Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Shop Class’ On Disney+, Where Teens And Shop Teachers Compete To Find The Best Builders

With all the competition shows around where people bake things, cook things, craft things, and even blow glass, it’s amazing that we haven’t seen a shop-based competition before. It seems like a format that’s especially oriented towards kids, because middle school and high school are often the first time most kids get exposure to woodworking and the various hand and power tools used in the craft. Disney+ has a new show that makes shop class into a fun competition show in the Great British Baking Show vein. Read on for more…

SHOP CLASS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A shot of the Shop Class set, and then host Justin Long saying in voice over, “A new generation of builders are carving their own path.”

The Gist: In Shop Class, 18 teams consisting of two teens and a well-regarded shop teacher are challenged to design and build a complex project in three 12-hour days. In each of the first six episodes, three new teams compete to go to the semi-finals, then the six semi-finalists compete to see who are the three teams who go to the finals. The winner is declared “Shop Class Champions” and given a big grand prize that wasn’t announced in the first episode.

Joining Long are the permanent judges, architect Brooks Atwood and interior designer Lauren Makk. In every episode, the judges are joined by one of the thousands of Disney Imagineers, who combine tech and imagination to create attractions and movie effects around the Disney empire.

In the first episode, the three teams are challenged to design a Little Free Library, those boxes you see in parks and other community spaces where people take and leave books. The idea is that these boxes should be visually creative and tell a story. Oh, and they also need to stand up to the elements, as the libraries are designed to stand outside for years without the books getting wet.

One team makes a modern, Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired structure with glass on two sides and a slanted roof that will deposit water on a box with succulents. The second team decides to make a rocket ship, with French doors to access two shelves of books. The third group makes a pretty plain box, except for a roof that is supposed to look like a book.

After the three days, the boxes are put to the durability test, exposed to a 100mph fan, then pelted with rain, and finally walloped with hail. Each box’s durability is factored into the judges’ final decision.

Our Take: Shop Class, produced by John Stevens, Spike Feresten, Richard Rawlings, Ruth Amsel, Long and Charles Steenveld, keeps the tone positive and light. Everyone roots for each other, and drama is kept at a minimum. In a lot of ways, it strikes a similar tone to LEGO Masters, except the teams consist of kids who are very accomplished woodworkers and designers at an early age. It makes sense, because both shows are designed to be enjoyed by entire families.

Long is there as the host, sure, but he’s also there as comic relief. He has no idea how to do any of the things the kids and shop teachers are doing, so he comes and visits during the first build day to basically distract the kids and make them laugh. It helps to break the tension, even if the show makes it look like Long is making dad jokes that the teens are just rolling their eyes at. But his goofiness serves an important purpose; these are kids, after all, and they should be having fun. So having him try to get the kids to break is a good way to reinforce that point.

Because the teams get three 12-hour days to get their projects done, there’s a lot of activity to film and try to get down to an interesting storyline. For instance, even though the team making the book-roofed box had the simplest design, they took the longest to actually design it. But they also made a box that was so sturdy it would probably stand in its location for 20 years.

We would have wanted to see a few more details about the design and some more of the trials and tribulations the teams had in building their boxes, but the show is just informative enough — who knew what a “dado” was if they didn’t woodwork or watch This Old House? — to perhaps spark kids’ interest in building.

What Age Group Is This For?: Anyone 8 and above who is interested in building things. After all, many a boy’s first building project is their Pinewood Derby car in Cub Scouts, right? (For the record, mine looked like a lopsided jalopy. Woodworking was never my strength.)

Parting Shot: The winner goes on to the semi-finals, but the losing teams all got some pretty sweet-looking, fully-stocked tool cabinets.

Sleeper Star: All of the shop teachers who participate. Shop teachers are always the most down-to-earth teachers in your school, who have no problem dispensing life advice in the guise of design and building tips. Slow down and measure everything, for instance. It’s good stuff!

Most Pilot-y Line: We get the Disney/Imagineering angle, but that part felt more like product placement than a useful addition to the judging panel.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Shop Class doesn’t blow you away, but its amazingly crafty kids and Great British Bake-Off positive vibe makes for a fun way to pass 40 or so minutes.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company.com, RollingStone.com, Billboard and elsewhere.