Product Description

LAGUNA BEACH: THE REAL ORANGE COUNTY -- It’s one of the wealthiest, most beautiful communities in the world and MTV has unlimited access to the tight-knit power clique of eight rich, beautiful teenagers that live there. Their lives intertwine in ways you won’t believe, until you drop in for a visit. Watch as these friends share experiences through parties, relationships, love triangles and small town injustices. This is where the angst and the tumultuous affairs are the stuff of prime time drama – except this is all REAL. Welcome to Paradise, otherwise known as Laguna Beach, California.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12622 in DVD
• Brand: Paramount
• Released on: 2005-07-19
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 3
• Running time: 226 minutes

Amazon.com
Branded as "The real Orange County," this tepid yet easily addictive MTV series follows a group of wealthy high schoolers from Laguna Beach, California. Their lives are almost too perfect to be real: good looks, houses by the beach, even close relationships with their parents. They shop, plan parties, and get brand-new cars wrapped in a bow for graduation (and you thought that only happened in commercials!). But it's a reality show packaged as a teen soap.

At the center of season 1 is the love triangle between good-girl narrator LC, her childhood friend Stephen, and his beautiful but cold girlfriend Kristin, who likes to mention at any chance possible how much she "hates" LC. Other highlights for the seniors include spring break in Cabo, birthday bashes, one character's embarrassing audition for a Broadway show, and the repetitive mantra of "Can you believe this is the last time we'll be together like this?"

One's envy of young rich kids who are just like you--but not--is certainly what Laguna Beach likes to tap into (you find out they even have weekly O.C. viewing parties!). Unfortunately, it's also what makes it so vanilla. Since there aren't producers auditioning the most colorful personalities to home-grow drama, you're left with pals so alike you get them confused. Not only that, their "conflicts"--limited to gossip and drunk confrontations--don't really make for great television, at least by the reality-TV standards we're used to. But kids who thrive on the gossip of their own friends will likely continue chatting about this show like it's their own high school.

DVD features include an MTV cribs-type tour of LC's massive mansion (still being built in season 1) and many deleted scenes, which include the technical glitch that got Morgan into BYU (see? It's not just money) and Trey's argument with a midget. --Ellen Kim

Customer Reviews

ah, Guilty Pleasure at its finest
This show is pretty much the definition of a guilty pleasure, and I'm guilty all right: half of the people I know mock me for watching this show and the other half have no idea I watch because I would die of shame if they found out. My sister constantly questions why I watch LB and I have fine-honed my reasons:

-- I went to an overly academically geared high school, so never had the chance to gossip about the in-crowd hijinks of "hooking up" and drunken antics. I missed out on my prime gossip years!

-- It's a chance to see how the other (wealthier) half live... and mock them.

-- Anthropologists have determined that 60% of human communication involves talking about other people; watching "Laguna Beach" proves how human I am.

-- It's a chance to sit back and watch attractive, overly wealthy and pampered teenagers make each other miserable by gossiping, back-stabbing and stealing each other's boyfriends and objects of affection. It's like the real-life version of "Mean Girls" only without Tina Fey writing their lines for them. Less wit, better clothes!

The show is lots of fun if you've got the twisted sensibility to enjoy it. And the second season is much, much better than the first season, with more cat fights, break-ups, tears and "hook-ups" than ever.

My only caveat: watching this on DVD is really the best way to watch, just downing episode after episode right after each other, but I don't know about the necessity of owning them -- who would want to re-watch these episode over and over again? I'm pretty much of the opinion that no reality show is a must-have on DVD, so definitely Netflix/rent over buying.

Not the OC but a whole different view
Laguna Beach is a great show to watch while hanging out with your friends or just having some down time on a Saturday afternoon. It is mostly made up of fueds between friends and dramas that occur with regular teenagers around the world. I for one love this show and TiVo it every time it appears on television. I used to think it was just abut some stupid kids running around spending money but when I started to watch it more and more, I got hooked! I can't wait to see the next season! I would definatley recomend this show and would encourage you to buy the DVD set.

Good for the die hard fans.. but there's a problem...
Like many people, I was sucked into the Laguna bubble, and became a die hard fan of the series, so it only made sense that I buy this set. The packaging that MTV did is beautiful, the quality and sound is great, and all the extras are well worth watching.

The only problem I have with this set, is that MTV made a bunch of music changes. Some songs that were used in the original broadcasting of the show have been replaced, and in my opinion, the changes stuck out like a sore thumb. If you watched all the reruns, and are enough of a fan to buy the set, I'm sure you'll notice them too. Personally, I can't stand when the original music of episode has been altered. But what really annoys me, is that MTV didn't even put a warning anywhere on the box. "Features brand new music," would have been a nice warning to those willing to fork out $30 for their set, but apparently they kept it a close guarded secret. At least with "Dawson's Creek," ( original music was also changed for the dvd ) they let the consumers know about it. Bad move MTV.