Why Zenon And Smart House Are The Best Disney Channel Original Movies

What is it about these two made-for-television movies from 1999 that have captured the collective memories of millennials?

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If you follow Doug “Nostalgia Critic” Walker, you’ll know that his Disneycember reviews last year were on the Disney Channel Original Movies. And if you’re a millennial like myself who grew up watching those movies back in the 1990s and 2000s, you’d consider his reviews to be quite the trip down memory lane — for better or for worse!

In terms of quality, the Disney Channel movies are quite the grab bag. While a lot of them are cheesy, schlocky flicks that were always as bad as we remembered them, a few of them have proven to stand the test of time as quite the rare gems, or good enough movies.

Aside from High School Musical and Halloweentown, two movies that have come to be considered classics — or as “classical” as made-for-television movies can be — are two that were, interestingly enough, released on the same year of 1999: Smart House and Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century.

Both movies in recent years have risen to the surface within the cultural zeitgeist, with both movies ranking high on lists on Buzzfeed and Collider, inspiring several think pieces and reviews, and with Zenon even rumored to receive its own television series.

But what is it about these two movies that have captured the collective memories of millennials? Are these movies just as good as when they first premiered nearly two decades ago? Or are millennials just too blinded by nostalgia to realize that both movies have aged as well as the Y2K panic? (Answer: Yes, both of them are really that good!)