THE MORNING LIST
The American streaming platforms in France are entirely responsible for the selection of the week, coming from HBO, Prime or Paramount+. From retro feminism to the classic paranoid thriller to the nightmares of Donald Glover and Janine Nabers, the movement towards standardization is on pause and that’s a good thing.
“Minx”: the underside of an erotic magazine for women
Posted on the HBO Max platform in 2022, the series developed by Ellen Rapoport has experienced the tormented fate of productions which, in a context of budgetary scarcity, have failed to make themselves indispensable. Canceled by HBO when the second season was almost entirely filmed, minx was finally picked up by the Starzplay platform, which should distribute it this year (but not in France: Starzplay, renamed “Lionsgate”, will cease its activities there on March 31). It’s not the first series to be taken from platform to platform in this way, but the vagaries of its broadcast resonate in a certain way with its subject, which revolves around the difficulties that women encounter in being taken seriously.
A radical activist in Los Angeles in the 1970s, Joyce (Ophelia Lovibond) tries unsuccessfully to convince investors to fund a feminist magazine project, until a sympathetic but somewhat dodgy publisher in the San Fernando Valley offers her to take the lead in a new erotic magazine for women. Alternately galvanized then discouraged by the sum of obstacles to overcome to bring the magazine to life, Joyce had to put up with the nickel-plated Feet who made up the editorial staff, scrap with the censorship and, above all, take on a whole host of responsibilities to which she did not. was ever prepared. If Joyce’s journey looks like deja vu – especially since Mrs America recounted the feminist ferment of those years –, the energy of Ophelia Lovibond and the supporting roles that surround her make it an endearing and effective series. That’s enough to get to the end of this first season, without a second seeming, at this stage, absolutely essential. At. f.
Series created by Ellen Rapoport. With Ophelia Lovibond, Jake Johnson, Michael Angarano, Jessica Lowe, Oscar Montoya (USA, 2022, 10 × 30 min). Two episodes Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on OCS Max starting March 21. On demand on OCS Go.
“Swarm”: the bee and the beast
Dre (Dominique Fishback) lives in the shadows and thanks to the money of Marissa (Chloe Bailey), daughter of the foster family in which Dre grew up. Dre lives another existence, virtual, in the inexhaustible light of superstar Ni’Jah whose fans have come together as winter (“hive”). We will have recognized in Ni’Jah a barely fictional version of Beyoncé, but what do we recognize in Dre? With playwright Janine Nabers, Donald Glover explores a particular, monstrous case of the psyche of these fans as determined to celebrate their star as to rot the lives of those who denigrate it. Dre isn’t just dooming people to cancellation on social media, she’s stepping back into the real world to confront these mortal enemies. What gives a series built over the bloody vagrancy of Dre, all in rupture of tones.
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