I’m not going to lie—I loved watching Even Stevens back in the day. By the time it premiered in 2000, I was supposed to be over that type of stuff, you know, getting into Degrassi and TRL, watching Real World: New Orleans when my parents weren’t home. But, instead, on Saturday mornings when my friends thought I was “sleeping in,” I was watching Ren and Louis Stevens go through middle school angst on The Disney Channel.
I'm still not really sure how anyone could not like the show. I had my own particular reasons—that claymation intro was straight-up inspiring, it always appeared to be summer wherever they lived, and Louis, the young Shia LaBeouf, was the little brother I prayed for but never got (something I was constantly reminded of as I watched the show with my younger sister). But even more than that, I wanted to be Ren—the over-achieving class president/hall monitor/middle child who could pull off belly shirts and khaki pants. She qualified as one of my strong female role models, an exclusive club that included Laura Ingalls Wilder, Mia Hamm, and Topanga from Boy Meets World.
