This top-rated CW show brought to everyone’s favorite, Netflix, is the perfect show to spend your quarantine binge-watching. With an impressive 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, All American certainly hooked teenagers everywhere. Loosely inspired by the true story of Spencer Paysinger and the struggles he faced in the midst of his football career and early life, this show touches on the class divide between two Los Angeles suburbs and the racial inequalities that come with it. In addition, the classic high school and relationship drama will keep you clicking the “Next Episode” button until two in the morning (Abby watched both seasons in 4 days over spring break). 

The show follows 17 year-old football star, Spencer James (Daniel Ezra), as he navigates the wealthy Beverly High School while living in his poorer hometown of Crenshaw. Coach Billy Baker (Taye Diggs) recruits Spencer to play football at Beverly, leading Spencer to leave his hometown school and join a new team with a radically different culture. In the first episode, we meet some of those who soon became our favorite characters, both from Crenshaw and Beverly. Spencer has a solid support system back in Crenshaw between his best friend, Coop (Bre-z), mother Grace (Karimah Westbrook), and little brother Dillon (Jalyn Hall). Slightly culture-shocked on his first day at Beverly, Spencer is quickly introduced to some key characters. Although he immediately connects with Olivia (Samantha Logan) and Leila (Greta Onieogou), his first impressions of Jordan (Michael Evans Behling) and Asher (Cody Christian) aren’t as positive. Even though Jordan and Asher are painted out to be antagonists through the first few episodes, Spencer soon warms up to them, as do the viewers. The show does not hesitate to load on the drama in these character’s lives, keeping you hooked to the screen for hours on end.

Though we greatly enjoyed the show, there are a few major flaws. First would be the close similarity to other popular teen shows, like “Friday Night Lights.” Similar to the conflict between “The Office” and “Parks and Recreation,” it’s likely that whichever you see first will prevent you from being able to watch the other. The second issue on our list revolves around Coop (let us explain). Her struggle to stay out of messy situations often resulted in what we refer to as Coop’s “sad face.” Rather than solving issues, she seems to resort to expressing her emotions with said “sad face”, which we can only describe as an unmoving pout. She compounds her issues by further screwing the situation up. Next up, is our problem with the fact that every girl immediately likes Spencer upon his coming to Beverly. While he does have a good personality, his looks are not exactly tasteful compared to the other candidates, which left us confused about how he got so many girls. Our final criticism would be the show’s overall unrealistic portrayal of football. We felt unqualified to make an accurate evaluation, so we recruited Abby’s 14-year-old brother, Adam, to analyze the football scenes. His point, and a fair one in our opinion, is that Daniel Ezra’s lack of prior football experience as a British actor consequently made the show’s football plays “slow and sloppy.” Trying to sell him as an All-American player “isn’t realistic or believable if you know anything about football,” Adam said. But don’t get us wrong, even with these few issues, we still loved the show.

Now onto our favorite parts… We’ve already touched on the first one, but the show’s inclusion of societal issues added another dimension to the plot that really made the show captivating. From scenes revolving around race, socioeconomic status, police brutality, gang violence and more, the show definitely hit many relevant issues in our nation. On top of this, the show’s constant plot twists and drama made us want to keep watching. Another one of our favorite parts was the amazing soundtrack which had the perfect mix of artists and songs. And lastly, the cast was a huge factor in bringing the show to its full potential. Even with some lesser-known actors, we were really impressed with the level of acting in the show and each actor seemed to fit their role perfectly. Despite Spencer being the main focus of the show, each character’s individual plotline is followed, showing us that facing adversity is a difficulty for everyone. While not obvious at first, it became clear that even the wealthy Beverly students faced struggles of their own. In addition to the actors’ well-done performances, they were definitely not too hard on the eyes. An overall attractive cast made watching the show even more enjoyable, so even if the plot doesn’t interest you, there is still something for you in All American— which leads us to our final segment: 

Our totally biased (possibly based on looks) ranking of the characters! We hope you enjoy it. *Spoilers coming – don’t read the rest if you haven’t watched yet!*

1. Jordan Baker: No explanation needed

2. Darnell Hayes: We know why Cory James chose to spend 8 years with this son instead of Spencer
3. Asher Adams: At a whopping 5’8” thankfully he has other qualities to make up for the unrealistic nature of his successful football career

4. Chris Last-Name-We-Don’t-Know: He makes you smile every time he comes on-screen
5. Billy Baker: The way the sun hits his bald scalp really gets to us 

6. JJ Parker: The only reasoning for his low rating is his blinding hair color
7. Spencer James: A + personality but let’s be honest the only person he beats out here is ol’ Uncle Flip

8. Flip Williams: Please refer back to the Jordan Baker explanation

Our Rating: 5/5