GIRLS talk (the Lena Dunham thread)

I don't mind her not being sympathetic as long as there's something honest about her character. I like the way this show got loads of flack for it's self-involved asshole characters and then, as the season has progressed, it's been clear that that was the intention the whole time. some haters lookin' pretty stupid imo.

― Fas Ro Duh (Gukbe), Tuesday, May 29, 2012 12:26 AM (12 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

When ppl look at pop entertainment made by someone who is on the young side they often have this weird kind of fallacy where they cannot imagine any self-consciousness on the part of the author, like, "Oh she thinks all these annoying ppl are cool" or "she endorses the way these characters live". News flash, writers sometimes make characters annoying and ambivalent ON PURPOSES

otm/d'uh

yeah I was v dismayed by the show at first but I think I was viewing it as a weird Sex & The City kind of thing where you're supposed to get on board with the characters; rather than more of a Curb Yr Enthusiasm vibe which I feel like this sort of has like lol these ppl are awful bwahaha

i don't feel that any of the characters are awful people at all & many of them are better people than most characters in sex&city. generally find all this handwringing is kind of missing the point, like i don't think this kind of mature old person moral evaluation is an interesting or worthwhile way to think about characters on this show, or even in general. like, flawed characters are still likable, often moreso than their counterparts. also iye are people irl really that much worse than chars in this show? (i obviously agree she's self-aware & is playing with likeability of diff characters across episodes, but i find everyone on the whole sympathetic and ultimately likeable)

Flopson otm.

generally find all this handwringing is kind of missing the point, like i don't think this kind of mature old person moral evaluation is an interesting or worthwhile way to think about characters on this show, or even in general. like, flawed characters are still likable, often moreso than their counterparts.

― flopson, Tuesday, May 29, 2012 10:56 AM (58 seconds ago)

i think it's reasonable to talk abt the way likability is developed in this show, contrasting it with other shows and/or our expectations of "TV in general". i mean, if everybody really and truly hated all the characters, no one would watch the show. likability is important. i don't see most of this as "mature old person moral evaluation". it's just casual conversation regarding feelings abt TV people.

I get invested in the characters of the shows that I watch, I can't help it. I don't know how else to watch.

haha i get very invested too tho maybe in a diff way that doesnt involve thinking they're awful people??

It's clear that the characters are developing in a way that wouldn't be possible with a series that would be under threat of cancellation in its first few episodes.

that first episode had me recoiling so bad it was like I was trapped in a room with them, lol

overactive imagination I guess

i think it's reasonable to talk abt the way likability is developed in this show, contrasting it with other shows and/or our expectations of "TV in general" ... i don't see most of this as "mature old person moral evaluation". it's just casual conversation regarding feelings abt TV people.

i guess i just don't think "he came off as a horrid drip this week. as did marnie. hate them." is a very insighftul reflection on the way likability is developed in the show

not that it's an illegitimate comment (tho i do disagree) just that it's not a cool thing to have dominate discussion of the show

I thought Jessa throwing the bottle of wine and then being a total asshole to those guys who weren't even mean abt it was sooooo NAGL and I super hope she starts growing up/acknowledging that other ppl around her exist

Yeah. She might be a little bit awful.

haha i get very invested too tho maybe in a diff way that doesnt involve thinking they're awful people??

the characters on curb your enthusiasm are awful, but that doesn't make the show any less enjoyable. i like larry both despite and because of his awfulness. thing is, it's been clear from the beginning that this is more-or-less how we're "supposed" to relate to him. he's an entertainingly lovable/hateable dickheaded scamp.

character development on girls was less sitcom-familiar at the outset. though it was obvious that hannah was meant to be our point-of-view surrogate, the show didn't try very hard to get us to befriend her or its other characters, and didn't make immediately clear how we were supposed to understand and relate to them. that's a violation of standard sitcom operating procedures, and as a result, there's necessarily been a period of evaluation and re-evaluation as we get the hang of the show's sensibility and approach to its characters.

as far as the "hate them" comment about marnie and weed dad goes, i was half kidding, playing up the gossipy/bitchy angle for titters. i don't have anything against the co-mingling of dumb chatter and insightful analysis. i'll bring the former if you bring the latter...

the characters on curb your enthusiasm are awful

haha i disagree! so often in curb it feels like jeff & larry are the only sane/non-awful ones

also i think the worst thing jessa did in last episode wasn't throwing the bottle but leaving shoshana with that guy after she accidentally smoked crack. so crushing because just one second earlier she was being such a good friend "i will be your spiritual crack guide"

haha i disagree! so often in curb it feels like jeff & larry are the only sane/non-awful ones

¯\(º_º)/¯

haha maybe i'm just morally bereft

jessa seems like she likes the idea of being shosh's spirit guide WHEN she says it, and then is immediately done with the idea when the next thing comes along...her intentions are occasionally good when she has them, but she has like zero follow-through

challops: i prefer the veep/girls double feature to game of thrones

I enjoy Girls but lord knows I would enjoy it 1000 times more if they all carried swords

ditto for veep

Not that challopsy this season tbqh

marnie was kind of being a jerk in the sense that, if it was my friend, id be like 'damn ur kinda whining right now considering' small-scale way but completely believable & realistic & i think we've all known ppl who or ourselves acted 'like that' in certain situations esp when we're like 22. i felt like jessa's actions were way more reckless & frustrating but maybe im bringing my own experiences w/ 'FREE SPIRITS' (selfish ppl who dont think abt consequences) to bear on this situation or something

at any rate all the characters feel very real, which is ultimately the pt i think

http://gawker.com/5914033/ghetto-defendant-a-girls-recap
can someone explain whats going on here

like, is it a parody of recaps? does it have to be so painful?

gawkers gotta gawk

if it's a parody of shitty writing, it at least gets points for accuracy

it's pretty funny, though. but i don't know why he's mean to that's so raven, and korean pork belly tacos are sort of amazing.

jeez reading that gawker recap was a monumental waste of time, even by my standards.

this was maybe my favourite episode yet! marnie was kind of 'awful' (as we like to say) here, but on the other hand, it's the kind of situation where i'd imagine most people would be awful in some manner. likewise hannah's particular brand of awfulness is one that makes a lot of sense coming from someone who spends a lot of time in her own world. jessa, i have more difficulty with, but when she's great she's great, and i assume she'll do some kind of learning at some point. in the world of non-awful people, may ray and shoshanna's relationship blossom. (okay, ray's awful too, though not in this episode.)

i'd take to dancing like adam, but i don't think i'm strong enough.

in the previous gawker recap, the write admits he legit hates the show, which somehow makes his criticism worse (like it reflects poorly on his personality and writing ability if he actually MEANS all that shit to be critical).

There was a bit of a blow-up in the AV Club thread about this past episode. It's linked in this article, which I think is very good: http://thinkprogress.org/alyssa/2012/05/29/491372/lena-dunham-girls/

This was probably the only episode that I've enjoyed more of than I've actively disliked. I've basically just been watching this show out of a sense of duty to the cultural moment or some bullshit.

I mean, minute for minute I'd take any given episode of any other cable half-hour dramady over this (Weeds, The Big C, Hung, Nurse Jackie, whatev).

Also things like that av club article are the sorts of reasons I sympathize with a gut-reaction of despising the show entirely.

That said, maybe the closest analogue in terms of maturity of characters and attitude towards them is Skins, though even the worst characters there were more uniformly likable.

hey man, Chris 4-eva.

i hate/am totally bored by most tv, including those shows you listed, but i love this show

and i wish more tv were like this

me too

there are episodes in curb where larry genuinely behaves badly (it seems 2 me) but most of the time i feel like it's just an inability to pick his battles that stems i guess from a malformed sense of proportion.

VG otm about jessa's attitude towards being shoshanna's crack spirit guide; it has zero to do with shoshanna; it is just a diverting thing to say seeing as there's nothing else going on just now. but of course there are plenty of people who behave like this and they don't even make particularly bad friends as long as you also have some friends who are aware you exist. plus they tend to grow up. marnie, meanwhile, still repels me on some fundamental sub-cognitive level, like nixon did to HST (but not to me, not like marnie); every time she speaks my muscles tighten. dunno. hannah's sweet (the glee on her face while dancing w/ adam, with her bag still on her shoulder) and the show is somehow managing to successfully flesh shoshanna out using nothing but broad I Accidentally Smoked Crack or I Accidentally Witnessed My Roommate Fucking plots. not unlike how it's fleshing adam out without betraying his detached brusqueness, which looks like cruelty in some lights but half-formed wisdom in others. good show!

in the previous gawker recap, the write admits he legit hates the show, which somehow makes his criticism worse (like it reflects poorly on his personality and writing ability if he actually MEANS all that shit to be critical).

yeah, though i played along with the suggestion that it might be a parody, it doesn't read like one. instead it reads like snarky, self-impressed idiocy by someone who doesn't even understand the level the show is playing at. not, it's not supposed to be the greatest party ever thrown. it's just supposed to look intimidatingly cool to relatively sheltered hannah and shoshonna. no, penisless band isn't supposed to sound "hip," "now" and "downtown". they're just supposed to sound penisless, and they do. omg, the author has noticed that the girls are white, unlike the problem-having black people joe strummer once mentioned in a song. oh shit, and the show show has blown the lid on secret bushwick, exposing it to tourists and korean pork belly tacos (lol specificity). fuck this guy.

i can't even tell if he really thinks there will be girls-themed tour buses, and i should be clear on that point; this is what happens when your hate just totally swamps your control and suddenly you're not actually writing for anyone or about anything that isn't an invisible monster in your aching head

gawker's mission statement iirc

really good pork belly tacos are a thing of beauty.

there are like five korean taco trucks in new york now, and they are all wonderful. as far as i know they're a manhattan thing more than brooklyn or hipsters or twentysomethings or whatever. and before that they were an l.a. thing.

i feel very protective of my korean street food.

Tako

Yaki

see now there's a street food we need more of in new york. i would tolerate such a hipster wave just to have more takoyaki joints than the one sorta meh place with long lines by st. marks.

Are you planning on bringing you intellect to bear on the show at any point sterling, because all I'm getting is "0/5 stars".