The airwaves have been chocked with teen dramas probably since advertisers realized there was big money to be made appealing to the 15 –25 year age group. They started off with films in the mid to late seventies and then moved on the television screens in the early eighties and haven't let us alone since.

I'm sure most of us have heard of at least Beverly Hills 90210, Degrassi Junior High, (and its latest incarnation, the kids of kids of Degrassi or as they like to call it Degrassi: Next Generation) and My So Called Life which featured Claire Danes. Of those three the original Degrassi series was the least slick and most believable, and Claire Danes was her usual luminescent self in salvaging what could have been teen melodrama, and 90210 was – well the less said about that one the better.

But after the fall of 90210 and before the resurrection of Degrassi there appeared a half hour show that may have snuck under your radar, even if you lived in its country of origin. Our Hero was produced in Canada by a small independent production company along with the ubiquitous assistance of the Mother corporation, better known as the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (C.B.C.).

Our Hero was broadcast for three seasons starting in 2000 and followed seventeen year old Kale Stiglie (Cara Pifko) as she came to grips with life, the universe, and everything. It sounds like your typical teen-angst drama, an oh-so-embarrassing moments type show, but it was saved by a number of details so many of these shows seem to overlook: originality, great scripts, a firm grip on reality, and an understanding of what is and isn't funny and what is and isn't emotion.

The great script and originality pretty much fall into the same camp in Our Hero as it revolves around Kale's attempts to find her way in the world and her recording of it in that precursor to blogs known as a 'zine. 'Zines were and maybe still are a means of recording your life in the form of a newspaper. They were very deliberately made along the lines of a cut and paste ransom note to emphasize their true homemade nature. They were heavily reliant on paste, scissors, originality, and photocopying.

Each episode in Our Hero is thus given an issue name, with Kale proudly announcing it at the beginning. We are than treated to a live action version of the 'zine that she has printed up and distributed to the school and mailed off to all points of the earth that she may have addresses for.

Episodes have titles such as "The Shallow Issue", "The Gutsy Issue" or "If The Shoe Fits Issue" each in reference to what Kale is going to be struggling with in the upcoming thirty minutes. But, while Kale may learn what courage is really about, how you can't truly understand someone else's life that easily, and being shallow cuts a lot of ways, there are no pat answers or benefactors to help her along the way.

The hero of Our Hero doesn't rescue anyone or solve problems in a single bound, she stumbles around in the dark like the rest of us did as teenagers, making ridiculous mistakes, sticking both feet in her mouth, and often regretting she was ever born. Her 'zine, "Our Hero," from which the show derives its title, was her way of taking control of the fact she is imperfect by reveling in her flaws and telling the world about them before it can rub her face in them.