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Video Game High School, on RocketJump (YouTube)
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Caution: spoilers!

This started in May 2012, but I just started watching it in November 2014, when it was a ways into its third season. I had first heard of it (as far as I recall) a month or so earlier, when I started seeing ads for this series and SciShow (which is unrelated, except that both shows are on YouTube). Anyway, I think the show was pretty cool and amusing (and sometimes surreal) from the very start, and it gets progressively better throughout its three seasons, as the plot thickens and we get to know the four main characters (Brian, Jenny, Ted, and Ki) better. Oh, and the closing credits always have amazing orchestral music (starting with the season one finale).

Season 1
I guess VGHS is set about five years in the future. Video games have become a massively popular spectator sport, and the top players are treated like star athletes. (There's even a sort of sports news show about gaming, called PwnZwn, which is hosted by a guy named Scott Slanders and a robot named ShotBot.) One day an unranked FPS (first-person shooter) gamer named BrianD unwittingly kills the avatar of the top amateur gamer in the world, the Law. Because of this, Brian is offered enrollment in the prestigious Video Game High School (which apparently just teaches video game-related subjects). The school's dean is Ernie Calhoun, who's usually rather hard on Brian. Anyway, Brian soon befriends a couple of students, Ted Wong (who becomes his roommate) and Kimberly 'Ki' Swan (Ellary Porterfield). (Ki quickly became my favorite character.) Brian also develops a crush on the captain of the Junior Varsity team, Jenny Matrix. They become friends, but it's awkward, because she's dating the Law (the Varsity captain), who becomes Brian's nemesis. Meanwhile, Ted and Ki start dating. Oh, and Ted's father, Freddie Wong, teaches a rhythm gaming class. Ted is initially into rhythm gaming, but he's not that good at it. He eventually switches to drift racing games, recruited by D.K. (the Drift King). By the end of the first season, Jenny breaks up with the Law, and Brian makes it onto the JV team.

Season 2
The FPS team gets a new coach: Mary Matrix, Jenny's mom (played by Cynthia Watros). Meanwhile, the Law is on a downward spiral after a gaming scandal, and he's forced to move in with Brian and Ted. Also, um... so like, Ted was an R.A. in season one, but nothing much was ever done with that plot point. But this season, his position is given to Ki, who is pretty great at it. (But the head R.A., Shane Pizza, becomes her nemesis.) Also, Brian loses his scholarship, and has to take a work study job as a janitor. He also starts dating Jenny, but they have to keep it a secret, because Mary doesn't want anything distracting her daughter from working towards a gaming career. (Jenny and her mom definitely don't have a close relationship.) Eventually, through circumstances I don't even want to try to explain, ShotBot helps the Law prove that he had been framed, and the Law finally gets back into gaming. (The one he was framed by was Shane, but that part remains unproven.) At the end of the season, Mary finally accepts Jenny and Brian's relationship, but meanwhile Ted feels unappreciated by Brian, and moves out of their dorm room. Also, Ki has a bit of an existential crisis, not really knowing what her purpose is. However, she finally decides to run for student body president, against Shane. She chooses Wendell (who until now has been a very minor character) as her running mate. And the Law gets recruited by a rival school, Napalm Energy Drink High School.

Season 3
So... Napalm's team captain is Ashley Barnstormer, who has a surprise connection to a student at VGHS, the nature of which I don't want to spoil. But I will say that the Law isn't treated very well at NEDHS, and is eventually kicked out. He also loses the right to his own handle; a new kid replaces him as "the Law" (played by Nathan Kress, whom I know from iCarly, though I didn't realize it was him until I read that on Wikipedia after I finished watching the season). So he becomes a nemesis to the old Law. Meanwhile, Ted tries to help Ki with her campaign for class president, but his efforts don't go as he planned. And Ki makes some mistakes of her own, though she gains new allies: the social gamers, led by a girl named O'Doyle. Also, it will be awhile before Ted and Brian become friends again. And... I don't want to reveal the outcome of the election, which comes in episode 3 (halfway through the season). But lots of other stuff goes on this season, including a strain on Brian and Jenny's relationship when she gets the chance to potentially join a professional FPS team in Paris. And... the season just gets progressively darker and darker. I mean, there's always some humor and stuff, but... also a lot of personal drama, some of which I am absolutely not going to spoil. But the season (and the series) ends with a totally epic FPS tournament between Napalm and VGHS. And ultimately, the series ends on a relatively happy note. And I guess that's all I can tell you.


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