Imagine with me, if you will, that you’re talking to someone really great and hitting it off. (Congrats, by the way, love that for you.) Maybe you’re on a date, maybe you’re chatting at a party or in the non-dairy milk section of your local grocery. Sparks might not be flying just yet, but the potential is there. It’s charged and exciting but also, nerve-wracking and could end with you embarrassing yourself in a big way. Are you with me here? In many ways…that’s what this episode of our beloved gay soap opera felt like!
Amid the break-ups, the make-ups and the new pairings we’re excited about, on this week’s episode of To L and Back (Generation Q…edition…), we also discuss the nuance required for meaningful conversations about tokenism and identity on television! Other topics include some ideas for a Bachelor / L Word crossover, some jobs Finley might actually be good at, and Angie’s baffling DNA test results. If none of those interest you, maybe Tess and Shane doing illegal things will?
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SHOW NOTES
- Riese’s recap for Episode 203
- Drew live-tweeted her watch of Glee, I think you all deserve to see that
- Some Autostraddle coverage of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, the book I recommended to about 100 people
- Drew has written about Magic Mike XXL before! And Riese has now watched it!
- As Peggy Peabody popped into this pod episode briefly to explain, here’s some reading on Stendhal syndrome
Drew: Hi, I’m Drew!
Analyssa: And I’m Analyssa.
Riese: And I’m Riese!
Drew: And this is—
Drew, Analyssa, and Riese in unison: To L and Back: Generation Q!
Riese: Edition.
Analyssa: Edition?
Riese: I did say edition.
Drew: We’re doing the edition. I like that we’re sticking with edition.
Riese: Uh-huh (affirmative). I say edition.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: I do the addition of edition.
Drew: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Well, here we are. Another episode of The L Word: Generation Q, the sequel to the original series that changed so many lives.
Riese: Yeah. I love changed lives.
Drew: Yeah. I love gay changed lives, especially. This episode is episode 203. It is called “Luck Be a Lady,” which is actually the name of my favorite episode of the original L Word.
Riese: Really?!
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: Episode 406?
Drew: Episode 406 is my favorite episode. It has the Bette Jodi sex scene, it has fun poker, it also starts with the really great—
Riese: Oh yeah, the phone chain.
Drew: Angela Robinson phone chain. It’s an incredible episode on television.
Riese: You’re correct.
Drew: Yeah. Either way, it’s a pretty bold move to name this episode after an original series episode, especially one that is so good. Yes, Riese? She’s raising her hand, that’s why I just called on her.
Riese: Okay. You guys, this is episode 203 and what’s 203 times 2?
Drew: 406.
Analyssa: Whoa. Okay. You’re getting to like Taylor Swift Easter egg level situation. Is that relatable to anyone or just me?
Drew: I got the reference, I think. This episode is also directed by Marja. So, is she directing the entire season? I don’t know, but so far she’s directed the first three, this episode is written by Maisha Closson, who has written on so much television, written Claws, How to Get Away with Murder, That’s So Raven, long career of TV writing.
Analyssa: That’s So Raven? Thank you for including that.
Drew: Yeah I know, seemed important. And yeah, and so I’m assuming, because of the name of the episode and because of what happened in the original “Luck Be a Lady,” there’s going to be some poker.
Riese: In the front.
Drew: Exactly. Should we get into it?
Riese: Yes.
Analyssa: Let’s do it.
Riese: Let’s do it.
Drew: We start with Angie! She got her DNA test results back and she is excited to check them.
Riese: Math time!
Drew: Math. Yeah. I wasn’t as… yeah. So yeah. What do you want to say?
Riese: As the resident math person on the show, on the podcast.
Analyssa: Thank you for taking that on.
Riese: Yes. I’d like to submit for your evaluation the following puzzle. Angie has a biological mother and father. The mother is Tina Kennard.
Analyssa: Yep. I’m with you so far.
Riese: The father is Marcus Allenwood.
Analyssa: I’ve seen the first season of The L Word.
Riese: A father’s genetics cannot comprise more than 50% of the whole makeup.
Drew: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Analyssa: Right.
Riese: So whyst, I must ask. Why therefore is Angie 51% Sudanese, 20% European, 22% native American, and 7% other regions.
Drew: Feels like whoever was in charge of that graphic thought that Bette carried Angie. That would be the leap that I would make. And look, it takes a lot of people to make a television show, and sometimes things like that happen. I don’t think there’s actually an explanation. I prefer the mistake explanation than the Tina—
Riese: Having Native American heritage?
Analyssa: Tina gets her 23andMe back and she’s like, I’m 3% Sudanese, actually. And yeah, woof.
Drew: Oh god. I don’t want to live in that world. Tina’s bad enough.
Riese: Show us Tina’s test.
Analyssa: Yeah. Now I want to see every single person’s… Again, famously anti-23andMe, but I would like to see fictional 23andMes from all of these people.
Riese: Absolutely.
Drew: I can’t imagine that any of our main characters — well, not maybe any of them, but I’m just thinking like Tina, Alice, them getting a 23andMe test, there’s just so many ways that that could go wrong. And I’m really trying to stick with these characters as opposed to getting frustrated with them. So, I’m going to call this a whim that we maybe don’t get the details of the various characters. The really exciting thing about this is that Angie already has a message from someone named Kayla Allenwood, who is a relative of hers.
Analyssa: It happens really fast. It happens as though these tweens have the 23andMe app on their phone and are immediately responding to every match they get.
Riese: Gen Z stands for Generation Geneticz.
Analyssa: Great plan.
Riese: With a z at the end, geneticz.
Drew: Right.
Riese: Yeah. ZNA.
Drew: That sounds like a really bad sci-fi novel. So speaking of… not speaking of really bad sci-fi novels, because Finley and Sophie are talking, but not about sci-fi novels. They’re talking about shitting your pants, and it’s fine but what’s really the main thing is that Finley and Sophie are cackling and having the time of their lives together.
Finley: Dude, so you’re telling me, you never shit your pants?
Sophie: Oh my God.
Finley: Oh dude. I shit my pants in the CVS.
Sophie: No you didn’t.
Finley: I shit my pants in my own bed. Yeah, I have problems, why do you think I’m coming in here in such a fucking hurry all the time?
Drew: And that’s really nice to see after all this time.
Riese: They’re sweeping?
Analyssa: Yeah, they’re cleaning up. It’s cute. Again, I feel like every conversation about The L Word, I’m like, “I wouldn’t have said this in my life, but sure, fine.” If I’m Finley and I think I may be in love with Sophie, but we haven’t actually become a couple yet, I might not talk about how many times I’ve shit my pants, but there’s something kind of charming about this.
Drew: Okay. But Finley’s type is exactly the type of very normatively attract… normative in the sense, like in a lesbian community sense, attractive person who just can get away with being disgusting and never think twice about it and people are just like, “Oh, Finley!” And you’re like, that person has never showered. And everyone’s like, “I love Finley so much!” That is Finley’s energy, so this felt very real to me.
Analyssa: 100%.
Drew: The number of times some hot cis blonde queer has talked to me about something where I was like, “I really wish you wouldn’t be sharing this, but by all means, you’re going to get away with it aren’t you?”
Riese: They’ll take really bad pictures of themselves and put them on Instagram in some subversive way and I’m like, “Ha ha, some of us look like that all the time.” Is this when Finley asks her to talk and she says—
Sophie: It’s too soon.
Drew: Incredible moment. Yeah.
Analyssa: Yeah.
Drew: It is.
Riese: And she’s like, “No.”
Drew: Yeah. She’s like, “It’s too soon.” Sophie’s expression is so good. What a great delivery of that. I really loved that.
Riese: When Sophie says it’s too soon to talk about your feelings, it’s too soon to talk about your feelings.
Drew: Yeah. I think that might be true.
Analyssa: Speaking of talking about feelings—
Riese: Nice.
Analyssa: Thank you so much, I’ve been working on that forever. Nat also wants to talk. So Alice is like, mournfully cleaning the house, she’s doing dishes and looking sad. And I was like, what has happened? And Nat comes in and is talking about how she slept with someone last night, and she’s very excited and Alice is deeply unexcited.
Riese: Right. She’s trying.
Analyssa: But sort of like tries to play along.
Riese: And failing.
Analyssa: Not well. Yeah.
Drew: Yeah. It’s interesting the way that … just, God, the way they talk about polyamory in this episode, it’s interesting because it’s not like I fundamentally disagree with the way that they’re framing it. I do think that being polyamorous can be a part of your identity in a way that it’s unchanging, right? I do think that like… I don’t know, the weight that is, I guess it’s because they feel like their relationship’s on the line. But it’s just very interesting… I think they’re talking about polyamory like it’s a very new alien concept and that’s what’s bothering me, is that I just feel like even if Alice couldn’t handle polyamory, she would have a reference point for it. I just don’t believe at this point in… I mean we’ve even seen it. I mean, we’ve talked about this last episode, but I just can’t imagine a world where Alice has never tried polyamory with people who she doesn’t care as much about.
Riese: Or with Jamie and Tasha.
Drew: I mean, she even has so it’s like… but even in the gap years that we didn’t see, like I’m just like… or have just so many friends who are polyamorous that like, all of the way they talk about it, like it’s—
Riese: Like Shane.
Drew: Yeah. Like it’s this mystery is just very weird to me. And also Alice asks Nat to shower twice before they have sex, so that’s not a great sign.
Analyssa: Yeah. She is just not trying very hard, it feels like.
Drew: Mm-mm (negative).
Analyssa: We’ll talk about this more later, I’m sure. But I don’t think that polyamory is necessarily for everyone, but it doesn’t seem like Alice is giving it a shot at all. She’s just like, “This feels bad and I don’t want to do it.”
Drew: She’s not communicating that. And she would be much better if she said this feels bad. The problem is that her version of trying is not communicating. And one of the main things I would say about polyamory is you need to be communicating and so it’s just… I mean, that’s very realistic to me I think, is someone being like, “I’m good, I’m good, I’m good, I’m good” and then they’re just silently dying. And it’s like, that’s not the way to handle this. Alice should be like, here are the feelings I have. Also Nat’s already sleeping over at someone else… it just feels like they’re really accelerating this.
Riese: But it feels realistic that Alice is probably still trying to figure out how she feels. This is her first date.
Drew: Oh no.
Analyssa: For sure, yeah.
Drew: Oh, it totally feels realistic that Alice wouldn’t be good at communicating about this. I’m just giving her advice from the real world that she probably should actually communicate her feelings.
Riese: Free advice!
Drew: Yeah.
Analyssa: I screamed in the next scene.
Drew: I also screamed.
Analyssa: I shrieked. Gigi and Bette are walking into a building and that’s not really important, what’s important is that Gigi’s hand is on Bette’s back and then she just fully grabs her ass in the lobby. Unreal.
Drew: Gigi is a really special person, to me and to all of us.
Riese: Yeah. First of all, Gigi is very thirsty as a person.
Drew: Yes. I really like that quality.
Riese: Which I appreciate. Yeah.
Analyssa: She wants to be as close to anyone she’s in a scene with as possible, and I relate to that.
Drew: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Riese: Yeah.
Analyssa: Anyone sharing my space, I’m like, “Let’s sit closer? Put your face next to mine?”
Drew: If they’re hot.
Riese: And then Bette introduces her as her girlfriend.
Rudolfo Nùñez: Nice to see you again.
Bette: Nice to see you. Rudolfo Nùñez, this is my girlfriend, Gigi Ghorbani.
Riese: Which really surprised me, but also, I’m already jarred by the experience of seeing Bette in a normal relationship, where she went on a date with someone and they’re getting to know each other and now they’re doing things together. And she honestly doesn’t really seem that into it. I feel like — and maybe again, I’m projecting because I rarely have had relationships… I’ve had one relationship that just started with, “Oh, we met on a dating app, let’s go on a date. I guess we like each other, let’s start dating.” And the whole time I was like, wow, this is just very… I guess this is just a nice way to date someone where there’s no drama around it or some sort of intense fallout.
Drew: Yeah. I do like Bette’s version of that is getting set up on a blind date from her friend who was previously in a throuple with that person.
Analyssa: But there is some drama there.
Drew: A little bit… but yes, it is also very jarring to see Bette that way. And Bette is introducing Gigi to Dani and her dad because Gigi is a realtor and Dani’s looking to get her own place now that she’s moving out of her previously shared home with Sophie.
Riese: Are there any couples on The L Word that started with two people going on a date to see if they might like each other and then gradually building a relationship?
Drew: Like Dana and Lara.
Riese: Ah, yeah. Dana and Lara.
Analyssa: That’s a good poll. If I could ask a genie for one power in the whole world, it would be instant recall of L Word episodes so I could participate in these sorts of conversations. Unfortunately, my brain is Swiss cheese so I have no answer to your question.
Drew: I really think you should use the genie for something… you could literally be like, “I wish that Gigi was a real person and in my bed right now.” Don’t waste your genie wish.
Riese: You could wish for world peace.
Drew: Or that.
Analyssa: I think that’s probably against the genie rules. In my head the genie is like, “I can’t give you anything that will materially change your world or the world around you.” That’s a very low rent kind of genie situation.
Drew: Twenty four hours with Gigi seems like it might not change that much.
Riese: You could teleport.
Analyssa: I always said if I had a super power that I think invisibility would be ideal because you could just sneak onto airplanes instead of teleporting.
Riese: Oh, but then you’d have to be on the airplane.
Analyssa: That’s true.
Drew: And you have to just be like up against the wall, trying to not get bumped into by the cart.
Riese: I don’t have that kind of time. I just want to teleport.
Analyssa: Places to be, places to get.
Riese: Places to be, things to do, people to see, normal relationships to have.
Analyssa: Riese, that’s actually a great segue into the next scene, where Micah and Maribel—
Riese: My OTP.
Analyssa: They have things to do, places to be, people to see. Micah’s starting a new job! And Sophie’s sister went with him for moral support, and Riese’s OTP lives.
Riese: She loves it. She’s like, “There’s a coffee shop in the lobby, you should work here.”
Analyssa: I have interviewed at a place with a coffee shop in the lobby and I agree that people should work there if they can.
Riese: I mean also the psych ward has a coffee shop in the lobby.
Drew: Micah’s very worried about whether his shirt is good. And I really am obsessed with her shouting at him, as she’s leaving, being like,
Maribel: Micah.
Micah: Yeah.
Maribel: The shirt’s great. Everyone’s talking about it. They’re definitely talking about it.
Micah: Okay.
Maribel: That guy is talking about it.
Micah: All right, bye.
Drew: Very funny. And I really enjoyed that.
Analyssa: She’s so funny!
Riese: She’s so funny! Jinx!
Drew: Yeah.
Analyssa: And she’s really good at the sort of making-fun-of-you joke that doesn’t feel mean.
Riese: Mm-hmm (affirmative), yeah.
Analyssa: They’re writing that sort of… yeah, like, “Everyone’s talking about the shirt!” Or it comes back later, too. Like, she’s just like, you’re an idiot, but it turns out we kind of have a lot in common, like Sophie calls Finley stupid all the time and it never feels like actually mean, it’s just like, you’re so dumb.
Riese: Yeah.
Analyssa: So I like that about them.
Riese: Their family must be a riot.
Analyssa: They grew up together in a very fun home, it seems like, with their mom and grandma.
Riese: A lot of ribbing.
Analyssa: Yeah.
Drew: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Riese: Okay. Speaking of budding romances, we go to Dana’s. Dana’s hot and tot, grill and poker palace, where Tess is very upset because Shane wrote her a check for $5,000 and she’s not a charity case. And I think everyone’s just normalized being a charity case.
Analyssa: I think if somebody wrote me a check for $5,000, I’d say, thank you so much.
Riese: Thank you.
Analyssa: I will move on with… We’re never going to talk about that, that’s great.
Drew: Especially if your boss is rich, you take whatever money you can get from them, even if you want to fuck them so you want to be on equal level with them, you’re not on equal level, she’s your boss. So if you’re going to fuck her, you have to take the realities of that. And you know what, get $5,000 out of it.
Riese: Your mom is sick, you need the money.
Drew: Why not? Yeah.
Analyssa: I mean, Shane says that and Tess folds immediately, Tess is like “Oh, I was really worked up, but actually this is nice, I’m going to leave now, thanks.” That was fun. I love them together.
Drew: Yeah. The trio of Shane, Tess, and Finley at this bar is really good, it really works.
Riese: Yeah.
Analyssa: It is really fun. Finley continues to be horrible at this job, also. She just doesn’t have this in her, but that’s fine, I’m glad that they’re supporting her lifestyle. So then, Angie is sprinting to find Jordie and she tells her that she has a sister and that she’s really excited about it. And Jordie’s like, “Well, when are you going to tell your mom?” And Angie’s like, “I’m absolutely not doing that.” And then Jordie’s like, “Okay, great. Well, I’ll come with you to make sure you don’t get kidnapped.” Which is very sweet.
Drew: Yeah, it’s really nice. I would love to get some more time with Angie and Jordie. I know Angie’s storyline this year is not romance than it was last year, but I’d love to have a little bit more time, a little bit more time with them.
Riese: Yeah. Do you think Angie knows that her mother is an experienced kidnapper? Her actual mother, Bette Porter?
Analyssa: Yeah, do you think that she knows that she’s actually experienced a kidnapping before?
Riese: She’s actually already been kidnapped in the past? She was kidnapped on a drive. Bette Porter drove her from Whistler, Canada to southern California.
Drew: Bette and Tina don’t feel like they have the best boundaries, so I feel like they have in fact probably told her about this. I think they probably told her about everything. I wouldn’t be surprised if Angie was like, “Oh yeah, my moms once fucked in an elevator during a blackout.” I think she probably knows a lot.
Analyssa: She definitely knows too much, or at least more than I would want to know about my parents’ situations.
Drew: Yeah.
Analyssa: So back at Gigi being—
Riese: Castle in the sky.
Analyssa: Yeah. Thank you so much. She’s showing them a massive condo.
Drew: This apartment is incredible.
Riese: It is enormous.
Analyssa: It’s so big. I just mean it’s so big that it’s like, why call it that? It’s like the floor of a building.
Riese: It’s a mansion in a building. It’s a loft, it’s a large… it’s a penthouse. It’s a penthouse.
Drew: Yeah. I was briefly Wes Anderson’s assistant and his apartment in New York was the only time that I’ve ever seen an apartment that was more impressive than this.
Riese: Famously, Autostraddle, for our first nine months, worked out of a penthouse apartment in the Trump Towers because—
Drew: Wow. I didn’t know that I was in Trump Towers.
Riese: Yeah. Which is really, really cringe, but our COO for that period of time was working for a guy who lived in Miami, but had an apartment in the Trump Towers he never used, and it was wild and it was enormous and it was just a whole other way of life. And now Dani is going to get to experience it. But speaking of experiences that people have and other people don’t have, we find out that Dani speaks Farsi.
Analyssa: But basically it’s cute because it’s like, Gigi tells Dani, my dad was kind of the same as yours. He wanted me to own stuff, he wanted me to make money and be a homeowner. I don’t know. Kind of weird, but fine. And they have a bonding moment and then they all start speaking Farsi to each other and they’re kind of getting along, hitting it off. Dani’s dad loves it, Gigi kind of loves it, Dani loves… I don’t know. I thought it was fun even though I had no idea what they were saying.
Riese: And Dani seems to trust Gigi, like at the end of it, she’s like, okay. And in this moment, I switch my alliance and now I’m shipping Gigi and Dani.
Analyssa: Yeah, same.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: I think they’re a better fit.
Drew: Absolutely. And because Dani’s dad’s being really pushy about her getting this apartment right now. And Gigi sort of turns to Dani and is like—
Gigi: Hey, we’ll do whatever you say.
Drew: And it’s like a really… it’s good.
Riese: Gigi is so good.
Drew: Gigi’s incredible.
Riese: At adjusting to the situation, at sensing what people need, at kind of like feel… She’s obviously a great real estate agent because that’s a lot of that, is sort of how to slightly manipulate people into buying properties.
Analyssa: And feeling soothed enough that they trust you and want to do the thing you want them to do, which is buy a property. The only other thing is that it seems insane that Dani’s dad wouldn’t want to see more than one place, but he’s immediately like, “Let’s just buy this.” He wants Dani to move on. So.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah. I mean, I think we’ll get to why in a little bit. But one other thing I’ll say about Gigi is just that, she’s chaotic in a way that’s like, controlled chaos and it is the best, it is my favorite type of person. Where it’s like, this person… she is the kind of person who is thinking about — whether it’s a throuple, whether it’s whatever she’s up to, in her head, she’s calculating everything and very aware of everyone’s emotions and very aware of her own emotions and then does the chaotic thing anyways. And that is, I think, how I lived my life and I love to see it on TV in someone so hot.
Analyssa: When they talk about aspirational television, that’s what this is. We’re going to rename the podcast To Gigi and Back, it’s fine.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah. Someone who is not in control of pretty much any situation in her entire life, Alice is playing foosball in her office and is in a Twitter fight with James Corden. Those are my first two notes.
Analyssa: Yeah. Mine says, “Alice is playing foosball and feuding with James Cordon,” so we both have the same—
Riese: Just a normal day in LA.
Analyssa: That’s what it’s like. I mean, I also beef with James Cordon, just now on Twitter because that would be amazing. I just personally—
Drew: Yeah, he doesn’t have a clue who I am.
Analyssa: But personally in my brain, every time he appears in a trailer for a movie musical, which is all of them, I beef with him.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: She is dreading her meeting with Tom, who I find myself kind of loving, I must admit.
Drew: I like him a lot.
Riese: I like him.
Analyssa: I like these fish-out-of-water characters they’ve introduced to the group this season. Tom and Carrie both being like, “You guys are fucking weird,” because I think it is a weird world. It’s very rich and very specific, and they’re all lesbians, obviously, or queer, but yeah. I like these new more sort of quote, “normal” personality types that are like, “This is weird. This is how you live?” Anyway.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah. But right now, Alice is talking to Sophie about… Well, Sophie’s pitching her segment ideas and then they pivot to talking about Nat, and we learned that Nat’s date was with Marissa, the trans woman from the last episode — well, trans actress from the last episode or from the first episode, and then Nat texts Alice saying, “Can I see Marissa again tomorrow night?” Which is pretty intense because I’m just like, isn’t Nat tired? And I’m also like, oh, so Nat doesn’t want to dabble in polyamory, Nat wants several partners. If you’re seeing someone twice within three days, she wants Marissa to be her girlfriend and Alice to be her girlfriend, and that feels like… I’m not saying that a monogamous person can’t be in a relationship with a polyamorous person, but I feel like maybe not with that kind of polyamorous person. That feels really challenging for Alice and the way Alice is, but Alice says, “No prob!” Which is because she does not know how to communicate.
Riese: Well, and also she can’t… I mean, I feel like maybe in a way I was in this situation and it’s like, I could handle being with a poly person who just wants to hook up with other people or whatever. That’s fine. I can handle that. But having full blown relationships with other people and kind of what this seems like, with Nat maybe is just really into new relationship energy and likes riding that high, like that, when I’ve done that, when I’ve tried to have that kind of relationship, it’s been incredibly difficult for me. And I also think that Nat probably should have set expectations a little more, or honestly should maybe take a few days off just out of respect for Alice. Just because she’s trying to ease her into this thing that she’s not sure about.
Analyssa: Yeah. I mean, I think this is a continuation of the thing from last season too, which is when Gigi and Alice and Nat kind of fell apart, because Nat just like… I don’t think it’s malicious, but I think she doesn’t really think about like, “Oh, I should set down. This is what I would like, and this is what that would look like for you. And how do you feel about that?” She’s like, “It was fun to hang out with Marissa. I’m really into her. I want to do it again and is my partner cool with that? Okay, great.” She’s just kind of bowling through it, which I do get is really tough for Alice.
Drew: Yeah. It feels like Nat should be solo poly. It feels like she should be her own primary partner, or she needs to be in a primary partnership with someone who very much has the same relationship to polyamory as she does because yeah, you’re right. She doesn’t seem to want to set ground rules or really talk that much about it, and that feels like a problem for a lot of poly dynamics.
Riese: Right. And it’s also further complicated by the fact that Nat has kids, and so when she goes out, Alice takes care of them and, which is fine, but also that is like… That’s another way of complicating it. Alice is kind of in a weird situation there where it’s not necessarily… It’s this weird… Because it doesn’t seem like Alice was super into being a mom, really, and she never really expressed a desire to have kids in the original series or this series. So I don’t think either of them are doing very good with this.
Drew: I think they’re also writing it in a way, I mean, I think based on the reactions and based on… It doesn’t feel like this is being written by people with a lot of experience with polyamory or with a lot of sympathy toward polyamory, in a way that I find a little bit annoying. I just am like, why does Nat have to be this person who’s bad at communication? I mean, I still think Alice probably would have struggled if Nat had been good at communicating and that could have been more interesting, I don’t know. But instead it just feels like, “Oh, these polyamorous people are so weird with their multiple dates a week and not knowing how to talk” and, it just, I don’t know, it feels just a little bit… I don’t really get why they’re choosing to frame it this way, but it’s fine. And Nat’s certainly not perfect because in the next scene, as she introduces Micah to the new job, she’s like, “We were looking for someone just like you.” And he’s like, “Oh, amazing,” thinking she meant someone who specializes in grief, and she obviously meant trans.
Riese: Why didn’t she just say that?
Drew: Oh, I mean, she absolutely wouldn’t say that. Don’t you think? I think cis person Nat would totally just be like, “Oh my God, we’re so happy to have you with your experiences,” with the words trans—
Riese: She would just dance around it?
Drew: Yeah, for sure. It seems like a good gig though. So that’s nice.
Analyssa: They have a coffee shop in the lobby, I’ve heard.
Riese: Yeah. They have a coffee shop in the lobby.
Drew: I’ve heard about that coffee shop. Yeah.
Analyssa: So, in the next scene, Dani is already signing papers. She’s back at the—
Riese: Manor.
Analyssa: The manor. Thank you. She’s back at the big manor. Some man in a suit, I’m sure, has handed her a pen. Her dad really wants her to sign all this stuff. He also wants her to date Gigi because she’s, quote, “adventurous and gutsy.” Personally, I want them to date because they’re both hot, but that’s just me. And then Dani’s dad is being supportive, but in a kind of weird way. He’s like, “I’ll give you anything in the house that you want to fill your apartment. I know you don’t have all your furniture,” and then he’s like, “Also while you’re signing stuff, here’s some other papers to sign,” and they’re a will, and power of attorney and a DNR and a bunch of other rich people I’m dying kind of paperwork, right? That’s the thing.
Drew: Yeah. At this point it was heavily implied that he’s dying, was my takeaway. That is not where, eventually, I will think the story is going, but at this point in the story, I was pretty sure that he was dying.
Riese: And I was like, come on, like give her… Her mom is dead. Her girlfriend fucked Finley in the green room, and then she ruined the wedding after they’d already paid for everything. Just give her a break.
Analyssa: Give Dani a break.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: Give her a break.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: At least she has a ton of money, I guess. That can help when you’re going… I mean, it sucks to have all of that and be poor.
Drew: Sure.
Analyssa: Right.
Drew: I fully forgot that people could buy an apartment. When she was signing it to buy it, I was like, oh, she’s not just signing a lease? Oh right, people buy apartments. Cool. Right. Yeah.
Riese: It takes a little longer than that, but yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: Can’t really process it day of, I don’t think. It takes like a month.
Drew: Yeah. Yeah.
Riese: But I love TV.
Drew: Yeah. We then go to one of my favorite things, which is Bette and art and now with added Gigi. So it’s really just a real dream for me, personally.
Analyssa: And both wearing great jackets, I want to say.
Drew: Of course. Of course.
Riese: I didn’t like Bette’s jacket.
Analyssa: I don’t remember right now, but I did write that Gigi and Bette are wearing great jackets and holding hands, so good for them.
Riese: Her arm was 50% cuff.
Analyssa: Oh, I kind of liked that.
Riese: Which is a common thing they do. Whenever they look at Bette, they think we need more in the forearms. We think more fabric in the forearms and then they wrap her arm in gauze and they puff it up. That’s her style.
Analyssa: Yeah. Something about Bette’s costuming is more on the arms, more on the collar, more on the hem. That’s the Bette Porter way.
Riese: More, more, more, more, more.
Analyssa: Yeah. Anything on the edges of her clothes, they’re like, yes. Keep going.
Riese: And Bette’s like, “Art, art, art, art,” and I think Gigi’s like, “Mm-hmm,” but mostly is excited about Bette.
Analyssa: Yeah. Gigi’s like, “Bette, Bette, Bette, Bette, Bette.”
Drew: Yeah. Gigi’s like, “How do you know when abstract art is good?” And Bette’s like, “Does it move you? Does it change you? Does it catch your eye?” And then, Gigi is like, “You catch my eye.” And I was like, “No Gigi!” It gave me the same vibes as if I’m showing a movie to someone and they want to make out during it, I’m like, no, you really even pass this test. I mean, there’s no movie that I’d rather watch than making out with Gigi. So to be fair, I think she can pull it off. But theoretically, no. Show interest in your girlfriend’s interests, get excited along with her. I don’t know. That’s just, I think for Bette and for me, I think that was an important thing for someone you’re dating to do. They don’t have to have the same interests, but if you’re at a thing with a person, put some effort into understanding, if not the thing, their excitement about the thing.
Analyssa: Right. It’s the difference between when someone you’re dating is, when you’re rambling about something you’re really excited about, and they’re like, “Oh, you’re so cute when you talk about this,” versus “I love listening to you talk about this.” Those are different vibes and Gigi’s is very much doing, “You’re so hot when you talk about art,” and I think Bette wants somebody to be like, “I could listen to you talk about art all day,” and it’s a very subtle difference, but Bette does react pretty weirdly.
Drew: Yeah. The good thing is that Bette starts crying at art again. One of the best things to see is when Bette has just… What’s it called? In that one episode…
Riese: In the Peggy Peabody episode? Stendhal.
Drew: I can’t remember what the word is. Yeah.
Riese: Yeah. When art something, blah, blah, blah. Peggy Peabody says it better than I could ever say it.
Peggy Peabody: You know Stendhal?
Bette: The French art critic?
Peggy Peabody: He went to Florence, he saw the Caravaggio.
Bette: And he burst into tears, and then he fainted. The work of art was so beautiful and moving, he couldn’t withstand the impact. The Stendhal Syndrome.
Riese: But I do think this is really when I’m like, they don’t click. They just don’t click. And I feel like Bette either needs someone like Tina, who’s going to lap up her every word, and now Tina’s an art expert too and knows the name of this dealer or whatever the fuck, or she needs someone like Jodi, who is going to just be sparring for dominance, who’s going to be challenging her and pushing her. And I feel like Gigi’s kind of in between those in a way that’s not really going to work. But Bette is, I guess, lonely. Actually Bette hates being single.
Drew: Yeah. Bette’s never been single.
Analyssa: Bette is really moved by an artist named Pippa Pascal, who I didn’t have any recognition of, but we will hear more about later.
Riese: Yeah. She’s not a real artist in the real world.
Analyssa: Right. But the way she says it, I was like, oh, am I supposed… Again, I remind you that I have a Swiss cheese brain, and so I was like, am I supposed to remember this? Do I know who this person is? Anyway.
Riese: What we do know from meeting the news of the world is that Pippa Pascal is going to be played by Vanessa Williams, but there’s more than one Vanessa Williams, and it’s not the one that you’re thinking.
Drew: Incredible. So Micah brings home pizza, which is so exciting.
Riese: Maribel is there and Finley’s there, and Micah’s talking about his thing and Maribel is so funny. She just prods at him about it or pokes him about it, and it’s just like, ask for what you want.
Drew: Yeah. Okay. Here’s the thing, I really hate that I feel like I’m the downer of this podcast, but in my defense, I am trans, I just—
Analyssa: I have this note too, I think.
Drew: I just don’t understand why it’s framed oppositionally instead of commiserating. She’s like, “Oh, boohoo, you were treated poorly. I wanted a pony as a kid. I didn’t get that. Life sucks.” And it just was like, okay, Micah’s talking about transphobia that he experienced, and then later in the conversation, he says that it’s just demoralizing, and she’s like, “No, what’s demoralizing is a white lady lifted me out of my chair this week.” And I don’t know why they wrote it to be a contest between them instead of a commiseration and making it be like one thing is potentially worse than the other. It just feels sort of gross to me, and also just ignores disabled trans people, and I just never like when identity is discussed this way, and it didn’t really feel… I like that Maribel is someone who teases, and that’s really fun, and that banter is fun and usually it’s really fun, but in this scene I just was sort of like, I don’t understand why it’s being framed this way.
Analyssa: Yeah. I had that thought too. I have that in my notes too. It’s very fun to me to have a character like Maribel who’s like, “Just listen. Life is hard and what you need to do is just kind of buck up.” I can see that as sort of being her personality, but the few lines, and Drew, I think you’re right, it just didn’t need to be framed this way that were like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. You think you have it hard, but I have it hard all the time,” is a weird line to draw in the sand. I mean, I think it’s similar to the things we’ve pointed out in some of these other big conversations. Bette being like, “I want bonuses for white artists too,” or like, “Bisexuality and polyamory are the same thing.” Trying to get into these bigger things in a character dialogue way sometimes leads to them feeling a little flip and actually not handled the best, which in conversation, you might do that, but that’s a real person talking instead of someone who got written and edited and cut together a bunch of times. You know?
Riese: Yeah. I think it reminded me a little bit of that conversation with Bette. Because I felt like the way they were framing it with Micah was Bette was insulted by the idea that she would only be interested in BIPOC artists, and then they also wanted to frame Micah as being insulted by the idea that he would be helping trans clients. And I feel like that’s an interesting way to address tokenism. I didn’t feel… I was like… And obviously I am the white cis person on this podcast, so my opinion matters the least. They wanted to address tokenism, but I just don’t think they did a very good job. I don’t think they picked good circumstances from which to explore that.
Analyssa: Right.
Drew: Yeah. I agree with that. And it’s just… I don’t know. Because if Finley is apologizes on behalf of all white women—
Riese: And they both just roll their eyes.
Drew: Yeah, but also they’re talking about ableism and transphobia, so I’m just like, would it kill them to use the word cis? Would it kill them to use the word abled? It just was, that felt really strange to me because I was like, yeah, Maribel specifies that a white lady picked her up out of her chair and it’s just like this conflation of otherness or just… I don’t know. I was just very frustrated throughout this scene. And I mean, because it’s clear that Micah and Maribel are going to like… I don’t know where their relationship’s going to go, but it is clear that they’re going to be paired together and maybe something’s going to happen. So maybe it will be handled well. I hope it is. I just, I think there’s such a great opportunity to show this trans abled person with this cis disabled person and the ways in which they don’t understand each other, the ways in which they do understand each other by being othered from this community, and it’s all something we really have never seen, at least not a ton of. And so I just hope they do it right. And this scared me a little bit as a starting off point.
Riese: Yeah.
Analyssa: Yeah. We’re in an era of TV that feels like, not to get too close to being canceled on the internet, but that feels very much like it has to moralize or talk about representation in a way that’s like, this is right and this is wrong. And it’s just like, we could’ve just not put this line in and it would have been a thing where Maribel is challenging Micah on, “You’re being kind of whiny about it and you haven’t even talked to Nat. Why don’t you go do that?” And that’s just a slightly different conversation that colors their relationship as one that is pushing each other to grow instead of arguing about who has a harder day and how to win at that.
Riese: Right. Yeah.
Drew: Well, speaking of politics and art and how things, sometimes, the industry just isn’t really made for people who aren’t cis and white and abled, and so Bette is super excited about Pippa and is talking to Gigi and is just so excited about it and is giving all this backstory about her and it’s very cute. Honestly. If Bette was my girlfriend and was this excited about art, I would die.
Analyssa: This was very cute. And they do a really cute hug and Gigi is like, “Do you want to go back and look at it again?” And Bette’s like, “Yes,” and they go and that was sweet.
Drew: Yeah. Yeah.
Analyssa: Back on the set of The Alice Show, Tom is talking to Alice about how she met Nat, what their relationship is like, what they’re doing now with being open, why the throuple didn’t work out. He has somehow zeroed in on exactly what is going to bother Alice the most to talk about today, and that’s what they’re talking about.
Riese: I think he wants her book not to suck.
Analyssa: Right.
Drew: Yes.
Riese: Yeah. Which I respect, also.
Analyssa: But there have to be other stories in that book that we could have talked about on today of all days.
Drew: Yeah. I mean, he’s just not helping the situation because he’s very much… I believe that this cis straight guy doesn’t know a lot about polyamory and so this all checked out. This felt like when I talked to my family about polyamory and they’re just like, “What?” And so it honestly felt very real to me, Tom’s reaction, and I was like, are Alice and Tom going to hook up?
Riese: I started to think that too!
Drew: There was a vibe and I was like, “I’m into this. Okay.”
Riese: I kind of am too.
Analyssa: It felt very flirty.
Riese: I feel like they might do a thing where one of them kisses the other one in a moment that they’re misjudging, whether or not, and then it gets really awkward. That’s what I’m predicting for them. But I also sense this tension, but yeah, you’re right. When I was dating someone who was poly, I knew that if I mentioned it in any scenario, besides the queer community that they would respond with some anecdote that was unrelated and about how they couldn’t do it. And oh, that’s so weird. And I’m like, “Thanks for your input.”
Analyssa: “Okay. Thank you.”
Drew: Speaking of people freaking out about things they don’t need to be freaking out about, Bette gets home early, basically Angie gets caught, and has to tell Bette about the DNA test.
Riese: With a box of childhood photos.
Analyssa: She gets caught with family photos, incriminating evidence.
Drew: No, but here’s the thing, I liked the fact that I think Angie could keep some things. There’s a difference to me between keeping something secret and lying. So I think once sort of caught, Angie was like, “I need to tell Bette about the 23AndMe and about my sister,” and so that, I really liked that. But then Bette starts freaking out, Gigi arrives and is like, “Angie seems right.” She’s very reasonable, but also I really liked this because I really like when people are like, “I’m going to say the real opinion, not the opinion that my partner wants.” And then when Angie’s like, “Who’s here?” Bette’s like—
Bette: No one.
Drew: And Gigi’s like—
Gigi: Wow. So yesterday I was your girlfriend and today I’m no one.
Bette: Oh Jesus. That’s not what I meant. All I meant was it’s really not a good time to meet her.
Gigi: Really. That’s all you meant? Because that felt like a lot more.
Bette: Okay. I can’t deconstruct your feelings right now.
Gigi: I’ve never asked you to deconstruct anything of mine, let alone my feelings.
Bette: Okay.
Gigi: You have a great day.
Riese: Again, Bette doesn’t like relating to people. Bette likes relating to art. She doesn’t like relating to other humans. If another human suggests that they have an experience anywhere similar to Bette’s, she just rejects it. And Gigi’s like… It’s not unusual for Gigi, the other non-biological mother of her children to suggest maybe these things are happening and Bette just shuts it down. So again, this isn’t going to work. It’s not going to work. It just feels like they’re dating because they think they’d be a good match in the same way that we thought they would be a good match.
Drew: Yeah. I think that’s true. I mean, look, I’m really grateful for that sex scene. And sometimes that’s what a relationship is. You’re really grateful for a sexual experience, and then you really realize you have to move on and that’s what it is.
Riese: You’re like, “We had a great sex scene.” They had two great sex scenes.
Analyssa: They’ve had a hot, beautiful time and now they need to part ways, I think.
Riese: Yeah. Some great episodic stills came out of this.
Drew: But what Gigi says does stick with Bette because she tells Angie that she’ll help her and go with her to meet her sister. So, that’s—
Riese: Yeah. Well, like Bette’s going to let her do that without her.
Drew: Right? No, but she might try to ground her or keep her, she might push back longer, so.
Riese: Remember when she grounded her and took her to the campaign HQ? Were we ever so young?
Analyssa: She also calls Tina, right, and leaves a voicemail. Presumably Tina, and leaves a voicemail.
Riese: Do you think that every time she has a reason to call Tina, she gets a little bit excited?
Analyssa: Yes. That was exactly… She pushed Gigi out the door and then her first thought was calling Tina, and I was like Bette, you just really wanted to call Tina so bad. Immediately.
Drew: I mean, every time she has an excuse to call Tina, a lot of people in my Twitter mentions are also really excited. And you know what? I think that’s great for all of you.
Riese: Probably when Tina comes over, Bette steals her sweater that she leaves on a chair so she can call her later and be like, “I think you left your sweater on my chair.” Come back and stare at me and not say anything.
Analyssa: Bette’s trying to loan Tina books on the way out so that she has to come back and return it to her.
Riese: Yeah, and then she’s like, “I need The Scarlet Letter back.”
Drew: Yeah. Tina’s like, “Bettina is over,” and Bette’s like, “It’s Tibette!”
Drew: Well, speaking of kids working out their issues, Micah is seeing a client and then is talking to Nat about it, and says that he asked the kid if he’d asked his parents about making a “chemical transition,” which I’ve never heard that used before. I don’t know if it’s because it’s… I’ve always heard “medical transition.” I don’t know if you’ve heard “chemical transition,” and that’s also a proper term? Let me know.
Riese: I think it’s if you have sodium and oxygen and niacin in your body, they take it out and they put in calcium and maybe some sort of morphine. Is that a chemical? I’m just saying words, and then it’s just like… It’s sort of like chemistry class, and then everything goes into a beaker, and then it kind of bubbles up all over. And then it’s like, “Oh, it’s a volcano!” And then you’re a person.
Drew: Yeah. I think, when I was in chemistry class, I read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy under my desk. I don’t actually remember a lot from chemistry itself, but it wasn’t really a science kid.
Riese: I wrote poems.
Drew: Yeah, that sounds right.
Analyssa: I did a fun experiment where I made flames turn different colors, based on what element you put in the flame.
Riese: Wow!
Analyssa: I was kind of a science kid.
Drew: That’s cool.
Riese: I memorized state nicknames, and wrote poems.
Drew: That’s nice. Well, Micah confronts Nat about only seeing trans clients. And then Nat’s like… It was like, “Oh, my bad. Like I’m… How embarrassing. That’s on me, blah, blah, blah.” So it works. I know it’s my job to unpack this, but I’m honestly pretty tired. But I’ll do my best. I guess what I just want to say is that everyone gets to have sex and cheat and have chaos. And I know Micah has a little bit of that with José, but the main screen time we’ve spent with Micah and José was Micah explaining trans stuff to José. Then it was Micah explaining trans stuff to his mom. And it was Micah explaining trans stuff to his boss. And I’m like what if Micah started working for Nat, and then they fucked? Because Nat’s clearly horny, and she’s got a very organized schedule of fucking random people. What if that had been the storyline? I just am like why does the trans character have to have every storyline be about oppression or navigating these things? I mean, I guess if my life was filled exclusively with cis people who didn’t know a lot about transness, that would be what it is, but that’s… Most trans people don’t make their lives that way, especially living in major cities and whatever. So I just… It doesn’t feel… I think I’m just like that’s what I’m frustrated about. And it makes me, honestly, despite fighting so hard for Tess to be trans, and Jordie to be trans, I sort of give up, in the sense that I’m sort of happy that they’re not because… And I get that’s probably what Jamie was thinking, and it’s frustrating to me because I actually don’t think it’s an either/or. I think you can have a character that… It’s literally just not that hard for there to be a line here or a line there that feels grounded and realistic and specific, and while a character is still getting to be a full person. But, apparently, that is too hard for, I think, most writers’ rooms nowadays, especially ones that are populated almost entirely by cis people. And so, it’s like, I’m so happy that we get to watch Jamie Clayton have a character that is full and complicated. And I know what Leo can do. And he’s good in the scene and he’s good, but I just… It’s just frustrating that I don’t feel like he’s necessarily getting the storylines that are fun, and can show what he can do, and can just let him be hot and complicated, like everyone else on the show. And who knows where… Again, we are getting like it seems like a future romance with him and Maribel. So maybe we’ll get that. But I’m like, do I trust their ability to write trans people or disabled people? Not really. So, I’m a little bit… I’m more like I want to be excited about it because I really like both of the actors, and I think they have a lot of chemistry. But I’m also just sort of nervous and exhausted. Again, he doesn’t have to be like… If he’s not… I mean, we’ve seen that he is sexual. But every character doesn’t have to be a slut, but it is just like let him be… I just… Anyways, I want the fun. We’re about to get into a scene right after this that is so fun, and is everything I love about the show. And it’s just like what if trans people—
Analyssa: Got to do that?
Drew: Yeah. And so, what that scene is, is a Dani-Gigi scene, our new favorite ship. Dani arrives at Gigi’s office to get the keys to her new home, and Gigi says…
Gigi: Hey, lady.
Drew: And I… It’s so funny because, actually, I have a few friends who refer to me, and I refer to a lot of people as lady, and so… And it’s fine when they do it. But I also… Sometimes people will “Lady” me, and it feels like a cis person trying really hard to validate me in a way that I’m like, “Mm, I don’t need that.”
Riese: How do you feel about Lady and the Tramp?
Drew: Famously about a T4T couple of dogs. So, yeah. I’m into that.
Analyssa: Famously.
Riese: Also has erotic spaghetti-eating, like Blue Is the Warmest Color.
Drew: That’s true. I would… Oh, my God. I would Lady and the Tramp with Gigi any day. But when she said, “Hello, lady,” like I died. I was like, “This is really doing it for me.” There’s like the top, top, top love triangle that’s happening here. It’s just like it’s so intense. There’s so much earth and fire happening, and I’m just very into all of it.
Analyssa: Yes. Very earth and fire sign forward situations unfolding. Anyway, Gigi is like, “Here’s the keys to your new place. Like, you want to throw out the keys to your old place? Also, I’ll show you around the neighborhood,” which is beyond her job description as a realtor, I’ll say. Drew and I just signed a lease, and you know who didn’t ask us to be shown around the neighborhood? Our property manager.
Drew: Wow! Wait. Is our property manager hot?
Analyssa: No. Absolutely, he’s not hot.
Drew: That’s so disappointing. Oh, right. I forgot. He’s also a man. You know, some people’s thing, but not usually mine.
Drew: And I would like to say, as I always feel the need to clarify that hotness is an energy.
Riese: Right.
Drew: It’s not really about a specific way to look. Hotness is an energy. Anyone can be hot if they have the personality for it.
Riese: Like the beast in Beauty and the Beast.
Analyssa: Great point.
Riese: Thank you.
Drew: He’s pretty abusive. But if that does it for you, Riese. Not… I’m not your therapist. I’m just your friend.
Riese: Okay.
Drew: So we can talk about it later, but—
Riese: It doesn’t do it for me.
Drew: Okay.
Riese: I was actually referencing the television program, Beauty and the Beast. It aired in the 80s.
Drew: Oh!
Riese: Yeah. You guys missed it because you were not even a fetus yet. I was there for it. I don’t remember it, but I know that it happened, and my mother watched it. And now she’s gay.
Drew: Well, that seems… That’s… I mean, look—
Analyssa: Important work.
Drew: That’s all we need to know. So, speaking of throwing keys, Sophie gets home, flops her keys down, and there is no table there. Honestly, there was a lot of silliness to the scene, but all of it really worked for me. I thought it was so funny.
Riese: I love this scene.
Drew: Yeah. And especially when Sophie asks for red pepper, and Finley’s like, “Dani took that too.” Like full cackle out of me, like very stupid, very funny.
Finley: We got pizza though. There’s an upside.
Sophie: Can you pass me the red pepper, please?
Finley: She took the red pepper.
Sophie: You’re fucking kidding. Really? Jesus Christ!
Riese: Dani took everything. And Finley’s just so good at keeping it light, you know?
Drew: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Riese: You know?
Analyssa: Yeah. She’s very like, “We will figure this out. Like, it’s fine. I know it looks bad. Don’t look over there, but we will fix it.” And I think that’s good. I think also, with Sophie, Finley just commits to… Even though Finley is constantly cracking jokes, she’s never getting deep into her emotions, exactly. She still is committed to acknowledging that the emotions are there, and being like—
Riese: That’s true.
Analyssa: “This must suck, but here’s a joke about it.” Whereas something we had such an issue with last season with Dani was Sophie would be feeling something and Dani would just be like, “I don’t have time for that,” or like, “I can’t engage with that,” or like… You know what I mean?
Drew: Right, right.
Analyssa: She was so removed from that. And Finley doesn’t deal with emotions in a way that is like… She’s not great at this, but she is doing it, which I think is cool of her.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: And then we have a wonderful moment, for me, personally.
Analyssa: I knew that you would like this moment.
Riese: Which is, they sort of like… Then they get into it because everything that’s happening. And Finley is like, “I thought I was doing the right thing. You know, like I thought I was saving you.” And then, Finley walks out, and then Sophie, really quiet, just like, “You did.”
Finley: I thought I was saving you, dude.
Sophie: You did.
Finley: Excuse me?
Sophie: Ah… Nothing! What?
Finley: What did you just say?
Sophie: Nothing! What?
Finley: No, no—
Sophie: No!
Finley: No, no, no! You said—
Sophie: Nothing.
Finley: Something! What did you say?
Sophie: No, I didn’t say anything!
Finley: I know. I heard it! What did you say?
Sophie: I didn’t say anything at all!
Finley: What did you say?
Sophie: I didn’t say—
Finley: Tell me!
Sophie: Okay, fine! You saved me, okay? You fucking saved me.
Finley: Okay, so you are saying something nice, but in a mean way.
Sophie: Yeah.
Finley: It’s confusing.
Sophie: Well, I’m confused.
Riese: And that’s the first acknowledgement we’ve had from Sophie since this happened, that she does know that her relationship with Dani was bad, and that Finley did save her from it, although obviously not in the best way to do so. The better way would have been, of course, for Sophie to tell Dani, “I hooked up with Finley. Also, we should break up.” But it’s television.
Analyssa: And we’re long past that now.
Riese: Yeah, we’ve gotten past that.
Drew: Yeah. I also do want to say about this scene that I do think it was within Dani’s rights as the wronged party to take all of the material things.
Riese: Absolutely.
Drew: Like when I broke up with my ex, and like… I mean, I also was moving across the country. But I really just left all of our stuff to her. I was just was like, “Yeah, my TV’s your TV now. Everything’s yours.” And I was like that just feels… I didn’t even do anything bad. I just broke up with someone. But I still was like, “I ended it. You get to keep the stuff.” And I don’t think that has to be the case for everyone. But I think, for me, generally, I’m like, “Ah, yeah. This just seems like you’re sadder than me. You keep the stuff.”
Analyssa: My only counterpoint to that is that Dani is much richer than Sophie.
Riese: That’s true.
Drew: This is true.
Analyssa: Dani could populate a brand new apartment with all sorts of stuff that is new and doesn’t have the memory of Sophie, who she said she never wants to talk about again, in her apartment.
Drew: No, I don’t think Dani’s keeping any of the stuff. I think she’s throwing it away, which yes, obviously—
Analyssa: Okay, that’s worse.
Riese: Maybe she’s taking it to Goodwill.
Analyssa: But then, let Sophie have it.
Drew: Sophie didn’t just break up with Dani though. Sophie fully did not disclose that she cheated. And then they were about to get married, and the person she cheated with showed up there in a fucking hat.
Riese: Dani can take the red pepper.
Drew: Generally, I would be on the side of the person with less money getting to keep the belongings. But, in this situation, I think the way that it was handled was bad enough that I return to my previous stance, which is, person who… The wronged party gets to keep the stuff.
Analyssa: Fine. I won’t argue this, but I hope Sophie knows I was on her side.
Drew: Yeah.
Analyssa: Wait. But there’s one more thing in this scene, which is that Finley asked Sophie to forgive her. And Sophie’s like, “I don’t know how.” So there’s like some—
Drew: Right. Yeah.
Analyssa: Or like stuck, kind of.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: Yeah. Speaking of people who have great chemistry.
Riese: Nice! Pony play!
Drew: Yeah. Well… My goodness, I think Micah is taking Maribel to ride a horse because of the story about the pony, which is very sweet. And I did say in my notes, “Let them fuck! Ride Micah after!” So, you know, we’ll see, we’ll see.
Riese: Pony play. It’s time for pony play. Everybody knows it. Everybody is at home, and that’s what they’re waiting for.
Analyssa: I think it’s very funny that Maribel is like, “I was just telling a story from when I was a kid.” I really relate to that. I say shit all the time that’s like… People are like, “Oh, you really mean that.” I’m like, “No, I was just talking to hear my own voice.”
Riese: It’s such a proverbial thing, the pony. The ponies are what little kids want and don’t get. It was like… And I felt… I do feel like they didn’t really explore that enough, in terms of, from a humor perspective, but it’s fine. Or pony play.
Riese: Speaking of wish fulfillment.
Analyssa: Nice. That’s a good one.
Drew: Shane, Alice, and Bette take Angie to meet her sister, Kayla.
Riese: I love this for them!
Analyssa: I love this. This is so fun.
Drew: This is really cute. I honestly wish we could spend more time. I wish we could have seen the conversation between Angie and Kayla.
Riese: What the fuck?
Drew: But instead, we like… Instead, we cut to the trio, they’re talking about it. And it’s like, that’s fine. But I was like, “Wait. What are… They look like they’re getting along. I want to spend some time with that.” Hopefully, she’ll be reoccurring, and we’ll get more time later. But I was like, “Wait. I want to get… I want to get inside. You’re very much putting me in Bette’s headspace right now because I want to get inside and hear them. I want to see what my daughter is talking to her sister about.”
Riese: Also, Bette telling Alice to just shut it down, the thing with Nat, is also just an incredibly typical thing for somebody who’s never considered non-monogamy, but probably should, would say to somebody who’s trying to see if poly can work for them and their partner. Because Alice is like, “Well, I can’t really, but…” They have witty banter.
Drew: Yes, no, it was very enjoyable. I always enjoy when the three of them are together.
Riese: They should have put sound like in the FBI or in shows that Drew won’t watch, where people are in the van and they’re listening on the headphones. They should have done that for this. And then we could have gotten both things at the same time.
Analyssa: Yeah, that I could have listened to the trio responding to what Angie and Kayla were saying, which would have been fun.
Riese: Exactly. Like Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Drew: I’m happy for Angie that Bette wasn’t eavesdropping on her though. I’m going to throw that out there.
Riese: Yeah, that’s true.
Analyssa: I did get teary-eyed, embarrassingly, when Angie was like, “That’s my family out there.” I thought it was so sweet.
Drew: Oh.
Riese: Oh, yeah. That’s so cute.
Drew: Yeah. That was really nice.
Riese: Because they are. And Tina wasn’t there though. Where’s Tina?
Analyssa: Tina was not there. Also, I thought it was very silly that Bette was like, “They kind of look alike, right?” It’s like, yeah, they definitely do.
Riese: They’re related.
Analyssa: They’re related, and they’ve been cast to specifically look alike. Yeah.
Riese: Right. Tina wasn’t on the call sheet this week, I guess.
Analyssa: Yeah.
Drew: No. Neither was Rosie.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: Back for our horseback riders. They’re on the horses, and—
Riese: Majestic.
Drew: The real takeaway from — oh, yes. Very majestic. And the real takeaway from this is that Micah’s like, “We should do this again sometime,” meaning like a date, not ride horses, I think? Unless that’s just going to become a thing.
Riese: No, it’s riding each other like horses.
Analyssa: Riding horses as a date is a very important—
Riese: Bachelor.
Analyssa: … Bachelor. Thank you, Riese. Yes, you knew exactly what I was going to say. Important Bachelor rite of passage. And if the mantle I have to wear is continuing to bring up like extremely heterosexual media on this podcast, that’s fine. I’m queering heterosexuality by watching The Bachelor, actually.
Drew: Honestly, brave.
Analyssa: Thank you so much.
Drew: Very brave.
Analyssa: Anyway. I wish we could see all The L Word pairs on Bachelor dates. They could go to an empty amusement park, where a country singer you’ve never heard of does one song for them. Drive a convertible around Los Angeles, and then go shopping in a really expensive store. They could—
Riese: Romantic.
Drew: That’s the one I always want. Like, okay. Oh, you don’t get picked? Well, you have like $5,000 worth of great clothes now. Who cares about the man?
Analyssa: Yeah. And when you go on The Bachelor or Bachelorette, you have to bring all of your own clothes anyway. So, if you get to go out on a fancy date where you get a bunch of stuff, then that’s fun.
Riese: Yeah, exactly.
Analyssa: You leave with more clothes than you brought.
Riese: Right.
Drew: Yeah.
Analyssa: Speaking of clothes, Tess looks amazing in this next scene. She’s getting out of the car. She’s walking into the poker game. She’s telling two women who want to go to Dana’s Poker Palace that it’s closed for the night because they are doing a private event.
Riese: God, those girls are so pissed, probably, about the Lyft and everything.
Analyssa: For sure, I know.
Riese: And they’re pre-partied. Now they’re just going to go to Akbar.
Drew: That happened to me at—
Analyssa: I was just about to say they’re in a good location. They can walk to some other bar. It’ll be fine. But I would be mad. Also, is it lucrative enough, this poker game, to shut down the bar for all night? Whatever. I don’t need to get into it.
Riese: I think high-stakes poker is very lucrative.
Drew: Yeah. That makes sense. All I know is that once I was going to the bar where they shoot Dana’s and it was closed. It was closed for a private event. And me and the person I was with had to turn around and not go there. And then we just walked around Echo Park.
Riese: Maybe they were filming this scene at that moment.
Drew: No, this was in 2019, so…
Riese: You guys, I think the last time that the three of us were in the same room was at this bar.
Drew: Oh, my God.
Analyssa: Is that true?
Riese: I think so. Because wasn’t that like—
Drew: I think that… Yeah, that is true.
Riese: … It was like in February they had that.
Drew: It is true.
Analyssa: Wow! At Dana’s. What a fun hangout for queer women in LA.
Drew: I know.
Riese: Are we going to Gigi-Dani?
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: Still shipping. I’m just riding this ship all the way into the sunset.
Drew: Yeah. This whole scene is excellent. One, I love how much information we find out about Gigi.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: We get some family background that her dad doesn’t really accept her. She’s super close with her mom. She mostly gets along with her seven brothers.
Analyssa: So, Gigi and Dani are on a date. They’re like… Well, they’re not on a date.
Riese: Is it officially a date?
Analyssa: They’re hanging out.
Riese: This should be a date.
Drew: Yeah.
Riese: But then, a man comes over and starts flirting with Gigi. And she’s — in Farsi, so I’m assuming, she’s like, “I’m a lesbian. We’re here together.”
Analyssa: And then she… Does she say it in English? Like, “We’re on a date.”
Drew: Yeah. Well, she says to Dani, she was like…
Gigi: Sorry, I know this isn’t a date, but it’s the fastest way to get rid of them.
Analyssa: What was great about not having subtitles in this scene is, as many people, I’m sure, have, have had this experience before. So I knew exactly what was happening.
Riese: Right, yeah. That’s exactly, totally.
Analyssa: We actually don’t need to be speaking the same language. I know exactly what you’re saying to that man, and more power to you.
Drew: We’re speaking the same language, and it is lesbian.
Analyssa: And it’s being asked if you can hang out with a guy while you’re on a date.
Riese: Right.
Analyssa: No.
Riese: Yeah. It happens so much. Still.
Analyssa: So frequently.
Drew: So much.
Riese: It’s so weird.
Analyssa: Dani… I never use this word, but the only word I can use to describe Dani is “shook” after this moment. She’s like, “Uh.”
Riese: Right.
Drew: Yeah. Well, she says — she brings a Bette, because I think she’s starting to feel guilty. So, she’s like, “It’s so nice that you and Bette are together.” And Gigi’s like, “Yeah, it’s not going to work out.” But it’s just like, “Oh!” Gigi’s like, “Forget it. I want to know more about you.” And I’m just like, Gigi’s so bold.
Riese: I know. The boundaries on this woman. She’s like, “You’ve wronged me once. Shame on you, because I’m gone.”
Analyssa: “I’ve moved on.”
Drew: I want her so badly. I wish she was a real person.
Analyssa: I do want her, but I also want to be her. Classic.
Drew: Yes, same.
Analyssa: The way that she’s just so comfortable in this scene. She’s giving food to Dani off her plate, and she’s taking some of Dani’s food, and she’s just like fucking chilling. And I am recently back on the dating scene, and I’m realizing that I’m actually… I thought of myself as a very smooth and chill person, like, gets a flirt in. Absolutely not. Post-pandemic, none of that. And so, I’m trying to channel more Gigi, and leaning in and looking at someone and being like, “I just want to hear more about you.” Like, ooh! The power of that line.
Drew: Yeah. Something that I’ve realized that I do that has really started to work for me, because I am a very anxious person, is that I go into a date assuming it’s going to be awkward. Or I go into a dinner with a new hot person, who I want it to eventually be a date, like it’s going to be awkward. And, so when there’s like an awkward silence or when there’s like a moment of whatever, I just feel very comfortable because I’m not trying to prevent it from being awkward. And then, usually, the other person gets a little bit — because it will be quiet, and I’ll just look at them and smile. And then, they’ll get a little bit like… They’ll find me to be confident, even though secretly in my head, I’m deeply anxious. Anyways, if you want more dating advice like this, you’ll have to listen to my other podcast, Wait, Is This a Date? produced by Autostraddle.com, the website, as well. But yeah. So, anyways, Gigi and Dani, incredible. Also incredible, Tess and Shane. But not incredible, what just happened because this random old guy, I was so confused.
Riese: Why? Why was he allowed in?
Drew: It’s like wait, men are allowed? Yeah, I was like, “Wait. Straight men are allowed at this high-stakes poker? No.”
Riese: Yeah, you sent those two lesbians to White Castle, but you’re going to let this random man in?
Drew: Yeah. It’s terrible.
Riese: Come on!
Drew: Yeah. We don’t know what happened because Shane asks if Tess is okay, and she lies and says yes. She’s clearly lying.
Riese: Yes. I thought he was a cop.
Analyssa: I kind of thought maybe Tess was doing something kind of shady for a sec. I was like, “Oh, maybe there’s like they have some deal where Tess gets a cut.” I was doing all kinds of… The real thing that happens, which we’ll talk about later, it sucks way more than that. But whatever.
Drew: Yeah. Speaking of men on The L Word, Alice is out to dinner with Tom, and they’re kind of having a blast. You know what? Is the show going to finally let Alice be bi in a way that isn’t weird? Because that’d be great. I really… I’m fully on board.
Riese: I love him.
Drew: I’m really excited. And then it was like, “Oh, no. Nat and Marissa are there.” And at first, I was like, “Okay. You need to coordinate. Like there… And also, are there three restaurants in LA? Why does this keep happening?” I was so confused.
Riese: And then, you were like, “Oh! She did it on purpose.”
Drew: Yeah, we find that out in a little bit. But before we find that out, they’re like… Tom talks about struggling to separate sex and emotion. And they’re just talking about polyamory in the way that Tom would. And then, Alice sees that Nat and Marissa are holding hands, and she starts to have a panic attack, and everything’s in slow motion, and the sound drops out. And it’s just like, Jesus Christ, it’s polyamory, and not Saving Private Ryan, you know? It’s really intense.
Riese: But it’s so hard to see the person you love with someone else in that context, I think, if you’re not poly.
Drew: Yeah. I guess I don’t get it. I don’t really experience jealousy.
Riese: I mean, like when Tina saw Bette and a carpenter hold hands in the art museum. It’s like someone’s stabbing you in the heart, even though it’s allowed. So, it’s different because it’s not cheating. So, it’s not like she’s betraying you. She’s doing something you said she could do. But I think it’s hard, which is why I would never do what Alice did. I would not go to the restaurant.
Analyssa: That’s the thing. It’s like… But then, the unspoken—
Drew: Right.
Analyssa: Even if Nat has never laid down boundaries, I do think the unspoken agreement is, “You won’t sit next to me on my date.” Like that just feels like, “Yeah, unless we’ve explicitly said to do that, you could just avoid that and save yourself the drama.” But Alice doesn’t know how to save herself from the drama, ever.
Drew: No.
Riese: Yeah.
Drew: No. Very Alice. All of this feels very Alice. I would have loved to see Nat and Marissa on a date, though. I’d love to know if Marissa’s trans. I’m just like, okay. So, we can only have a trans actress if she looks like a high femme cis woman and barely speaks? Like cool cool cool.
Riese: And this is her second episode, and she’s only supposed to be in three episodes.
Drew: That’s not a great sign.
Riese: I was wanting to say it would be interesting for Nat even to mention that to Alice, but I remembered everything and was like, no, it’s probably better that she didn’t.
Drew: I mean, I would love to… I just… Anyways. It’s fine. Also, I want to clarify that if someone looks like… When I say looks like a cis woman, I mean looks like a cis woman to a cis audience that’s watching. And there’s no value judgment placed on that. It’s just that, in media, it is prioritized that a lot of the trans performers that get cast in things, generally are people who look very, all of our language is limited. And so, it’s like I was going to say binary. I was going to say like, looks cis. I don’t really…
Riese: Pass?
Drew: I don’t know. Yeah. But I don’t even really like to just use that. I sort of hate that that’s the way that the discussion is framed, but…
Analyssa: I mean, Marissa looks like a runway model is the thing, like regardless of like any…
Drew: I’ll put it this way. Marissa does not look like me, or like most of the trans women who I see in queer community. I mean, I don’t know what Marissa’s sexuality is, as last time I checked, Jamie identifies as straight. And like, I do think oftentimes an aesthetic goes along with that, and it just would be really fun to see some trans dykes. Anyways, speaking of trans dykes, Shane is talking about making money, and then we get the backstory, or we find out what happened with Tess and that guy.
Analyssa: Tess went to a back room to do some poker game business, and the guy followed her and groped her. She says, basically she sort of just waited for him to tire of it. We don’t really know exactly what happened, and thank goodness for that, but Shane is very mad instantly and ready to rip this guy’s head off.
Riese: Then Tess said she took money.
Analyssa: Okay. Remember, the last episode when I was like, Tess should watch Molly’s Game? Tessa has watched Molly’s Game, it turns out, because what Tess does to get back at him is take a rake, which is like a percentage of the pot from, I actually have only seen Molly’s Game twice, but I actually don’t really know that I’m doing this correctly, but basically it’s like taking a percentage of the pot from players’ winnings. She’s stolen $4,000 from the game, which makes the game illegal. Like if you are a person who is putting on the game and you take money back, that makes the game illegal, for sure. Like gambling rules are different I think state by state, but a rake is pretty much always bad. Anyway, she said she took $4,000 from him, 2,000 for Tess and 2,000 for Shane, and she’s like, “Please don’t be mad at me. Please don’t fire me. It was a one-time thing. I won’t do it again.” Shane says that she wishes Tess had ripped him off for more. Anyway, I want these two to kiss a little bit.
Drew: I do too, and I’m also wondering if this is going to become a thing. Like are they going to start taking rakes? Are Shane and Tess going to go to jail?
Analyssa: I don’t know.
Riese: Is it going to be like Hustlers? Or is it going to be like Monster?
Analyssa: Yeah, I don’t think it’s going to be like… My guess is they don’t start taking rakes from every game, but that this guy becomes a problem in the way that Felicity’s husband became a problem last season.
Riese: Right.
Drew: Push him down the stairs.
Analyssa: That’s my guess. Honestly, a small murder plot on The L Word? Sure. Why not?
Riese: They did so good with it last time.
Drew: Yeah. Really foolproof.
Analyssa: Isn’t this one supposed to be about righting some of the wrongs of the first series?
Riese: I’m still so confused about whether or not this game is legal, because she says that taking a rake is illegal. That implies the rest of it is illegal. Also literally closing down your bar for a private event that is actually a poker game feels like pretty risky business if you’re doing something illegal? And would Bette participate in the illegal poker game? I really don’t think she would.
Analyssa: I think it must not be illegal until the rake happens.
Riese: Like they get a license for it or something?
Drew: I don’t know.
Analyssa: I think it’s underground only so that they can keep it exclusive. I don’t think it’s underground because it’s going to be like… I think it’s like, we don’t want those two lesbians who were in the alley and now had to go to White Castle to be able to show up at the poker game, you know?
Riese: Yeah. Home poker games are legal in California as long as the host of the game doesn’t take a rake.
Analyssa: There it is.
Drew: There you go, and we love Google.
Analyssa: Thank goodness for Google. Okay. Back at Nat and Alice’s. Alice has finished her dinner with Tom. She’s gone home to Nat. There’s a funny aside about how the babysitter wears Nat’s clothes, and they should talk about that, which I thought was fun. Basically Alice is like, “I can’t do this.” She doesn’t, once again, communicate a ton, which made me actually pretty mad at her. I felt like there was more conversation to be had, even if you stand really firmly and like, “I can not do this,” you know? But Nat is like, “I’ll stop seeing other people. It’s you and me. Like, whatever you feel comfortable with.” Alice is just like, “No, I can’t do it.”
Drew: Alice is right here.
Riese: Yeah. She is right, being like, “No, I don’t want to be with you if you have to suppress.”
Analyssa: I definitely think that she’s right.
Drew: No, no, no, no. You’re right that Alice should communicate about it. I mean, here’s the thing, Alice has been in the right through a lot of this, because I think the show is on Alice’s side, but also I think Alice doesn’t communicate it well, and doesn’t handle any of these things well, and that’s part of the problem, yes. Cut to one of our famous end of Gen Q episode montage.
Analyssa: I love a montage at the end of an episode. Is this the first one of the season? We have the one where Dani was running and she was seeing…
Riese: Oh, “Driver’s License.”
Analyssa: “Driver’s License.”
Drew: Yeah. The “Driver’s License” where we didn’t get the bridge. I re-watched that episode, and I was like, “Oh my God, I can’t believe it didn’t.” What they really should’ve done is when it cuts to the credits, the bridge of “Driver’s License” should have started.
Riese: Every time I hear it now… and it says, “I bet you’re with that blonde girl,” I’m going to think about Drew being like, “Finley is the blonde girl.”
Analyssa: Speaking of Finley in the montage, Sophie gets home and she puts her keys down and they land on a table that Finley has provided somehow. I thought that was so sweet.
Drew: Angie’s looking at photos, Tess and Shane count money, and then we go back to Sophie and Finley and Sophie hugs Finley.
Riese: She kind of leans on her, and Finley is like, “Oh my God.” Honestly, I think that Sophie should go be a bad-ass producer and Finley should just mind the home.
Drew: Yes, absolutely.
Riese: Maybe do some freelance moving. Maybe she’s a mover.
Analyssa: I was just about to say she would be great as like a pair of hands in a moving company.
Riese: Yeah, she can build furniture. Remember she said…
Analyssa: “Uh-huh (affirmative)”
Drew: Ooh, like Magic Mike.
Riese: Yeah. I mean, I haven’t seen it.
Drew: That’s my reference. You haven’t seen…? Wait, have you seen Magic Mike XXL?
Riese: There are different movies?
Analyssa: There’s two.
Drew: Yeah. There’s Magic Mike, which you don’t have to watch, and then there’s Magic Mike XXL, which is one of the greatest movies of all time.
Analyssa: Drew loves Magic Mike XXL.
Drew: Okay. Everyone who has not watched Magic Mike XXL, you have to watch Magic Mike XXL. It is an incredible movie. It is the closest—
Riese: I don’t know if I can watch the sequel without watching the original.
Drew: If you’re like me and can’t, then watch the original, the original is fine. It’s fine. It’s not a great movie, but you’ll get through it. It’s not bad. Then the sequel is, you don’t have to see the original, they’re very disconnected, but the sequel is incredible, and it’s the closest, I think, that like we’ve had in the last 10 years, like an old Hollywood musical, not in like a La La Land, like trying to copy the style, but in our… Like contemporary the same energy of just like… it’s just a positive masculinity. It’s great. It’s so good. You need to watch Magic Mike XXL. We can go back to The L Word, where Gigi is ignoring Bette’s call post-montage, which is a bad choice.
Analyssa: Bette has been Googling Pascal, and finds out also that she has a studio in Topanga, and then calls Gigi, and then Gigi ignores the call, because she’s having such a fun time with Dani.
Riese: Yeah. Probably the first person to ever silence a call from Bette Porter, besides Helena Peabody.
Analyssa: I bet Bette did not love that. Then they’re hitting it off, and Dani’s like, “I had the best time tonight. This is so great.” Then they pull up to her home and there are sirens outside.
Drew: So he’s getting arrested, not Dani?
Analyssa: Yeah, for sure.
Drew: That’s the episode!
Riese: That’s the episode!
Analyssa: That’s it! What did we think?
Drew: I remember you telling me that this was your favorite episode so far, but I unfortunately have to say that this was one of those L Word episodes where like, it was like a real, some L Word episodes I’m like, “This is a great episode.” Some L Word episodes I’m like, “This was not a very good episode.” Then there some where I’m like, “Well, half the storylines I really liked.” I really liked all the Gigi-Dani stuff. I like where some of the other storylines are going, but I was pretty exhausted by this episode, to be honest. I was a little disappointed and a little bit frustrated as shown by this podcast you’ve just listened to, but I’m not giving up hope yet. If at the end of the day, all I get out of L Word: Generation Q, season two is a lot of like top for top flirting and sex. I’ve spent my time doing worse things. I watched six seasons of Glee.
Analyssa: Recently.
Drew: Yeah, like very recently. I’m just fine. I’m happy to be here.
Riese: Well, there was no sex scenes, Drew.
Analyssa: There were no sex scenes.
Drew: I know. Honestly like when someone as hot as Gigi and someone as hot as Dani talk, it’s basically sex.
Analyssa: A thing that I’m realizing about me is that I will have my quibbles with an episode or a movie or a book or whatever, and then if I finish it in a good mood, I’m like, “Loved it. Oh my gosh. Amazing.” If it ends in a way that I think is fun, I’m like, “Oh, incredible piece of media.” Then over the course of a couple of days, I’m like, “Wait a second. Actually, this didn’t really make that much sense.” Or when I’m talking with friends about it, that book Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, I recommended it to three friends and they all read it and were like, “Yeah, it’s good, but what about this weird thing?” I was like, “No, yeah. You’re so right. I agree.” I do still think that 202 is my favorite actually. I think that just like, sort of, Drew, what you were saying, there were some pretty rough, rocky lows in the episode, and then there were some really fun gleeful things. That is sort of like, I have to remember that I get taken by the gleeful parts, in many things, not just in The L Word. I’m like, “Oh, that was great. Good for you guys.”
Drew: Good. That’s a great way to be. That’s a great way to be. Honestly, this is part of the downside of being a critic or hosting a recap podcast is like, if I was watching this with a big group of friends and we were just like hanging out and watching the episode, the stuff that bothered me, I might like be like whatever, but I would also walk away with… The thing is, is that the things that bother me, I’m writing down notes to be like, “Well, this is what I’m going to talk about on the podcast.” It does impact my experience in a way for sure.
Analyssa: Because I’m my own best friend, watching anything for myself feels like watching with a big group of friends, and so I just keep it pushing.
Drew: I like that. It’s very beautiful.
Analyssa: All I have at the end of the day is me and my silly brain.
Drew: That’s beautiful. Riese, what did you think?
Riese: First I have a quick question, which is like, do you think that you could just be a person? Because I was once a person who barely even knew her own sexuality and I was watching The L Word, and I was like, “There’s absolutely no way I can consume another season of this show without somehow writing about my feelings about it in a public forum.” Like I couldn’t just sit there and have feelings about it and keep them to myself. I needed a platform to express them. Like, do you think that you could just sit back and watch the show and not share those feelings? Because I’d be like, for me, like considering just being a layman viewer is probably not even possible.
Drew: That’s a really good point. I mean, what I think I could do is I could watch it and then be like, “I have these takeaways, I’m going to revisit it and think about them for an essay.” But yeah, you’re probably right. I probably would always be responding to The L Word in some capacity, that is where I’m being paid. That’s not the important part, but where — I guess when I watched Glee, I tweeted about it and I wasn’t paid for that. That was just the kindness of my own heart.
Riese: Yeah, that was… I mean that was fucking joy, Drew.
Drew: Yeah, thanks so much. But yeah, you know, I don’t know. I like thinking about things critically. I do enjoy it. I just get frustrated and I get frustrated because I just see the potential, and I know — There’s never been more trans talent, who are professionally working in this industry, and have stories to tell and have just the ability to fulfill those stories in a way that’s successful, and it’s just always a little bit of a bummer to me when we’re stuck sort of making compromises in rooms full of cis people, as opposed to getting to like show the whole scope of who we are. It just is like, it’s just a bummer. I mean, I think things have gotten so much better in the last five years and I think they’ll get better in the next five years, and so I feel optimistic about it, but I’m not the most patient person. I would love for The L Word to be where I wish it was, but it’s not, and that’s why we talk about it. Also we talk about it because it’s fun and hot for the other characters, for the cis characters and for the trans characters that aren’t trans.
Riese: Yeah. I think it was fine.
Drew: That’s your take on this episode? That it was fine?
Riese: Yeah. I think it was mostly good. It’s really nice that everyone is getting mixed up with everyone else.
Drew: Yes. I really like that.
Analyssa: That is fun.
Riese: I think the only things I felt disappointed about so far is I did feel disappointed that Finley and Sophie haven’t had sex yet. I also, I did kind of think that they were going to actually have Marissa be an actively trans character. After this, I’m not sure if she is going to be one.
Analyssa: I mean, the bummer is that she doesn’t even seem to be actively a character. She’s just like… she’s an extra, which is a bummer. I think that that actually is one of the things that I felt most critical about in this episode is how much actual stuff is happening that we don’t get to watch? The conversation between Angie and Kayla, the conversation between Nat and Marissa, I’m sure there’s another one that I’m forgetting because things always go in threes. But like, I don’t know, I was just like, we’re just watching people react to something, but I think the more interesting story is in the thing that they’re reacting to.
Drew: Right. Totally.
Riese: Much like the original “Luck Be a Lady,” though, I think that what’s fun about this episode is that everyone is either single or in turmoil in their relationships, and so there’s a lot of friendship stuff and there’s a lot of fun drama and people dating each other within this group of people that we like, thank God, you know?
Drew: Yes.
Lauren: Thank you so much for listening to this episode of To L and Back Generation Q! One of two podcasts brought to you by Autostraddle.com. You can follow us on Instagram and Twitter @tolandback. You can also email us at [email protected]. Don’t forget, we also have a hotline! Yes, it still exists! Give us a call, leave us a message, or just give us a piece of your mind! You can reach us at 971-217-6130! We also have merch! Head over to store.autostraddle.com. There are “Bette Porter For President” t-shirts, there are To L and Back stickers, and lots of other simply iconic Autostraddle merchandise. Our theme song is by the talented Be Steadwell. Our brand new To L and Back: Generation Q logo is by the incredible Jacqi Ko! Jacqi is so, so talented and you should definitely go check out her work, I’ve linked her website and socials in the show notes! And definitely let us know if you want us to make stickers of the new logo, because I think those would look pretty sick! This episode was produced, edited and mixed by me, Lauren Klein, you can find me on Instagram @laurentaylorklein and on Twitter @ltklein. You can follow Drew everywhere @draw_gregory. That’s “Drew” in the present tense. You can follow Analyssa on Instragram @analocaa, with two As, and on Twitter @analoca_, with one A and an underscore. And you can follow our in-house L Word savant and living legend, Riese Bernard, everywhere @autowin. Autostraddle is @autostraddle. And of course, the reason we are all here…. Autostraddle.com. Okay. So sticking with the trend of last week with our now full-of-intention L words, we are going to end this episode with an L word that describes what we thought of this episode. So Drew, Riese, Analyssa, what are your L words?
Analyssa: My L Word is “listening.” I want to listen to more characters and I want more characters to listen to each other.
Drew: It’s a great word. My L Word is “labor,” because of the emotional labor that it takes to be a trans person in media.
Riese: Mine is Lady and the Tramp.
Analyssa: Nice.
Drew: Incredible.
Riese: A film about love and pasta.
Analyssa: And a T4T dog relationship.
Drew: Yes. That is now canon, as I’ve said. People don’t like it when I say things are canon when they’re not a canon, but it’s canon.
Analyssa: Anything can be canon if you try hard enough and believe in yourself. That’s what canon means. Just willed into being.
Riese: That’s the message.
Analyssa: Okay. Well, bye.
Drew: Well, I feel like I really brought us down, but you know, sometimes—
Riese: But did you? Or did the show?
Analyssa: Were you silent or silenced?
Drew: Great point.
Analyssa: Okay. Well, I love you guys.
Drew: I love you guys, too.
Riese: Love you guys.
Analyssa: Bye!
Riese: Bye!
