S01.E02: Naked Party

[paulvdb]

Premiere date: November 18, 2021

[Bort]

I loved Leighton getting that math professor to do a mic drop for her as she cruised up to a more challenging math class. Which… none of her teachers in high school realized she was good at math? How is this a revelation for her this late? 

[peachmangosteen]

I'm confused, if Whitney just started going to Essex how was she already having an affair with the soccer coach?

[Bort]

Maybe he recruited her.

[peachmangosteen]

5 minutes ago, kariyaki said:

Maybe he recruited her.

That makes sense. For some reason I could not figure that out lol.

[gesundheit]

I was so startled by the second episode being a half-hour show after the first one was an hour! I'm a dope and I hadn't even looked that far into information about the show.

I'm glad we got more info on why Leighton is closeted (she makes sense as someone who isn't ostensibly homophobic and has probably had token gay friends who are good for her image, but being tokenized herself is bad for her image) (at least that's how I interpreted the way she sees it!), and I guess she chooses cougars because they're more degrees of separation from her primary world? Hooking up with them will get her some good unsolicited life advice, but on the other hand they are hooking up with a teenager. Not cute.

Is Whitney going to go back to that awful man? Nooo!

[peachmangosteen]

8 minutes ago, gesundheit said:

I was so startled by the second episode being a half-hour show after the first one was an hour! I'm a dope and I hadn't even looked that far into information about the show.

I was surprised by the first ep being an hour because I just figured the show, being a Mindy Kaling comedy, would be a half hour. I hope the rest of the eps are a half hour.

[Bort]

37 minutes ago, gesundheit said:

I'm glad we got more info on why Leighton is closeted (she makes sense as someone who isn't ostensibly homophobic and has probably had token gay friends who are good for her image, but being tokenized herself is bad for her image) (at least that's how I interpreted the way she sees it!), and I guess she chooses cougars because they're more degrees of separation from her primary world? Hooking up with them will get her some good unsolicited life advice, but on the other hand they are hooking up with a teenager. Not cute.

Yeah, I think Leighton picks cougars so that there is zero chance of them interacting with her social circle. She seemed like she was kicking herself when the soccer mom cougar saw her college keychain. 

Her reasons for staying closeted make sense, she doesn’t want that to be her entire identity; the ab body paint spraying gay guy is a prime example. He’s gay and that’s all anybody knows about him. It was the only thing he talked about in their dorm intros.

[Angeleyes]

I think Leighton picks the women she does because she knows that they too are on the down low and won’t want to be exposed and it helps keep it just a hookup with no expectations of a relationship. 
I was surprised that the other girl in the comedy magazine agreed to forgive and forget considering what Bela did with her boyfriend. Bela gave a sincere apology, but that doesn’t mean she would automatically trust her going forward. I wonder too if those 6 guys will have certain expectations of Bela now that she may not want to continue. She could have lingering repercussions despite her alleged sex positive stance. Considering that the guys have already mentioned X number of spots for a girl, I don’t think the guys are as progressive as she wants everyone to be. 

[gesundheit]

10 hours ago, Angeleyes said:

I think Leighton picks the women she does because she knows that they too are on the down low and won’t want to be exposed and it helps keep it just a hookup with no expectations of a relationship. 
I was surprised that the other girl in the comedy magazine agreed to forgive and forget considering what Bela did with her boyfriend. Bela gave a sincere apology, but that doesn’t mean she would automatically trust her going forward. I wonder too if those 6 guys will have certain expectations of Bela now that she may not want to continue. She could have lingering repercussions despite her alleged sex positive stance. Considering that the guys have already mentioned X number of spots for a girl, I don’t think the guys are as progressive as she wants everyone to be. 

I don't think the women are closeted - the woman from this episode said she'd been out since high school.

 

I agree about the other comedy writer. I think she got over it a little too fast. I could see her agreeing on a ceasefire since Bela didn't know, but most people take a little while to warm up after something like that!

[DearEvette]

I am surprised that the girlfriend knows comedy writer dude got the handjob from Bela in the first place.  You'd think while it would be a nudge-nudge wink-wink thing among the guys, they'd keep it from getting to the GF.

I thought the naked party looked  fun -- lord knows I never would have gone to one if it was even a thing when I went to college, but god bless them it was funny.

I am glad Leighton is smart and more complicated than just snarky rich girl.  I like the layers the show is giving her.

I am disappointed that Whitney would go back to the coach.  I have major stress watching them because it has disaster potential all over the place -- for her, for him, for her playing, for her relationship with her players, for her mother -- Although I kinda can't wait to see Mom's reaction if this becomes public.  Sherri Shepherd was great in her scenes. 

The scene in the french class of what everyone did over the summer is all too real.  If you go to a college where a lot of the student body is affluent, those first day 'getting to know you' ice breakers in the smaller seminars can be demoralizing for the non-rich kids  My husband is a professor and he comes from a very working class background btu he works at a tony liberal arts college and he did this one time in one of his classes.  He said that the divide between the rich and the poor and their summers was so stark.  He could see some of the less affluent kids just deflate as the richer kids talked about all their international travel.  He never did it ever again in a class.

[zenithwit]

5 hours ago, gesundheit said:

I agree about the other comedy writer. I think she got over it a little too fast. I could see her agreeing on a ceasefire since Bela didn't know, but most people take a little while to warm up after something like that!

I'm guessing this wasn't the first time her boyfriend got a hand job from a freshman.

I think there may be more layers to this.  We know that there aren't very many girls on the comedy staff.  So far the show has only showed us two of them and they both have boyfriends in the inner circle (at least that's how it appeared to me).  Maybe it's a coincidence but maybe this was a bit of game recognizing game?  It seemed like the other comedy writer was more upset that she put her neck on the line for Bela than Bela actually jerking off her boyfriend.

[Black Knight]

On 11/19/2021 at 8:35 AM, kariyaki said:

Her reasons for staying closeted make sense, she doesn’t want that to be her entire identity; the ab body paint spraying gay guy is a prime example. He’s gay and that’s all anybody knows about him. It was the only thing he talked about in their dorm intros.

Except that's actually something he did to himself. As you said, it's all he talked about in their dorm intros, so it's the only thing people know about him. If he wants people to know other things about him, he has to tell them.

In the past, sure, saying "I'm gay" is something that would subsume everything else in many people's minds, but these are college kids in the 2020s. The only way it will be someone's entire identity is if that is all they tell people.

And it seems like Leighton, in hiding her sexuality, goes even further and hides everything about herself. Those two "friends" of hers did say that she didn't tell them anything.

18 hours ago, zenithwit said:

I'm guessing this wasn't the first time her boyfriend got a hand job from a freshman.

I think there may be more layers to this.  We know that there aren't very many girls on the comedy staff.  So far the show has only showed us two of them and they both have boyfriends in the inner circle (at least that's how it appeared to me).  Maybe it's a coincidence but maybe this was a bit of game recognizing game?  It seemed like the other comedy writer was more upset that she put her neck on the line for Bela than Bela actually jerking off her boyfriend.

That's true. It seemed like she felt she had been made a fool with that. It seems to be the college girl version of adult women who know their husbands cheat and accept it so long as it does not lead to public embarrassment for the woman (so rules like no one she knows, out of town only, etc.).

I'm confused as to why the writers picked Gilbert for Kimberly's hometown. They are writing as if it is a small, entirely white, bumpkin town in the middle of nowhere. It is not; it is a city that is part of Maricopa County, Arizona, which is very similar to southern California in that all the cities are slammed up against each other rather than having any space between them, so that it's just one big continuous urban/suburban sprawl really of Phoenix, Gilbert, Mesa, Tempe, Chandler and Scottsdale. It's the fourth most populous county in the country and it's nearing majority-minority in demographics, so Kimberly's clueless-white-girl-who's-never-seen-a-POC act made no sense.

Female friendships are my jam, so the big attraction of the show for me, despite the title, is really about watching the roommates' friendships develop. I like that they're being realistic in that initially some girls are doing more bonding than others. Kimberly and Bela are spending the most time together, with Whitney next, probably because she doesn't want to talk about her relationship with the assistant coach. And then Leighton is really outside because she's hiding an entire part of herself. All of herself, really, if we listen to her ex-"friends."

[Bort]

On 11/20/2021 at 9:03 PM, Black Knight said:

Except that's actually something he did to himself. As you said, it's all he talked about in their dorm intros, so it's the only thing people know about him. If he wants people to know other things about him, he has to tell them.

In the past, sure, saying "I'm gay" is something that would subsume everything else in many people's minds, but these are college kids in the 2020s. The only way it will be someone's entire identity is if that is all they tell people.

And it seems like Leighton, in hiding her sexuality, goes even further and hides everything about herself. Those two "friends" of hers did say that she didn't tell them anything.

I don’t disagree but that doesn’t mean Leighton still doesn’t believe it herself.

Also, I totally related to Leighton balking at her roommates wanting to know details on where she was going and what she was doing. Not for the same reasons but I would do the same thing when I had roommates/friends be nosy like that. I kind of equate it with someone trying to boss me around, which I really hate.

[Irlandesa]

On 11/19/2021 at 9:59 AM, Angeleyes said:

I think Leighton picks the women she does because she knows that they too are on the down low and won’t want to be exposed and it helps keep it just a hookup with no expectations of a relationship.

I don't think they're on the down low.  I think she blocked her pilot hookup in this episode when she tried to get in touch.  Or at least I think that's what happened. 

On 11/19/2021 at 9:13 PM, DearEvette said:

The scene in the french class of what everyone did over the summer is all too real.  If you go to a college where a lot of the student body is affluent, those first day 'getting to know you' ice breakers in the smaller seminars can be demoralizing for the non-rich kids 

The difference in summers is real.  The fact that Kimberly was placed in what sounds like a specialized French history class offered all in French during her first trimester is what I didn't find all that real.  And she doesn't need a tutor.  She just needs to drop down to a lower level class focusing on language development before she starts taking the history and literature classes where the presumption is that a certain baseline is already established. 

From what I remember, all universities test for language proficiency and will place students accordingly. 

 

[Aim123]

The actress who plays Bela is getting on my nerves, she is overacting far too much. Does the over-enthusiasm have to be on 24 hours a day? All of them seem just a little bit off. The first episode was working but I'm going to have to drop off after this second episode it's just not flowing or vibing... it's uncomfortable. I think it's far too cliched. 

Edited April 11, 2022 by Aim123
Thought of something else

[jeansheridan]

I agree. Only Leighton and Whitney work for me. Bela has potential if she just dialed it back. But I deeply dislike watching Kimberly. Her entire being and performance annoys me. And I want to like the working class girl from suburbia. She's just so flat and awkward and lacks charisma. Whereas Leighton owns her scenes. She reminds me of Busy Philips.