web series – Page 2 – Bitch Flicks

Moving Us Forward: ‘Carmilla’ the Series

This is a guest post by Kathryn Diaz.

The YouTube web series Carmilla might just be the internet’s next best-kept secret. Often compared to Buffy, Carmilla is about a girl, her vampire, and her friends taking on life’s challenges with a dash of apocalypse-stopping on the side. But Carmilla is not a derivative of the 90s classic or anything else you’ve re-watched this year. Carmilla is the next step we have all secretly been waiting for. It is a treatise on the power of teamwork and love. In the words of one of its many heroines, it’s about girl-ing the hell up. And lesbians. We cannot forget the lesbians.

No, but seriously–at a time when the most popular gay ships on Tumblr are queer-baiting extravaganzas and TV lesbians have a tendency to be either invisible or dead, seeing not one, but at least three queer girls whose sexuality is present and normalized matters. Laura Hollis is a journalism student who has seen every episode of Veronica Mars. Danny Lawrence is an active member of the Summer Society, and a TA. Carmilla is a femme fatale in combat boots and heavy eyeliner who studies philosophy when she isn’t feeling Coleridge-y about her life. These young women have been written as women, not stereotypes or labels with legs. While ample time is given to their love lives and personal desires, it is neither the sole nor central part of their personalities and character arcs. We have seen this kind of character before, from Willow on Buffy to Cosima on Orphan Black. But these women, and many others on TV, inhabit a peripheral space as supporting characters. On Carmilla, they take center stage. As someone still working out their sexuality, I cannot emphasize enough how refreshing and heartening this is to see.

Besides its open queerness, the other big thing to consider when thinking about Carmilla is just how much of a reinvention of familiar stories and genres it is. Most obviously, this series is technically an adaptation of J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s 1872 gothic novella of the same name. For this reason, it is sometimes lined up with other YouTube modern retellings of classics such as The Lizzie Bennett Diaries. However, Carmilla shares more in common with the emergence of radical re-imaginings in media like Wicked and Maleficent. Further still, the new setting and plot that Carmilla adapts in its transformation nestles it in the same company as Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Like Maleficent, Carmilla consciously retools its plot and characters to chip away at oppressive elements in their source material and introduce feminist ideologies in the reinvented narrative. However, Carmilla takes things a step further by doing more than just turning the plot around and changing original antagonist into an anti-hero. The series transforms all the prominent characters into new, compelling versions of themselves. Where Le Fanu’s pure hearted heroine Laura timidly speculated about the horrors around her, web-series Laura starts her story as the only person at her university willing to investigate the mysterious disappearance of her roommate. The caretakers from Le Fanu’s story, Mme. Perrodon and Mlle. De Lafontaine, become neurotic maternal floor don, Perry, and genderqueer science whiz who isn’t afraid to face actual monsters in the library head on, LaFontaine. Carmilla gets what the production team of Maleficent did not: creating an anti-heroine of awesome need not come at the expense of the rest of Team Hero (I’m looking at you, Knotgrass, Thistletwit, and Flittle) and when it doesn’t, the story can benefit greatly.

Because of its subject matter, “rag-tag group of heroes” makeup, and “stop the Big Bad” plot, Carmilla also shares many elements with Buffy, as earlier mentioned. Whether intentional or not, to look at the show without this comparison might be missing an important part of the picture. There is a snark-tastic sense of humor between both shows that keeps the story from falling into pure melodrama. Carmilla’s dialogue includes such genre references as “honest to Lestat” and a bout of black comedy involving sock puppets. Beyond this and the presence of a brooding vamp with a hidden heart of gold, we also have light haired spunky heroines, love triangles, brain-sucking baddies, even a Big Bad fake-out before the reveal of the true villain at the season’s halfway point. And yet here, too, Carmilla can be seen as an endeavor to go beyond what was done before. Here there be no burying of our gays or turning them into revenge monsters.

Also worthy of notice: there be no singling out of our heroine either. No one is a Chosen One and no one has to go into a big showdown alone. Laura is the central protagonist, but she is not inherently the Alpha girl of the team she assembles. On a more episode-by-episode scale, the dynamics between Laura and Friends rejects any hierarchal structure. In fact, it is precisely when some of the friends start to play “I Know Best” that tensions emerge. The essence of what commentary comes out of these debacles seems to be this: that when something is big enough, personal agendas come second to the greater good and that love should not come between individuals and their autonomy. Carmilla rejects the possessive or selfish facets of love as attractive. However, this does not mean that it makes flawless do-gooders out of its heroines. Without getting even more spoiler-y (because you need to watch this series and watch it now), many a member of Team Hero has their negative moment and, though the good fight and teamwork must continue, transgressions are not always forgiven easily. By the season’s finale, not every relationship has a happy closure. Understandably, it’s the differences in the Carmilla-verse that make it feel like its own place. More specifically, a place that is simultaneously more realistic and more optimistic than the Sunnydale Hellmouth.

This is not to diminish the good in either Maleficent or Buffy. Personally, I’m a shameless fan of both, flaws and all. They are both strong, impactful works that have influenced many. But we are settling for less than what we deserve if we believe that they are as good as it gets. Even Carmilla isn’t as good as it gets. What Carmilla is is the next step–one that is worth taking and seriously well worth watching.

Kathryn Diaz is a writer living in Houston, Texas. She is currently pursuing a B.A in English at the University of Houston. You can follow her at The Telescope for more of her work.

‘Broad City’: Girls Walking Around Talking About Nothing

While ‘Broad City’ is about girls, it isn’t “About Girls.” It’s not a show that makes it its mission to make statements about modern young womanhood, it’s a show that makes it its mission to be funny as all fuck and depict an incredibly sweet friendship between two well-drawn female characters. And that’s just as important.

This guest post by Solomon Wong previously appeared at Be Young & Shut Up and is cross-posted with permission.

Comedy Central’s Broad City, created by Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer, is a show about underpaid 20-something white girls in New York. Kinda like Girls, only Broad City doesn’t give me that rather unpleasant feeling of existential dread that would be probably five times worse if I were a woman. I’ll be honest, that dread kept me from watching past the first episode of Girls, so I don’t have an informed opinion on it. What I will say is that whatever Girls’ place and importance in the TV landscape, Broad City matches in value and exceeds in entertainment. While Broad City is about girls, it isn’t “About Girls.” It’s not a show that makes it its mission to make statements about modern young womanhood, it’s a show that makes it its mission to be funny as all fuck and depict an incredibly sweet friendship between two well-drawn female characters. And that’s just as important.

A while ago, we reviewed Michael J. Fox’s sitcom, The Michael J. Fox Show, and came to the conclusion that while the show was boring, hackneyed, every word for generic and un-creative, its value was in showing it could be done. A cookie-cutter family sitcom where the main character has Parkinson’s. Broad City, on the other hand, is excellent, but similarly, in a field women typically don’t stand in—the genre of slacker/gross-out comedy.

Representation is the big media issue of the past couple years. Women have less than 45 percent of speaking parts in prime time TV, and less than 30 percent of speaking roles in film. Some parts rise to the top—we can all name phenomenal woman characters in television. But it’s rare that a show, particularly a comedy, focused on women gets to be so goofy and small. A friend watched one of the original webisodes (the show is derived from a YouTube series) and read the comment “Who would want to watch a show about girls walking around and talking about nothing?” Well, like, a lot of people. Walking around and talking about nothing is generally reserved for male-dominated casts, and while that’s a combination of words designed to be unattractive, it describes a coveted set-up where the interest comes solely from the characters being themselves. With no gimmicks and no real premise, Broad City draws from its central friendship between Ilana and Abbi to be an intensely character-based show. And let’s be real, they do more than just walk around.

[youtube_sc url=”http://youtu.be/1WavVwnEFhw”]

That said, one of the show’s biggest strengths is its willingness to be petty. These characters have small lives, and pathetic problems. Abbi has a meltdown over her roommate’s live-in boyfriend recycling her big stack of expired Bed, Bath and Beyond coupons (they don’t actually expire!). There’s a whole episode about Abbi trying to buy weed and Ilana struggling with her taxes. In an episode that takes place during a hurricane, the biggest conflict is that Abbi’s toilet won’t flush after she takes a dump with company over. The pilot is about Ilana convincing Abbi that they have to scrounge up $200 to buy tickets and weed for a Lil Wayne show. Nobody is trying to get or keep a job, the stakes are low, but the characters lead themselves on an adventure anyway, “returning” stolen office supplies to Staples and cleaning an adult baby’s apartment in their underwear.

Small problems, but the kind everyone has. What do people in their 20s worry about? Getting drugs, seeing Lil Wayne, having sex, struggling to come up with the motivation to do anything worthwhile. We all have gross, stupid lives, sometimes. The dialogue is often pointless, but it’s the kind of relatable pointless conversation you and your friends take pleasure in. This show, despite the zany heights its plots reach, is authentic and genuine. Ilana is the kind of pseudo-political millennial we all love to hate, taking issue with Staples playing “What a Wonderful World” because “it’s a slave song, look it up,” and referring to her supervisor as “Mr. George Bush.” At one point, Abbi tells her “Sometimes, you’re so anti-racist, you’re actually…really racist.”

Broad City carries with it the themes of decline and aimlessness and disenfranchisement that a more serious and self-important show might, but they’re part of the fabric of this show, not the focus. Abbi folds towels and cleans pubes out of gym shower drains for a living. Ilana gets high at her telemarketing job. One episode opens with the two strutting into a bank to Drake’s “Started From the Bottom” as Abbi deposits an $8,000 check. At a fancy seafood prix-fixe, Ilana eats as much as possible, despite a serious shellfish allergy. At one point, they call in a locksmith to help them into Ilana’s apartment, but he’s so gross and creepy that Ilana gives a fake name and ends up having him get them into her neighbor’s apartment instead. In a montage of their morning routines, Abbi sits next to an old man reading the same book as her. He takes this as a sign and tries to kiss her, and flips her off angrily when she rebuffs him. These themes aren’t often directly explored, but they’re always there in the background and driving the characters.

At the end of the day, Broad City is just a goddamn delight. Abbi and Ilana have an adorable friendship, and the supporting characters are hilarious, especially Ilana’s fuck buddy Lincoln, a dentist played by Hannibal Burress. It’s confidently pointless and gross, willing to show its protagonists at their worst and most brandy-sick, most unmotivated and selfish. With shades of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Workaholics, Broad City carries on their tradition of ludicrous character-based catastrophe from a perspective that until now has been excluded from the genre.

[youtube_sc url=”http://youtu.be/jwt3em9NSZk”]

Broad City has been renewed for a second season. Check this show out, please.

Solomon Wong is a writer and a graduate of UC Santa Cruz. He is the co-editor of Be Young and Shut Up, author of the cyberpunk serial novel Stargazer. He likes cooking, fishkeeping, and biking around Oakland.

Seed & Spark: Latinas in the House!

BUTS started as a joke we had about our bodies. We are both pear-shaped women. (And God bless Lena Dunham for putting that silhouette out there without apologizing or qualifying it.) However, as our beauty standards still predicate, the hourglass figure rules. But our “hourglasses” had all the sand in the bottom! We would laugh about it and pad our bras when going to auditions.

This is a guest post by Irene Sofia Lucio.

First of all, it is an honor to be included in this fancy group of Seed & Spark women writing for Bitch Flicks, given that this is our very first project as co–creators. Reading the past articles written by these inspiring women is humbling, exiting, and gives you a good kick in the butt to keep working and be worthy of this community.

I will start off by saying that I am a Latina woman as is my co-creator, Emma Ramos. Never in a million years did I think I would be starting an article, or a characterization of myself, with those two titles. Perhaps I am naïve.

But it is incredibly important to open with this fact—that I am a woman and a minority. To do so is not only about combatting a lack of representation (or misrepresentation) in media, but also about eroding the loneliness that we all feel when there isn’t a heroine that we can call your own.

I was trained as an actor. And, because I look white, I played all kinds of American and European characters in grad school. After graduating, I adapted to the struggling actor lifestyle right away and was thrust into the casting pool and casting mentality of New York. Since then, I have been similarly cast: When the director was open-minded enough to disregard my Latin name and imagine me as something else, I only played white characters. I realize that I am fortunate to be ethnically diverse, but I felt sad that I could never tell the stories of Latin America. I wasn’t brown enough; I seemed too educated; I seemed too aristocratic. What does that say about how we think of Latinos and how we’re characterizing them?

I am not the typical Latina. I was brought up in a wealthy town in Puerto Rico, went to an American private school, and then two Ivy League schools. These are all privileges and accomplishments that I have often felt apologetic or embarrassed by. I didn’t experience many of the struggles that Latin Americans have to face on a daily basis, and as a result, I felt I had to prove that I was from Latin America. This is sad— not only because that implies that being Latin American restricts us to a certain experience and color, but also because it suggests that my stories are less valid, or less welcome.

It was at the peak of my frustration with the industry that I had the good fortune of meeting Emma. Though Emma looked “the part” more than I, she too was not “Latina enough” to play the bulk of the roles available. Unfortunately, the majority of these are still restricted to prostitutes, maids, and hyper-sexualized stereotypical figures. Emma grew up in Sinaloa Mexico, studied business, led radio stations there, and then decided to become an actor in New York City. After graduating from grad school, she too felt the harsh reality of a fundamental lack of roles. Frustrated that our stories weren’t being told, we decided to create BUTS.

Soon, though, we realized that our “inadequacy” was reflected elsewhere too. Again, we were too educated, privileged, Americanized, quirky, nerdy—you name it—to be considered Latina by TV and film standards. So, with our butts in mind, we started thinking about how we could expand the conversation. We took a ‘T’ out of the butt and considered the many ways that we as women and Latinas complicate the stereotypes and the very notion of what those two titles mean. It is our BUT argument to how those labels are being depicted. We have chosen to do it in a comedic format because, as we say in Puerto Rico: “I laugh so that I don’t cry.” And it is crazy how empowering it has been to embark on this endeavor with Emma.

As of now, we have only released one episode, but the laughter and impact it is already creating is extremely encouraging. Episode two will be released at the end of the month. We simply cannot wait to tell more stories of what it means to be an American millennial Latina: a person that identifies more with what it means to be a millennial than what it means to be a minority (even though society continuously insists on keeping us in that box).

As I read these other Bitch Flicks Seed & Spark articles in preparation for writing this one, it became incredibly clear that we are all trying to do the same thing: produce work that stands on its own, that “happens” to be by women and by demographics that are considered minorities. Like these other projects, I hope that BUTS will open more windows into more stories that are valid and true. I hope that my little sisters will see the episodes and relate instead of feeling like they are strange hybrids. By opening windows we are creating opportunity, hopefully reaching others, and welcoming them to do the same.

Finally, I will also say that the self empowerment that one feels when producing original work and calling the shots to maintain its integrity is the most thrilling feeling I have ever felt professionally. It surpasses that of standing in front of a large audience and reciting gorgeous text. Thank you for inviting us to be a part of this inspiring community. I look forward to reading many more.

Irene Sofia Lucio was born and raised in San Juan, Puerto Rico. She is an actress, writer, and teacher in New York City. Recent credits include: Love and Information NYTW, WIT at MTC, We Play for the GODS at Women’s Project, Pygmalion at California Shakespeare Co., Bad Jews at Studio Theater of DC, and Romeo and Juliet at Yale Rep, Stranded in Paradise (Sony Pictures), Casi Casi (HBO Latino), and Gossip Girl. She is a graduate from the Yale School of Drama and Princeton University. www.irenesofialucio.com

Emma Ramos began her career in Mexico in politics and business. She dramatically changed her life to become an actress after training at East 15 Drama School, UK.

Credits Include: NYTW: Scenes from a Marriage. Off-Broadway: Comfort of Numbers (Signature Theater), Accidents Waiting to Happen (IRT), La Santa (Ontological Theater), Him (Soho Rep), Sangre (SummerStage) Mala Hierba (Intar). Film & TV: 3rd St Black Out, Sunbelt Express, El Cielo es Azul, “Unforgettable,” “The Hunt,” “Killer Talent.” www.emmaramos.com

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

Girls on Film: The superhero genre’s ‘giant green porn star’ problem by Monika Bartyzel at The Week

At Cannes Stories About Women Dominate, even if Female Filmmakers are Rare by Sasha Stone at AwardsDaily

Lesbian Truths and Laughs by Mary Meriam at Ms. blog

The Feministing Five: ManSee Kong by Suzanna Bobadilla at Feministing

‘Neighbors’ Review: Seth Rogen’s Suburbanites vs. Frat Boys Comedy Is an Instant Classic by Inkoo Kang at The Wrap

Angela Bassett Will Direct Lifetime Original Movie Based On Whitney Houston/Bobby Brown Relationship by Tambay A. Obenson at Shadow and Act

How American Pop Culture Has Embraced Same-Sex Marriage by Sarah Mirk at Bitch Media

Want a Princess Leia Action Figure? Sorry, Disney Doesn’t Sell Them by Inkoo Kang at Women and Hollywood

Trolls Don’t Just Want to be Rude—They Want Power Over Us by Amanda Levitt at Bitch Media

The Naked Truth: Advertising’s Image of Women: Jean Kilbourne at TEDxLafayetteCollege

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

Filmmaker Josephine Decker Discusses Darkness, Sexuality, and the Problem with Wes Anderson by Erica Thomas at Bitch Media

The problem with saying the media has a “woman problem” by Soraya Chemaly at Salon

Read Gabourey Sidibe’s Wonderful Speech From the Ms. Foundation Gala by Jennifer Vineyard at Vulture

Why Women Rarely Get To Narrate Movie Trailers… by Tambay A. Obenson at Shadow and Act

Lupita Nyong’o Is Cast In “Star Wars” at Clutch Magazine

‘The Other Woman’: When Terrible Movies Happen To Funny Actresses by Linda Holmes at NPR

We Need More Female Buddy Comedies, Please! by Kit Steinkellner at Hello Giggles

Producers Ann An and Paula Wagner to Make War Drama About Heroic Chinese Nurse by Inkoo Kang at Women and Hollywood

Girls on Film: The hidden feminism of Audrey Hepburn by Monika Bartyzel at The Week

The Vagenda: A Righteous Guide To Dismantling Mainstream Media Garbage by Kelsey Haight at Bust

In Search of the Next ‘Broad City’: Five Comedy Web Series That Could Make It to TV by Carrie Battan at Hollywood Prospectus

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Seed & Spark: Agency and ‘Afternoon Delight’

I was lucky enough to listen to Jill Soloway speak recently at a small gathering to discuss a new filmic voice for women, hosted by the genius and innovative Emily Best, CEO of the crowdfunding and distribution platform Seed & Spark. Soloway spoke so eloquently about her process and about women’s opportunities and struggles in the film industry. She was so engrossing and inspiring to listen to that there was a palpable feeling of magic in the room. One of the valuable lessons I took away from our discussion was about her career turning point — from producer to filmmaker — is that she realized that no one else was going to make it happen for her. It makes me wonder how many other women and men are waiting for permission to make their masterpieces, and license to make the characters within them bold, alive, and human.

Juno Temple and Katherine Hahn in Afternoon Delight — Juno Temple and Katherine Hahn in *Afternoon Delight*

This is a guest post by Leah Rudick.

I recently made my first foray into screenwriting. Very exciting, no? A few months ago, I started writing a script about a woman in her early 30s who finds herself suddenly living in New York City, wading through the murky waters without direction, a passive observer in a sea of eccentric, cruel and hilarious characters. A woman searching for her purpose. Who’s excited? Did I pique your interest? Is that a resounding YES?! I wrote about 40 pages, got stuck, and showed it to my intuitive and brilliant better half who read it, gave me some very generous compliments, and then asked, “Why don’t you give Sarah [my heroine] some agency? What does she want? Is there a way for her to be bolder instead of having all of these things happen to her? A way to let her be the ignition for whatever construction or destruction occurs? Can we watch her be the cause rather than the reaction?” They were great questions. Why was I interested in writing something about a woman who seemed comfortable being so inactive? Who was satisfied sitting back and observing, judging, but paralyzed from actually stepping in and taking part.

It’s a manifestation of a struggle I’ve always had, the fight against my natural instinct to be the shy, passive observer. It’s something that my inspired 78-year old acting coach worked tirelessly to drill out of my head: “Leah, what do you want in this scene? You can’t exist in this gray area. It’s boring!” It’s an issue that I notice in many films that I’ve seen and worked on. The female character is the watcher, the muse, the victim, the object. And while I have been easily able to detect this trope in the work of others, I was totally oblivious to it in my own work.

When I watched Jill Soloway’s most recent feature, Afternoon Delight, I was, in the truest sense of the word, delighted. It was everything I wanted in a movie: Hilarious, tragic, deeply moving, beautifully shot with incredibly grounded and brilliant performances across the board. The story follows stay-at-home mom Rachel (Katherine Hahn) who takes in a young stripper named McKenna (Juno Temple) in an effort to save her and also to distract herself from her own upper middle class malaise.

This is a film about women’s agency, and watching it was an eye opener for me. The movie is so bold and colorful and also so feminine in a more real way than I think one often sees in film, even sometimes in those made by women. It is emboldening to watch, because it has been created by the voice of a woman who is seemingly unfettered by the much discussed “male gaze” in filmmaking.

Leah Rudick and Katie Hartman in web series Made to Order — Leah Rudick and Katie Hartman in web series *Made to Order*

I’m grateful she had the realization, because Afternoon Delight is masterful at defying the norms of the comedy genre in such an incredibly subtle way. This conversation of agency begs another discussion about which genres best lend themselves to this kind of work. It is one thing to make an action film with a female lead and make her active and in control and awesome (I am so excited to see the Seed & Spark funded Sheila Scorned, a “grindhouse short starring a quick-witted stripper who’s out to get even with the men in her way” because it looks badass), but what about when the genre is one that typically does not allow for female agency?

I produce a web series with my comedy duo, Skinny Bitch Jesus Meeting, called Made To Order about two sisters who start an underground food delivery service. It is a sort of high octane comedy about two women who forcefully throw themselves into a world they know nothing about at the expense of everything. With my very brilliant comedy partner, Katie Hartman, it has been thrilling to create two characters who do rather than watch and manage this in a completely unhinged way.

I love the idea of finding more ways to write female characters with agency in every genre, across the board. This awareness and need for these types of character in creative work has had a profound effect on my own writing and I know that I’m not alone in this sentiment. When we start allowing characters to do, rather than to simply watch others do, worlds open up and we can actually started having fun.

Leah Rudick is an actress, writer and comedian. Film credits include Cut to Black (Brooklyn Film Fest Audience Award), Lost Children (Desperate Comfort Prod., IFP Lab Selection), Bloody Mary (Sci-fi channel), Kids Go to the Woods, Kids Get Dead (Darkstar Entertainment), Prayer to a Vengeful God (Insurgent Pictures) and Jammed (Runaway Bandit Productions). She can be seen on the popular web series High Maintenance and on the webby-winning youtube channel Barely Political. She is a founding member of Lifted Yoke Productions, and is currently in pre-production for their feature dramedy, Sweet Parents. Their first short film, Blackout, can be streamed at Seed & Spark Cinema. She is a contributing writer to Reductress.com. She is half of the sketch comedy duo Skinny Bitch Jesus Meeting (Edinburgh Fringe, The PIT, UCBT, NY Fringe Fest) and co-creator/co-star of their upcoming web series Made To Order (madetoorderseries.com).

Meet the Women of ‘The Flow’

The first season was released in February 2014, and features the animated banter of Linda Dianne, Delly P, Nicole Ryan, and Kelly Lyn. These women are earnest, joyful, and excited to talk with each and share their experiences about topics that include (but are not limited to): period shits, gender representation in the media, and their feminist roles models in real life and television.

If you’re in the mood for some candid and righteous yet light-hearted conversation among millennial feminists, then look no further than The Flow. Though the tableau is a familiar one—four women seated on coaches with mugs of tea in hand holding forth on popular culture—the content of their dialogue is far from the daytime registers of The View or The Talk, the likes of which I only catch when stuck in waiting rooms. That’s another way of saying The Flow is well worth your time (trust me, you have all of 20 minutes to spare). The first season was released in February 2014, and features the animated banter of Linda Dianne, Delly P, Nicole Ryan, and Kelly Lyn. These women are earnest, joyful, and excited to talk with each and share their experiences about topics that include (but are not limited to): period shits, gender representation in the media, and their feminist roles models in real life and television. Each of the three episodes has a companion confessional video wherein we get a snapshot of each woman’s perspective on the given topic of the main episode. This structure works well to help us viewers get to know each woman a bit more on her own terms, which isn’t something conveyed in the group discussions.

Delly P, Nicole Ryan, Linda Dianne, Kelly Lyn

Though season one is brief, The Flow manages to pack in a lot of intelligent talk about media that deserves the hype. Viewers will likely be familiar with films like Miss Representation, shows like Orange in the New Black, and especially the amazing actor/activist Laverne Cox, but I hadn’t heard of nor seen the video “Shark Week” by the Brooklyn-based rap group Hand Job Academy. Without spoiling too much—because there really are no words—let’s just say “shark week” is a euphemism for menstruation. But that’s where the politeness ends. This photo should be enough to entice:

In addition to running through their own shorthand, such as “Crimson Tide” and “The Original O.B.” (my favorite was always Antietam: the bloodiest day of the Civil War), the confessional episode reveals each women’s narrative of the memory of when she got her first period. Though the details differ from story to story, the common refrain was that Linda Dianne, Delly P, Nicole Ryan, and Kelly Lyn each took pride in their experiences, mostly made positive thanks to the supportive women who were there to supply them with reassurance and maxi pads(or in Delly’s case, chocolate, too). There’s a wonderful lightness and lack of shame in these stories that I found resonant and refreshing (particularly compared to the pain endured by many women of older generations; see The Vagina Monologues). Here’s to seeing where The Flows goes next month in season two.

‘The New Adult’: Generation Delayed

‘The New Adult’ is a small slice of life in the post-Aughts. Amber Morse plays Amber, a 30-something who, after being kicked out of the family home, is living uncomfortably with her best friend, her best friend’s husband, and their young child. The pilot opens with Amber passed out in the backyard. Upon waking she goes inside to get breakfast, and what follows is almost seven solid minutes of excellence.

Review and Q&A with creator/director Katherine Murray-Satchell.

Written by Andé Morgan.

Can we talk about this awesome new web series pilot?

It’s called The New Adult, and it’s the brainspawn of Katherine Murray-Satchell (creator and director).

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsX91lHd5VI” title=”The%20New%20Adult”]

The New Adult is a small slice of life in the post-Aughts (how’s that unpaid internship working out?). Amber Morse plays Amber, a 30-something who, after being kicked out of the family home, is living uncomfortably with her best friend, Jamie (Lauren Augarten), her best friend’s husband, Joe (Daisun Cohn-Williams), and their young child. The pilot opens with Amber passed out in the backyard. Upon waking she goes inside to get breakfast, and what follows is almost seven solid minutes of excellence.

While this is Murray-Satchell’s directorial debut, it doesn’t feel like it. The dialogue is real, snappy, and engaging. The cinematography is flawless, and the editing is on point. The cast exhibits great chemistry. The overall effect is that TNA feels polished.

A minor gripe–occasionally, Morse and Cohn-Williams’ deliveries come across a bit stilted, but only momentarily.

Amber is beautifully unlikable. She’s ungrateful, she smokes, and she curses in front of children. But, thanks to Morse and Murray-Satchell, I feel her, and I want more.

She’s also not the typical female protagonist. She’s Black, and she rocks, literally. This also makes her atypical for a Black protagonist, because, as we all know, Black People Don’t.Like.Rock. (or cosplay). Yeah, that cake is a lie.

Amber Morse and Lauren Augarten in *The New Adult.*

Murray-Satchell graciously agreed to an interview to discuss TNA.

Bitch Flicks: When will we see more TNA?

Murray-Satchell: The purpose of making the pilot episode is to use it as a fundraising tool for getting the rest of the episodes made…I have five other episodes written and ready to go, so once the other factors fall into place, I’ll have a better answer for you…I chose for it to be a six-episode season, modeling after the “British Brevity” approach to television production.

Bitch Flicks: How did you get interested in film?

Murray-Satchell: I was a freshman in high school at the Philidelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts (CAPA), majoring in Creative Writing. A friend introduced me to the world of screenwriting and filmmaking…me, not really having any knowledge of making movies (or even seeing it as a viable way for me to express myself creatively). My friend gave me a screenwriting book by Syd Field and I was hooked.

My writing became more visual as the years went on, and I would find ways to con my way into the school’s TV/Film class. I got interested in film because it combined everything that I loved into one neat little package: acting, writing, and music. I started to look at movies and TV differently, seeing how emotion could be portrayed much more quickly with one shot than it could with a paragraph. My desire to open people’s eyes to different cultures and philosophies has always been a part of me, and I saw filmmaking as a way to express that.

My ultimate goal is to be a showrunner…By creating TNA, I became a showrunner in my own right.

Bitch Flicks: Adult-child/failure-to-launch stories are part of the post-2008 zeitgeist. What was your inspiration for TNA?

Murray-Satchell: I’ve actually been working on this show idea for three years, I think. Maybe four. It’s been a while. And since then, so many other failure-to-launch stories have come out that for a while, I felt discouraged in making anything of TNA. It’s inspired by a bunch of people I know, and my own inner demons.

I experienced what most people refer to as a quarter life crisis. Back when I was 25, I had a bit of a meltdown when I just kept thinking “Is this my life now?” I had a full-time job, a daily routine, paying rent, paying bills. And I literally just wanted to drop everything and run away because it just became so mundane and not at all what I pictured adulthood to be like.

Building on that, seeing how my friends from high school and college had changed and evolved, I knew that in some way, we were all lamenting about this whole adult thing. No one prepared us for those feelings of despair and confusion. So, the show is an exploration of the different types of adults out there. And it’ll pose the question of what defines being an adult, and what this modern grown-up looks like.

Bitch Flicks: What distinguishes TNA from similar series?

Murray-Satchell: The New Adult will set itself apart from other stories by focusing on the female perspective. While, yes, there are a handful of woman-children in fictional media right now, Amber’s character adds to this mosaic. Most of the things out there really go for the slapstick when it comes to adult-child characters, putting them in situations where they then showcase how immature and silly they are. TNA is a dark kind of funny. It’s a character study on a woman stubbornly going through this adulthood transition.

My intent is to make it real enough to see her torn apart by this whole situation, but funny and absurd enough to keep the auidience wondering how she’s going to dig herself out of this mess. Additionally, making Amber a woman of color gives an alternative representation of the black female–she’s not “ratchet,” the strong single mother, or some stoic professional… there’s a massive gray area that has hardly been tapped (kudos to Mara Brock Akil and Issa Rae for bringing them out), and I’d like to introduce that person to the public.

Bitch Flicks: Tell us more about Amber Morse.

Murray-Satchell: Amber [the character] is a tough pill to swallow when she’s first introduced. She’s deeply flawed, honest, charming when she needs to be, rude, and comes off as a bit of a rebel.

Amber Morse is a super talented woman who could relate to the background of the character. The character was a very specific kind of personality, and casting was extremely tough. She nailed the audition, and I knew that she could add the charming but rough-around-the-edges vibe to the character…I feel like her screen presence is so commanding that she’d be able to carry the show, and I believe in her ability to take the character to the depths that she’ll inevitably have to go to as the story develops.

Bitch Flicks: There’s a distinct lack of female (or WOC or POC, for that matter) directors in the Hollywood system. As Lexi Alexander and others have noted, this may be because Hollywood is less willing to give female directors opportunities, rather than because there are few women who want to be directors. What are your thoughts?

Murray-Satchell: There’s a lack of female and POC directors in the Hollywood system because newcomers don’t see enough of them already present, and they feel that the opportunities are not there, which discourages them from pursuing it…I don’t think of myself as a Black female filmmaker. I like to think of myself as a filmmaker who happens to be a Black female. But I’m not blind. I feel like there are a lot of women who want to be in a more creative filmmaking role like directing but feel like they can’t, or won’t be given the chance. Or maybe they feel like they don’t have what it takes to be a director, or that people won’t take them seriously. It’s a shame, really. With filmmaking tools being more accessible now, anyone can make a movie.

Bitch Flicks: Does the web series format give women and POC an opportunity to be heard that is absent in the traditional system?

Murray-Satchell: Absolutely. So many up-and-coming filmmakers who are women and people of color have been recognized because of how they used the web series format–and the internet in general–to their advantage. The obvious example is Issa Rae, who created a web series to not only showcase her talent, but to give viewers a refreshing take on the modern African American experience. For me, I’m using it as a platform for showing what I’m capable of as a showrunner. By creating a series outside of the Hollywood system, it allows me the flexibility to experiment, to make mistakes, to look at this format as a microcosm for the bigger television industry.

Women and people of color definitely have an opportunity to get their voices heard more easily with a web series… it’s just a matter of getting the audience’s attention.

Bitch Flicks: Who are your cinema and television heroes?

Murray-Satchell: Joss Whedon initially comes to mind. When I really started to break down television series, I loved what he did with the characters on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Of course as a teenager, you go into the show for the glamour of the vampire saga, but as an adult, I can appreciate it for so much more. I loved the flexibility of television writing and development that could introduce a character, build them up, knock them down, build them up again, change how we as the audience feels about them… it was incredibly influential in my decision to pursue series development and showrunning.

As a cinematographer, one of my heroes was Emmannuel Lubezki. I took a lot of notes watching his work, and I was so glad that he finally got an Oscar in recognition of his work. He’s one of the great DPs who “paints” with the light, and thinking about it in those terms made me approach cinematography in a completely different way.

Bitch Flicks: What are you watching?

Murray-Satchell: I’m a television junkie…I’m watching The Walking Dead, True Detective, Breaking Bad, Scandal, Revenge (the guiltiest of pleasures, but hey), Kroll Show, Bob’s Burgers. Movie-wise, the last few things I watched were Friends With Kids and It’s A Disaster. Netflix streaming is an evil, evil goddess and I love it.

Follow Katherine Murray-Satchell on Twitter @KatStreet1

Also on Bitch Flicks: Flat3 is the Little Web-Series You Have Been Looking For

Andé Morgan lives in Tucson, Arizona, where they write about culture, race, politics, and LGBTQ issues. Follow them @andemorgan.

‘Flat3’ is the Little Web-Series You Have Been Looking For

The first season was a self-funded passion project and as it got more popular they managed to crowd fund the second season so that they could pay actors and crew; the girls did not pay themselves. They have successfully secured funding from New Zealand on Air to pay for the upcoming third and fourth seasons that should air sometime this year and I really can’t wait.

I want to tell you about a gem of a web-series that I discovered recently. It is called Flat3 and it is made in a small country in the South Pacific more famous for its big-budget fantasy epics (Lord of The Rings, The Hobbit) than for small, interesting character-driven comedies. Although let us not forget Flight of the Conchords.

How to describe Flat3… It is basically everything I have ever been looking for in a web series. Smart, funny, engaging, a little bit weird, a little bit bleak, and little bit hopeful all at the same time. The show illustrates perfectly that talented Asian women can make a show that is funny and doesn’t rely on painful self-deprecation or crapping on other minorities. Ally, JJ, Perlina, and Roseanne (the director) have said that they set out to make a show that they would want to watch. It isn’t about hitting you over the head with their Asianness, it is about three women whose lives haven’t turned out quite the way they planned and how they deal with that. For me the show really captures the pain and humour of your mid-20s, post-university, now what do I do with my life phase. Think something like what Girls would be like if it was about people you actually knew. There is considerable talent at play here. Roseanne Liang is the show’s director and writer as well as wearing the co-producer hat. She was the first ever Chinese New Zealander to theatrically release a film and her movie My Wedding and Other Secrets was the highest grossing locally made film of 2011. Co-producer and cast member JJ Fong is currently starring on South Pacific Pictures’ Go Girls, one of the highest-rated locally produced shows on New Zealand television.

Ally JJ Perlina 2 — Ally, JJ, and Perlina

The show follows the misadventures of three flatmates–two of whom have graduated with degrees in the creative industries and are trying their best to make it in this recession-heavy world. First there is Lee, the quietest one of the three who is trying to figure out what she can do with a degree in fine art and how to date when you have never really done it before. Next there is JJ, a beautiful promo girl/actress/waitress who is struggling with what it means to be valued solely for your looks and how to be taken seriously as an actress when your big break comes from shilling feminine hygiene wipes. Then there is Perlina, straightforward and upfront yet worried that she is unlikeable and struggling to connect with her work colleagues. In the first episode that centers around her, Perlina spends her time trying to be more likeable and goes to the point of interviewing her ex-boyfriend to figure out what she did wrong and how she can improve. Despite this, it is Perlina who normally saves the day because of her ability to see through bullshit and get to the crux of an issue.

I think what I like most about Flat3, aside from the fact that it is both well-written and well-acted, is that I relate to it. In JJ, Lee, and Perlina, I see many of my friends and parts of myself. They throw awkward house parties where no one turns up and you end up getting drunk and doing stilted skits while your one cool friend looks on in horror because it seems funny at the time. Their relationships seem real to me, not weirdly competitive, just sometimes a bit fucked up with a dash of drama because sometimes people go through stuff and make bad choices, especially in your 20s when you aren’t really sure who you are and what you should be doing. It is female friendship as I recognise it: chatty, supportive, fun, and sometimes complicated.

Sabotage on Flat 3 — Perlina and her friend seeking vengeance on an ex’s underwear drawer

If you have seen Flight of the Conchords you might like this, but I mean that in the generic sense of, well if you like offbeat sort of comedies that are slightly awkward but not so cringe-y that you have to close your eyes for half the episode you might like this, because really that is where the similarity ends. Highlights from the series have included: a post-coital scene that includes the clean-up of fluids (something of a unicorn on television), the line that semen tastes like “a million potential offspring crying out – and then silence,” a hitchhiker who dispenses wisdom and LSD, a fancy dress party a little bit reminiscent of Eagle vs Shark, trust exercises for accountants, and much much more.

The only thing that I actively dislike about the show is the size shaming and the dehumanizing of fat people. It is so so tired for women, especially Asian women on television, to be preoccupied with their weight and the fat jokes seem out of place with the freshness of the rest of the writing. They can do much better than this and they usually do. Fat jokes make up a tiny percentage of the humor on the show (there are many more accountant jokes) and it is not enough to stop me watching but I could certainly do without them, they aren’t funny and they contribute to the marginalization of fat people generally. I am hopeful that the next two seasons will continue to bring the excellent writing and talented acting that we have seen, hopefully minus the boring fat jokes.

If you are looking for a fresh comedy that is silly and sometimes awkward then this is definitely the show for you. To watch, head to http://www.flat3webseries.com/ and prepare to be thoroughly entertained!

Seed & Spark: Gettin’ Physical

There is an empowerment to seeing women use their bodies to intently serve their character’s purpose. There is honest recognition of the female form in all of its glory and trust in the actress, director, or writer to create that honesty. There is also a young little lady, up way past her bedtime, copying your every move as you high-kick your way into Saturday night.

Mary Katherine Gallagher as — Molly Shannon on *SNL* as Mary Katherine Gallagher

This is a guest post by Jessie Jolles and Tracy Soren.

When Molly Shannon threw herself into a pile of chairs as Mary Katherine Gallagher on Saturday Night Live, funny girls whose parents let them stay up past 11:30 p.m. were, from that point on, changed. Cheri Oteri as a Spartan Cheerleader, kicking her legs up high during an uncomfortable routine, or Ana Gasteyer, stiff but still dancing as Bobbi Moughan-Culp, one part of the trying-to-be-hip-music teacher duo, were telling us our bodies are for us.

Cheri Oteri as a Spartan Cheerleader (video)

As women, we are told we are meek and frail; we should be smaller, thinner, and able to fit in a spoonful of sugar so a man can put us in his coffee and swallow us down. There’s nothing new here that we are saying. I believe there’s an Upworthy post on your Facebook that’s exhibiting the notion right now (as they should be!). How many times have you watched a film or TV show where the woman is in some well-shaven, acrobatic position for the male gaze. So for us, Jessie Jolles and Tracy Soren, comedians and creators of the web series, DIBS, we enjoy nothing more than a woman allowing herself to transform her body for the sake of a well-earned laugh.

We should point out that we met in an improv class at the Upright Citizens Brigade and were improvisers before we decided to create something on camera. We are now on all-lady improv team named Gulf Oil, kickin’ ass, takin’ names, getting suggestions. This past weekend, we had a show where Tracy ended up with a bruised knee and Jessie actually flew across the stage in an all out physical improv fight. We had a blast! There is something very interesting that happens though when you are a woman very physical in your comedy… the audience becomes your collective mother. They are laughing BECAUSE WE ARE FUNNY (right?!) sure, but there is also a gasp of breath as if our lady bodies will disintegrate into Tinkerbell’s fairy dust. It is sometimes a shock to them when we get down and dirty on a down and dirty theatre floor in the East Village. We are guilty of this reaction too, I’m sure. I mean, boobs hurt when they are sliding across the ground but in improv, you can’t think, you just do. And that’s how we want to see filmmakers treat ladies when they are making funnies or not. Because the question really is: what would the character’s body actually do in this moment?

Tracy and Jesse “being physical” on the set of DIBS

Now that we are writing and preparing for the Season 2 of DIBS, we know the characters Joey and Emily deeply and we are excited to use the entire range of our physical comedy to get the laugh. But this doesn’t only apply to comedy of course. We want to see filmmakers and content creators let female actresses and female characters use their true range. Indie films and content respond to this more so then mainstream media (again, nothing new here). Imagine what it takes to decide you want to be an actress or a creator and go for your dream; the skin is already tough, we don’t need our character to be one-dimensional in their physical abilities. Of course, if the character calls for a delicateness then I’m sure the actress playing her can master delicate. But we women can take it! Molly Shannon threw herself into a bunch of fold-out chairs, than she made a movie doing it. Trust us to know our abilities.

The physicality of women cannot be spoken about without the sexualization and oppression of women’s bodies in media which is of course cyclical. They tell us our bodies are supposed to look like x (x can be thin, hairless, light-skinned, small, etc…). We think our bodies are supposed look one way so we then make our bodies look like that and people go, ah yes, that’s what women look like or what women want to look like so we will put out another film/ad/show/beer bottle representing women as x. So then our female characters are widely represented as x. But then there’s that special moment when we see Maya Rudolph shit her pants in a wedding dress on the street in Bridesmaids and it’s amazing, hysterical, and women go “See! That’s what America needs!”

There is an empowerment to seeing women use their bodies to serve intently serve their character’s purpose. There is honest recognition of the female form in all of its glory and trust in the actress, director, or writer to create that honesty. There is also a young little lady, up way past her bedtime, copying your every move as you high-kick your way into Saturday night. So audiences, filmmakers, friends, families, dentists, healthcare workers, Bugs Bunny, let’s let women get down already. We promise, you’ll laugh.

Jessie Jolles and Tracy Soren make up the comedic duo, Soren & Jolles. They are in pre-production for the second season of their web series DIBS and are crowdfunding here on Seed & Spark! They both study at the Upright Citizens Brigade and are on a wonderful improv team, Gulf Oil.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

Review: ‘Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom’ Anchored by Strong Performances by Nijla Mumin at Shadow and Act

The Best Part of “Catching Fire” is What it Says About TV News by Sarah Mirk at Bitch Media

5 Hilarious Web Series That Were Created By Women by Shannon Iggy at Bust Magazine

The Book Thief: Stealing Hearts and Minds by Natalie Wilson at Ms. blog

For Every Woman Working in the Film Industry, There are Five Men by Sarah Mirk at Bitch Media

Kathleen Hanna and ‘The Punk Singer’ Director On New Doc, Riot Grrl and Why People Hate on Feminism by Bryce J. Renninger at Indiewire

Infographic: Gender Inequality in Hollywood (It’s Worse than You Think) by Inkoo Kang at Women and Hollywood

Emma Thompson Calls Out Hollywood Sexism in Ten Different Ways at THR Actress Roundtable by Inkoo Kang at Women and Hollywood

MHP’s Black Feminism Reading List by Melissa Harris-Perry at msnbc

Black Women, White Women and the Solidarity Question by Janell Hobson at Ms. blog

Top 12 Feminist Reasons to Be Thankful This Year by Melissa McGlensey at Ms. blog

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Speaking with a Woman’s Voice: ‘The Future Starts Here’

Bitch Flicks was lucky enough to receive an invitation to the premiere of Tiffany Shlain’s new webseries The Future Starts Here in New York City last week, and your humble correspondent was lucky enough to be the one to attend it. Shlain is, as her series’ voiceover states, a mother, filmmaker, and founder of the Webby Awards, and The Future Starts Here is an AOL-produced miniseries about being human in the digital age.

Our history books have been telling the stories of just a small handful for centuries. When we look back at this time in history, the story’s going to be about the power of creative breakthroughs that include all of us.

Episode 5, “Participatory Revolution”

Bitch Flicks was lucky enough to receive an invitation to the premiere of Tiffany Shlain’s new webseries The Future Starts Here in New York City last week, and your humble correspondent was lucky enough to be the one to attend it. Shlain is, as her series’ voiceover states, a mother, filmmaker, and founder of the Webby Awards, and The Future Starts Here is an AOL-produced miniseries about being human in the digital age.

Eight bite-sized videos, The Future Starts Here will only cost you forty minutes of your life total, and it’s well worth the time. It’s a remarkable distillation of complex ideas into accessible, snappy soundbites that are thought-provoking rather than reductive, and I think it makes a fantastic general introduction to some of the complicated questions I happen to be grappling with in my own doctoral research.

Though the series is all about technology and how it is changing our lives, the first episode, “Technology Shabbat,” is about switching off. When I spoke with Shlain, she explained that this was a quite deliberate move: it serves to ground what follows in caution and self-awareness, steering the series clear of the naïve, starry-eyed techno-optimism it sometimes skirts. When I asked her if she thought technology was a force for good, she said yes, provided that we use it right. (And this assessment is clearly borne out by any brief glance at, say, internet feminist activism and the backlash thereto.)

The second episode, “Motherhood Remixed,” is the one that Shlain pinpointed as most explicitly engaging with feminist concerns. It’s an intriguing and important look at Shlain’s efforts to balance her busy workload with her family life, and it features some delightful infographics that reconfigure parental roles in admirable ways; but its concluding piece of advice is perhaps the weakest of the bunch, because “Create your own schedule or present a plan to someone who can make it happen” is simply not a workable option for many parents outside of Shlain’s socioeconomic bracket. The episode raises some excellent points about how technology can change the work-life balance, but it’s simply narrower in scope and context than some of the other pieces, and a direct acknowledgment of that fact wouldn’t have gone amiss.

A thread of feminism runs through the whole series, in a way that Shlain emphasized is intended to be accessible to the widest possible audience. Shlain told me with a sigh that she had had no end of questions about being a woman in a male-dominated arena, and she stressed that she feels her feminism is most powerfully enacted simply through being a woman and speaking with a woman’s voice. When you come down to it, this is the very heart of feminism: the most abstruse feminist theory is ultimately rooted in the many disparate experiences that we collect under the heading “being a woman.” Throughout the series, Shlain does a skillful job of integrating the fact of her womanhood, mentioning it explicitly at key moments when the non-feminist-identified viewer might be struck by it and brought to new understandings.

One of the delights of the series, and something that is perhaps at least partly attributable to a familiarity with the phrase “the personal is political,” is the seamless integration of aspects of Shlain’s personal and family life. Even outside of the episode directly concerning motherhood, Shlain grounds her musings and illustrates her ideas by using material from her own life: anecdotes about her children, examples of her family’s actions, even an episode co-helmed by her robotics professor husband (episode four, “Why We Love Robots”). This fluid movement from the micro to the macro, exemplifying the inextricable relation of the personal and the theoretical, is what good feminism does best, and in this sense The Future Starts Here is a triumph of feminism in action.

Examining aspects of technology from the simple rules of tech etiquette to the effect of participatory culture on the creative process, Shlain strikes an excellent midpoint of optimism and skepticism – what she dubs “opticism.” She expertly weaves together big ideas (referencing such luminaries as Heschel and Teilhard) and an approachable style. She ends each episode with a suggestion for action or a question for consideration. And, as noted above, she does it all in about the length of your average TV drama, if you DVR it and fast-forward through the commercials.

The Future Starts Here. What are you waiting for?

Max Thornton blogs at Gay Christian Geek, tumbles as trans substantial, and is slowly learning to twitter at @RainicornMax. He’s intrigued that a secular Jew like Tiffany Shlain and a leftist Christian like himself have such similar ideas about the philosophy of the digital revolution.