Queenie
My Dad has issues with the first episode of TV shows. He doesn't like to spend the time getting to know the lay of the land. He wants the story to just start immediately without bothering to learn character names or relationships or any details that might be relevant. No matter how many times I explain that this worldbuilding is important for the audience to form a relationship with the characters which will pay off in later episodes he almost always will declare by episode two that "this episode is so much better." Sigh. It's a cross I will forever bear. On the other hand, his weird predilection for being thrown into a story with no context means that Queenie should have been the show for him. It wasn't. I don't know who this show is for. I tuned in because of the commentary on how calling Queenie the black Bridget Jones was doing the show a disservice. And it is, because one bunny suit and Sally Phillips does not make this Bridget Jones. In fact I would willingly watch the abysmal Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason several times versus watch this show again. This show is just so depressing. Queenie wallows in bad life decisions as a result of not dealing with trauma. A trauma whose reveal is drawn out so long that you think it has to be really bad, sexual abuse, physical abuse, something earth-shattering. Well, let me save you the trouble of having to watch this piece of shit. Her mother left her alone so that her partner wouldn't hurt Queenie. Now, yes, you can have severe abandonment issues which lead to relationship problems later in life, but compared with what was happening with her mother and what could have happened to her, Queenie comes across as an entitled bitch who might just be the most self-centered character I've ever seen in a television show. A show that every aspect of it is a mess. First, there's just the confusion that is this show. You don't know who anyone is and therefore you don't care. The texts and memes and messages that flash up on the screen are too quickly removed to be read and are in such color and font choices that they can't be read even if you cared to. Everything is just whirling confusion. The visuals of this series are just a mess. But I guess they compliment the mess that is my second point, the characters are a mess and I hate them all. Queenie is not likable. She's not relatable. At eight episodes this felt like it was a hundred, half of them wallowing in shit and then half of them trying to get out of that shit. Oh, and how does she get out of that shit? By being a hypocrite and taking money from her mother who she won't talk to. And as for her job that she royally fucks up by having sex with a married coworker on the bathroom floor, what is it? What does Queenie actually do other than make bad life choices? I have no idea what her job is. And worse, I don't care. This show was about a miserable person who makes horrible decisions and then gets rewarded for admitting she needs therapy? Just no. All the no. These actors deserved better. Oh, and Cabbage Patch Kids weren't out in 1979.
