Friends, I need you to gather around and settle in for some tough but fair conversation, because this season of The Sex Lives of College Girls is bumming me out! I truly enjoyed the first two seasons, even though I wasn’t going around claiming that it had broken any new ground — certainly not in the Mindy Kaling Universe. (See also: Never Have I Ever, The Mindy Project, Velma.) But I liked watching this group of women get to know each other and grow together! Leighton added a needed energy, but I don’t think the issue is simply that she is no longer around. It’s how listless and disconnected these stories feel, like we’re just trying to give them random tasks to do until there is some big moment where they all need to come together.
For example, this week, Kimberly has a day off! Fun! Maybe she can hang out with her friends! Oh, no, she can’t hang out with her friends today because Kimberly’s entire personality this season is just a “weird nerd,” so she … decides to take the Essex campus tour? Okay? Is that interesting? Does that add anything to what we already know about her? No! It is a new facet of the nerdy Kimberly we know and love? Not really! Is this campus tour a setup so she can flirt with and later kiss Brian, one of the meganerds from Tig Notaro’s law class? Yes! But … why? Was there no other way we could get these two together? They already have a class together; why are we going back to the well of “Kimberly is obsessed with Essex”?! It tells us nothing new about her, and it makes me like her character less because they just keep giving her the same three things to do.
No one is safe from this dreaded narrative slog. Bela and Arvind haven’t had sex yet — which is definitely stressing her out — but given that we have seen them in like three scenes together, it doesn’t seem that shocking. And perhaps, since I am ranting now, this is a good time to mention I don’t really get this relationship. It’s good for Bela to learn that men are not all shorty comedy nerds who will be mean to her, but the Bela I have gotten to know would be so bored by this man. I find their relationship to sit strangely in my heart. Narratively, it makes sense that Bela would want to turn over a new leaf and try something not comedy-related for once. But that’s it? One throwaway sentence in the first episode of the season, and that’s the end of Bela and comedy? I’d love to know more about how that’s affecting her or if FAF-ing is fulfilling that hole in her heart, but no. No new insights into anything outside of Arvind and Taylor. Not fun to watch!
Speaking of not fun to watch: Kacey and Taylor! One of the hallmarks of a good sitcom is how it adds new characters into the mix — how a new character can find complimentary weirdness in unexpected places or allow the audience to see different depths of the characters we have already gotten to know. Unfortunately, it seems like these two characters were just jammed in here to fill the space vacated by Leighton. I mean, one is blonde and queer, and the other one is image-obsessed and preppy; it’s like they literally split Leighton in two. But what are we learning from watching Whitney, Bela, and Kimberly interact with them? They keep feinting at hidden depths to both of them, but we haven’t learned anything new about Taylor’s relationship to alcohol, for example. She’s just mean to Bela and/or someone in Bela’s circle, she confesses the real reason, and we move on until the next episode, where we do the whole cycle again. This shouldn’t be a surprise; I’ve had her on a countdown since she arrived. There is a bit more hope for Kacey, I suppose? She’s got more to do than Taylor, and between BREAD! The Musical and this plot about her obsession with image and looks, I can see where they want to take this character … I just do not care about her yet, and it’s making me resent her for taking time away from the rest of the girls.
Speaking of: Whitney. The sigh I just let out. What is happening with Whitney? Why is she saddled with this many plots? Let’s count them, shall we? (1) #WomaninSTEM/overachiever with anxiety; (2) love triangle with a rich hottie and her ex-boyfriend; (3) sports injury featuring emotional manipulation by her coach. Plus, remember when she was in a sorority? It’s just a bonkers thing for her to do, which means that she’s often isolated from the others, adding to this strange, disjointed feeling. Still, we know what is building with Whitney, right? Of course we do; she’s giving all the classic signs of a girl who is about to make a risky emotional mistake! She lies to Willow about her injury; she’s worried about losing funding for her fish lab, and then she’s mad at Isaiah for funding her fish lab with his dad’s money. Girl, your mother is a senator; why are you acting like you are broke and/or SHOCKED to hear that rich people can make things happen? She yells at him about it; he apologizes, but she doesn’t like the apology. But when she runs into Canaan, he says … basically the same thing while relating it to his scholarship experience, which apparently, Whitney understands. Please refer to my earlier point re: her mother the senator! I’m not buying it, not for one minute. And my larger point still stands: Babes, can we save some plot for the rest of the girls?!
I’ll be the first to admit that it’s fun to get a good zinger on a silly bit of worldbuilding or confusing character choice. My little flourishes and rhetorical turns of fancy are largely for the goal of making myself laugh (and oh, how I laugh), but it isn’t really that fun to rag on from week to week. I want this show to work; I want to watch these girls grow and laugh and maybe, EVERY once in a while, shed a tear. There is so much opportunity here! Let’s give Kimberly a burnout; she’s got nothing to do but “ooh” and “aah” over the architecture of a school she has gone to for a year. Wouldn’t it be more satisfying if Bela were in a love triangle, maybe with a guy she met when she was trying to figure out her way back to comedy? Wouldn’t it be fun to watch Bela try to fix any of the damage she created last year? Wouldn’t it be nice if they mentioned they got a text from Leighton or took a picture to send her? Wouldn’t it be darling if a single narrative thread grounded this show and these characters to this earth and each other? Please, I’m begging here!
Office Hours
• I was thrilled to see VINCINT pop up here! They have, to this day, my favorite cover of “Creep,” and it happened, in all places, on The Four? I have listened to it an unwell amount of times. Also, this is an official call for anyone with a passion for YouTube performance-video editing: Can we remove Diddy from this video? Honestly, cut all the judges, but that one seems most pressing, thanks so much!
• When Tig Notaro is eating her lunch in the courtyard, keep a careful eye on the bottom right on the bench, then come back and tell me what snack she is chomping on. Apples? The biggest bag of apples I ever saw? Segmented orange? These are my best guesses.