Prime Video‘s new Australian series Class of ’07 is a comedic twist on the survivalist genre we’ve come to love. Reminiscent of shows like Lost, Yellowjackets and The Stranded, Class of ’07 stars Emily Browning as one of several women stranded inside her high school located on a hilltop after a flood decimates all the land around them. The show is more linear in structure than, say, Yellowjackets, with most of the action taking place in the present, but these women still have to learn how to survive with one another in the now, while addressing the high school drama of their past.
CLASS OF ’07: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: A young woman named Zoe (Emily Browning) stands across from a man named Gareth (Troy Honeysett) on the set of a Bachelor-inspired show called The Match. She’s expecting a rose from him and she doesn’t receive one. She reacts…poorly.
The Gist: The first five minutes of Class of ’07 set up the back story of our main character, 20-something Zoe. Zoe has gone viral, a true global sensation, thanks to her participation in a dating show called The Match. When the man she’s been seeing on he show rejects her, she flips out on camera, and in the process of her spectacular meltdown, she releases a caged love bird which was on the set as a prop. As she watches the love bird fly away, it shits in her mouth. This being the digital age, the moment becomes a phenomenon and Zoe becomes a punchline. We cut away to an idyllic, lush hilltop six months later, to see Zoe living off the grid. No phone, no other humans around, just a woman trying to escape infamy by living in a trailer.
As Zoe works the land – talking to herself and then chastising herself for being the kind of person who talks to herself – she experiences what seems like an earthquake, but weirder and more concerning. Cracks form in the ground and water starts pouring out of them, first in a stream, then in geysers. She takes out her “In Case of Emergency” cell phone and checks to see where the nearest high-ground evacuation point is. It happens to be her old high school, where her 10-year reunion is taking place that very night.
A Catholic all-girls school, the campus is set atop a mountain, and it’s a gorgeous, castle-like building. Inside, all of Zoe’s former classmates have assembled, each one some kind of archetype: there’s the type-A leader, Genevieve (Claire Lovering), who organized the whole reunion, the formerly bitchy popular girl Saskia (Caitlin Stasey) who is now a philanthropist, Tegan and Megan (Bernie Van Tiel and Chi Ngyuen), the stoners who sit outside on the “Fingering Bench” and get high, and Zoe’s former best friend Amelia (Megan Smart), who dropped out of school after she had a relationship with a staff member who she then married.
While everyone else has come to the reunion dressed for the occasion, Zoe, having fled her home in a hurry, arrives in denim cutoffs and Crocs, and surprises everyone with her arrival. They’ve taken her for a reality TV fame whore who’s been ignoring them all and living it up thanks to her notoriety, when in fact, she keeps pleading with them all that she “received a bad edit” and she downplays what happened on The Match. And that’s beside the point, Zoe is there because the school is an evacuation point and something truly weird, some bizarre natural phenomenon, is afoot, but alas, no one will listen to her. So Zoe does the only thing she can, she gets an upper from Tegan and Megan and gets drunk and high, dancing with her old friends all night.
When Amelia, whose relationship with Zoe has been strained for the last decade, attempts to leave for the night, she returns in shock. She announces gravely,”We have a situation at the Fingering Bench,” and the women all proceed outside to see Tegan and Megan sitting on top of the gazebo that houses everyone’s beloved hand-job spot, which is now surrounded by several feet of water. Worse still, some kind of serpent-like creature is swimming in it. The end is nigh, and all of these women are trapped in their high school together, the rest of the world submerged in an apocalyptic flood. What’s going to happen to them now that everything they know is under water?
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? It’s not often that these “stranded in the wilderness” shows lean into comedy, so imagine Yellowjackets or The Wilds, but instead of high-stakes, life-threatening drama, the situations are played for laughs instead.
Our Take: Class of ’07 starts off very strong. While we’re focused primarily on Zoe and the fallout from her stint on a dating show, the real drama exists within the walls of the high school. We’ve only touched the surface of the simmering tension between her and Amelia, the phoniness of Saskia’s shiny facade, and the rest of their classmates’ trajectories, and the show has already developed these characters enough that we’re intrigued to see who they were in high school and how they’ll fare in survival mode. I keep comparing it to Yellowjackets, but it’s inevitable given that show’s success, similar themes, and the fact that Season 2 is coming out a week after Class of ’07 premieres, but the shows fulfill different viewing needs. While Yellowjackets is a show you have to peel back the layers of, building tension and mystery throughout, Class of ’07 is comfort viewing; sure, the situation is still life and death, but even then, you still have to laugh.
Sex and Skin: None
Parting Shot: Zoe stands on the remaining half of the dance floor in her school gym, the other half having sunken into the earth when the building cracked in half. She looks out at the watery landscape; cities now completely submerged, her school and the women in it appear to be the only survivors of a colossal flood.
Sleeper Star: So far, all of the young actresses on the show are fun to watch, but Tegan and Megan, the drug-loving outcasts played by Bernie Van Tiel and Chi Ngyuen, add some genuine laughs to the show.
Most Pilot-y Line: “I’m not crazy, I was just given a bad edit,” Zoe says over and over, defending herself against her reality TV persona.
Our Call: STREAM IT! Even though it feels like we have more than enough shows that fall into the “high school girls stranded and trying to survive” category, Class of ’07 is a standout for lightening the tone and providing some solid jokes and excellent performances amid the cataclysm.
Liz Kocan is a pop culture writer living in Massachusetts. Her biggest claim to fame is the time she won on the game show Chain Reaction.
