On Girls and Undeserved Hype

Like almost no other TV series, Girls has an ability to polarise opinions to the extreme. If you’re with a medium-large group of people, and express your thoughts on the show, you’ll likely see that group split into three sub-groups: those who strongly agree, those who strongly disagree, and those who haven’t seen it.

“So where do you fit into this, Colm?” I hear you ask. “Love it, hate it or haven’t seen it?” None; I am the exception that tests the rule. I have seen it, and I think it’s okay. In no way exceptional, but better than plenty of stuff which somehow gets on TV these days.  Is that enough to save me from the wrath from the lovers and the haters?

Probably not. Some people on both sides would probably argue with me, while some wouldn’t care. Those who have never seen it will continue to not care, perhaps wishing for a subject change. The lovers are the ones who will likely be most upset with my over-arching thought on Girls, though, which is that it’s massively overrated.

Girls has had so much praise for all kinds of things: being original, being really funny, being realistic, gritty, cutting edge, well-written, well-acted, having believable/likable characters, etc. I think some of this is deserved, but some of it is way, way off, so much so that the hype detracts from my enjoyment of the show.

First up, let’s look at the ‘original’ claim. People are falling over themselves to big up the originality of the show, yet they all somehow manage to compare it to Sex And The City. Leaving aside that apparent self-contradiction, the comparison is an obvious one to make. Both shows talk about sex and life from a largely female perspective, one which is rather underrepresented on TV. Both deal with four (at least initially) single women living in New York City. Both are about how they juggle work, friends and relationships, with mixed success. They’re not the same show; their tones and narrative styles are very different, for one thing, but there are plenty of similarities. I’m not attacking Girls for being unoriginal, as there is only a finite number of stories in the world. Find me a TV show, film or book in this day and age that isn’t similar to a previously existing TV show, film or book, and I’ll be very impressed indeed. What I am saying is, it’s not that original, so stop saying it is.

“Girls is different, though. It’s more realistic, the characters don’t all have seemingly endless supplies of money, taking cabs everywhere and buying brunch after brunch and pair after pair of expensive shoes.” That’s a fair point; the girls on Girls are shown to take the subway, or even walk more than four blocks at a time, if they’re really skint. They more often meet in their apartments than coffee shops, bars or restaurants. Apartments which they share, incidentally, they can’t afford one each. This is how more people, and more New Yorkers, live, I’m fairly sure. I’ll give you the realism one, although there are plenty of people who live like the Sex And The City crew. (It’s also worth noting that the Sex And The City women are in their 30s and 40s, as opposed to early-mid 20s, and all are established in well-paying jobs at the start of the series.)

Is realism what we want, though? My life is real, and not especially interesting. I understand that we’re not always looking for something completely off-the-wall and unbelievable, although it worked for The Simpsons, at least for the first decade or so. Most shows should have a degree of realism to them, but I think Girls has too much. There are dull episodes and dull parts of episodes, just like there are dull parts of life, like while you’re walking from one “scene” to the next, or waiting for the kettle to boil. As Jerry Seinfeld once said, “If I wanted a long boring story with no point to it, I have my life.” And if you think Jerry Seinfeld’s opinion on TV or comedy is irrelevant, then I’m amazed you’ve managed to read this far.

“It’s different, it’s gritty. Hannah’s not conventionally attractive, yet they show her naked anyway, and people like it.” This is true; Hannah is probably quite a healthy/reasonable size and weight, but larger than many women have been conditioned to believe they should be. Despite this, she’s seen as the central sex figure of the show, which is apparently brand new and a victory for feminism, fighting against the idea that women have to be stick-thin, etc. That’s fair enough, women are not sex objects, they’re people. They shouldn’t be made to feel inadequate and unattractive because they eat three square meals a day and don’t vomit up at least one of them.

Is this new, though? Sarah Jessica Parker looks more or less exactly like a horse, and she led the cast of what we have already established was a very similar show. And another thing; where are the unattractive men on Girls? Adam is something of a stud, although I might just think that because he reminds me of my good friend Doug, also a stud. And Donald Glover, well, if he isn’t handsome, I don’t know who is. What exactly is Girls doing for men who are my shape and size, for instance? A person far more superficial than me might interpret Hannah’s trysts as meaning that a man needs to be incredibly attractive even to get with an unattractive girl. (I mean no offence to Lena Dunham, but I can’t think of a way to make the preceding sentence more diplomatic while still retaining its point. For the record, I think she goes out of her way to make her character appear less attractive than she herself is.) Girls might improve girls’ self-confidence, which is a good thing and needs to be done given the current climate, but it does the opposite for guys. Some might write this off as a non-issue, but you can do that with anything, and people frequently do. If someone thinks something’s important, then it’s important to someone.

(The above paragraph is largely tongue-in-cheek. I would hate for anyone to think of me as some whinging MRA; the world has more than enough of those, I think.)

I’m not going to argue with the claims that the show is well-written or well-acted, because I largely agree with them. I did write above that there are flat parts, and I stand by that, but the dialogue is realistic and believable. It doesn’t follow the standard sitcom format of every other line being a punchline; most people aren’t naturally that funny. (This is not unique to Girls, though, it is in fact an increasing trend, and has been on the up since The Larry Sanders Show was among the first to do it. Not having a laugh track is not quite the same matter, but they are related.) For what it is (a dramatic comedy, in which the amount of comedy varies from episode to episode), I think Girls is well-written, and the acting is generally pretty good.

The characters are not especially likable, though, and I take great issue with that. Hannah is selfish and spoiled, something which she does hide well at times, but it’s a trait that’s definitely there. Jessa is incredibly self-entitled, self-obsessed and self-important, as well as being very immature (some of the time) and a hypocrite. Marnie annoys me with her constant whining about her life, which is actually pretty good. Not perfect, admittedly, but pretty good nonetheless. A certain amount of whining in such a situation is realistic, but I don’t really want to see it on TV. Shoshanna is my favourite of the girls, because she’s the only one who ever seems to accept any responsibility for things going wrong in her life, but she’s still somewhat annoying. My favourite character? Well, that’s Adam, of course, although he’s not a very nice person. I know it’s ridiculous that my favourite character in a show called Girls, which is (unsurprisingly) largely about girls, is a man, but it’s not uncommon for that to be the case with me. More on that another time.

It’s not essential for the characters to be likable for me to enjoy a show, but it does get in the way as far as Girls is concerned. It’s well-documented that my favourite TV series is Seinfeld, in which the main characters go through life rarely giving a damn about anyone but themselves. Because of the way the show is done, this is something that a lot of people didn’t notice at first (myself included), and is (I think) a major reason why the much-maligned series finale is so poorly thought of by so many. It pointed out to millions that, for (up to) nine years, they had been watching and enjoying the antics of four selfish, inconsiderate and arguably downright bad people. Seinfeld is really dark depending on how you look at it. This layer of the show, which becomes more and more visible with each rewatch, gives it a new dimension and helps it endure through the years.

I also love It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, which took the idea of the darker aspects of Seinfeld and ran with it. The five main characters care not a jot for anyone else, and constantly stab each other in the back for the slightest personal gain. None of them are in any way likable people, yet they all make for brilliant characters. (Charlie gets away with it because he’s rather thick and wacky, whereas the others have no excuse.) Characters do not have to be likable, or indeed have any particular positive traits, for me to find them interesting and/or funny. The characters on Girls do not engage me at all, or make me interested in what’s going on in their lives. This is demonstrated by how frequently I forget major events from the previous episode before I watch the next one (it’s quite a lot, and that’s not something I tend to do with other TV shows).

“Okay, Colm, we get it,” you’re saying (if you’ve made it this far, in which case, well done). “You quite like Girls but you’re not wild about it. Why, then, should it be such a problem for you that other people like it so much more?” Because hype really bugs me. The last few shows I can think of that people hyped up for me, which I then watched, are (in reverse order) Community, Parks and Recreation and Arrested Development. So, yeah, good luck beating that competition, Girls. I know that it’s in no way logical for my enjoyment of something to be affected by hype, but many things I do, think, feel and say are not logical.Girls doesn’t do anywhere near enough to justify the hype, and that annoys me.

“Yeah, well, you know, that’s just like, your opinion, man.” Yes, it is. I don’t get the hype surrounding Girls, and I see no reason for any of it. And that’s not because I’m a guy, that’s a shite excuse. More on that later.