Finalewatch '07: 'Kid Nation'

Wednesday (Dec. 12) night marked the ending of the first (and last?) season of Kid Nation. There were many grand, sweeping pronouncements about all of the things that the series proved, all of the evidence it gave that today's children are ready to heal the world and make it a better place.

Wednesday (Dec. 5) night's Kid Nation began with our pint-sized pioneers up to Day 35 of their social experiment/forced labor camp. With only five days to go, the focus began to shift from general childish belligerence to the kind of crushing premature nostalgia only possible amongst those of either limited or boundless years.

Wednesday (Nov. 28) was the last night of November sweeps and so Kid Nation pulled out all the stops in the only way it knows how. That meant lots and lots and lots of misbehavior from Taylor, followed by a redemption we can expect to last at least a few hours.

I've made several joking references to how Kid Nation has been advocating Communism, but Wednesday (Nov. 21) night's episode offered the most telling depiction of how kids are naturally and instinctively drawn to fascism since the 1981 telefilm The Wave.

Yikes. Wednesday (Nov. 14) night's Kid Nation was pretty action-packed, eh? A district swap, a genuinely compelling Showdown, a humiliating F-bomb, a kid going home, Taylor in tears and a shocking end-of-episode cliffhanger?

Kids today have absolutely no appreciation for quality comedy. That explains both the baffling ongoing success of Dane Cook and the results of Wednesday (Nov. 7) night's Kid Nation.

Well, as of Wednesday (Oct. 31) night's episode, we've scraped the bottom of the Gold Star barrel on Kid Nation.

If Wednesday (Oct. 24) night's Kid Nation didn't leave you with a bit of a lump in your throat, you're either impervious to manipulative reality TV drama or else you were watching the Red Sox jump out to a 3-0 lead in Game One of the World Series. If you're in the first group, I say to you "Why you wanna be so heartless?" If you're in the second group, I say to you, "Go Sox!"

After spending the first chunk of the season governed by four leaders picked by the show producers, the pioneers of Bonanza City went to the polls on Wednesday (Oct. 17) night's Kid Nation. Some of the results were surprising, others completely satisfying.

Golly, world. It took less than a half-hour on Wednesday (Oct. 10) night's Kid Nation for the 39 remaining children to solve all of humanity's spiritual differences, proving that all we need to end war and bloodshed is the incentive of a $20,000 gold star.