WARNING: SPOILERS!
If you haven’t read Part I you’ll have no clue why the heck I’m even writing this. It’s short and sweet so take a minute to catch up: https://steemit.com/feminism/@jrhughes/watch-gab-giggle-the-horrible-and-hilarious-truth-of-crazy-ex-girlfriend-part-i
For the better part of Episode 1, I was confused. Should I laugh? Cry? Be offended that yet another show with a female lead is dragging us through the “crazy woman defines herself by man’s approval” trope? Here she was, bright, driven, seemingly successful by all modern standards, and Rebecca Bunch had thrown it all away along with her meds (oh yeah, she DEFINITELY had meds) in order to sit on the couch staring at her iPhone waiting all day and all night for a guy to text her back.
A guy she barely knew, who had unceremoniously dumped her at age 16 after a two-week summer camp fling, and who really isn’t much of a catch to be honest.
Then opportunity strikes: Greg – local bartender and font of self-destructive behavior – finds himself captivated by her obvious unavailability and offers to bring her to a party where Josh might be. Our star stalker accepts and sets about getting herself all dolled up á la “The Sexy Getting Ready Song.”
It starts out with a bedraggled-looking but sultrily-singing Rebecca gazing into the mirror and crooning, “Hey Josh, I wanna look good for you tonight… so I’m gonna get in touch with my feminine side…”
(Video NSFW)
As Rebecca and a back up crew of lithe beauties pluck, scrub, wax, singe, stuff, and paint themselves in an agonizing ritual, I chuckled at the irony of just how un-sexy the process of getting sexy is. When the song took a break to “see how the guys get ready” and the scene switched to a snoring Greg sprawled on his couch, I guffawed. I was positively rolling, when in sauntered Nipsey Hussle, telling our heroine to “turn that ass around like you tryin’ to impress” and then faltered at the sight of the torture devices arrayed on the vanity:
“What? This is how you get ready?” Rebecca – crammed into spanx, fresh curling iron burn on her neck, bloody from waxing, raw from exfoliation - nodded enthusiastically.
“This is horrifying… like a scary movie or something… like some nasty-assed, patriarchal bullshit.” Nipsey takes his leave, needing to “go apologize to some bitches,” “forever changed after what [he’s] just seen.”
The scene ends with Greg picking up a perfectly coiffed and stunning Rebecca, who you’d never believe had the cellulite she just brazenly displayed in the preceding moments. When he compliments her she replies breezily, “Oh, I woke up like this!”
Yesterday I said that one of the things this show most made me ponder, was how much of that “patriarchal bullshit” do we as women bring on ourselves and one another. I think this is a great example of one of those things. As women, we don’t just want to be beautiful, we want to be effortlessly - even deceptively - so. In one breath we will criticize the airbrushing of a magazine cover and in the next, airbrush out of existence our own efforts to aspire to that standard of beauty.
The moment I knew I would love this show was the moment I saw Rachel Bloom (as Rebecca Bunch) expose not just her bodily imperfections, but the internal inconsistency we women sometimes embrace. Maybe it’s because we’re conditioned not to be troublesome from such a young age. Maybe it’s because girls are expected to be mild and sugar and spice and nice things. Whatever the reason, the solution is to just STOP pretending we are something we are not. It puts pressure not only on ourselves but the women around us too. Getting ready isn’t sexy and why should we pretend it is? How can we be so disappointed with men who don’t appreciate the sacrifices we make to beauty, when we pretend we make none? Why do we compare ourselves to magazines when we know damn well they’re fake? And if Nipsey Hussle can be “forever changed” by just a little bit of honesty – a peek behind that curtain – maybe what we need as women is to be more honest with ourselves, one another, and the men we love and who love us.