The History of "Saved by the Bell" (Part III: The New Class)

On May 22, 1993, the original Saved by the Bell run ended with the core sextet donning their caps and gowns and receiving their high school diplomas. That episode marked the end of the original TV series, though the saga with that group continued on with two telefilms, with a continuation series, Saved by the Bell: The College Years wedged in between. College Years premiered right after the graduation finale episode, but that was not the only bit of continuation that the series would receive.

Just months after College Years began, the franchise made a return to Bayside, with a whole new group of students. Though, at first, it didn't seem like it was a different group.

On September 11, 1993, Saved by the Bell: The New Class premiered on NBC, airing on their TNBC lineup just like their predecessor. I remember trying to watch the Season One episodes when they reran on the USA Network. Boy, was that a chore. There were so many hols in Season One, but the main problem was that they were desperately trying to take literally everything from the original series and display it in this group.

Take the first season's batch of students. The cast was led by Robert Sutherland Telfair as Scott Erickson, and to say he's an attempted Zack Morris clone would be an understatement. Not only is Scott a schemer and a troublemaker, he also did the whole "fourth wall break" thing that Zack mastered. Isaac Lidsky played Barton "Weasel" Wyzell, an immensely lame attept to copy Screech, and I'm being nice when I say that. Jonathan Angel played Tommy De Luca, nicknamed "Tommy D," and holy crap, was his character awful at first. He was supposed to be the Slater of the group, yet they managed to do the impossible: they made Tommy D even more toxically male than Slater.

The female half of the sextet was represented by Natalia Cigliuti as Lindsay Warner, who was definitely the Kelly Kapowski of the group, Bianca Lawson as Megan Jones, who was a cross between Jessie Spano (due to the character being a star student) and Lisa Turtle (due to representation), and Bonnie Russavage as Vicki Needleman, who wasn't a copycat of any of the OG characters, but it can be said that she's definitely a version of Ginger, one of the side characters from Season Four of the original series. Of course, Dennis Haskins was back as principal Richard Belding, but that and cast members Lawson and Cigliuti were the only positives. As I said, Season One was a mess, but thankfully, the debut season only lasted 13 episodes.

Season Two fixed a lot of Season One's issues by trimming half of that group from the show. Telfair, Lidsky, and Russavage were out, and regarding the female latter one-third of that trio, that void was filled by Sarah Lancaster as Rachel Meyers, who basically had a lot of combined traits of Kelly, Jessie, and Lisa, but we don't really see them forced on the viewers, which is an improvement. Spankee Rogers played Bobby Wilson, who is described as a bit of a goofball, and finally, Christian Oliver joined the show as Brian Keller, a transfer student from Switzerland, and was basically the defacto leader of that group of students. In real life, Oliver (who tragically passed away in January 2024) was born in Germany, which does border Switzerland. In addition, the character of Tommy D improved a bit; he wasn't as toxic and was less of a bully then he was in Season One.

So the student group improved quite a bit, but that wasn't the only improvement:

Along with the new additions, Season Two featured an oldie but very goodie: the return of Samuel "Screech" Powers. The season opener, aptly titled, "The Return of Screech," centered on Screech being hired as Belding's administrative assistant, beginning a professional kinship between the Bayside alum and his former principal. This was a much needed boost after the disastrous first season, and the powers that be knew it. Another trend that we would see for the rest of the series' run was Belding and Screech having their own stories, where we see the duo serve as a bit of a comedy team, with Screech giving a Stan Laurel vibe alongside Belding's Oliver Hardy-esque exasperation. I always did love that Screech referred to Belding as "Chief," very awesome and a bit humorous. More on Screech later.

Season Two premiered on September 10, 1994, months after College Years ended but a few weeks prior to Wedding in Las Vegas' airdate. The season doubled in size from 13 to 26 episodes, beginning a trend that would see back-to-back episodes aired for 13 weeks. Season Two ended with a two-part episode, "Goodbye Bayside," which centered on a wealthy alum attempting to buy the school and replace it with condos, only for Bayside to be saved by three returning alums: Lisa Turtle, A.C. Slater, and Zack Morris--all making their first appearances in the franchise since Wedding in Las Vegas.

By this time, The New Class' own core sextet was starting to build. It began with Rachel debuting in Season Two, and Season Three saw Oliver, Lawson, and Rogers out and replaced with new cast members. Enter Richard Lee Jackson as Ryan Parker, Salim Grant as R.J. Collins, and Samantha Becker as Maria Lopez. All three new Bayside students were actually transfers from Valley--Bayside's main rival, and that didn't set well with Tommy, Rachel, and Lindsay, though it would work out eventually. Ryan was the schemer of the group, and he often had R.J. as a partner in his plans.

During Season Three, Ryan and Lindsay became a couple, but that would change in Season Four, as Natalia Cigliuti left after three seasons, as did Jonathan Angel, meaning that there were no remaining students from New Class' beginning. Salim Grant only lasted that third season, and the void left by those three was filled by Anthony Harrell as Eric Little, Lindsay McKeon as Katie Peterson, and Ben Gould as Nicky Farina (Ryan's stepbrother from New York, though he's nothing like Eric).

A lot of things changed with these additions. For one, Ryan and Rachel became a couple, as did Nicky and Katie...well...until Nicky was caught locking lips with Maria. Oops. So they became a thing right after. Season Four ended with a two-parter, "Fire at the Max," where the popular hangout is accidentally burned down by Ryan, and it's in the conclusion where Mario Lopez returns again as Slater, his second and last appearance on The New Class, as well as the last time that any other OG core member appears (other than Screech and Belding, of course).

Season Five saw another departure; Sarah Lancaster left the show after three seasons, and filling that void was Ashley Lyn Cafagna as Liz Miller, a new student to Bayside, as well as an eventual new love interest for Ryan. It was around the middle of Season Four that I started watching The New Class religiously on Saturday mornings, and Season Five was the first full season I watched. It didn't take long for me--at the age of 12 when Season Five aired--to develop a bit of a crush on this amazing actress:

I loved Maria Lopez, played wonderfully by Samantha Becker, now known as Samantha Esteban. She was bold, she was awesome as hell, and a lot of times, she told it like it is. There was something else about Maria, too, and it hit me when Season Six started. Season Six gave us the show's last casting change: Richard Lee Jackson was out as Ryan Parker, and in came Tom Wade Huntington as Tony Dillon, another transplant from Valley. As shown in the season opener, "Maria's Revenge," Maria was definitely not happy to see Tony, and that's an understatement, as she had held a vicious grudge against Tony for standing her up at a middle school prom. As the episode's title states, Maria gets her payback by spreading vicious lies about Tony, which actually end up costing Tony his job and actually gets him beaten up by the football team.

The last part does cause Maria to develop some guilt, but her anger remained. She then finds out the truth: Tony couldn't afford a tuxedo,and that's why he stood Maria up back then. This isn't the first time Maria showed that she was capable of evil deeds. Season Five's "Secrets and Liz" showed that Maria was willing to basically demean her own friends if it meant that her talk show could succeed. Now I know why I had a bit of a crush on Maria--she's basically a Lifetime movie villainess in training.

Seasons Six and Seven were actually filmed all at once in 1998, and each season lasted just 13 episodes. Season Seven was the final season of The New Class, and premiered on September 11, 1999--six years to the day after the show's overall premiere. The season featured the last batch of themed episodes, and overall, they've done episodes placing the students at a country club and even overseas, but for Season Seven, the students were at a police and fire academy, which is run by Maria's police captain father. Speaking of Maria, she's not the only one capable of unethical behavior. In the episode, "Liz Burns Eric," Liz changed the test answers of a boy she was crazy over, and it resulted in her crush getting promoted over her own friend Eric. She turned herself in out of guilt, but even so, she resorted to all of that just to get affection.

"The Bell Tolls" served as the true overall series finale of The New Class, and it saw the students receive their diplomas and later end up going their separate ways. Liz was off to Stanford, Eric was attending school in Chicago, and while Nicky and Katie were back together, Nicky was off to NYU. As for Richard Belding, he accepted the position of Dean of Students at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (Fun fact: Dennis Haskins really is from Tennessee). While "The Bell Tolls" was the overall series finale, it was not the final episode to air. The episode aired on December 4, 1999, but the last episode to air was "A Repair to Remember," which aired on January 8, 2000. Staying true to the show's habit, "A Repair to Remember" was supposed to air just a few weeks earlier, but ended up airing five weeks after the official finale.

Similar to the original show, some serious issues were tackled. Drug use was definitely one; in one episode, Lindsay developed a smoking habit, which actually led to a dream sequence where Lindsay sees her friends decades later...mourning her death. An episode from Season Seven saw Katie addicted to prescription painkillers, and we saw a few episodes with female characters in controlling, and even abusive, relationships.

The New Class also featured its share of memorable guest stars; for example, Amy Jo Johnson (the original Pink Ranger) appeared in an episode as a potential love interest for Screech. Johnson wasn't the only Power Ranger who appeared on the show, as another episode featured Justin Nimmo (Silver Ranger Zhane from Power Rangers in Space). In one episode, Ryan Hurst, aka Beta from The Walking Dead, appeared as Crunch Grabowski--a member of Bayside's football team. Another episode featured Jim Harbaugh, now the head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers, as Screech's cousin, and Olympic gymnast Shannon Miller appeared in Season Five's opener, while NBA icon Kareem Abdul-Jabbar appeared in Season Six's opener.

Before I end this chapter, there's one thing I have to address:

One thing I couldn't help but notice as The New Class progressed: Screech's character became more and more cartoonish. I used to think the portrayal and characterization of Screech was only messed up on The New Class, but honestly, it's been screwed up from jump street. Think about it. Screech is supposed to be the show's resident nerd. Nerds are smart. Look at Steven Q. Urkel. Look at Sheldon Lee Cooper. Look at Edd (Double D from Ed, Edd n Eddy) While they're awkward, the common sense is there. The same cannot be said for Screech. Screech is more dimwit than awkward nerd, and that was before his return in The New Class.

As the show progressed, Screech became more and more cartoonish, with the centerpiece being his voice. Screech's voice was getting higher and higher during the show's final years. I get that he's not supposed to be a serious character, but he's also not supposed to be a gimmick, either. Because of this, I can understand some of Dustin Diamond's frustration with the show in later years. If they made my character out to be nothing more than a gimmicky sideshow, I'd be salty as well. But that's the only thing he should have been upset about.

It's amazing; Saved by the Bell: The New Class actually lasted for seven seasons, which is three seasons longer than the original series. I do love The New Class; it definitely had a lot of amazing moments, and the cast, while changing, was absolutely stellar. While this series served as the end of an overall long era, we would receive a brief continuation two decades later, but that is another story for another time.