Tag: cultural criticism

Does ‘Girls’ get adulthood right?

by Henry Goldman • June 19, 2012

Does this get adulthood right?’ is a blog series where a yr an adult writer watches or re-watches or reads a cultural work about adulthood and consider whether it’s depiction of adulthood is reflective of real life. Past entries can be read here.

What’s the thing called? Girls. (You’re on the internet, so you’ve obviously heard of it)

When was the thing made? The showed debuted earlier this year, first to wide pre-release acclaim than to wide pre-release-acclaim-backlash, satirized BRILLIANTLY by my favorite writer in this hilarious blogpost (If you don’t bother clicking the link, the joke is I link you to my post about Girls. I’m my own favorite writer). The show just finished it’s first season and has been picked up for a second.

What’s the thing about? The show is about a small group of white 23/24-year-old girls, who are living out their post-college/pre-career lives in and around Brooklyn. They have weird friendships, pseudo-relationships, job troubles, uneasiness about their lives, petty disagreements. The show, ostensibly, over the course of several seasons, will depict it’s characters development from complete fucking idiots, to actual grown-ups. But for this first season, Girls has mined the humor of those first couple years out of college for the broken, silly depravity that marks the transition many middle-class college grads go through after college, but before they know what the fuck they are doing.

The characters are led by Hannah, an entitled, self-conscious wannabe personal essayist, in the mode of Sloan Crosley (if you don’t know who Sloan Crosley is, please don’t look her up. She’s the worst). Hannah thinks she’s the voice of her generation and is stuck fawning for most of the season over her weird/awesome fuck-buddy Adam. The other “girls” in the show are Hannah’s shallow rooomate Marnie, their naïve/oddball/virginal friend Shoshana, and self-styled manic pixie Jessa. Each episode follows their various misadventures and the series succeeds (in my mind) because it presents its character with a TON of flaws, and mines those flaws for humor.

… KEEP READING!

cultural studies

Does ‘Community’ get adulthood right?

by Henry Goldman • May 16, 2012

What’s the thing called? Community

When was the thing made? The show premiered in 2009 and is nearing the end of its third season.

What’s the thing about? Community is about the relationships between a the members of a study group at a fictional community college in Greendale, Colorado. Each character in the group comes from a different background and has enrolled at the college in attempt to get their lives back on track. As the series has progressed, the group has become tighter knit while the show itself has gone off the hinges, getting weirder, crazier and more self-referential. Many episodes play either as homages to different movies or genres while others are inverting generic sitcom the tropes. Despite being one of weirdest sitcoms in the history of network television, Community still hinges on the emotional growth of the characters at the heart.

… KEEP READING!

cultural studies

Am I too old to get into the Beatles?

by Henry Goldman • May 14, 2012

As kids come of age, and get into music, there are all kinds of different paths they take to define their palette as music listeners. Some are influenced by their parents’ musical tastes, which provide the foundation for their nascent musical development. Others follow the lead a cool older sibling, who feed their musical appetites with cassette singles of whatever cool older siblings were listening to that week. Unfortunately, my parents only listened to NPR and my older brother had a pretty severe learning disability, so I was on my fucking own. And as such, I had a weird musical upbringing on my way to becoming a genuine music nerd.

I don’t know when or where it happened, but somehow it got into my head that cool kids didn’t listen to the music all the other kids listened to. I remember in second grade, when everyone my age was getting in MC Hammer and Kris Kross, I was getting into my Soul II Soul cassette, a band which I had learned about from their cover of The Little Mermaid’s “Kiss the Girl” on the Disney’s Simply Mad About the Mouse music video collection. “This shit is so underground,” I thought to myself. The impulse, thoughout my life, has led me to be incredibly insular and nerdy about music. I can’t honestly say if that’s a good or bad thing, but it’s the way it is.

… KEEP READING!

cultural studies

14 things you could say about HBO’s ‘Girls’ (if you’re a moron)

by Henry Goldman • April 26, 2012

I really didn’t want to write a “thinkpiece” about TV’s latest internet meme, HBO’s new comedy series Girls, which has been over-exposed in the blogosphere while underexposed in real-life. However, the idea of the show, about four early-twentysomething women in Brooklyn, has clearly struck a nerve with people who write about things on the internet. And being one of those people, I reluctantly admit I’ve read a couple different blog posts, thinkpieces and reviews of the show. And I’ve actually seen the show myself, and liked it ok to continuing watching it, and it does deal with themes about adulthood, which clearly are of interest to me.

However, instead of offering my opinion on the cultural import of a show that has only had two episodes aired and was watched by only .33% of Americans, I just thought I’d list all the things I could say about Girls, IF I was a moron.… KEEP READING!

Tag Archives: cultural criticism