Saved by the Bell - DVDs

Buy now!	Saved by the Bell - Season 1 & 2 As high school comedies for young viewers go, Saved by the Bell is as light as they come, yet there is something unusually addictive about it. No doubt that's because the series, set at Bayside High School in Pacific Palisades, California, balances fluffy stories with evolving relationships. It's no chore to watch every episode in this Saved by the Bell: Seasons 1 & 2 boxed set and feel satisfied with the touching, admirable growth and affection between key characters.
Buy now!	Saved by the Bell - Season 3 & 4 Product Description Studio: Lions Gate Home Ent. Release Date: 02/05/2008
Buy now!	Saved by the Bell - Season 5 Product Description: SAVED BY THE BELL SEASON FIVE (DVD MOVIE)
Buy now!	Saved by the Bell - The College Years Zack, Kelly, Slater and Screech are back for new adventures, new challenges and new friends at California U! Arriving at college, they realize that life is going to be very different. As Zack puts it, "Last year we ruled Bayside...this year we're the lowest rung on the food chain!" It's a time for firsts and lots of surprises. Zack gets rejected by a girl, Slater's the worst wrestler on the team, Kelly gets a hankering for her professor and Screech finally starts getting the girls! Resident Assistant Michael Rogers helps the gang through the rough patches. Now you can enjoy the entire series of 18 episodes in their entirety, plus the pilot, as the gang navigates their way through the ups and downs of college life! Episodes include: Pilot / Guess Who's Coming to College / Zack, Lies & Videotape / Rush Week / Slater's War / The Homecoming / The Poker Game / Professor Zack / Screech Love / Dr. Kelly / A Thanksgiving Story / Teacher's Pet / Kelly and the Professor / A Question of Ethics / The Rave / Bedside Manner / Love and Death / Marry Me / Wedding Plans. Featuring Mario Lopez, Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Tiffani-Amber Thiessen, and Dusty Diamond.

Saved by the Bell is an American sitcom that originally aired between 1989 and 1993. The series is a retooled version of the 1988 series Good Morning, Miss Bliss, which was itself later retconned into the history of Saved by the Bell. The series followed the exploits of several students along with their principal at Bayside High School.

The show starred Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Dustin Diamond, Lark Voorhies and Dennis Haskins, who appeared in Good Morning, Miss Bliss, as well as Tiffani-Amber Thiessen, Elizabeth Berkley and Mario Lopez, who joined the cast for Saved by the Bell. The show brought fame to the cast members and launched most of their careers; however, many were typecast into their Saved by the Bell roles for many years.

The show often incorporated dramatic elements into episodes by dealing with real teen social issues, such as friendship, drug use, drinking and driving, homelessness, financial issues, divorce, graduating, college, sibling rivalry, taking responsibilities for one's actions, being bullied, death and environmental issues. This made it a precursor (with other teen sitcoms of the time like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) for networks of more recent shows such as The O.C. and Dawson's Creek to introduce young target audiences to critical moral matters. Notably, sexual relationships were alluded to but not actually dealt with.

The show's popularity allowed for two spin-off series: Saved by the Bell: The College Years, which followed several of the original characters' college experiences and Saved by the Bell: The New Class, which followed a new group of students at Bayside High School. The series also spawned two TV movies and a short-lived comic book series.

The series is also available in French: Sauvés par le gong, Spanish: Salvados por la campana, Italian: Bayside School and German: California High School.
 

Main characters

[edit] Zachary "Zack" Morris
Main article: Zack Morris
Played by Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Zack is a charming schemer in the mold of Ferris Bueller. The series features Zack engaging in Bueller-esque, direct-to-camera addresses to the audience as well as occasionally freezing everyone around him, offering plot exposition and amusing side-commentary. Unlike Bueller however, Zack's schemes often backfire and result with worse outcomes. Slater refers to him as preppie.

Zack's best friends since grade school have been Lisa Turtle and next-door neighbor Jessie Spano; Samuel "Screech" Powers has also been tagging along with Zack since they were little. Zack was also constantly pining for Kelly, coming up with new ways to try to win her over in many episodes, often battling for her affections with his on-again off-again best friend A.C. Slater. This rivalry ended as the show decided that Zack and Slater were better suited as good friends, not least because of the close friendship between the actors who played them.

Zack's father is a hot-shot computer salesman (with whom his relationship was, for a time, rather distant) who has been played by two different actors. His mother is a kind, but overly permissive homemaker. Upon graduation, Zack was slated to go to Yale, having scored 1502 on the SAT, the highest of the gang (despite his slacker reputation) but he ultimately attended Cal U with Slater, Screech and Kelly.


[edit] Kelly Kapowski
Main article: Kelly Kapowski
Played by Tiffani-Amber Thiessen (now known as Tiffani Thiessen), Kelly is a cheerleader and has been described by creator Peter Engel as the quintessential "All-American Girl." She served as a love interest for both Zack and Slater in the first season, but it was Zack who would eventually win her heart and actually end up marrying her. Indeed, much of the show's storylines concerned their on-and-off relationship. Considered the most popular girl in school and despite the stereotypes of cheerleaders, Kelly was one of the kindest and most squeaky clean (though she did have to serve a couple of detentions during high school). She was introduced as an outsider to the show's core clique.

At times, Kelly and Jessie had arguments due to their differences. Jessie believed that cheerleading was demeaning to women although she was a cheerleader in several episodes. Zack had been obsessively in love with Kelly for years, as evidenced by a cardboard cutout of her in his bedroom. His pursuit of Kelly led to her eventually joining the gang. She is on the volleyball, cheerleading and swim teams and is also a trained lifeguard. Upon graduation, she did not have enough money for college so she attended community college, but later transferred to Cal U with Zack, Slater and Screech. Both Elizabeth Berkley and Thiessen, as well as Jennie Garth, auditioned for the role of Kelly Kapowski. Thiessen and Garth would later work together on Beverly Hills, 90210 as unfriendly rivals Valerie Malone and Kelly Taylor, respectively (the actresses became best friends in real life).

Kelly comes from a big working-class family (one of seven children) that often had financial difficulties. This figured into the plots of several episodes including Kelly not being able to attend her own prom.


[edit] Lisa Marie Turtle
Main article: Lisa Turtle
Played by Lark Voorhies, Lisa is trendy and talkative. She is the clique's fashion expert and the gossip queen of Bayside High. She comes from a wealthy family; her father and mother are shown to be surgeons. Originally, her character was written to be Caucasian and Jewish, however, Lark aced the audition and they awarded her the role. Because of her upbringing, Lisa always has access to the latest fashions and knows when something is in and when it's not. Like Jessie and Screech, Lisa has been Zack's best friend since grade school and some episodes hinted that she harbored a small crush on him. Lisa's goal is to become a world famous fashion designer (Voorhies would later play fashion designer Jasmine Malone on The Bold and the Beautiful). For the majority of the gang's years at Bayside, one of the running gags was Screech's fruitless attempts to woo Lisa. While his romantic feelings for her were never returned and often rejected with insults and jokes, eventually she realized she had developed a soft spot for Screech and even attended the Bayside Senior Prom with him. Upon graduation, she receives acceptance into the Fashion Institute of Technology after a successful fashion show.


[edit] Samuel "Screech" Powers
Main article: Samuel "Screech" Powers
Played by Dustin Diamond, Screech (whose given name is Samuel Powers) is the school nerd. Screech has been tagging along with Zack since they were in elementary school and is extremely loyal to him. In exchange for doing Zack's homework and being roped into Zack's various stunts, Screech receives protection from school bullies and a general boost in his confidence; but Zack's affection for Screech is evident in spite of this. He is very comfortable with his geekiness and fancies himself a ladies' man. The rest of the gang simultaneously picks on and humors Screech for his eccentricities (e.g. hiding in his locker, wearing extremely loud and mismatched clothes and obsessing over science and chess). A recurring storyline in the series is his unrequited love for Lisa Turtle. During the show, Screech had one girlfriend named Violet (played by Tori Spelling); it was never made clear why the two broke up. In several early episodes of the series, Screech has an anthropomorphized robot named Kevin, which he programmed. Screech was class valedictorian, but gave that title to Jessie as he knew how much it meant to her. However, Jessie learned what Screech had done for her and returned the honor on graduation day. He received acceptance to The Barbizon School of Modeling and Acting, Duke University; Emerson College; Clemson University; University of California, Berkeley; the California Institute of Technology; Emory University; University of Southern California; Washington & Jefferson College; and Princeton University.[citation needed] He is rejected from an all-women school that was his number one choice. He chose to go to the fictional Cal U after graduation and shared a dormitory suite with Zack, Slater and Kelly. He also was the only cast member to star in every incarnation of Saved by the Bell, as he joined the cast of The New Class as an aide to Mr. Belding. Diamond was three years younger than most of the cast though his character was the same age as them.


[edit] Albert Clifford "A.C." Slater
Main article: A.C. Slater
Played by Mario Lopez, Slater is the token "jock" of the group. An army brat, he was an outsider, having transferred to Bayside in the first filmed episode (which aired later as a flashback). A.C. mentions that he has been to Bolivia, Italy, Iceland and Berlin among other places. He becomes the school's star athlete, excelling as a wrestler and the quarterback of the football team. He is on the basketball team in one episode, even though the basketball season coincides with the wrestling season. Slater was originally written as Zack's rival for Kelly's affection before becoming Zack's best friend in the show's second season and developing an attraction to strong-willed feminist Jessie Spano.

He refers to Zack as "Preppie" and when he starts dating Jessie, calls her "Mama". Lopez is a drummer and dancer and some episodes include Slater showcasing these "hidden talents." His father (a Major) appears in two episodes, but his mother, though mentioned throughout the series, never appears. He also has a younger sister named JB whom Zack briefly began dating, much to his chagrin. In the season 4 episode "Love Machine," his ex-girlfriend from Berlin visits and calls him by his real name, "Albert Clifford". Much like Voorhies, Lopez was able to captivate the show's producers into casting him into a role that was originally written to be Caucasian. This issue of Slater's ethnicity is addressed in an episode from The College Years, where it is revealed that 25 years earlier A.C.'s father changed his last name from Sanchez to Slater so he could get into the military academy. A.C. receives a wrestling scholarship to the University of Iowa, but ends up going to Cal U. During an episode in which Zack was dealing with Gem Diamond to purchase class rings, the A.C. was stated as meaning "abnormally cruel." During an episode where the six core characters used fake I.D.'s to get into an "over 18" dance club called "The Attic," the A.C. was stated as meaning "absolutely charmed."


[edit] Jessica Myrtle "Jessie" Spano
Main article: Jessie Spano
Played by Elizabeth Berkley, Jessica Myrtle ("Jessie") Spano is the show's resident know-it-all crusader. She's often seen pursuing a variety of environmental and generally liberal causes while keeping up her position as Class President and one of the smartest students in her class. Like Lisa and Screech, Jessie is Zack's childhood friend (despite the lack of continuity with Good Morning, Miss Bliss) and he routinely climbs into her room via a tree outside her window. From the second season onwards, her main love interest is Slater, who disagrees with her feminist views. Jessie's parents are divorced and both are remarried during Season 3. Her mother's remarriage introduces a conniving stepbrother named Eric from New York in a 2-part episode, although neither her mother nor stepfather are featured. In another 2-part episode, her father marries a much younger aerobics instructor named Leslie, whom Jessie initially disfavors. Jessie also struggled with drug addiction at one point on the series, taking caffeine pills in order to stay awake for longer study hours. Jessie fully expected to be crowned valedictorian, but finished a fraction of a point behind Screech and reluctantly settled for salutatorian status. Upon graduation, Jessie attends Columbia University, although she had been hoping to get into Stansbury (fictional) in one episode and had applied to Harvard and Yale and Princeton as well (she had also expressed a desire to attend Stanford in a few episodes).


[edit] Richard Belding
Main article: Richard Belding
Played by Dennis Haskins, Mr. Richard Belding is the principal of Bayside High School and the show's resident authority figure. However, when he attended high school he was an anti authority hippie whom, in one episode, Jessie refered to as "The Zack Morris of the 70s". According to an old copy of the school paper he once mooned his teacher. Although rarely alluded to, he is known to be a hero of the Vietnam War. He once mentioned that had he been allowed to return for a fourth tour of duty, "the war would've been won in a week". He's known for his catch phrase "Hey, hey, hey, what is going on here?" as well as his high-pitched laugh. Belding has frequent run-ins with Zack and his friends as either a foe to be outwitted or a friend to turn to for help. Despite being a responsible authority figure, Mr. Belding is unique as he genuinely seems to care about what his students, particularly Zack, think of him. He is married to Rebecca "Becky" Belding (née Flugelman) and has an irresponsible younger brother Rod. Rod Belding appeared in one episode having volunteered to take the class on a rafting trip but backed out at the last minute to go on a date with a stewardess; the resulting argument was overheard by Zack, who had initially liked Rod's lighthearted manner. Belding remained the principal at Bayside (along with Screech as his assistant) until he left to become dean of students at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (Haskins' alma mater in real life) in the final episode of Saved By The Bell: The New Class. He is also known for his love of The Beach Boys classic "California Girls".