This was in a way the beginning and end of Nick's Golden era

This, along with Clarissa Explains It All and to a lesser extent My Brother, I feel, represented the end of the time when Nickelodeon had genuine and honest respect for kids and their stories and unique difficulties that each and every kid has to deal with in some way. More than that, this was when they understood that if you put enough hard work and energy into creating viable stories, it is perfectly possible to make stories revolving around kids' everyday struggles enticing enough that viewers will actually pay attention to them.

I mean, look at even the 90s Nick shows that followed: All That, Journey of Allen Strange, Secret World of Alex Mack, Kenan and Kel, 100 Deeds for Eddie McDowd, The Amanda Show, Cousin Skeeter and the following wave of over the top dramas that followed in the Millenial decades. I loved, and still get a major kick out of, these shows as much as the next Nick die hard, but one cannot help but notice that all of them needed to have some sort of crazy and over the top gimmick in order to catch viewer's attention; some of them had kids mutating into something not quite human anymore (Alex Mack, Eddie McDowd), featured an abnormal being not really human to begin with (Allen Strange, Cousin Skeeter-made more inane coz he was supposed to be seen as a regular human), or showed kids acting obscenely irresponsible all the time with zero real life consequences (Kenan and Kel, All That, the Amanda Show). Of course they all managed to entertain, but none of them managed to do so by simply telling stories of kids' perspective, by relating to the audience how huge and scary and intimidating while simultaneously thrilling and enticing the world is. The same way the classic comics Peanuts, Foxtrot, Zits and of course the oft mentioned Calvin and Hobbes did. And then in the following wave of kids shows it got worse as Nick and Disney somehow got the idea that only kids who wanted to be sexy and glamorous Hollywood/pop/rock/hip hop stars are worth a damn when it comes to writing stories people want to see on screen. And most ridiculous thing about it is that Nickelodeon to this day manages to find great young actors and actresses and you can see these talented, talented kids in such stuff as ICarly, Victorious, House of Anubis and their latest Hannah Montana incarnation How to Rock, and you can see these kids could be cast in kids' comedic dramas in the vein of Pete and Pete and Clarissa and young viewer's would flock to it like flies to the city dump. Hell, the talented casts' abilities anything Nick comes up with captivating is the primary reason these shows are even staying alive in the ratings as it is.

But this and Clarissa, while they had insane individual characters, also repeatedly stripped all of the theatrics away and made kids' everyday life the most entertaining thing you could ever want to see. That is why I actually feel this show represents the end of Nick's Golden era-even in the remainder of the 90s, much less the following decade, you just didnt see much of anything else on Nick or other Kid's channels for that matter that essentially said "we're gonna tell you the story of kids aged 7-14 and their struggles with school and getting in trouble with teachers and hanging out by the ice cream truck after a long day of school and dealing with homework and fighting with friends and brothers and sisters and everything else that all of you yourselves went through when you were kids, and you're gonna wanna watch it religiously". Since then, it's challenging to tell what happened, is this when kids started to become more narcissistic and feel that those who wanted to be huge stars when they grew up were the only interesting ones, with kids networks following their lead ? Did kids' networks somehow lose their esteem for kids and decide to implicitly send messages that only those who tried to be as sexy and glamorous as possible all the time are worth watching ? Whatever the reason, after the first couple of seasons of this show, it really was the beginning of the end and Nick was no longer truly "the" Kids' Network. No surprise that countless viewers, myself included, actually do break down and cry when watching this. I guess just keep the faith that some day a revolution in youth pop culture will occur and Nick will have enough faith in entertaining people by letting kids be kids.