Lena Dunham Netflix Rom-Com is charming

“Too Much” is not the immediate continuation of Lena Dunham for “Girls”, the groundbreaking HBO comedy that remains the calling card of his maker. In de acht jaar sinds die serie uit de lucht ging, creëerde Dunham samen met een andere HBO-show (‘camping’, een beperkte serie die slecht werd ontvangen), de piloot van een andere (‘industrie’, die een ‘meisjes’ -achtige interesse in 20 selecteert die vreselijke beslissingen maakte) en twee functies maakte (‘scherpe stok’, een pandemische indie en ‘Catherine die Birdy’ -verhaal) heeft genaamd, een medemiddelde, ‘A medium average story). But the Netflix half-hour is, with a considerable margin, the most personal and committed company of Dunham, because for the first time it became a household name under the creative class. Given her status as an eternal lightning distance, Dunham returns to the spotlight topics “too much” for added control. Nevertheless, this charming, quirky show keeps the gift of Dunham for effortless different, joke -loaded dialogue, while the ‘girls’ Ethos evolves for a new phase of life.

The protagonist of “Too Much”, Jessica, is in many ways a clear Dunham curogate: an aspiring director – albeit in advertising – who moves to London for work and quickly gets involved with a musician. (Dunham made the series together with her husband, Luis Felber, who met Dunham after she moved to the VK for “industry” and contributed to the soundtrack of the show.) In the first of many big breaks of “Girls”, Jessica is not played by Dunham himself, but by “Hacks” Breakout. Although Jessica has been drawn from Dunham’s experience, stupid stallter, a comedian, the character with its characteristic MotorMouthed cadence and stumbling delivery-to-it-all suited for a ROM-Com heroine that is over her skis. As Jessica’s recently divorced older sister, Dunham remains in the cast as a support player, not the main event. The presence of the author is much more important behind the camera, where Dunham writes and directs credit on a majority of episodes.

Jessica meets Felix (Will Sharpe of season 2 of “The White Lotus”) only months after the collapse of her long-term relationship with Zev (Michael blessing “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”, who develops that the CV of the terrible exes of TV heroines is developing), the nice Jewish boy she thought. Instead, he did not waste time by continuing with knittingin -influencer Wendy (Emily Ratajkowski) – exactly the kind of beautiful, artistically filled other woman to play on Jessica’s deepest uncertainties. Jessica canalize this grief and envy in the framing device for “too much”: a series of monologues addressed to Wendy and reused in a voice -over.

There are a handful of easy cracks about cultural conflict when Jessica, a lifelong fan of Regency dramas, first crosses the pond. She gets a flat in an estate that thinks that the term rolling lawns contains, not a boring brick tower, and thinks that “bollocking” sounds like a sexual act. But “too much” is not a portrait of London in the 2020s, the way in which “Girls” was a snapshot of Brooklyn in the years 2010. The last show functioned as a comment in a specific time and place; The first is the story of two specific people and the band that forms between them. Many of the best scenes in ‘Too Much’, including a whole episode that displays a casual completely lander who enjoy each other’s company, consist of Jessica and Felix alone in her apartment. It doesn’t matter if what is outside of East London or the space.

Although “too much” explicitly refers to people such as “Pride & Prejudice” and “Love actually”, it is really part of another tradition: television series, instead of films that use the extensive canvas of the medium to explore a relationship in all its length and complexity. (Some of the best examples, such as ‘Catastrophe’ and ‘Lovingick’, are also trained in London.) Both Jessica and Felix are cultivated into complex individuals with oddities, a past and, of course, chemistry. Jessica feels emotions deep and intense, a quality that it takes on Felix’s English reserve; Felix has a dreamy, scatterbrained air (“we live opposite the internet” is how he explains his home near the headquarters of a technology company) that attracts and challenges a business study as Jessica. Each has a deep -rooted dysfunction that is investigated in episodes that relieve their family history and earlier love lives.

Dunham has a well-deserved reputation for sexual frankness, and although “too much” stops the butt eating, body bars extremes of the most notorious moments of “girls”, uses sex as a vehicle for stories. There is a spiky, strange tenderness for their first encounter, in which Felix has to navigate around bridge tires that cover the hull of Jessica, and the casual Midden-Coitus-Scherts of the couple bears witness to their comfort with each other. Stalter’s large, bladder -like persona, both in “hacks” and on stage, makes her an unconventional choice for a romantic lead. (Although Dunham, who was confronted with a flood of small skepticism around the sexual escapades of Hannah Horvath, knows enough to throw the type.) She nevertheless reveals a softer side in Jessica, who settled in a more central role without losing its unique attraction.

“Too much” is not paid so much attention to the supporting players, who stay to a halt and never completely merge into a coherent ensemble. For example, it is a strange choice to make Jessica’s mother (Rita Wilson), sister (Dunham) and grandmother (Rhea Perlman) central in the plot when they are thousands of kilometers away. All three artists are great, but they are often pressed and stranded on telephone screens without a scene partner due to the circumstances of the plot. Jessica’s colleagues, especially her boss (Richard E. Grant) and a colleague transplant that is played by director Janicza Bravo, are delicious, but subplots about their love lives who can supplement that primary romance has not given enough room to resonate.

Both Grant and Wilson are “girls” alumni, where Andrew Rannells also returns to the fold and the ex-husband of the Dunham character. (Just as Hannah’s College friend Elijah came out as gay, Jessica’s boss and former brother-in-law investigates his bisexuality in a Throuple in which both lovers are called Cody.) These welcome faces other shared tendencies between the two shows. It is sometimes difficult to buy the titular idea that Jessica is unusually exaggerated when every other character seems to share her lack of filter or boundaries, as well as an impulsivity that can limit pure arbitrariness. Such as ‘girls’, ‘too much’ runs a delicate line between the audience and they confuse them with abrupt, random developments. One episode, Jessica is told that she has to do it at work; The next one, she is praised and invited for a team dinner powered by Cokes.

Jessica and Felix are happy islands within this pleasant chaotic sea. Neither of the characters have their lives together, but the obstacles they encounter are more mature and more than the miscommunication that tends to drive so many ROM coms. Jessica’s anger and pain of her falling apart are still an open wound; Felix gives dedication an honest attempt, but maybe too much of a rookie to make it work. “Too much” has not completely discovered what it is outside this central combination. See how they figure out what she His is still more than enough to earn our attention. Episode 2 ends with an extensive, wordless photo of Felix who looks at Jessica while listening to a mixtape he made. The moment continues and further and further. I wish it still took longer.

All ten episodes of “Too Much” are now streaming on Netflix.