Sequel or Equal??

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Many people have discussed this at length, and you'll find that most Rocky fans are sincere believers in one or the other (and still others dub it "crap", but we'll ignore those for the moment)

Sequel

Shocky does have several elements that could cause it being dubbed a "sequel".

• The same characters (Brad and Janet, Ralph and Betty)
• The character's lives have progressed since we last saw them.
• They live in the same town (Denton)
• We are given bakground on some characters (ie: Brad's adoption and his twin brother)

However, these are fairly shaky. If Brad and Janet had been through the experience of RH, you'd think they'd have mentioned it once . . .

Equal

The suggestions for this option are somewhat stronger-

• Returned actors in different roles. (Charles Gray, Richard, Pat, and Nell,  -not to mention a couple trannies)
• The dream quality to the film- ST has a surreal quality of a dream: all sets being pure white, the audience coming in at the beginning (but never leaving until the very end) The maze-like feeling of DTV's studios . . .
• The main characters represented by different actors. (meaning Brad, Janet, and Betty) 
• I also find it hard to believe that Brad could become such a complete wuss in the time between the two films.

Of course, these are just MY opinions, and you're more than entitled to your own. But it seems to me that Shocky has just enough added to it to allow those that want to consider it a sequel to do so, and those that would rather see it as an equally entertaining filmed musical wouldn't be far off either.

But as far as I'm concerned, calling Shock Treatment the sequel to RHPS is like calling Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat the sequel to Jesus Christ Superstar. Yes, they're both musicals, yes they're both by the same author, and yes, hey, they're both basically about the same subject, in our case Brad and Janet, and in the above case, the Bible. But that doesn't automatically make them the same.