Fab or flub: Raven-Symone Presents’ DVD

Posted in Mom Stuff
by besttech

Catherine Mallette McClatchy Newspapers

WHAT IT IS: Kids know Raven-Symone as the former star of “That’s So Raven” on Disney Channel and one of the former singers in the Cheetah Girls. Parents will remember her as Olivia on “The Cosby Show.” This 90-minute DVD presents her as a kind of Martha Stewart meets Katie Couric for kids. She crafts! She cooks! She interviews glass blowers! She gives a wide range of advice and boredom-busting ideas. There’s also, inexplicably, a couple segments where she takes on jobs at Six Flags.

WHAT WE THOUGHT: My 14-year-old daughter dubbed this DVD a “career-killer,” and I have to say, this wasn’t a good choice for Raven-Symone. It’s hard to tell what age group she’s targeting. Some of it seems incredibly juvenile (making candy sushi out of powdered doughnuts and Twinkies) but then she also shows you the right way to wash your underwire bra and how to bleach out and stress-out blue jeans (the end result was unattractive). The theme “voice your voice” was admirable, but the profiles of the kids and adults doing activities that interested them (glass blowing; photography) didn’t seem to fit with the more commercial parts of the DVD.

FAB OR FLUB?: Sorry, Raven. Flub.