Tara Ward watches Three’s coming-of-age comedy set in her old home town, and recognises… not much.

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Most probably think of it as a small country town, but when I moved there from an even smaller country town at age 15, Gore was a metropolis. It had a Warehouse. It had a movie theatre next to a hairdressers that was open on a Wednesday (a Wednesday!) night. It had two supermarkets and a roundabout. It had lots of bogans and lots of centre parks. There were opportunities in Gore, especially if (like me) you enjoyed staring at the shiny ball gowns in Farry’s and then strutting next door to Deka for a big bag of pick’n’mix and dreams of golden days to come.

So it was with an optimistic heart and a brain full of repressed memories that I dived like an old brown trout into Three’s new coming-of-age comedy series n00b, which makes the rare move of setting its story in Gore. The year is 2005 and Nikau (Max Crean), captain of the first XV and most popular student at the fictional Gore College, is in the midst of a social downfall. In a time when the internet offered new ways to escape and connect, Nikau has a secret passion for writing fanfiction shipping Ashton Kutcher and Gerard Way from My Chemical Romance. When his secret is exposed, his social stocks plummet.

Outed as gay, Nikau is ostracised by friends and family. He has to navigate the unpredictable social hurricane of high school – as well as the exciting world of the internet – so he can learn to embrace his true identity.

N00b began as a popular TikTok series created by Victoria Boult (who wrote and directed the TV series) and Rachel Fawcett (who produced). The expanded six-part series aims for a Sex Education vibe, a show that pours teenage angst and raging hormones into a rocket fuel of real world issues like sexuality, family tensions and unplanned pregnancy. The result is a hectic comedy cocktail, and a show that’s anything but subtle.

In n00b’s world, you know you’re not cool when the rugby lads refuse to do “soggy biscuit” with you any more. The first few episodes feature circle jerking, a beer bong up someone’s arse, projectile vomiting, electrocution and senior citizens dialling up cowboy porn in front of high school students. The team of young actors do a solid job of bringing the show’s archetypal characters to life. Some moments feel more genuine than others, like the all-encompassing rugby culture and the school trip to the freezing works (my fifth form school camp also included a tour of the Dunedin hospital laundry facilities, as well as the Ravensdown fertiliser factory).

There’s a lot going on in n00b, and it comes at you at a fierce, big energy pace. The tone is set in the opening moments, with a reenactment of Havoc and Newsboy’s infamous “greedy old gay man’s Gore” 1999 satirical rant. It was a moment that triggered a shameful over-reaction from some locals, but n00b is a useful new lens on this pop culture moment to explore how a teenager would come to terms with his own sexuality in such an environment.

But if you were hoping to see Nikau’s girlfriend Lauren Conrad (no, not the Lauren Conrad) walk the hallowed halls of H&J Smith’s or watch Nikau talk to the deer at Bannerman Park, think again. Apart from a few stock shots, n00b wasn’t filmed on location in Gore, and it’s missing some recognisably Gore-y details that would add authenticity to the story. It’s weird that nobody in this Gore rolls their r’s (this really was “thirty purple work shirts” time to shine). That might seem like a small, irrelevant point, but putting five thousand r’s in “curly-wurly” is an unavoidable part of growing up in Southland, which is the story that n00b purports to tell.

N00b reminds us that sometimes you can’t help where you live. Maybe it’s using Gore just for the punchline, or perhaps as the story unfolds, n00b will have something new to say about “gay old Gore”. But even if it is using Gore’s negative reputation to springboard into comedy, this series could be set in any New Zealand town where prejudice and ignorance simmer on the surface. The chaos and cliches in this teen dramedy won’t be for everyone, but if you’re nostalgic for the era when the internet was full of hope and escape – and you don’t mind watching numerous circle jerks – you’ll appreciate what n00b has to offer.

N00b streams on ThreeNow.