Review: The Sex Lives of College Girls

With so many movies and TV shows about high school, the college market seems relatively untapped apart from quirky productions like Pitch Perfect and Blue Mountain State. This is perhaps, in part, because only a third of Americans have an undergraduate degree, and so college shows are not something the entire population can get behind. Despite this, there is a new offering on the small screen.

The series explores themes of consent, sexism, racism, and trying to find who you are

Having achieved large-scale success in the United States, Mindy Kaling’s depiction of college has finally begun airing in the UK. The Sex Lives of College Girls follows four 18-year-olds as they begin university life at the fictional Essex College in Vermont. The four girls are Kimberly (Pauline Chalamet), who comes from a predominantly white town in Arizona; Bela (Amrit Kaur), a sex-positive Indian-American aspiring comedian; Leighton (Reneé Rapp), a rich legacy student from New York and a closeted lesbian; and Whitney (Alyah Chanelle Scott), the daughter of a US Senator who is having an affair with her soccer coach.

The series explores themes of consent, sexism, racism, and trying to find who you are as you begin your adult life away from home. It also explores – as the title suggests – the girls’ sex lives as they embark on new relationships. Having now left home, they are free to drink and explore their sexualities, but this also means the parental repercussions are no longer present, and the effects of their actions lie solely at the girls’ doors.

The actors in this series really did not match the fresh, college-age girls they were supposed to be playing

Having recently watched Heartstopper and having watched Riverdale for longer than was acceptable, I found it very noticeable how the actors in this series really did not match the fresh, college-age girls they were supposed to be playing. Pauline Chalamet – brother of world-famous Timothée – is 30 years old, yet plays a freshman. Having seen how casting actors of a similar age to their characters can add to the success of a show (such as in Heartstopper, where Joe Locke and Kit Connor are doing their A-Levels during the press tour), it feels frustrating and false when the actors don’t really represent what real freshmen look like. This then makes it obvious that it is a TV show, and not real life, which is distracting from the viewing. I did, however, appreciate how diverse the cast was – black actors were not just sidelined to play the ‘best friend’, as is so often the trope, but had their own thoughts and feelings as main characters.

The first episode was hard viewing – it was clunky and felt quite awkward and I was concerned about continuing my viewing. However, I did appreciate the topics they talked about and enjoyed some aspects of the episodes, such as how they take down Nico (Gavin Leatherwood) for his adulterous ways. I had seen TikToks raving about how funny it was, partly due to Mindy Kaling’s writing. However, I didn’t find it that humorous and definitely did not laugh very much. Perhaps this is because of differences in American and British humour and what can translate across the pond. When I think of university shows, I am reminded of Fresh Meat, which feels a lot more relatable to the British university experiences and is, therefore, a more entertaining watch. If you tried to explain Sports Night to an American, they would be quite confused.

I didn’t find it that humorous and definitely did not laugh very much

Whilst I appreciated aspects of the show and the way it brought into the discourse the real struggles of college girls and also the vast representation the show creates, I found it quite hard to connect with and was distracted for a lot of my viewing time. It doesn’t feel as engaging as other shows I have watched. I really wanted to enjoy The Sex Lives of College Girls because I had seen so much hype about it, but unfortunately, it was not the show for me. A second series is incoming, though, if it is something you enjoy.