I am an impatient TV watcher, if a story takes too long to develop, I just up and leave. That was the reason why I left after three episodes of Dark, on Netflix, only to come back three years later to finish it. But never once was I impatient when I recently came across and fell in love with the family drama show Chasing Life, originally released on ABC Family.
Being locked in the home without some decent show to watch is not easy. I was going crazy so I went on a mission to find a show to watch. I tried everything, Switched at Birth, The O.C., One Tree Hill, and many other shows but nothing worked. Then the first episode of Chasing Life came on and I knew this show was going to be the cure to my boredom.
It was only going to be a simple time passing option for me early on but there was something about Chasing Life. It was a show about a family struggling to live together with a disease wreaking havoc on all of their lives. I couldn’t help but draw a comparison to what we are all going through now.
While I found the pilot episode to be a generic tear-jerker ABC programming. The current situation couldn’t help but elevate the show to a unique standing. The simplicity of the story combined with Italia Ricci‘s amazing performance gave the show more life than the pilot episode showed.
What is Chasing Life About?
Chasing Life is about a mid-twenties girl who is only starting out in her career as a reporter. She is living with her mother, grandmother, and younger sister because interning doesn’t pay enough. April thought that was all the struggle she had to do before standing on her own two feet, but things take a sharp left turn when she is diagnosed with leukemia.
April was only in her twenties, her whole life was ahead of her and a home-wrecking disease springed on her. Only when she was making some headway at her job and in her home, she got the surprise no one ever wants to get. So, then the story is not about April chasing success, it is about her Chasing Life.
Created by Susanna Fogel, the show ran for two seasons and was canceled after only 13 episodes in its second season. All in all the show has 34 episodes which you can find on Amazon.
Why Chasing Life is a Show for This Time?
Okay, this is a long shot, but there are some similarities between what happened in Chasing Life and the current situation we are all in right now. Maybe it is the recency bias I have which is leading me to draw parallels between the show and the current situation we are living through but just bear with me.
Chasing Life does not have a world shutting virus, but what it does show is a young girl’s struggle with leukemia. While COVID-19 is playing out on a much larger scale, the result is almost the same when it comes to COVID-19s effect on family and caring for a child with leukemia, and the mental toll it takes on everyone.
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Life stops for everyone, you need to tiptoe around the person suffering, everyone makes plans around the big virus/disease from a family’s point of view you can draw parallels. Chasing Life shows what happens to a person, a family, when one of theirs is in pain and suffering, while no one can do anything but hope and pray their beloved does not fall on the unlucky side of the percentage.
Maybe I am just to wrapped up in the virus and the toll it is taking on all of us. But for me, Chasing Life was a ray of sunshine in these gloomy times, a generically unique show which is standing the test of time and something everyone should experience right this moment.
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ABC April Chasing Life Italia Ricci
Last modified: September 2, 2020
