Each episode brings some new fresh hell for Patty and Lauren, but also some hope that their fortunes will somehow change and their stock will rise (in the pilot episode, Patty impresses a "stone fox" upperclassman, and in another, she's Vinnie's leading lady in the Chorus Line-inspired school musical, "A Cafeteria Line"). Until then, cup size may trump IQ, but friendship will trump popularity. Weemawee High School appears to be based in New York, but everything else about the show is totally Los Angeles, from, like, Jennifer’s Valley Girl-speak to an appearance in one episode by Steve Sax and the Dodgers. The laugh track is as lame and half-hearted as the one employed by SCTV, but the show’s left of center spirit shines through. Two standout episodes feature, respectively, Bill Murray (Beatts’ former National Lampoon and <>SNL colleague) as an unorthodox substitute teacher, and Devo, who performs at Muffy’s New Wave Bat Mitzvah. And that’s Wally Cleaver himself, Tony Dow, as Patty’s estranged divorced father in what passes as a Very Special two-part holiday episode. Square Pegs is totally '80s (in one episode, Marshall's Pac-Man addiction can only be cured by an intervention by Don Novello’s Father Guido Sarducci), but the Waitress’s indelible theme song ("I’d like it if they like us/But I don’t think they like us") sets just the right pathetic/persevering tone that will resonate for a new generation for whom "one size does not fit all." --Donald Liebenson