What does it mean, to be a bitch? Because, sure, sometimes there’s no better word to use when describing some of the pettier interactions between women, but maybe, sometimes, being a bitch isn’t such a bad thing.
In Strike.TV’s recent acquisition Imaginary Bitches, Eden (Eden Riegel) is the lonely single girl in a group of the most girlfriend-y girlfriends you could possibly imagine existing. And at a vulnerable moment, when she feels most abandoned by said friends, two imaginary friends seem to appear. Except, though, these imaginary friends aren’t so friendly — and are, in fact, kind of mean.
Created by Andrew Miller (Riegel’s husband and a prolific writer and actor) during the WGA Writers’ Strike, Bitches has completed a 13-episode first season, which is currently available on DVD via Amazon, with new episodes are debuting every Monday on Strike — you can also catch the whole thing on YouTube, where it ran initially last year (scoring over a million views on the first episode, along with, as Steve Bryant reported last year, some viewcount-related controversy). This in theory makes Bitches a bit of a rerun for Strike, but you can hardly blame them for wanting to get on board, as negotiations are underway for a second season, and the first season alone’s done pretty well: Riegel won the 2009 People’s Choice Webby for Best Individual Performance, as well as a 2009 Daytime Emmy nomination.
The writing is uniformly clever, the acting sharp and believable (which is key, given that the show’s emphasis is on friendship). The biggest flaw of Bitches is a structural one. While episodes with a strong premise (like Eden’s session with the world’s most unprofessional therapist) hold up well, the core jokes at the heart of the premise are in extreme danger of being overplayed, especially in less focused episodes. How many more times in the first season will Eden admit that her fictitious pals are “kind of bitches”? After watching seven episodes, the answer is: “Hopefully, not too much more.”
But what works best about Bitches are the parts that show how these imaginary BFFs are possibly the best thing to ever happen to once-timid Eden, who’s no longer just letting people walk all over her. The latest episode, A Spiritual Bitch-Bath, features a former nemesis of Eden being humiliated in public by “Catherine” and “Heather” — at least, so Eden claims. “There are a lot of people, women in particular, who don’t listen to that internal voice because sometimes it’s not saying pretty things,” Riegel said via email. “But it’s a good barometer to make sure you are living the life you want and spending time with people that make you feel good.”
Thus, despite the show’s definite spin towards a female audience, the overall themes are universal. Miller himself strongly identifies with the central character: “I firmly believe that feeling like a total single loser in a couples-dominated world knows no gender boundaries,” he said via email. “So it was something I knew a lot about and a topic I wanted to explore. Women just seemed like a better gender to do it with. When girlfriends make up, they cry and hug and talk and shop. When guy friends make up, they play Xbox together. Men are much less cinematic.”
After all, the relationships at the core of this story are friendships, not romance. “We don’t spend a lot of time working on our friend relationships…and yet they’re often the longest lasting, most intimate relationships we have,” Miller said. True enough. After all, your real friends are the ones who stick with you, even when you’re being a bit of a…well, you know.
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