The L Word: Generation Q season 1 episode 2 review: Old habits die hard
This week on The L Word: Generation Q, Bette has a great rebound on the campaign while Shane works to find a way to move forward.
On last week’s episode of The L Word: Generation Q, we picked back up with Bette, Alice, and Shane after 10 years, while also meeting new characters Dani, Sophie, Finley, and Micah.
Pour one out for the original “L Word” theme song by Betty. It’s gone for good as the reboot is opting for a more modern take on the credits. We’ll instead will see the logo with popping colors for a few moments and hear a different pop song each week, à la Girls.
This week, we start with a flashback to two years ago. Nat and Alice are making out when Gigi starts banging on the front door and screaming to come inside the house. They don’t let her in, so she ends up hammering a nail to the door and hanging her ring on it.
It’s a reminder that Alice and Nat’s relationship is rooted in the breakup of a family, which will surely come into play as the season goes on. When Nat and Gigi’s son gets sick and they’re both busy, Alice is called upon to pick him up from school and take care of him.
Of course, Alice is completely incompetent, grabbing a Crock Pot for him to throw up in. She calls Shane for help who is pretty good with all kinds of people, and thus naturally, is good with kids, too. “Kids are people,” Shane shrugs.
And even if Alice isn’t a natural, she at least tries — if for nothing more than Nat’s sake. The next day, Alice has gotten the stomach bug (welcome to parenthood, Alice), and Gigi is there to take care of the kid, so the two have a bonding moment about Gigi’s previous behavior, finally thawing some of the ice there.
Meanwhile, there is less on the Sophie/Dani front this week as Dani settles into her new job — that she didn’t tell Sophie about ahead of time — throwing Sophie into a tailspin about the kind of person she’s marrying. Thankfully, her incredibly sweet and supportive family (props to her single mom in particular) basically tell her to chill out because she knows she loves Dani.
It finally culminates in a touching scene at their engagement party where Sophie’s mom gives her her grandmother’s ring so she can give it to Dani, along with some sage advice about marriage. While it’s important to portray the realities of unsupportive families, it’s also so nice to see healthy, loving parents who are happy for their children.
Of all the new characters, Finley is the one I understand the least. I’m not sure where they’re going with her right now. After building Shane’s bed in last week’s episode, Finley apparently just never left and decided to become a permanent couch-crasher (not that Shane has a couch).
Anyone other than Shane would be so upset by this. Even for Shane, you can tell she’s put off by the weirdness of Finley and annoyed by her very presence, but Shane is too nice to really do anything resembling conflict. After Shane gets served her divorce papers (thanks to Finley), they end up going out (to what appears to be a post-The Planet sports bar) and Shane encourages Finley to put down Tinder and cruise the room.
After getting shot down by every girl in the bar, Finley manages to hook up with a girl by asking her if she wants another drink and then getting her to buy. It’s kind of like negging, but more pathetic. Again, I just don’t get where we’re going with Finley.
To make matters weirder, she has some kind of panic attack while they’re hooking up. Perhaps she’s a survivor? Or maybe new to these kinds of experiences? I’m sure this will be explored further, but so far, it feels like a lot of little pieces of story shoehorned in without payoff.
This is similar to the problem with Micah right now — the least developed character so far — though he and Jose are incredibly cute and charming on their gift card date. Every scene with Micah leaves me wanting more. Right now, he feels a bit like a trans trope.
We don’t know anything about Micah’s life outside of his relationship to other people (namely Dani and Sophie) and that he’s trans. Where does he work? What is his family background? I want more!
Meanwhile, Shane meets a couple who work at the bar, and they opine the loss of The Planet and lack of any lesbian bar in Los Angeles. (Is this true? That seems outrageous!) Shane then gets the idea that someone should buy the bar and let the couple manage it, so perhaps Shane has found her next path…
Over at the Porter Campaign Headquarters, Dani arrives for her first day and isn’t quite ready for the rough-and-tumble world of local politics — though honestly, Bette’s campaign may be the fanciest local race that I’ve ever seen. She literally has a Judy Chicago painting on loan in her campaign headquarters.
During the first meeting with Dani and Bette, Dani asks if there’s anything that could compromise the campaign other than the affair Bette had while working for the City of Los Angeles. Bette tells her she spent a night in jail, cheated on Tina, and that her friend, Jenny Schechter committed suicide at her house.
The final season of The L Word killed off Schechter, one of the most annoying characters to ever exist, and famously ended without resolving the question of how she died. Tonight, in a throwaway scene, the question apparently has been answered after ten long years.
And, overall, I think that’s fine. It was a pretty ridiculous story to begin with.
Bette has a campaign event at an equality center and talks about the issues with LGBTQ youth homelessness. The scene is a bit preachy, but it’s completely fine to have something that caters to queer viewers.
It’s also a rare moment for Bette to be exposed and show her personal side, in general and on the campaign trail. (Though we still don’t know “why she’s running.”)
So, of course, just as soon as she has a really successful day on the campaign, Bette calls up the woman she had the affair with to meet up. Old habits die hard…
Next. The L Word: Generation Q season premiere: It's good to be back. dark