Kristina's Media Blog

*Skins is broadcasted on E4 at 10pm every Thursday.

*Skins was premiered on E4 on 25th January 2007. The fourth series was officially announced in 2008. Filming will commence with all the series three cast in July 2009.

*The show was created by father and son television writers Bryan Elsley and Jamie Brittain for Company Pictures.
Executive producers: Bryan Elsley and George Faber
Producer: Chris Clough

*The pilot episode of Skins averaged 1.5 million viewers.
The rating for the second series which launched on E4 on 11 February 2008 peaked at 884,000 viewers (a further 160,000 watched it an hour later on E4+1)which gave it 5.9% audience share and taking 60% of the 16-24 demographic,however this was still more than 500,000 viewers down on its series one premiere. 809,300 tuned in to the second episode, which aired one week later in the 10pm slot. The series finale attracted an audience of 740,000 on E4 equating to a 4.65% share of the audience. The start of the third series drew in 877,000 and 113900 including E4+1, which did well with its key audience demographic of younger viewers (56.2% were aged between 16 and 34). The second episode was up in figures as 889,000 watched (including E4+1). Episode three drew 857,000 on e4. Episode four drew 866,000 viewers on E4 (including E4+1).

*The first series received positive reviews, although some critics complained that the series depicts teenagers unrealistically and stereotypically. Writer and producer Marieke Hardy was extremely admiring of the show, and particularly enjoyed the fact that the show was "beautiful and sad and poignant and perfectly hurtful", while also managing to give impression of being drama that is "edgy, funny and rude". Comedian and writer Stewart Lee has remarked during an interview on the BBC4 programme Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe that he feels lucky for having been a teenager watching TV for teenagers in the 1970s and not the 2000s as "there was something really comforting for nerds and weirdos about programmes like Children of the Stones and The Changes." He said that watching Skins as a teenager today would make him feel lonelier than he already would have been. Gordon Farrer writing in Melbourne's The Age called it a "refreshing, entertaining and worthy series" and wrote it was "compulsory viewing for parents of teenagers as much as for teens."

*The target audience is for teenagers and young adults as they can relate to Skins.

*The programme won the Best Drama prize at the 2008 Rose d'Or ceremony. It also won Best Production Design (Drama) for Amelia Shankland's work on "Cassie", at the Royal Television Society Awards 2007, in addition to being nominated for Best Photography (Drama). Tal Rosner's graphics for Skins won a BAFTA for Best Title Sequence at the British Academy Television Craft Awards in May 2008. It was announced on 18 March 2008 that the show had been nominated for Best Drama Series in the British Academy Television Awards 2008. Skins won the Philips Audience Award at the BAFTAs 2009, beating The Apprentice, Coronation Street, Outnumbered, Wallander and The X Factor.

*The Dawson Bros, co-writers of Skins, say the series represents the everyday lives of adolescents: Skins revolves around the lives of a group of 16-19 year-old friends who live in Bristol and attend the fictional Roundview Sixth Form College. Each episode has a self-contatined theme and focuses on a different character, although several story arcs span different episodes. Accompanying the episode title at the beginning of each episode is a short montage of that episode's central character. Each character is stereo-typical of teenagers, for example; the geek, the naughty one etc.

*To see the trailer for Skins, click on this link: http://www.e4.com/skins/interactive-trailer.html