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Just say no, y'know?
Punky Brewster, “Just Say No” (S2E8 – YouTube)
A spate of drippy, doe-eyed, anti-drug bromides plastered TV screens throughout the mid-to-late 1980s, and this treacly, shot-on-film sitcom was such a product of empty, Reagan-era fanaticism that the episode is actually called “Just Say No.” Punky and her friend are initiated into a sixth grade girl gang called the Chicklettes, where they dress up “like pint-sized Pointer Sisters,” endure harsh initiation rituals and get offered hard drugs. The lead Chicklette pulls out a box that contains “some grass, a few uppers and a little nose candy,” but Punky resists, eventually leaving the gang to form her own Just Say No club. This time-capsule-from-hell episode ends with footage of eight year-old star Soleil Moon Frye leading a real-life Just Say No rally in Atlanta, which is upsetting on a number of levels.
