What’s worse than going to your high school reunion? Being there when the apocalypse strikes and finding yourself doomed to see out your final days with people you’ve spent years running from. This is the premise of Class of ’07, a new eight-part Amazon Prime comedy that follows a group of 28-year-olds as they navigate life after a huge climate event maroons them on the newly formed island that was once their all-girls high school.
Leading the story is Zoe (Emily Browning), who shows up at the reunion during a personal crisis and reconnects with ex-best friend Zoe (Megan Smart) and former mean girl Saskia (Caitlin Stasey). Also there are stoner duo Tegan (Bernie Van Tiel) and Megan (Chi Nguyễn), former school captain Genevieve (Claire Lovering) and scholarship student-turned crypto queen Phoebe (played to perfection by the very funny Steph Tisdell). Together they must find a way to survive with dwindling food stocks and process the unresolved trauma and residual rage that quickly comes floating to the surface. Think Yellowjackets but with shoey references.
A show like this lives or dies on its cast and the Class of ’07 ensemble is utterly charming. The two high-profile leads in Browning and Stasey are both excellent, with Stasey particularly at home in the role of school-bully-turned-tyrannical-leader who demands everyone use electricity generators to straighten their hair each morning; the apocalypse version of making your bed when working from home (“It sets a standard.”) Tisdell, who snags many of the show’s best lines, is a clear standout, as is the delightful Renee (Emma Horn), who, in a white lie that can only end in disaster, given the circumstance, tells everyone at the reunion she’s a doctor (she actually a nail technician).
The show benefits from what is an evidently big budget: it looks great and has a star-studded soundtrack aimed squarely at those of us who were also in the class of 2007. Indie sleaze-era hits from the likes of the Gossip, Dizzee Rascal and Lykke Li are fun inclusions but the use of songs from 10 Things I Hate About You, The Devil Wears Prada and the Veronica Mars theme feel to be trying a little too hard to extract nostalgia. Millennial-specific humour also comes in thick and fast, with lines like: “I racked up a $200 bill on my dad’s working phone texting the Australian Idol number because you said that you would kill yourself if Paulini was voted out” – but often they’re funny enough that you don’t mind.
And there are plenty of laughs here, particularly when the show leans into Australian humour (see: “the poco” as slang for the apocalypse), as well as some sweet, yeah-the-girls scenes. There are also some teenage backstory plot lines – one about a sexual relationship with a teacher, the other concerning the death of a parent – that are both moving and could have been explored in more depth.
Unfortunately, many of the best moments come later in the show. Viewers may struggle through the first episode, where lines like “I just farted out of my butthole” are deployed as punchlines and irritating moments outweigh endearing ones. But Class of ’07 finds its rhythm as it gets further along and particularly soars in episodes four and five, which were penned by Romina Accurso; if only the writing had been as clever the whole way through. But Class of ’07 does end on a funny note, and one that leaves the door open for a second season – which it is ultimately enjoyable enough to deserve.
Class of ’07 starts on Amazon Prime on 17 March
