“American Dreams” Season 3 (2004-05, NBC), episodes 1-5 – Like the new show “Jack & Bobby,” “American Dreams” conjures up better days, but it looks to the past instead of the future. It lionizes the 1960s with an “American Bandstand” soundtrack and contemporizes the period by having modern pop stars play dress-up while covering classics by their predecessors (I guarantee you won’t hear Hilary Duff singing “Leader of the Pack” on any other show). The parallel between Vietnam and Iraq is there for those who want it, but “American Dreams,” especially as of last season, has a softer touch than you’d think.
Pryor family patriarch Jack (Tom Verica), running for a Philadelphia City Council seat in the current storyline, is the type of stick-to-what-you-believe guy who would get a lot of votes. The cast features the best one-note actors on TV, and I don’t mean that as a slight. In addition to Verica, there’s Sarah Ramos as younger daughter Patty, who speaks in the perpetual monotone of an interested/baffled kid who is put off by parents’ seeming disinterest and drawn to older sister Meg’s (Brittany Snow) phone calls.
Milo Ventimiglia, who played aloof rebel Jess the last few years on “Gilmore Girls,” essentially reprises his role, only this time he’s called Chris. He smokes cigarettes and drinks beer (1965 edgy), preferably with smart/cute girl Meg, instead of dropping out of school and secretly working at Wal-Mart to save up enough money to buy a car and live his aloof lifestyle in peace (2002 edgy), preferably with smart/cute girl Rory. I think Jess/Chris would be perfect for Veronica Mars.
As brother J.J. (Will Estes) fights overseas, Meg directs her school’s ’Nam-centric version of “Henry V,” and Jess/Chris feigns disinterest in the project while secretly wishing her well. He hides his true feelings in an attempt to get someone to like him.
He’d make a good politician.
– John Hansen, “On Tuesday, vote Pryor and McCallister,” Brainerd Dispatch, Oct. 28, 2004