1) Miles Hollingsworth (Last week: #1)
He only appeared briefly in If You Could Only See, but his emotional reaction toward Maya’s “nosiness” ensured his position at the top of the power rankings. In 1402 he seemed to have given up, and now he’s just being stubborn toward any possible help since he views doing anything to change the dynamic with is father as futile.
2) Zoë Rivas (—)
The effect of Zoë’s sexual assault doesn’t linger, it’s a gigantic cloud that Zoë’s riding on and now consuming others with. The amount of actual power Zoë wields on this show is absolutely INSANE. If you’ve been paying attention since Zoë took over the cheerleading squad, those girls (excluding Jack and Frankie) have been blindly following her around like lost puppies, hanging onto her every word. These are young, impressionable girls whose “leader” is leading them down a very dangerous path. Degrassi Nudes is a ticking time bomb, and the only question now is how will it blow up in everyone’s faces. Worst case scenario is Simpson finding out, because then we’re looking at suspensions and legal ramifications, since they are distributing child porn after all.
3) Maya Matlin (#4)
Oh hey there, long-running continuity. Maya still can’t get over Cam’s death and the fact she didn’t catch the warning signs and didn’t do enough to possibly save his life. She’s now projecting all of those fears onto Miles, but right now he’s in denial and unwilling to talk about his problems or get help. What I did love is that Zig came into the room right after Miles blew up at Maya, reminding her that he would currently be worse off if she hadn’t intervened as aggressively as she did.
4) Frankie Hollingsworth (#7)
I’m really enjoying season 14 so far, but I’m having a really difficult pinpointing WHY. It’s one of those things where everything just seems to be on point; the characters are interesting and so are the storylines. I know a lot of people think season 13 sucked, but I also think fans really underestimated the effect of Jordy suddenly leaving the show and the ripple effect it had on a majority of season 13. So far in season 14, Degrassi seems to be free of that messy cloud.
And that leads me into Frankie and her storyline in 1403. This is one of those plots where there isn’t just one central idea to focus on…there are multiple things happening in this plot, and they’re all interesting: 1) Frankie is a good girl; she’s smart, gets good grades and stays out of trouble. We see the clear double standard in the way she’s perceived and treated by her mom and how Miles is treated. Simply put, she’s not trusted to protect herself and make responsible choices, despite the fact we literally watched her make a smart choice with Winston. 2) I was hoping for young, innocent plots involving Frankie and Winston, and we got it. These are two inexperienced teens who are smart enough not to rush into anything. Also, Frankie said “No” to Winston’s attempt to reach second base, and he complied without questioning her decision. 3) Zoë’s got her own personal reasons for operation “Degrassi Nudes,” and Frankie’s the only person on the squad who was vehemently against doing it. But as we see, no matter how smart someone is, peer pressure is a very powerful force. It’s easy to say you won’t do something until social pressure becomes a factor, especially at Frankie’s age. 4) I don’t think Frankie would’ve actually sent a nude pic if it weren’t for the second conversation she had with her mom. It’s one of those “angry in the moment” things where she decided to do it simply to retaliate against her mom’s stupidity. 5) Oh Lord, let’s not even go there when Frankie realized her brother Hunter is one of the guys requesting nude Oomfchats. But I think that’s the breaking point for Frankie, and I would actually like to see her be the one who blows the squad’s cover.
5) Zig Novak (—)
I guess Zig’s character is an example of being unable to pinpoint specifically what’s great about season 14, because there’s so many good things happening. His and Tiny’s response to Miles’ sexuality was 100% believable. They view him as just “liking guys” now, and joked about Miles “being turned gay” when we know that Miles’ sexuality is far more fluid. Then in the same breath, Zig realizes Maya’s genuinely upset after her outburst in the rubber room, and he shows his appreciation for her later in the episode. His casual commentary about Miles’ sexuality is stupid, but it also doesn’t make him a monstrous homophobe. It’s too easy to get caught up in labeling characters as either good or bad based on specific behavior, when an overwhelming majority of us in the real world reside in a gray area. We do good things and we all also do bad or stupid things, and I like how Degrassi presented both sides through a character in a single episode…it’s realistic.
Oh, and bonus points for Degrassi for getting edgy with its dialogue and having Zig say, “Moneybags is a dick.” Too bad they had to replace it with “dork” in ADR.
6) Drew Torres (#3)
7) Clare Edwards (#6)
8)Becky Baker (—)
Just keep in mind that at the moment, Becky has no one. I assumed Drecky would be dead after 1402, since Jonah will appear sooner rather than later. Oddly enough, Drecky reuniting in 1403 makes more sense than the rushed development of Drecky during Zoë’s sexual assault trial. That guy Becky tried to date reminded her way too much of who she used to be and what she’s lost since the trial. It doesn’t matter how complicated things are with the Clew baby…Drew is familiar territory, and at this point in time familiar is better than being alone.
9) Grace Cardinal (#12)
Fans love to place too much value on the amount of screen time characters receive. The generic way of thinking is if you receive a bunch of time, that means you’re the most important; if you don’t, you’re completely useless. As far as I’m concerned that’s way too simple of a mindset to look at things…to an extent.
If a certain character gets a bunch of storylines in a season, that means nothing to me in terms of their overall value. It’s all about the QUALITY of screen time that matters to me in the landscape of a 30-minute episode. Grace appeared in a handful of scenes in 1403 and slayed all of them. Hunter was effective in his role that helped shape the Hollingsworth family scenes. Shay Powers only had a handful of lines, but one of them ended up being hands down the most memorable line of the night and of season 14 so far.
It’s almost a curse to hope your favorite character becomes a major character, because even since the TNG days Degrassi has a tendency to take characters and run them into the ground with A-level exposure (“character fatigue” has been happening every season since at least season 4). At the same time you can’t give everyone equal screen time because then you have a bunch of half-assed characters running around, development wise. For all of the Clare’s and Connor’s of this show there are characters who navigate somewhere in the middle: Grace KILLS the limited amount of screen time she receives, as does Mike Dallas. I’m not saying she shouldn’t receive plots of her own. If she receives some, that’s okay. If she doesn’t, that’s okay too (bringing up potential archs then doing nothing with them, aka Dallas and his kid, is not okay though). But my point is that Jake Martin, who never really had a major arch of his own, proved that you don’t need to be a major character receiving tons of development through your own storylines to be important, make an impact and be well loved by Degrassi fans. Do not undervalue or underestimate the power of secondary characters.
10) Mike Dallas (#10)
11) Winston Chu (#14)
Kudos to Winston for being an understanding boyfriend in 1403. A couple of years ago I threw out a Degrassi brainstorming idea about them tackling a romantic relationship destroying a friendship. I’m very excited to see if that’s what will go down between Winston/Miles/Tristan next week in 1404.
12) Hunter Hollingsworth (#13)
13) Alli Bhandari (#11)
14) Tristan Milligan (#10)
15) Shay Powers (Unranked)
“No boy’s worthy of my room.” BEST QUOTE OF THE NIGHT. I also loved her delivery of that line. Hazel’s role was restricted and Chantay was barely used until her latter seasons. Liberty Van Zandt is the closest thing this show’s had to an A-level black female..fingers crossed Shay can surpass that.
16) Imogen Moreno (#18)
Great support by Imogen for Becky in this episode.
How important is God in your life?
BECKY: Well he hasn’t been here for me lately…
IMOGEN: …because he works in mysterious ways.
How close are you to your family?
BECKY: They used to be my rock…
IMOGEN: …and they will be again.
17) Jack (#19)
18) Connor DeLaurier (#17)
19) Tiny King (#16)
20) Eli Goldsworthy (#15)
21) Lola Pacini (Unranked)
22) Jenna Middleton (#20)
UNRANKED: Arelene Takahashi, Jonah Haak.
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Kary's Degrassi Blog 
KARY YASSSS i agree with everything u said. i love how u talk about degrassi as the work of art it is. especially what u wrote for graces paragraph. it was beautifully written.
AND I HAVE BEEN PRAYINGGGG for an A-level black female for SOOOO LONGGGGG. i think it would help the show and change a lil bit of the dynamic if they had a black girl with clare or maya level of power!! THEYVE NEVER HAD ONE IN DEGRASSI HISTORY. u can argue liberty was one but i truly see her as just a significant supporting character. it seems even mia had more screen time then liberty in her 3 year year run, then liberty ever had
I had gotten so excited when they introduced mikes baby mama!!!!! i thought YES finally a beautiful black girl and poof shes gone. im not sure if shay is the right woman for the job.. im a little iffy about her.. honestlyyyy she looks like shes the same type of girl like hazel/chante before her but i hope it turns out to be other wise
soundcloud.com/aayize
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“i thought YES finally a beautiful black girl”
Hazel, Marisol, and Liberty once her looks blossomed were all beautiful…
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I COMPLETELY AGREE with you!!!! i thought marisol was gorgeous and found liberty attractive.
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“bringing up potential archs then doing nothing with them, aka Dallas and his kid, is not okay though”
That’s one of my biggest problems with the show. I understand that some characters, such as Chantay and even Wesley, who I adored, are best as supporting and that not everyone can get tons of screentime. However, when the writers refuse to expand on a character who has tons of storyline potential (examples include Liberty and Toby after JT’s death, Connor’s Aspergers, and Dallas’ kid), that becomes a huge problem and only fuels the speculation that the writers play favorites and non-favorites.
I do believe that if a character gets tons of A-plots, then they should get fewer subplots and most of those should be reserved for the characters who don’t get as much screentime.
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I absolutely agree with your statements here. I believe that at this point, the fandom (or at least on a certain wiki) are suffering from Drew, Clare, and Eli fatigue. Although we are getting more Becky screen time (and less Alli), I think I would enjoy seeing the Jackogen plotline and the Bhandallas plotline (simply because it expands on Dallas’s character) more than Becky’s (whose only interesting storylines imo are the conservative (Christian) family trouble and the recuperation (following the family drama) and reconciliation with her beliefs with the Jonah storyline.)
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Good point. but Clare is bringing down 3 people with her. she don’t need 2 guys there for her. & I’d like to say how RUDE it is (even though it needed to happen) that the guy who 1st saw her with 95% of her boobs out in a black dress outfit left her then a few weeks later confessed his love cus he couldn’t do it earlier & he know finds out about the baby bullcrap?!
I know he wont be happy. that’s like the worst news you can tell a bipolar person. if there was any feelings he had coming down there.. its all gone. but I cant wait to see Drew’s mm in a plot. cus I know she will have the same attitude like s12 with “you continue school or move out” deal. so this time it might be “if you want to be in Clare’s babies life cant do it in this house”.
So far Becky, Clare, Drew & Zoe have been n every episode. but I don’t want to see Jonah in a relationship yet. I mean look at the girls we got. Lola, the black girl whose name I forgot, Zoe (not for long), Maya, Frankie & Grace. the only single ones are Zoe, Grace & the 2 ninth graders. if he comes in this block he is an 11th grader. This guy seems to turn
a new leaf & we don’t need him in drama yet. & if I remember correctly.. earlier I read on this blog that there’s a girl (idk which one) who likes a guy but the guy doesn’t like her back. so that also makes me wonder.
we will see the Jackogen thing. maybe mixed in with the Zoe legal trouble/snitch thing. from what I saw I guess she catches jack with another girl (maybe kissing) & she confronts her then shortly after sees a cuter girl than her with Jack thus causing the break up. with Becky we will see her parents soon, maybe in the Luke thing where she snaps on him:) I want to
see if any of these seniors thought about college (besides Clare). I know in a 13D episode Connor said he got accepted somewhere. I know for a FACT that Becky aint goin nowhere. her parents wouldn’t spend a dime. but I wanna see Zoe & Becky talk once her leg heels. maybe have her come to take her spot back. but id also like to add that who the frack wants
Drew or Zoe? Drew smashed 2 women in a month! he’s lucky Zoe not pregnant! I never saw the Dig Me Out ending but I’m pretty sure their sex was better than Clare’s. but Becky kissing Drew’s lips.. you might as well kiss the ground. I know his lips have been touching both Clare’s & Zoe’s “u know where” & Zoe’s been slurping his “you know what” as well as Clare.
& once that has been done that’s nasty. I’m sure Zig didn’t think about it. people don’t think about what they do when they date. just the thought of it. I hope Zig never kissed her.. he needs to take a chemical bath & brush his mouth with salt & lemon juice to get read of those germs.
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“that the guy who 1st saw her with 95% of her boobs out in a black dress outfit”
LOOLLLL! I was wondering when somebody would comment on that. Clare showing that much cleavage seems out of character. She was practically falling out of that dress!
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I think that I know why the season has been so good. I think that after the writers saw how terribly Season 13 fared, they knew that if they continued with the reduced budget, quality of writing, and quality plots, they would lose the rest of their audience. Thus, they decided that they should put an increased amount of effort into each of their episodes and story lines. They increased the budget (look at the amount of stunts and costumes they had in these 3 episodes so far), changed the quality of film (the visuals look a lot nicer this season), changed the writers (back to the Season 12 and Season 10 writers, check effyeahdegrassiwriters on tumblr), revised the dialogue a lot (look at the amount of substantial dialogue they had in just a few minutes, and also at the cuts of shots they made in the final product), improved the quality of jokes from Season 12 (that trended on tumblr), changed the audience (before they marketed towards young preteen girls who enjoyed the quality of cheap romance novels (sorry Twilight, and yes, I admit, this point is biased against corny chick flicks)), but now there’s jokes that target both mature teens and young adults (Shay’s comment falls under here), invested a lot more resources in directing and filming (just look at Miles’s storyline, and the amount of focus on the character’s facial expression after each event that upsets them, causing drama), and invested a lot more time researching things that are relevant to social media and today’s young adult society (such as reclamation of sexuality, nude shots (which was surprisingly relevant to twitter’s leaked celebrity nudes), polygamous / open relationships, and *spoilers* a speculative Hunter plot about nude comics (supposedly hentai or doujinshi)). The difference in quality between the episodes of Season 13 and Season 14 are substantial, and I think that that contributed to the reduced amount of episodes in Season 14. In my opinion, if the quality of episodes remains the same for the rest of Season 14, then this will actually be the best season of Degrassi out of all 14 seasons (based on the quality of writing, directing, and acting).
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I would also like to add that many plots harken back to the early season’s in terms of theme and style (like Season 1-4, specifically the pornography and social media plot lines with characters like JT and Toby (whose plots somewhat resemble Zig’s and Winston/Hunter’s)), while each episode retains the glamor that was introduced in Season 10 onward. Also, by doujinshi, I was thinking of the hentai or ecchi that is commonly incorporated into these fan works. Perhaps Hunter enjoys a certain character in one of his online MMO games, and finds a fan comic involving this character.
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I never saw any porn stuff in the past since I started watching in 13D but I did see reruns as far back as when Fiona was there. but Child porn is more serious now tan it was back when JT & Toby were around. it got more serious when smartphones & more advanced computers were created. i’d say in 2007 when the Android & iPhones were created is
when it got more complicated. it also depends on if those characters got caught. I think Zoe will go down before Xmas:) Frankie is like Becky, she knows when what she is doing is wrong. she will either tell her mom, Chewie or her friends. either way the principle finds out about the app, Zoe is in legal trouble, her mom comes, she could be taken by the 5-0
then on house arrest like Luke until her hearing. then its Frankie ( & maybe Lola, Shay) Vs Zoe. & after that she is out & the BiG evil cloud leaves. if she explains anything even remotely similar to what she said to the girls to the court or Simpson then that’s worse. Child porn in Canada is a felony, fraud is a felony. the girls could face Aiding & Abetting.
cus they knew its wrong & still did it & with the money she made from “a dollar a pic” that’s hundreds of pics. Child porn in Canada gets anyone up to 20 years, fraud maybe 7 but Aiding & Abetting gets them maybe 7 years or house arrest. but in Zoe’s case she will be guilty & get more jail time than Luke.
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LOL Kary about Zoe. its a bomb alright.. Nuclear bomb! Simpson needs to find out. that will be so cool to see. I am waiting for Zoe to get in trouble & no one shall enjoy it more than me. I love seeing super villains go down. & I will even through a party when she goes down. there will be legal troubles when he finds out! in Canada child porn is a felony & can land her up to 20 years in jail.
an since she doesn’t think of it as porn she see’s it as “girls selling their bodies for money” that’s like prostitution. I know her punishments -> no squad, cant see the girls anymore, she has to apologize to them, maybe detention, suspension & call her mom to discuss legal trouble. he has the right to call the police. she cant get away from consequences. those flimsy school stuff is
weak. Since she doesn’t think its wrong that’s funny. I could see a suspension followed by a police call or she could be put in custody of her mom until a trial date. & just being sent home with her mom aint no punishment. like her previous trial she gets a lawyer to help her out.. but if she tells him (or her) anything similar to what she explains to the squad she’s doomed.
(which I will get a kick out of). idk how the press would get hold of the story, unless she got arrested. but considering how sad she was before who knows what they would do. the only penalty for her felony is jail. then Frankie’s mom finds out. if we do see a trial it would either be the last 14A ep’s or the starting 14B ep’s but with this charge she wont finish her 11th grade year.
it also depends on if it will be a suspension or be sent home until further notice because if she misses finals or at least 2 or 3 weeks of school she can get held back for missing a certain number of days.
its still funny to see Hunter with Frankie’s boobs, that’s the only reason she was worried. I think she will just not tell Zoe she’s not taking pics. & if it wasn’t for her mom talking to her she wouldn’t of taken that pic. but Jack did raise her hand agreeing to do it. although making a gay girl do it is just as bad. maybe she just “yessed” her to get away.
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