bad was one long (albeit dramatic/nerve wracking as fuck) PSA. Jesse Pinkman’s quaint suburban home completes its transformation into New Mexico’s scariest trap house for white meth heads. This is easily the most depressing party on the list.
CSI: Miami
“What are you doing?”
“Dancing.”
“With your tongue? Total lesbo.”
The CSI series dabbles in a very slick, superficial, and ultimately phoney version of reality, and the Miami spinoff seems to have a model party or trendy nightclub as the backdrop of a crime in almost every one of its formulaic hours of procedural. How this show and its offshoots have been on so long and who watches this garbage both remain a mystery to this day.
True Blood [watch clip here]
Fangtasia is a vampire club/bar in smalltown Louisiana popular with vampires and fangbangers (non-vampires who like to fuck vampires). Bonus points for the feckless piano house cover/remix of “Don’t Fear the Reaper”.
Dawson’s Creek
In an episode entitled “Great Xpectations”, the high school gang celebrates Andie getting into Harvard by going to a rave that has a bouncy castle. TV rave rule #5: if your first time eating pills, do not go nuts on the bouncy castle.
Spaced
Simon Pegg gets it. This is one of the funniest takes on a dance party, where we’re laughing at the party fools but also laughing with them. Long live the chillout room.
Nathan Barley
The English get it right again and make us (somehow) miss MySpace culture. Nathan Barley is a loveable cunt who’s a dilettante of digital culture. His Trash Bat brand is, as he tells the club crowd during a performance, “the 9/11 of the Mind.” Peace and fucking.
Smallville
Leave it to Superman to hang out in a generic Manhattan-esque megaclub with absolutely no fucking vibe. Fun fact: Lex Luthor drinks apple martinis.
Boy Meets World
Enterprising young scamps Eric and Cory decide to host a “rave” (term used incredibly loosely) at Chubbie’s, their favorite hang, but later have to combine it with their parents’ anniversary celebration due to a scheduling snafu. As required by sitcom law, hilarity ensues.
Gossip Girl
Wealthy forehead magnate and high schooler Chuck Bass owns fictional Manhattan club Victrola. You know, one of those themey burlesque clubs popularized in the last decade and that has prop Victrolas dotted around the club as part of its design. If there is a hell, this is it.
The Ropes
One of Netflix’s early original series, The Ropes actually makes an effort to depict aspects of nightclub culture in a somewhat realistic and arguably interesting way. EP Vin Diesel used to be a bouncer himself at New York’s Tunnel in its heyday, so one has to imagine that some of this is inspired by real bouncer shenanigans.
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Honorable Mentions: This douchebag from Million Dollar Listing, the She She club on The Simpsons, most episodes of Sex & the City and Castle.