Will Friedle

It's time to recap 2002's military coming-of-age comedy...

cadet kelly this is a fan favorite this one was released march 8th 2002 and premiered to a whopping 7.8 million viewers mostly because it was the first movie to ever get the abc treatment in the wonderful world of disney series which pisses me off and makes no sense to me because why can i watch this one but i can't watch my date with the president's daughter h double hockey sticks so i maybe because it was also a disney channel movie

Yeah.

That they then Wonderful World of Disney'd?

I think it did both, frankly.

I think it got the ABC Wonderful World of Disney treatment on a Saturday or Sunday night, but then I think it was also simultaneously a DCOM, which ours was not.

Ours was just a Wonderful World of Disney movie, which is why I think you can watch Cadet Kelly and you can't watch anything else, much to my mother's chagrin.

But yes, but the Wonderful World of Disney series, that's obviously a big milestone and a successful debut by all accounts.

No shock for anybody.

This was filmed in Kenyatta.

Yes, this was Kenyatta.

And that's Canada for all the people up there in Canada, by the way.

But this marked the second one ever that was produced to our north.

And it was made specifically at two places.

The most prominent was Robert Land Academy, which is a private military style boot camp in West Lincoln that closed last year.

So over the years, it had its share of controversies.

But in December 2024, everything came to a head when the school faced over 50 lawsuits for alleged physical and sexual abuse, only to rise to 120 accusations by the end of the year.

So it seems maybe Cadet Kelly was a rare bright spot for this location and thankfully forced them to close.

The other notable location was Loretto Abbey Catholic Secondary School.

Ooh, that's a mouthful.