I fully enjoyed this show though it has massive issues.
Mackenzie Granger (Rachel Griffiths) is spending her first solo summer in charge of Camp Little Otter as she and her husband divorced. Steve (Jonathan LaPaglia) left Mack to live with a Russian waxer, Ekaterina.
Naturally, there are other characters: Buzz (Charles Grounds), Mack and Steve's typical horny teenage son; Kip (Thom Green), the reluctant and intelligent camper, forced to come by his father; Marina (Lily Sullivan) who is trying to better her image but keeps making bad choices; Grace (Charlotte Nicdao), usually kind and sweet, but feels the enormous pressure from her fathers; Sarah (Dena Kaplan), who is also trying to better her image and get her dreams back on track; Robbie (Tim Pocock) who thinks he has his future all figured out; Cole (Nikolai Nikolaeff), Mack's go to handy man who roams around the world for a living; and Roger (Rodger Corser) who owns the rival, high tech camp and is a rival with Cole for Mack's affection, though he gets further than Cole probably ever will. There are also the other parents: Todd (Adam Garcia, from Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen), Raffi (Chris Kirby)-Grace's dads and Shelia (Genevieve Hegney) who has more kids than she can count. The other parents are horribly underused, but the show boosts a huge cast.
The pilot is especially messy as the characters' pasts are poorly explained and they don't mesh together that well. Fortunately, the second episode which includes splitting the camp in two for a capture the flag game, the show somewhat finds its footing, mainly with the introduction of Chloe (Natasha Bassett), who finds out Kip's secret (he has leukemia) by researching his drugs found in Mack's medicine cabinet and blackmailing him into going out with her. Chloe is a nut, obsessed with death and the fact that Kip nearly died, but she does really like him; however, Kip is secretly in love with Marina who continues making her bad choices by sleeping with Greg (Jordan Rodrigues). Greg steals Kip's love poem and turns that into a song for Marina and then fails to use a condom when having sex with Marina, what a keeper. Kip also has his bad moment, by breaking up with Chloe on a boat and then saying he was sorry and giving her flowers which naturally, makes her think they are back together but they aren't so he receives a smack as a reward. In the end, Chloe is okay with Kip and Marina dating and even calls the position of godmother, though it is doubtful (though never mentioned) that Kip can have children considering he went through two dangerous rounds of chemotherapy.
The show has other characters including Sarah who was a former swimmer but got into some legal trouble by smoking pot. But she is offered a second chance and after talking with the writer whom she admires, Miguel Santos (Juan Pablo Di Pace), she goes back to swimming and peeing in a cup twice a week, but she also cheats on Robbie and has an affair with Miguel. Robbie does not take the news well and treats her horribly after the break-up. It takes him having a threesome and consuming some odd mushrooms to mostly forgive her, though who knows what the future holds for them as Robbie decides to defer law school so he can see the world.
Cole and Roger, surprisingly, team up as Roger is opening a new camp from scratch in Alaska. Mack eventually accepts the news, though by this time, she decided to pick Cole. Her heart quietly breaks as she hugs him good-bye, but that is probably for the best as Cole is twenty-eight and has yet to settle down.
Buzz has his own issues with getting into a nasty fight with the Ridgefield kids as they are cruel to Grace. He also nearly gets together with Zoe (Carmel Rose) who has big mommy issues but in the final episode, Grace admits that she likes him and he just stands there speechless. Buzz is delighted, though he ultimately fails to achieve his summer goal of losing his virginity.
Marina overcomes a pregnancy scare only to find out that her mother is in jail (for carrying drugs for another one of her loser boyfriends) and she must live with her cruel, strict aunt in Canada. Aunt Jeannette is not nice but after slapping Marina, Mack insists to Kip that she handle the situation. So it looks like Marina will be living with the Grangers which should be interesting. I was baffled at why Kip and his father didn't offer to take her in considering they are dating and everything.
The final episode also consists of the camp Olympics between the two camps. Sarah beats the mean rival, Kelsey and even Buzz manages to beat his enemy, though Roger helps out with that win and even Grace pulls a Black Widow and wins the hot dog eating contest. Chloe loses at ping pong to a much younger kid. Still, happy endings, probably a little too happy are had by all.
The problems with the show are numerous with the most obvious and odd one being that basically everyone in this cast is Australian and the show is filmed in Australia but it is supposed to be Michigan. That is just super odd, but the accents are mostly realistic so props for that. Some of the characters are poorly developed, especially Grace who is usually so nice and sweet but turns nasty when her dads decide to get married; she is absolutely vicious. Marina slowly learns to not make bad decisions, though it might be too little too late. Robbie is also under developed though they try and go into his past by introducing his mother who has a pretty bad gambling addiction. You know why he wants to be so grounded by deciding to give all that up is seemingly out of character for him. Even the villains are rather one dimensional. Fortunately, the acting, especially from Green and Grounds is good. They should have a bright future ahead of them if they pick better projects.
Yes, this show was nothing more than a guilty pleasure for me, but it contained genuinely funny moments and if it is cancelled, I will miss it. Grade: B
Side Notes:
-Rachel Griffiths looks younger now than she did in her amazing Oscar-nominated turn in Hilary and Jackie (1998). I don't know how that is possible.
-I also like how a major TV show finally has a character that battled cancer, something most shows would never have.
-I do wonder if Mack knows how much booze the counselors drink and if she does, why does she let them get away with it.
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