This week:
- Just how guilty is this pleasure?
- The TV show that finally ended this nightmare plot.
- Maybe pop stars shouldn’t fly through the air.
- Another fallen hero.
- A news update that’s making me feel gaslit.
Shamelessly in Love With This Netflix Show
The idea of a “guilty pleasure” TV series has evolved impressively.
In fact, it might have lost all meaning.
The idea is that we used to watch something that we feel like was in poor taste, or perhaps not “sophisticated,” and felt sheepish about enjoying it.
That indulgence used to be had in secret, before the explosion of reality TV and a bevy of hit soapy thrillers meant that people could be proudly unapologetic about the things they watch that bring them happiness. And so they should be! If I can acknowledge that there is something you find entertaining about watching cars drive in a circle for an entire Sunday afternoon, then surely you can reciprocate the generosity as I watch grown women fight about dinner reservations.
The Hunting Wives, Netflix’s buzzy new series currently surging to the top of the streamer’s most-watched chart, takes the idea of “guilty pleasure” to a new level.
It’s not just because the series is shameless, though it certainly is that: Shamelessly capitalizing on Big Little Lies comparisons it doesn’t merit, shamelessly catering to a MAGA sensibility usually ignored by this genre, and shamelessly inserting titillating lesbian nude and sex scenes no matter how nonsensical they may seem in context of the narrative—you know, should the husbands forced to binge with their wives need some stimulation.
It’s because of the contract we seem to have gotten into before we even press play on Netflix: an understanding that we are being delivered a “guilty pleasure,” and settling for the base level of all the genre provides. When we’re actively seeking out guilty pleasures—are they really guilty anymore?
Hunting Wives stars Brittany Snow as a former political publicist named Sophie who from Boston—well, actually, Cambridge, where Harvard is, she’s careful to specify—to Texas with her husband and son. There, she meets Margo (Malin Akerman), the community’s bisexual Queen Bee. Margo is instantly smitten with Sophie, pushing her out of her comfort zone in just about every way imaginable: She gets Sophie into hunting and buys her a gun; she seduces and starts sleeping with her; she convinces Sophie to abandon her sobriety.
Basically, the Sophie we see midway through the season is one who’s had a full personality transplant. When a local murder mystery ensnares Sophie, Margo, and their families—and Sophie’s own dark past comes back to haunt—the sexy soap morphs into a crime thriller.
More than with other recent entries like Sirens or The Summer I Turned Pretty, I do admit to having felt a little bashful watching Hunting Wives. Not that the series isn’t fun or that I didn’t speed through it. It just was the brazenness with which it randomly injects salacious scenes and twists into the season. Maybe that’s fearless. Maybe it’s pandering. I guess that’s the modern “guilty pleasure” brief?
It seems as if any series with a female-led cast, some sex, and a mystery is compared to Big Little Lies, which I find a little unfair. There was a certain cinematic aesthetic to Big Little Lies that was disarming and rather groundbreaking, as were the performances: complicated, prickly work led by a trio of Oscar winners. I wish the impulse wasn’t to evoke Big Little Lies as almost a genre to itself, as it minimizes that series while also not justly selling what a show like Hunting Wives is.
It’s a beach read on my television. And thankfully, from the privacy of my own home, I don’t have to worry about other people seeing the book cover and judging. The only person I’m judging is myself—and Lord and my therapist know that I have a lifetime of experience dealing with that.
Carrie Bradshaw (and the Rest of Us) Are Free!
(Warning: Some spoilers ahead.)
It’s been a while since I actively booed at my television. But that was the state I devolved to over the last few weeks of And Just Like That, during the recent ridiculous stretch of episodes of the Sex and the City sequel series—testing the limits of my devotion to these characters.
This week’s new episode, however, marked an improvement in quality wider in scope than Carrie Bradshaw’s eyes when she walks into a shoe sale.
It wasn’t just because the breakup we’ve all been clamoring for finally happened: Bye Aidan, don’t let one of the ugly doors you bought because you broke Carrie’s hit you in the behind as you leave!
It’s because the episode proved that, despite the best efforts of the writers and a very game cast, this show is only working when it focuses on Carrie and her growth. The distracting side plots have ranged from ludicrous to sacrilegious, so this week’s Carrie-centric reprieve was more than welcome.
In fact, I wondered if some major storyline had been cut because the episode was so short and so fleetingly glanced at the other characters. Here’s an only borderline cheeky recap of the episode:
Lisa: Get on Ozempic, fatty.
Miranda: I’m an alcoholic, don’t hate me.
Charlotte: Help, I’m falling!
Seema: I have to do this deodorant storyline because we already humiliated Miranda this week.
Anthony: Help! It’s Patti LuPone!
Carrie: A serious and nuanced 25-minute exploration of trust, self-worth, and romance later in life that it is once painful but also quite beautiful to watch.
I’m not complaining. Just noticing.
Bring the Pop Stars Back Down to Earth
There are pop stars raining from the sky. Chicken Little is positively beside himself.
Katy Perry was in the middle of belting out “Roar” at a recent concert when the butterfly she was riding above the crowd jarringly plunged while she was on it. This comes after Beyoncé weathered a similar fright when the car she had been riding over her audience also malfunctioned and she had to be rescued.
Katy’s training as an astronaut likely helped her keep her cool. Bey’s training as an angel sent from God likely worked in her favor as well.
Beyoncé has since replaced the car stunt with a horse that she now rides through the air at her shows. “I got back on that horse for y’all, so I can get closer to you,” she recently told her crowd. It’s inspiring and a sweet sentiment, but, respectfully, let’s hold a moratorium on launching our pop stars through the air until these malfunctions stop happening.
After all, there’s only one artist who belongs above us.
As culture writer Tom Smyth posted on X: “The skies have been rejecting any pop star who isn’t P!nk. The skies belong to P!nk.”
A Truly Unbelievable Sight
If you live long enough, all of your heroes will eventually disappoint you.
Case in point: a childhood icon of mine, a figure vital to my upbringing and becoming the man I am today, was arrested this week for credit card fraud.
You hate to see it.
A 40-Year Relationship Sham
Sure. Next you’re gonna tell me Bert and Ernie are just roommates.
More From The Daily Beast’s Obsessed
The making of the most bonkers rom-com of the year. Read more.
The true story behind the horrifying The Gilded Age storyline. Read more.
Ozzy Osbourne invented reality TV as we know it today. Read more.
What to watch this week:
Oh, Hi!: Why yes, the rom-com that Logan Lerman spends half off the movie naked and handcuffed is pleasant to watch. (Now in theaters)
Washington Black: This is a really special and original adventure series. (Now on Hulu)
The Hunting Wives: What’s summer without a guilty pleasure to watch?
What to skip this week:
The Home: I don’t know who thought Pete Davidson should star in a horror movie… (Now in theaters)
Happy Gilmore 2: A new level of Adam Sandler unfunniness is unleashed. (Now on Netflix)
The Fantastic Four: First Steps:This Marvel movie is definitely doing something new. If only it all worked. (Now in theaters)
