Kirsty Capes reviews Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt…
Upon first glance, Netflix’s latest comedy original Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, looks like an unemployed twenty-something’s dream. Set in New York, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt follows the delightful Kimmy, who has recently escaped a fifteen year-long incarceration in an underground bunker, held captive by Don Draper in a weird sex cult before being liberated and having to build her life again in a new world full of things she doesn’t understand like Instagram and fro-yo.
Funny and bitingly critical of the post-noughties bourgeoisie, botoxed to the eyeballs in the City That Never Sleeps, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt offers a glimpse into the mind of Tina Fey, one of the greatest female comedians of the twenty-first century.
Except it doesn’t. I had high expectations for this show, from the moment I saw the Songify This version of the theme tune. That theme tune, by the way, is the only good thing about this stale and unbecoming attempt at humour. What is intended as refreshing and ‘out-there’ actually comes off as irritating and mildly offensive. Ellie Kemper as Kimmy Schmidt wanders through New York in fizzy yellow cardigans and a peppy personality to match, and I immediately want to gouge her eyes out. The supporting cast are tropes who I suppose are meant to be hilarious caricatures. They’re not; they’re embarrassingly two-dimensional and there is not a single laugh to be had at anyone’s expense.
What’s even more upsetting about the whole thing is that this train wreck of a show has some really fantastic actors and writers involved. Ellie Kemper, who played Erin in The Office US, demonstrates in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt that not only is she a one-hit-wonder, but also most definitely a supporting role only, and the kind of personality that reminds me of one of those videos of a dog trying to eat a lemon. Which is shame because I was totally rooting for Ellie.
Meanwhile, it’s a long, hard fall from Mean Girls as NBC favourites pander to the binge-watching sentiments of the internet masses. It’s almost a little bit appalling that Tina Fey’s name is on this show. Her catalogue of favourites crop up all over the place – Jon Hamm as the creepy sex cult guy, Jane Krakowski and College Humour regular fixture Lauren Adams. None of them add anything special or exciting. Fey even pops up herself towards the end as one half of a comedic barrister duo with co-creator and NBC writer-producer Robert Carlock; painfully unfunny.
Elsewhere, the writing takes a pop at everyone from women to black people to gay people to sex abuse survivors. The premise of the show is appalling in the first instance, and then the conceited layers of “comedy” layered on top – which is anus-tensingly unpleasant and most certainly not funny – only serves to heighten the populist, churning banality of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Do yourself a favour and watch 30 Rock. Don’t even sniff at this unadulterated pile of wank.
Kirsty Capes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=pnc360pUDRI&list=PL18yMRIfoszFLSgML6ddazw180SXMvMz5
Originally published April 17, 2015. Updated April 15, 2018.
