Sex while the City‘s show finale aired eight years that are long.
but also for better and for even even worse, HBO’s previous flagship stays pop tradition’s default point of reference for almost any activity directed at females. Write a movie or television reveal about ladies interacting, and it’ll inevitably get in comparison to SATC. Create your characters that are main feminine urbanites, therefore the evaluations have also easier. And when your show is really an intimately explicit, half-hour comedy featuring four young, white, feminine New Yorkers that takes place to atmosphere on HBO? Well, for the reason that full instance, you’re simply asking for this.
HBO’s Girls hasn’t shied far from acknowledging its glitzy predecessor.
Creator/writer/director/star/key hold Lena Dunham has stated that her system couldn’t exist without Carrie and co. A character named Shoshanna also took the liberty of revealing which SATC character she thinks she most resembles in last week’s premiere. (By also bringing this up, Shoshanna proves that she’s a Charlotte.) And night that is last Girls boldly went where SATC choose to go prior to by centering its 2nd episode around a principal character’s theoretical abortion. The episode proved that while Dunham’s show is, in certain means, indebted to Intercourse, it is additionally an animal that is entirely different.
In most cases, Intercourse therefore the City wasn’t afraid to tackle taboos. So that it’s surprising that the show avoided the subject of abortion until halfway through its 4th period. Within an episode called “Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda,” workaholic Miranda understands that an opportunity encounter having an ex-boyfriend has kept her having a bun into the range. She’s got no intention of maintaining the child. It happens when she reveals this to the gals at brunch, sexually liberated Samantha announces, “It’s less than a desirable situation, but. We’ve all been there. I’ve had two!”
Samantha’s flippancy aside, the episode treats abortion with sensitiveness. Miranda functions outwardly confident about her decision, but secretly is not sure she’s doing the thing that is right. Carrie additionally reveals that while she does not be sorry for having an abortion at 22, she’s never quite felt the exact same since. Although the redhead fundamentally chooses to keep consitently the child, her option does not feel just like a cop-out — the show is supporting a woman’s straight to select while acknowledging that abortion is complicated and fraught. The only real element of the episode that actually feels down is a goofy, unneeded subplot about Samantha lusting after a $4,000 Birkin case.
SATC makes use of Samantha’s pursuit of a Birkin as comic relief after having a complete great deal of hefty abortion talk. But in Girls, the abortion talk may be the comic relief. The show’s episode that is second “Vagina Panic,” is partially occur a Manhattan wellness hospital. Shoshanna, Marnie, and Hannah show up to brides-to-be.com/ukrainian-brides/ aid their friend that is fourth, pregnant Jessa (she’s the Samantha associated with the team). But Jessa’s too frightened — to visit the center by by herself. She spends the afternoon consuming White Russians and setting up having a complete complete stranger as her friends keep her increasingly furious messages like this: “Uh, hey. You’re pregnant once you don’t desire to be. So that you may desire to come get abortion now. Many Thanks.” As opposed to segregating humor through the episode’s central issue, Girls finds humor for the reason that issue it self.
Even though both programs use frank language, Girls pushes the envelope by placing the term “abortion” into its discussion whenever feasible. On SATC, the word it self is uttered simply 3 x; otherwise, it is just implied. Girls, nevertheless, has its characters state “abortion” 11 times. Dunham could be trying to surprise watchers into laughing; she additionally might be wanting to desensitize us to your term, thus erasing a number of the stigma it holds. In either case, her show’s characters — from their attitudes for their language — are more bold than their ancestors that are manolo-wearing. Her show also is not afraid to tackle abortion through the get-go, in place of waiting four years.
But although the Girls are bold, they’re also woefully ignorant. None of the ladies has much knowledge about intercourse, let alone its effects; Hannah, the show’s Carrie equivalent, tries to determine if she’s got an STD by Googling “diseases that can come from no condom for example second,” then comparing herself to your photos that she discovers. Miranda does not proceed through along with her abortion because she’s carefully weighed the good qualities and cons of getting an infant; Jessa, having said that, inadvertently discovers that she’s either got her duration or perhaps is having a convenient miscarriage, which frees her from needing to choose when you look at the beginning. (Unlike the ending of “Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda,” this 1 does feel just like a cop-out.)
Girls, then, is really a show that’s both more audacious and less assured than Intercourse together with City. Maybe it is primarily because its figures are sheltered and young; possibly once the show continues, Hannah, Marnie, Shoshanna, and Jessa will begin to keep a closer resemblance to Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte, and Samantha. Having viewed the show’ very very first three episodes, this appears not likely. But either means, it is unjust to help keep comparing the two — since this duo of abortion episodes shows, their similarities are nearly completely shallow. (Well, all except one: Both programs function several of the most self-centered figures ever conceived for television.)