Fast Times

It is a happy, sweet surprise, much more humane than almost any of the teen-age comedies that have broken out like acne on the movie screens of the nation during what seems like an interminable cinematic puberty. [5 Mar 1986, p.D1]

If you're not expecting the motion picture, Fast Times is rather pleasant. Not as wacky as "Square Pegs," the underappreciated 1982 CBS comedy that also focused on high school students and their teachers, it is no less appealing, boasting an attractive, engaging cast and a warm, gentle sense of humor. (And the high-energy, animated title sequence, featuring a theme song by Oingo Boingo, is dynamite.) [5 Mar 1986, p.C-10]

Everybody, though, is well meaning and enormously attractive. Even Damone, banned from Disneyland, dressed like a rummage sale and generally recognized as the school sleaze, is basically likable. That is what makes the show moderately interesting. It might also be noted that there is no laugh track. That makes Fast Times almost courageous.

Fast Times is strictly spoon-gagging grotty-to-the-max, lacking the bite and outrageousness of the movie and coming across, in its tidied-up-for-television form, as nothing more than a peach-fuzz "Punky Brewster." [5 Mar 1986, p.C7]

Thumb-sucking scripts, actors without direction and forgettable emotional clout. [6 Mar 1986, p.E-8]