A couple of months ago my BFF made a cautious recommendation for my Netflix binge-list: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. She explained that the comedic musical TV series follows the exploits of a grown woman who leaves her high powered, lucrative NYC law firm and moves to an armpit of a small town in California in order to stalk a guy who dumped her when they were 16.
I understood her reservations; it sounded kind of - erm – crazy.
She tried explaining some of the songs – how they were so outrageous and silly –
"And the song starts out sounding like those standard platitudes, she's singing "Face your Fears" but then she's saying all these outrageous things like, "Literally TOUCH a star... Stars aren't that hot" and I was just DYING!"
-- but finally she admitted it was just something I’d have to try myself but she really thought it was in my wheelhouse. She’s my BFF, she’d know, so of course I cued it up straight away.
Crazy Ex started out making me cringe and squirm with empathetic humiliation; it was like watching Michael Scott with boobs. And though I was rolling with laughter by halfway through the first episode, it also had me thinking about feminism, patriarchy, gender norms, and especially (as a woman): How much of what we hate about being women do we bring on ourselves and foist on each other?
Surprisingly (and perhaps unintentionally) CEG consistently fueled my own little journey of self-discovery. Not "Eat, Pray, Love" style (thank God), but more “Watch, Gab, Giggle” as I dissected the smallest nuances of “The Sexy Getting Ready Song” or “Feeling Kinda Naughty” with my favorite feminist (aka BFF) over the phone most nights. The show and its songs were so jam-packed with conversation starters I thought it would be fun to do a little series on it. So if you’re one of those girls who never really had a lot of girl friends (me), or a guy who is mystified by women (my darling hubby), or a hot chick sick of the rest of us assuming you have it so easy (more real than unicorns, probably), or a not-so-hot chick who secretly hates super-models (see: “foist upon each other” above), you might enjoy Parts II through ? and you also might enjoy the show!
Wanna see some funny stuff while waiting for Part II? http://www.viraltor.com/news/18-times-crazy-ex-girlfriend-was-the-wokest-show-on-television/