The magic sauce of FX’s English Teacher is nostalgia. The show evokes high-school movies from another time: Its credits are scrawled in a neon-pink cursive that would be right at home against the backdrop of a John Hughes–movie establishing shot of a nondescript municipal building. Evan Marquez (played by Brian Jordan Alvarez) scrambles out of bed and zips off to his job while “Manic Monday” plays in the background, the 1983 synth sounds rubbing pleasantly against the ho-hum franticness of his coffee splashing around the cup holder of his beat-up car. If Abbott Elementary feels old school because it recalls the warm ’90s heyday of an all-ages prime-time comedy, English Teacher feels old school because its vision of high school runs 2025 through the philosophy of Ferris Bueller’s Day

See Full Page