Amac Productions

I think I said, ‘What the hell am I watching’ so many times during this episode it has started to lose all meaning to me.

You’d probably think that’s a bad thing, but it’s really not.

Let me tell you why.

I’m several episodes in at this point as I write this, like three episodes total, and I’m still saying it. I want to walk away, but I just cannot.

I just keep watching the train wreck because I need to know where all the pieces land.

What is this show?

I have no idea.

It’s funny. It’s terrible. It’s wonderful. It’s dumb and entertaining and I have no idea what’s going to happen next at any moment.

The first episode is a wild ride I did not understand.

I spent a good chunk of time during the episode that I’m watching something set in the 1950s. Women didn’t have lives or identities of their own. Everything about them was built around their husband.

I’m shocked to discover that she waits until her husband is asleep at night to get up and do her nightly routine. Does he know you shit or fart too?

Because I’m certain you do.

Do you have to hide those bodily functions as well? Or is he cool with those?

Miriam and her mother make a fine pair as they attempt to convince everyone they’re perfect all the time. Worrying about a little baby’s forehead and that she’ll somehow be ugly because of it.

The only self-aware thing spoken about the forehead situation is that if she grows up to be beautiful, she’ll have an easier time in life.

Well, shit. You’re not wrong there. It’s petty and awful, but it’s the truth. Especially of that time and I honestly can’t fault them for doing what they need to in order to survive. I get that. I do. As someone who is never sure how people will react to my sexuality, that I navigate it like a minefield to decide whether or not this will go well. I mean, I’m still going to tell them. Because eff them if they’re uncomfortable, however, I just need to know where I’ll stand with you.

Are we still good? Or am I dumping you from my life?

I understand it.

Does not mean I like it.

The scene where she heads upstairs to tell her parents and they freak was just weird to me.

I spent a good chunk of the episode reminding myself what decade this is set in, because reactions seemed so crazily over the top to me.

Like, they separated. Big deal.

Except it is.

Her life is in this man’s hands. At his whim, he could just ruin her life. Leave her homeless, poor, and with two very young children to handle while he goes off into the sunset with his secretary.

Also, how cliche Joel?

He’s also horrible while telling her.

Her shock is completely crazy to me. Like she can somehow logic him into not leaving. Her line though about well then don’t when he says this isn’t how he wanted things to go, was perfect.

Rachel Brosnahan absolutely kills this role.

Did not expect to see her boobs. Holy crap did the show take a turn.

I also understand that’s what she’s arrested for, but then we get that she’s being charged with saying foul language. Like? For real?

This was a thing?

How little she knows about the world for being an incredibly intelligent woman is amazing.

Joel’s inability to make anything funny.

He’s kind of awful at it honestly.

And I’m not entirely sure how long he’ll survive without his wife to do literally everything for him. Bring him his sweater. Cook the brisket to bribe people to let him go on. Keep the house in perfect running order. Take care of the kids.

Like she’s superwoman and you’re just going to leave?

As much as her life will be difficult to function in the world without a man. In so many ways, mind you. I’m a thousand precent certain she can figure it out.

Whatever she needs, she’ll get. What she doesn’t know, she can learn. She has skills and potential and brains to achieve anything she wants. Look at the life she created with Joel. It’s all her, putting it together for them. Not him. He’s bringing home a paycheck, but I’m pretty sure it stops there.

She’s tough.

Like Lorelai Gilmore.

She’ll manage without Joel.

But can Joel manage without her?

How long before his life falls to ruin because no one is ironing anything or bribing people to get him a prime stop? He freaks and she says she’ll fix. And she does.

He doesn’t.

He doesn’t do much beyond whine and whimper throughout the episode. Revealing that because his life hasn’t turned out magically perfect even though he’s not doing anything to make it turn out the way he wants, he’s going to take it out on the people he’s promised to be there for.

Like his wife and children.

Nope, I’m not happy so screw all of you.

It’s your fault dear that you didn’t know that I wanted to be a comedian professionally even though I apparently never mentioned it.

Sure, it’s her fault she’s not a mind reader. Moron.

I don’t like Joel very much. I think there’s a part of the show that doesn’t want to make him the villain. As the show is more of the ‘everyone has faults and upsides’ type of show. Like no one is perfect and that’s cool. But I also can just not like someone.

There’s a right way and a wrong way.

I’m also not saying Joel should stay even though he’s miserable. But maybe instead of cheating, bombing your stand-up, blaming your wife for your choices, and storming out in the middle of the night you should have tried making things better. Talk to your wife. Tell her what you really want.

Maybe write your own material.

I don’t know, dude. Something.

Cheating and abandoning your life because you’re upset that you’ve never amounted to anything is not anyone’s fault but yours.

On another note, the more I watched the first episode the more I felt like this was a twisted version of Lorelai Gilmore in front of me.

Almost as if, what if we took the same type of strong, opinionated, funny woman who is a little self-absorbed but instead of fighting against the system she’s in, she embraces it. What would Lorelai look like if she embraced the life she was supposed to have instead of running from it?

You get Miriam Maisel.

Who did all the right things. Just like Emily Gilmore would have wanted. She listened to her mother, she followed the rules every step of the way. She found a man, got married, had children, and that should have been enough.

Right.

Perfect.

Everything else should have just worked from there.

Except it didn’t.

It’s interesting to me.

I almost want to place the characters side by side and compare them. One ran from their privileged life and ended up returning to regardless to help her daughter.

The other embraced her privileged life and ended up back where she started except with a failed marriage and two kids.

Neither of their choices worked out exactly as planned.

Ultimately, Lorelai did come to enjoy being her parents’ lives. Even though it wasn’t what anyone expected, they made their relationships work.

I wonder if we’ll see a mirror of that here with Miriam as she embraces a life she never planned to have. One where she’s the star and she’s not playing barback for her husband to get all the credit.

It’s a fun reversal that I look forward to seeing how it ends up working out.

Because I imagine things are far from over.

Overall, this episode was good. The series is good, and I can see why so many people enjoyed it. Again, though, there’s a part of me that wants to look away, but I just… can’t.

I got to know how the pieces land.

Also, please Miriam do not take Joel back even if he comes back crawling on his hands and knees.

Please.

Well, onto next week!

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