User blog comment:ArtDraw12/How could've original TDAS look like?/@comment-25297892-20150808153947

Uhm..with Gwen excluded this "original" TDAS would have received backlash even before to broadcast. Anyway, it's not that different from the actual version, ok, there are more characters like Brick, Anne, Cody and Owen, all intended to fill the space, others like Jo, Lightning, Lindsay, Cameron and Sierra have not a different role from fodder, too, and then we get Mike, Zoey, Scott, Alejandro, Courtney, Duncan and Heather as main characters.

Mike: he's plot didn't change at all.

Zoey: lampshaded to have become a godplayer.

Duncan: I don't see his role much different, just misses Gwen to form Gwuncan, by the way we would have still being doomed to see his arguments with Courtney and probably a rivalry with his poor copycat Scott. City Delinquent Boy vs Farm Delinquent Boy: ultimate match.

Courtney: basically intended to create mess in the Alejandro x Heather, that's one of the most beloved couple of the show: I don't think the fans of them would have appreciated the hint of a triangle Courtney-Al-Heather. About her other main plot, Scourtney, nothing different. CIT picking the Farm Delinquent after getting over the previous one...

Scott: Scott in ROTI proved to be more effective as a joker than a true threat, his team killer strategy worked thanks of luck and lot of unrealistic coincidences. See him come back as villain again would have been boring: or resembled Duncan showing a mischievous attitude of delinquent, or tried to be villainous again with the result to become or a minion of Alejandro/Mal/Courtney or a first boot for the Vultures.

Like your theories, tough, but I don't see that difference and benefits in original TDAS, despite it would have been maybe more interesting and "original", the absence of Gwen would have brought HUGE BACKLASH, and lot of flaws inherited by the canon TDAS would have been here, too.