TELEVISION / The L Word: Generation Q: A Totally Unbiased Look Ahead / Jeanne Obbard
Image © Showtime
Good evening! It has come to my attention that there is a sequel to The L Word known as The L Word: Generation Q and I would like us to please discuss this immediately. To prepare for our talk, I have rewatched the first two episodes of the original show, which actually did not include that over-the-top theme song, which then caused me to seek it out, and listen to it. Willingly. Never let it be said that I’m afraid to go deep for these exposés. Like Jenny Schecter, I believe in suffering for my work.
Onwards to the trailer! There is a Lizzo song that definitely does not contain the words “fighting fucking crying drinking” all in a row, but does, according to my in-depth analysis of the text, contain the words “big dick energy,” which I will from here on out insist on mishearing as “big dyke energy”; please consider this canon. There are quick cuts. There are Bette and Shane. There are more quick cuts. I am dizzy! What is this, a music video? I’m too old for this! Ahem. There is a sassy young woman riding her bike in a sports bra. There is Leisha Hailey looking like she’s in a biopic about Cybill Shepherd? Whatever! Because it hath arrived: The L Word: L Wordier.
Shane
Upon being shown the trailer, my friend Cat (her real name), responded, “Shane getting off a plane. SOLD!” I have to agree that Shane doing anything involving sitting, walking, standing, wearing sunglasses, not wearing sunglasses, or otherwise existing on this mortal plane, is an acceptable premise for The L Word: L Harder.
Episode 1: Shane gets off a private plane.
Episode 2: Shane gets out of a car.
Episode 3: Shane steps off the metro.
Episode 4: Shane starts to get off the metro, then realizes she has the wrong exit and gets back on quick before the doors close.
Episode 5: Shane pushes the button for her stop.
Episode 6: Shane tries to understand the PA system but the voice is muffled and she can't figure out if it's her stop or not. Shane frowns Shanely.
Bette
Bette is beautiful. Bette is perfect. Bette is all-knowing and all-seeing. Bette is the dark/bright goddess against whose glory we must break ourselves over and over until we are worthy. Oh, hold on — that’s just my internal monologue that’s been running since 2004. In the actual trailer, Bette is making out with an unknown woman in an enormous glass-walled office with a view of the peasantry below. I’m pretty sure this type of space is notated for location scouts as “find an office that signifies the occupant has sold and/or will be selling their immortal soul.”
In possibly related news, Bette is running for mayor — wearing the boringest jacket and shirt I have ever seen, a crime against Our Lady of the Perpetual Stella McCartney Suit that will not stand. Regardless, I have to admit that a political campaign aligns 100% with my expectations for Bette. It is ambitious and very ill-advised and I’m sure all will go smoothly and no one in Los Angeles, a city of [googles] 18 million people, will look into Bette’s past or any questionable life decisions thereof.
Episode 7: Bette makes questionable life decisions.
Episode 8: Bette’s now-teenaged daughter is, like, so mad, Mom!
Episodes 9 through infinity: Bette and everyone around her tries to survive Bette's questionable life decisions.
(Missing) Tina and Non-Missing Angelica
There is an adorable teenager in a school uniform and I am advised by the internet that this is Bette and Tina’s long-planned-for-and-agonized-over baby, all grown up. This gives me the feels! Also where the heck is Tina? Do you expect me to believe that she abandoned her child? I’m dying to know if they tried to bring Laurel Holloman back and, if they failed, what could possibly be more important in her life than The L Word: Prometheus. This calls for a strongly worded Twitter meltdown, at the very least.
Episode 10: In a very special episode, Angelica must come to terms with her heritage as the child of a mildly insufferable lesbian power couple and — if Ilene Chaiken* is still involved — the untimely death and/or character assassination of one of her mothers.
*There is a reason the showrunner was referred to as IFC (Ilene F*cking Chaiken) on the TWOP boards, is all I’m sayin’.give.
Random Blonde Girl I Don’t Care About Yet
There is a new girl! It’s the sassy bike rider, who monologues that she came to LA to live big, and I must concede, riding a bike in the sunshine and flipping off catcallers is a respectable start. In another scene she is escaping half-dressed from someone’s deck slider and it damn well better be because there is an illicit and ill-advised relationship underway. Because look: these are women who long-love-lust. They are women who give. And this is the way, is the way, that they live.
Alice
Oh Alice. We missed you, Alice! We didn’t spend months listening to Uh Huh Her (terrible band name, decent music) when this crazy show went off the air because that was Leisha Hailey’s next creative project. That definitely didn’t happen, and I will not be answering further questions. Current Alice is . . . a talk-show host? Alice is Gay Oprah? Wait a minute, isn’t Ellen Degeneres already Gay Oprah?
Episode 11: Alice learns that it’s all fun and games to tweet about your secret nemesis until said nemesis shows up at The Planet for an awkward heart-to-heart. Ellen Degeneres and Roxane Gay co-star.
The Unquiet Ghost of Jenny Schecter . . .
. . . better narrate this joint from beyond the grave. I had a Twitter throwdown recently (ie: 3 tweets and me feeling mildly annoyed) about whether Jenny Schecter is The Worst or The Absolute Worst. I guess I’m a hopeless Jenny apologist, because Jenny is a writer, so I am automatically invested in her. But my argument is that Original Flavor Jenny was no more interpersonally destructive than the rest of them. I mean Marina basically assaulted Jenny in a bathroom, then lost her mind and went back to her husband in Italy; that’s bound to leave a mark. Shane bonks everything that moves in a futile attempt to fill the deep well of emptiness inside her. Bette compulsively acquires power and sex to avoid processing how her dad didn’t really love her right. Alice is the least messed up and yet, half of what she does annoys me, just because it can.
Episode 12: The controversial musical episode, performed entirely underwater in Bette and Tina’s pool. Featuring cameos by Mia Kirshner, Rebecca Solnit, Ani DiFranco, and t.A.T.u.
In summary, every character on this show is annoying and fucked up, even the ones I don’t know yet, and I will accept nothing less. The L Word: You Had Me At ELlo airs on Showtime in December.
[Exhibit A: In which the authors will demonstrate that the word cloud of the theme song is more or less indistinguishable from the actual word order of the theme song.]
Jeanne Obbard is a poetry reader for Drunk Monkeys whose work has appeared in Gingerbread House, Glass, andFive2One. She enjoys botanical gardens, long walks on the beach, and being contrary. She has a blog but has forgotten the password so it’s probably being used to disseminate Russian kompromat now. Safer to find her on Twitter where her very imaginative handle is @JeanneObbard.
