Sea of ​​Bulbuls: "Minx" is a routine sitcom on an unconventional theme

The "Minx" series is a pretty cute and fun comedy about the establishment of a porn magazine for women in the seventies, blown up naked of all kinds, just do not expect it to be as deep as the topics it deals with

Songs of salvation

14/04/2022

Thursday, 14 April 2022, 08:43 Updated: 08:57

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Trailer for the "Minx" Series (Lionsgate)

Early 1970s, the sexual revolution is in full swing.

The second wave of feminism is raging on every college campus in America, but female liberation is seeping into real life slowly.

Still, a young girl named Joyce (Ophelia Lobibond, "Elementary") has a dream: to produce a revolutionary feminist magazine, which will publish articles on weighty topics (sexual assault, abortion, inherent exploitation in the institution of marriage… you know, such fun things) and old The world of women and girls, who will finally see a different perspective on their lives.

The only problem is that in the field of publishing, as in most fields, men dominate, and no one is willing to publish her magazine, claiming that it sucks, annoys, lowers them and "why does the woman on the cover look angry?". Instead of seeing her dream fade away. , Joyce decides to go for the only offer she received, and produce her important and advanced magazine with the help of a publisher named Doug Renty (Jake Johnson, "New Girl"), whose business is porn magazines! Now they will have to somehow settle the two Their supposed worldviews are opposite, and learn that maybe they are not so different after all, and we viewers will learn that both pornography and feminism are not rude words.

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There is potential here for a tremendous story.

Ophelia (Photo: Lionsgate Television)

Let's say that if you followed the story of the American feminist revolution of the 1970s in the "Mrs. America" ​​series, and immersed yourself in all the wonderful drama of the female quest for independence and power in GLOW, you are already quite ready for "Minx".

This is a light-hearted comedy that is reminiscent in its structure of less comedic drama trying to really get into the depths of the subjects, and more of a new-generation workplace-based sitcom (single camera, not filmed live in front of an audience).

The creator of the series, Alan Rapaport, said in an interview that when she heard the true story of similar magazines, she immediately thought of this format, and the truth is that she is right - there is potential for a tremendous story here.

The thing is, so far in its first season (the last couple of episodes are up for grabs today, Thursday), it's not certain that Rappaport has managed to make everything possible out of this concept.

TV "Minx" is a little too soft, not witty and sharp enough.

It does not pretend to be important and teach where we came from and where we are going as "Mrs. America", and certainly does not reach the levels of depth and precision of the study of the human psyche like GLOW.

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Sitcom.

"Minx" (Photo: Lionsgate Television)

All the complexity is supposedly at the heart of the story here, but only supposedly.

Because "Minx" prefers to bring us a lighter story, where the big gaps are smoothed out and when there are conflicts they are resolved almost immediately, during the episode, as is the best tradition in the sitcom

The character design also belongs more to the world of sitcoms.

The world of "Minx" is populated by several distinct comedic characters, such as a blonde and supposedly-stupid porn star but actually with surprising depths (Jessica Lowe, "The Gemstone Family"), a gay photographer who wastes nude magazine photos because he is actually brilliant ( Oscar Montoya), and Joyce's sister (Lennon Farham, "Whip"), who represents the typical housewife, with her husband and children.

Particularly enjoyable is Rita (Idara Victor, "Rizoli and Ayles"), Doug's partner, a black woman who knows him and his sticks and without her probably his entire empire would have gone up in flames a long time ago.

They are all pretty fine characters, not brilliant or with intriguing layers (maybe except Rita).

The one who holds it all is Jake Johnson, in a role that seems to have been born to play - the charming and messy Doug, who came from the bottom and there learned everything he knows.

The heart of the series is the tension between the two worlds of Joyce and Doug, and the relationship that crystallizes between these two opposites.

She is, after all, an intellectual academic detained without much knowledge of the essence of life, and he is a liberated man who accepts everything and everyone, with street wisdom.

She attended the prestigious Wasser College, and he studied the art of hustle in the streets and specializes in doing business from anything.

On paper, this is a dynamic from which the best of romantic comedies are made, and the chemistry certainly exists between the actors.

And yet, the series is pleasantly surprising in that it does not immediately go for the easy option of romantic tension between the two main characters.

Instead it focuses on other and much more interesting options, at least so far.

There is a great lack of representation of beautiful platonic relationships on screen, and it is always nice to see friendship and mutual respect grow between two opposites.

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The sub-character who is really intriguing.

Idara Victor as Rita, "Minx" (Photo: Lionsgate Television)

Joyce, who is supposed to be the eyes through which we look at the world of the series, is a character that is hard to identify with.

She is portrayed, especially in the first part of the series, as a kind of cliché about feminism - she has a lot of opinions but little patience for other lifestyles, she judges and criticizes others who seem to her not intelligent enough, has a hard time accepting criticism and lacks a sense of humor.

She has to reconcile her theoretical knowledge with the realities of life that she has not known until today, and it takes her too long.

By the time she met Doug, her feminism was more academic than everyday, and in doing so she remarkably represented the second wave of feminism from which she grew up.

Just as many feminists were aware at the time when they went out to protest in the world itself, their own gaze was very narrow, from the point of view of white women of tronormative and privilege, which left no room for "other" types of women who knelt even greater, such as skin color. Socio-economic status, lack of access to education and sexual orientation.

As you can see, and as Joyce learns in an episode where she meets college girls who feel her magazine is not militant enough - feminism is a complex thing.

All this complexity is supposedly at the heart of the story here, but only supposedly.

Because "Minx" prefers to bring us a lighter story, where the big gaps are smoothed out and when there are conflicts they are resolved almost immediately, during the episode, in the best tradition in the sitcom.

Joyce's sister, the one who represents the traditional family values ​​of what was considered "normal" at the time, could have been a character that provoked dramatic conflict, but instead she is a super accepting and supportive, even actual assistant in the magazine.

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It takes time until a real conflict arrives, and then he improves the series.

"Minx" (Photo: Lionsgate Television)

A real conflict is created for the first time only in episode 8 (the best in the series so far).

It also gives a glimpse into the difficult experiences Joyce went through throughout her career, also gives her the confidence to present herself as a confident woman who does not let the voices of criticism bother her, and finally provides a real and justified crisis, which is not resolved at the end of the episode.

It's very satisfying, but also a little late.

Joyce's magazine may be dealing with weighty issues (sometimes absurdly) that some editors will not even touch on today, but her series does not deal with them at all, other than to mention them briefly, almost like another joke.

This is not necessarily a bad thing.

After all, who said every story should be super complex and full of conflict?

Perhaps we have reached a stage where the story of the feminist struggle can already be used from a more humorous, nicer place.

Perhaps this is a series for a new generation, a young generation whose word "feminism" has no negative connotation, and the concept of sex discrimination sounds, at least in theory, like something that has already passed from the world.

For this generation, the struggle is already an ancient history that took place decades before he was born, and it may be easier for him to digest how screwed up the situation was through such repression that says, "Would you believe women were just the ones bringing the coffee?".

The series chooses to present the story not as a mirror to everything that is still screwed up and requiring change in society, but uses other means to produce the market effect, for example unlimited frontal nudity.

Yes, "Minx" is a pornographic magazine that consciously craves the male body, as a counter-movement to traditional pornography, and because it's such (and because it's an HBO Max series), the series is full, not to mention blown up, of male nudity.

Occasionally a naked woman also walks through the frame (after all, this workplace comedy takes place in the porn magazine industry), but mostly and openly, she shows us pins.

Lots of pins.

full.

And this is not some random cock, but a whole parade.

In one of the first scenes in the series we participate in a casting session of models for the job of a middle boy in the first issue, and win a series of close-ups on male organs of all types and colors.

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Could have been a revolutionary series.

"Minx" (Photo: Lionsgate Television)

The side of pornography is represented here with a smile that almost immediately neutralizes it from the shock effect, which is a pretty amazing and unique achievement.

A lot of series in recent years have submitted to us female and male nudity and blatant sex scenes, to teach us that their series is cool and does not name, well, cock.

In "Minx" the nude is so relevant to the subject, that it does not activate anything in us except perhaps the sense of humor.

Amazing, but as the series that has shown perhaps the greatest variety of pins on TV (and quite a few other breasts and organs), it's funny how non-horny she is.

Ironically how quickly the sexual connotation of the male genitalia fades away, when in series like "Game of Thrones", for example, nudity is used in the same way that graphic violence is used - which actually makes it porn.

Perhaps this is the difference between the traditional male gaze and the female gaze through which "Minx" looks.

You would not expect a series with such a bold concept to be so easy to digest, since this is a "war of the sexes" - one of the most emotional topics there is.

This is a Sabba series, and there is room for Sabba series as well, but it's hard not to feel how much she's missing something really important.

It could have been a revolutionary work that seriously examined whether pornography could be empowering and proactive, and not just a place of humiliation and lust, distorting the way women and men view sex and relationships.

Is porn solely a social phenomenon associated with rape culture and encourages toxic masculinity, or perhaps, as it is increasingly experienced in modern times, porn is at all an opportunity to create a space of freedom for women.

In other words, can pornography be feminist?

It's a debate that comes up again and again in feminist spaces.

Instead of really talking about the thing for which we came together, "Minx" chose to be a kind and fun comedy that does not bother anyone, such an office series,

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