Ginny and Georgia was released on Netflix on February 24, 2021. The television series consists of a single season with ten episodes that follows a mother-daughter duo and their experiences moving into a New England town from Texas. Creating a one-sentence summary for this series is difficult and does not encompass the complexity of this show. From high school drama to murder, teen romance to embezzlement, underage drinking to the “Oppression Olympics” (the term created by Twitter). Now don’t get me wrong, I binge-watched this show over two days and had absolutely no regrets. I was just exhausted when the credits rolled following episode ten.
Ginny, played by Antonia Gentry, and her new friends find themselves confronted with issues of sexuality, race, racism, self-harm, eating disorders, and corrupt authority figures. The show also does not lack a cast of diverse actors and actresses, including minority main characters who experience microaggressions, a deaf father, and a gay best friend (whose character is not exclusively identified by only her sexuality). Ginny’s mother, Georgia Miller, played by Brianne Howey, is a strong single, messy mother with an assumed questionable past, which is later proved to be more than questionable (just some murder, embezzlement, and much more). But don’t worry, she is doing it for Ginny and her son, Austin Miller. So, it’s justified…? If that sounds like a lot, it’s because it is.
One controversy that I have to mention is Taylor Swift’s response to a joke made by Ginny in the final episode. In a conversation between Ginny and Georgia, Ginny jokes “you go through men faster than Taylor Swift.” Taylor and her fans perceived the joke as slut-shaming and misogynistic. While the line was unnecessary, I do not think it is worth canceling an entire show over. But seeing that the Taylor Swift fandom encompasses the majority of this world, I find it hard to be confident that we will be seeing a season two of Ginny and Georgia.
Ginny and Georgia has also been compared to Gilmore Girls which I find accurate to the extent that both star a mother and daughter who act more like sisters, but that is where I draw the line. Ginny and Georgia said, “hold my beer” and pulled in influences from probably the entire Netflix television show lineup. The show lacks the ability to stick to a single genre and is rather a wild mixture of several genres, with little warning as to when you will shift between comedy and legal drama. I think this is what makes the show so entertaining.
If the writers hadn’t overwhelmed us with several plotlines and found their own identity, maybe it would not have been so controversial and polarizing. You can tell the writers are millennials attempting to get inside the minds of Generation Z. From the tap-dancing birthday gift from Ginny’s boyfriend, Hunter, to Hunter dabbing while playing beer pong, maybe it’s only Hunter that has all of us cringing.
With all of this said, I did enjoy the show and if you are thinking about watching Ginny and Georgia, you just have to see it for yourself.
Favorite Episode: “Next Level Rich People Sh*t”
Favorite Character: Maxine Baker
Overall Rating: 7/10