Later, Joey's friend Archie "Snake" Simpson (Stefan Brogren), frustrated of his inability to get a girlfriend, ultimately reveals this fact at a party while Caitlin is in the same room, causing her to break the relationship off.

Joey and Snake's friend, Derek "Wheels" Wheeler (Neil Hope) start drinking heavily, resulting in a car crash which kills a two year old boy and blinds class valedictorian Lucy Fernandez (Anais Granofsky).

Despite being intended as a finale, the franchise was rebooted in 2001 with Degrassi: The Next Generation, whose premiere episode primarily centered around the ten-year reunion of the original class.

His longtime girlfriend Caitlin Ryan has taken a number of extra classes and completed high school in three years and has graduated with Joey's former peers.

Eager to hold on to her before she leaves for university to study journalism, Joey proposes to Caitlin at a graduation party hosted by Lucy Fernandez.

Joey storms out, only to run into classmate Tessa Campanelli fresh from an argument with her boyfriend Todd, and agrees to give her a ride home.

Joey, though initially hesitant, accepts Tessa's offer, has a great time, and, as he tells Wheels the next day, gets to "third base."

The next day, at an end of the summer lake house party, hosted by Lucy's boyfriend Bronco, Caitlin accepts Joey's earlier marriage proposal.

Snake (citing that he's been living through the "summer from hell") finally lashes out at Joey for all the teasing and blurts out about him sleeping with Tessa.

Immediately after unintentionally breaking up Joey and Caitlin, Snake realises that former classmate Allison Hunter is drowning and rushes into the lake to rescue her.

Snake is accompanied by his girlfriend Pam whom he met at university and is implied to have finally lost his virginity to her, and he appears considerably more self-assured; he still has yet to get into contact with Wheels.

[4] After the movie aired, Toronto radio station Q-107 received multiple requests to play Harem Scarem's music.

Writing for the Vancouver Sun, Hester Riches felt that like the preceding series, the movie took risks, but "paid off in typical Degrassi style".

[12] Writing for The Canadian Press, Bill Anderson stated that despite the main love triangle plot, "deft subplotting" resulted in a "memorable" end to the film's story, and that the movie put "a brilliant cap" on the "honest, compelling" tradition that the Degrassi shows had created.

[2][12] Writing for Fashion magazine in the wake of the movie's 25th anniversary, Lesa Hannah called it "a truly iconic piece of Canadiana".

[15] Writing for the Sydney Morning Herald, Alison Stewart praised the film and called it "much more real television" than its American counterpart Beverly Hills, 90210.