Television Update (Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin | Fallout | The Afterparty | We Are Lady Parts)

[jaggedwolf]

What can I say, some people are radioactive.

Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin S1

HBO show that has more of a slasher take on the teen girls getting tormented by text messages than the original. (I hate everything about the naming scheme - giving this the "original sin" subtitle when everyone is going to naturally refer to the 2010-2017 show as the original one, changing said subtitle for the next season when this is absolutely not an anthology).

I did have fun watching this, and have an appreciation for how it's doing something different beyond a genre change. The dead girl at the heart of the original show (see!) is Alison, a teen terror who never found someone in Rosewood she didn't want to torment. The dead girl at the heart of this show isn't either of the women who die as teenagers at dances - one in 1999, one in 2022 - but our main protagonist's mother, Davie, who was such an Alison in 1999, but a saint of a mother as an adult. The other four girls' mothers were friends with Davie in high school, and they were united in bullying the hell out of the girl that did die in 1999.

So the girls aren't being tormented about their own sins, but their mothers'. I have no objections to that, they get some good stuff out of that, especially Imogen, but it does leave our main girls feeling a little...put upon. Or blameless.

For instance, before canon, Imogen is friends with cruel bully Karen, who all the other girls loathe for their own reasons, but we get little insight into what they thought of Imogen, or even how Imogen co-existed with said cruelty. I can't help but compare it to how PLL S1 is filled with all four girls getting (fairly or unfairly) tarred by their association with Alison.

Perhaps its that overall blamelessness that makes Faran one of the most interesting of the five girls - she has the worst mother, which does make her put upon, but she has those bounces between teenage self-centered meanness and real empathy, which is especially great in her connection with Kelly. Imogen and Tabitha get an opportunity to sic their slasher villain on someone who hurt them, and they take it with gusto, which is great. Noa is a good kid, easy to like, but her season arc doesn't quite gel at the end. Mouse is...there.

LMAO, look, I am sorry to say this about the character who has two moms, one of which is Lea Salonga, but everything about her storyline made me go ??? Especially because by the end of the show I was thinking "If you're doing an eight episode show, five is too many main girls to have". I very quickly bought the group dynamic and was charmed by it, but by the end of the show the only inter-group pair whose friendship I had a real sense of was Imogen and Tabitha. (To compare with the original show, which of course has the luxury of more time, I'd argue you do have a sense of every inter-liar dynamic by the end of the first season.)

A couple of things I liked better here than in the original show was the creeper grown man being treated as such, and there being more racial diversity.

A thing I was pettily annoyed at compared to the original show was that there was no f/f with any of the main girls. Come on man, the original show had one of its four mains be gay and that was back when they had to deal with ABC Family's advertisers going uhhhhh can you show less gay stuff with her thx. You're on HBO in 2022, you have no excuse! Three of the girls in the 2022 show had boyfriends and there was other m/f stuff among the teens so I feel justified in my grumbling at this. They could've easily had one of the boyfriends be a girlfriend, or even, god forbid, have the obvious pair of the main girls get together.

Anyway, will watch S2, will hope that some of these things improve but I expect I'll be entertained regardless.

Fallout

I'd gotten an hour into Fallout 3 before giving up, is the most of my experience before watching this show. Enjoyed it, I thought it conveyed the world-building well, the goofy black humour worked for me, as did Lucy as protagonist. There are some convenient plot contrivances that one has to overlook, like why is everyone's timing such that they are in various places at the exact same time.

My most petty annoyance (apparently I am filled with petty annoyances today) is that as soon as I saw Ghoul Man with a Fucked Up Face as one of our main characters, the only thought I could have about him is "You would be soooooo much more interesting as a woman." Seriously. Sooooo much more. I know I do constantly contemplate female versions of characters but like, Maximus or Lucy's brother were fine to me as men, whatever. Ghoul Man? Nope, I was just internally going yeah, should be Ghoul Woman.

It would also help my question of what the 2077 era was like - we've got 50s aesthetics, we're relatively cool about race and gender given Barb's position though we've still got racial typecasting on tv, we hate the commies but uh...are we cool about gay people? Unclear. It really does not matter to the plot or the show at all but I could not help but wonder about it given the Cold War vibes, y'know.

Spoilers below.

Also mildly annoyed that as soon as we meet Moldaver in the present day, she dies. She seemed cool, I wanted to see more of her. Though given that it looks like she hasn't aged a day since the bombs were dropped, maybe we'll run into another clone of her in S2.

The Afterparty S1 & S2

Murder mystery-slash-comedy where every season focuses on a murder, with each episode featuring the interrogation of a suspect, who tells their narrative in their own genre - romcom, thriller, period piece, etc. I binged this show in a few days, definitely recommend it. It filled the mystery-loving gap in my media now that I'm done with my Poirot reading.

S1 is better constructed mystery-wise, but S2 better exploits the conceit of every episode being a different genre, and all of it was a joy to watch. I can't help thinking of S2 vs S1 in the same way I think of Glass Onion vs Knives Out. The benefit that a first installment gets in this genre is it can have another mystery underlying the homicidal one: what sort of person is our detective? what sort of person is the one we see them with? Those questions leave a wider scope. The second installments are inherently hampered by the lack of that...but the second installments also get in their own way in how they construct themselves.

More spoilery explanations below.

I have no issue with the S2 killer's identity or that you could literally see the perfect piece of evidence of it. I didn't mind the denouement either.

But the unfortunate thing about the construction of Season 2 was that you knew it couldn't be Aniq, Zoe, Grace, Vivian, or Feng, because then there was no way the season could end on a proposal, and the tone of this show meant that it had to end on a proposal, you know? Which is different from something like a Christie novel, where sometimes it really is the person you really don't want it to be, and sometimes an ending is a tad morose.

(And yet perhaps it is like a Christie novel, for it ends in a proposal and another couple reuniting.)

My favorite part of the S1 reveal was where it flashes through every person's version of Aniq waking up, that was so sick and I wish S2 had something as visually fun in the finale.

We Are Lady Parts S2

The long-awaited S2 has arrived!!! All of the new songs are absolute bangers!! The band is as charming as ever! Compared to the first season, S2 does struggle to juggle its broader scope, as it tries to give every band member her own arc. Amina remains endearing, as she proclaims she is in her villain era for maintaining proper work-life boundaries. Though, I found myself cooling on her romance. Of the band members that aren't Amina and Saira, Bisma's journey in self-perception and self-presentation was most compelling to me. I got very cross at anyone even halfway questioning her decisions there. It was cool to see Taz settle into band managing as a broader pursuit, realizing she's in it for the thrill of discovery, not just something she's doing for her mate.

I'll save Saira and Ayesha for under the cut, to avoid spoilers.

Steve is my favorite Lady Parts fan🤘. I wanted to appreciate the Gen Z band but their cover sucks and they sucked more at the inter-band dinner. Noor's stuff this season surprised me in a good way, but I wish we'd gotten more time with it - there's something awful about realizing your impact on a lifelong friend and wondering what else it extends to.

It was odd that whenever the band was on break for practical reasons that the gang didn't seem to hang out as friends at all, especially when one or more of them was dealing with personal shit - there's no equivalent of them all whisking Amina off to the countryside to help her deal.

Okay, spoiler time.

Ayesha first, because my thoughts on her are clearer. I don't have any problems with a not-coming-out story in and of itself. That is a rational and emotionally fair decision for many people and many characters. However, the way it's constructed this season left me with lots of questions. Ayesha's parents don't know she's queer, she's close with them, they see Lady Parts content online and reshare it because they love it. However, she's apparently publicly out enough that the Gen-Z band know she's queer, the in-universe rpf artists/tinhatters seem to know too, and so do random Muslim moms in the supermarket? I'm not saying there's no universe in which all of things can't be true at once, but that the show doesn't give me enough to buy it.

The other problem is Ayesha's girlfriend, Laura. She comes off as an incompletely constructed character, especially when you compare her to Zarina in S1. Zarina was only in two episodes, but you got a real sense of who she was as a person, her priorities, how that made her fundamentally incompatible with Ayesha and how all of that led to the betrayal of the article. Laura is understandably upset at being denied in public after some cute flirting, but that somehow leads to an off-screen ultimatum of Ayesha coming out to her parents(??) and in the end she's suddenly totally fine with Ayesha not coming out to her parents. She does not seem like a real person to me, more like a tall plot device to give Ayesha a coming out crisis and the band a place to practice in.

Did love Dirty Mahmood going yeah no shit I'm gay and giving Ayesha solid advice. He's a real one.

Oh, Saira, Saira, Saira. I loved her avoiding the eviction notices till it was too late, hopping from friend's place to friend's place every night because she can't admit she needs help. The censored song as a scene alone was fantastic, great way to represent Saira feeling choked into silence. I even liked the idea of her getting into an argument with the others on how far to go in their songs - when she angry joke-sings about fucking terrorists at the end of S1 it is only because how much the article is fucking with her head but you can also see that the entire band is shocked she'd even think of that.

But the lead-up to that...meh. Saira's whole anti-capitalist, us against the man shtick means that it's odd to see her so naive about what record deals entail. I know about the possible limitations of record deals and I've never made music in my life! It struck me as such an odd path for her to actively lead the band into, as opposed to a record deal being something the band felt forced into. I dunno, I like watching Saira be a mess (the latter half of S1 <3) but this left me confused. Same with Saira's sudden about-turn after her idol challenges her on Lady Parts writing "funny Muslim songs". The intent is that the comment taps into something already burgeoning in Saira, but what came across on screen was that Saira was being immediately reactive because her idol said something.

IDK, something felt off about Saira this season, would love to know if anyone else who watched S2 has thoughts on this...

Torn between the idea that the band gets super-sued or if the label decides it would be really bad PR to sue them and considers the money spent on them a lost cause. The label does technically have rights to their songs still, right? I can't believe they signed their contract without Amina's mom magically finding some nth-degree connection that's a lawyer to review it.

I had no objections to Ahsan in S1 but he annoyed me this time around. Like bro, the reason Amina went out with Billy has nothing to do with white supremacy notions of prettiness, it's that HE ASKED HER OUT. You literally already know she thinks you are attractive because she repeatedly publicly embarrassed herself over it, after which you friendzoned her. Just ask her out, bro. Normally I can respect a piner, but not in these circumstances.

There was much less Amina-Saira goodness this season since their arcs weren't as enmeshed, but there were still crumbs, from growl-singing at each other before practice to the Speak callback. Saira will give into writing girl power anthems if Amina shoots her the puppy dog eyes a single time <3.

Comments

[glassesofjustice]

Gliding over the WALP update because we've just watched ep 1 and I'm sensitive to spoilers/perceptions.

I'm so hype to see it unfold and really enjoyed Villain Era:
Self-care, bad bitch, I'm a villain, I'm a villain
Out of office email saying zero fucks given

Yes. Yes, indeed.

[jaggedwolf]

Great song, absolutely.