Netflix’s increasing library of originals devoted to the horrors of rising up continues with I Am Not Okay With This, an adaptation of Charles Forsman’s bleak comedian of the identical title. From Jonathan Entwistle, who additionally did Forsman’s The End of the F***ing World for Netflix, and the producers of Stranger Things, the present tells the story of Sydney (Sophia Lillis, It), an adolescent making an attempt to navigate the complexities of highschool and her budding sexuality whereas additionally struggling to know and management a newfound supernatural capability. It is hardly new territory — it isn’t even new territory for Netflix — and but the collection nonetheless finds methods to set itself aside whereas telling a narrative that resonates with its viewers, beginning with its setting.
The seven-episode first season, which is extra expansive and has a a lot lighter tone than Forsman’s comedian, was filmed round Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with many exteriors shot within the small city of Brownsville, roughly 40 miles to the south. Because of a tax credit score within the state, extra movies and TV reveals are opting to movie there (Netflix’s Mindhunter was additionally filmed in Pittsburgh), offering a a lot welcome reprieve from the final sameness of a lot of American TV. The streets of L.A., with the peaks of the Santa Monica or San Gabriel Mountains within the distance and palm and orange timber lining residential lanes, whereas lovely, make a poor substitute for a lot of the U.S. So when a collection is filmed outdoors these settings, it might instantly distinguish the present in an overcrowded panorama whereas enhancing a present’s sense of authenticity.
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Though I’ve by no means personally stepped foot within the areas during which I Am Not Okay With This was filmed, I’m from Ohio, and have household from the southeastern a part of the state, so the streets down which Sydney walks on her approach dwelling from college are just like streets that I, and lots of others from the Midwest or Appalachia, have walked down in our personal lives. This immediately creates a way of familiarity. It is virtually ridiculous to suppose {that a} easy change in fauna or topography can do rather a lot to create a way of place, set a present aside, or spark a reference to a viewer, nevertheless it’s true; think about the chances if extra TV reveals had been in a position to movie within the locations they’re really set.
In fact, I don’t anticipate everybody could have a robust connection to the collection merely due to its setting or its filming location. The inexperienced, rolling hills and the trusses of the Brownsville Bridge or arches of the George Westinghouse Bridge, each of which seem within the collection, seemingly will not ring a bell with somebody from Miami or a teen from Bozeman. However the Rust Belt setting is each distinct from most of what we see on TV and but completely widespread for an space of America that is not often (or usually unfairly) represented on TV. And this successfully grounds the present, even with its supernatural parts, whereas the narrative itself speaks to a common fact: adolescence could be overwhelming to the purpose of alienation.
Sophia Lillis and Wyatt Oleff, I Am Not Okay With This
Initially of the collection, we be taught that Sydney’s father died by suicide the spring earlier than, and this traumatic occasion has naturally had a profound affect on her life, each in school, the place she doesn’t have many mates to lean on as a result of she’s moved round rather a lot, and at dwelling, the place her mom ( Kathleen Rose Perkins), a waitress at a diner on the town, depends on Sydney to assist run the family and maintain her youthful brother, Liam (Aidan Wojtak-Hissong). Though she’s struggling, Sydney refuses to talk with anybody about her rising anger, loneliness, and resentment, so her steerage counselor suggests she write her ideas in a diary to “assist along with her moods” (these diary entries play out as Sydney’s voice-over narration within the collection). This can, her counselor hopes, enable Sydney to have a traditional highschool expertise, if such a factor even exists.
Not everybody shares Sydney’s trauma, however the bodily and psychological modifications that happen throughout our teen years are common. It is easy to narrate to the swirling maelstrom of feelings and hormones that carry Sydney by way of her day-to-day life even when we’ve not skilled a loss similar to hers. So when Sydney’s emotions of anger and jealousy over her finest (and just about solely) good friend, Dina ( Sofia Bryant), relationship Brad (Richard Ellis), the varsity’s fashionable dickhead athlete, start to manifest themselves as telekinesis, it is an ideal, if apparent, metaphor for the overwhelming expertise of rising up.
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Because the season progresses and Sydney continues to maintain her feelings locked up, and this contains not acknowledging her rising emotions for Dina, her telekinetic powers intensify till she’s unable to regulate them. This leads to nice bursts of power that wreak havoc and destruction on practically each facet of Sydney’s life, one thing acquainted to anybody who’s skilled the hell of being an adolescent and looking for their place on the earth whereas missing the flexibility to correctly specific themselves.
Just one different particular person is aware of the reality about Sydney’s burgeoning powers, a neighbor boy named Stanley ( Wyatt Oleff, It) who has a deep appreciation for vinyl data and VHS tapes, views highschool and all that it entails as a type of dwell theater, and, after all, harbors a crush on Sydney. He kind of raises himself whereas his father drives an 18-wheeler, and since they’re each lonely, social outcasts in their very own approach, Sydney and Stan naturally gravitate towards each other, sharing their deepest secrets and techniques and discovering consolation in a shared sense of loneliness.
Sophia Lillis, I Am Not Okay With This
At simply 30 minutes an episode, I Am Not Okay With This does not cowl lots of floor and primarily looks like a prelude to a a lot bigger and deeper story. Ordinarily I might advocate for brief runtimes and quick seasons, however the brevity of the season turns into an issue when the collection hints that Sydney’s telekinesis is not only a metaphor for the acquainted pains of adolescence but additionally probably psychological sickness.
This improvement comes immediately from the comedian, during which Sydney suffers from melancholy and dies by suicide after struggling to attach with family and friends and being unable to deal with trauma and an accompanying lack of management. On the web page, her powers virtually felt superfluous to the story, and her dying was a harrowing commentary on the methods during which society continues to fail the individuals who want it most. Within the present, Sydney’s powers seem like extra integral to the general narrative, which for probably the most half is much less darkish and crippling than its supply materials — actually, Netflix is advertising it as John Hughes meets a superhero movie. Due to this fact, Sydney’s harmful tendencies are likely to work higher after they’re the manifestation of acquainted teenage angst compounded by trauma quite than hinting they could be the results of a critical, unaddressed psychological well being concern that might sooner or later additionally finally result in suicide.
Not but understanding the place Sydney’s powers come from is smart from a enterprise standpoint; it’s in Netflix’s finest curiosity to go away questions unanswered and preserve viewers wanting extra. However with out correctly addressing among the present’s bigger themes within the first season, the implication that Sydney’s powers are the results of a psychological sickness has the potential to really feel irresponsible at finest and tragic at worst, particularly given the best way the LGBTQ neighborhood has been handled up to now. A second season might simply and responsibly deal with Sydney’s psychological state, and given the lingering trauma of her father’s dying and the best way the primary season finally ends, it feels unimaginable this may not finally come up ought to Netflix renew the present. However maybe it could have made extra sense to carry all hints of this clarification till they may very well be totally addressed.
Nonetheless, regardless of this misstep, I Am Not Okay With This is an easy-to-watch coming-of-age collection backed by an incredible soundtrack that includes songs by The Kinks, Karen Dalton, and extra that appear to completely and magically meld with the present’s visuals. The themes the collection tackles aren’t inherently novel or distinctive, and Sydney is usually a irritating heroine at instances, however I might argue that is the purpose and likewise why the present finally succeeds as a automobile for teenage ennui. Here is to hoping a second season is within the playing cards and can begin answering among the questions created by this primary one.
TV Information Ranking: 3.5/5
All seven episodes of I Am Not Okay With This premiere Wednesday, Feb. 26 on Netflix.