Cherry Picker

I watch a lot of good shows, but the zany Crazy Ex Girlfriend (CXG) is my favorite. Although it is very romcom-y, at its core, it is a wise and profound show about the human condition. Social and psychological topics such as jealousy, projection, manipulation, status, friendship, trauma and self-worth are dealt with in way that is honest and mature, but also fresh and hilarious.

Now, I will make the case for CXG being the most underrated TV show of all time by outlining its outstanding charisma, uniqueness, nerve, and talent. Yes, I believe that RuPaul’s famous criteria for what makes a good drag queen can be generalized to judge TV shows, specifically a deeply female, campy, character-driven musical (anti-)romantic comedy TV show such as this. Plus, show creator Rachel Bloom and I both love Drag Race (she has been a guest judge), so it feels appropriate.

Charisma / What makes it fun and charming?

The show’s charisma lies in its relatable characters, visual appeal, catchy music and light tone. It is also the perfect show to watch after a breakup.

1. Lightness

CXG has a lot of romcom charm to really draw viewers in. It is abundant in juicy drama, attractive male characters and loads of banter. Visually speaking, CXG is bright and colorful, but still has a realistic look. It is well-paced and manages to entertain and surprise despite being largely character-driven. Unlike many similarly brilliant shows, CXG does not bum me out or make me go back and rewatch previous episodes to keep a handle on a convoluted plot. Besides, CXG is deeply feminist, but without being preachy or triggering. It does not depict a single incident of violence against women. Tone and genre make it accessible to a wide audience and watchable in almost any mental and emotional state.

2. Eccentricity

CXG has wacky humor and catchy musical interludes featuring a wide variety of parodies and pastiches. They represent characters’ subjective interpretations of what is going on and are best understood to be daydreams. Perhaps to indicate that these musical numbers are part of the characters’ inner life rather than an organic part of the story, they are also stylistically different from the rest of the show. The color palette and setting changes and they are flamboyant to the point of camp (meaning over-the-top in a self-aware way). For example, I Give Good Parent (S01E13), a Nicki Minaj parody, is a comically sexual song about a woman planning to impress/seduce a man’s parents. 

3. Relatability

Rebecca, the titular ex-girlfriend, has very poor impulse control. That can be cringe-inducing, but it makes it possible for her to do what I secretly want, but never permit myself to do — which is to orchestrate an encounter with an ex. This show allows me to live vicariously through Rebecca, let her do it for me and also reap the consequences in my place. It is empathy that then leads to pure catharsis. This is especially helpful when I am going through a breakup and have to suppress the urge to contact my ex. Watching this show does not just disabuse or distract me. It soothes me.

Uniqueness / What makes it fresh and original?

Nobody is doing what CXG is doing: realistic portrayals of Asians, Jews, body diversity, female health and relationship dynamics.

CXG does many things I had never seen on TV before. Not because CXG is absurd, but it more honestly and completely represents what life is actually like. Some spoilers lie ahead — in order from lightest to heaviest.

1. Asian men and Jewish women

The male love interest is Josh Chan, a Filipino jock who is immature, cheerful, sweet, hot, unambitious and a bit clueless. I do not remember ever having seen an American show with the white female protagonist’s being infatuated with an Asian-American man before CXG. Unfortunately, Asian men on US-American TV are often ridiculed. They are depicted as unmanly, asexual and/or nerdy which is both racist and sexist. 

What is more is that the character of Josh is not just incidentally Filipino because the role was cast without a specific ethnicity in mind. The show is not color-blind. Josh was written to be from a very tight-knit Catholic Filipino family and his heritage is an integral part of the story. His mother sings karaoke and shops at the Asian supermarket. Many members of his family are visibly included throughout the story and other aspects of his culture are shown in small, realistic ways. 

Another non-stereotypical Asian man is Josh’s childhood friend Joseph aka Father Brah who is much wiser than Josh, but similarly bro-y, kind, and athletic. He is a priest who plays basketball, smokes weed and although choosing to be celibate, is not asexual.

While the show completely omits stereotypes about Asian men, it confronts Jewish stereotypes head-on. CXG uses three Jewish characters, Rebecca Bunch, her mother Naomi, and Rebecca‘s frenemy Audra Levine to dissect and deconstruct tropes of upper-class New York Jewish womanhood, specifically materialism and ambition. It also manages to seamlessly integrate themes of generational trauma, the Jewish diaspora, and religion — plus some additional quirks of Jewish American culture. Like Josh’s Filipino heritage, Rebecca’s Jewishness is neither incidental nor tokenistic. It provides necessary context for her journey of self-discovery. I do not think that any other network TV shows to date has explored Jewishness with anywhere near as much depth as CXG does and I want to give the topic its own blog post.

Generally, diverse representation in film and TV is noble because it can reduce prejudice and it subtly affirm the democratic core belief that everyone is equally valuable and belongs equally, but also because it makes stories better from a literary perspective: more honest, realistic, complex, and interesting.

In CXG, diversity is both interpersonal and intrapersonal. Besides coming from a variety of distinctive cultural backgrounds (interpersonal diversity), characters are internally coherent but also complex (intrapersonal diversity). They say and do irrational or unexpected things, that deepen their character and, despite having been unanticipated, still make perfect sense in hindsight. In these moments, a confident character can become unsure and self-critical, a laid-back character might feel anxious, or an agreeable character suddenly puts their foot down. These apparent contradictions are normal and human. They are the mechanism by which the characters’ layered personalities also lend more texture to the plot.

Specificities and idiosyncrasies technically make a character less generic, less universal. But paradoxically, and because it makes them more authentic and human, it is easier to connect with these characters than with the supposedly more relatable ‘average Joe’. That is what the writers understood and why again and again they chose diversity and specificity over universality.

Note: The show also has Black, Hispanic, homosexual and transgender characters and portrays them in a respectful and nuanced way, though in this regard it is not unique; many other modern TV shows do this well too.

2. Body diversity and female health

Body representation on CXG is commendably realistic. Actress Rachel Bloom has told interviewers about how she consciously decided not to lose weight to play the lead character of Rebecca Bunch. That is why she is not as skinny as audiences have come to expect their protagonist to be. Rebecca’s weight fluctuates over the course of the story. She often berates herself for her weight, especially when she feels emotionally unwell.

She also sometimes receives backhanded compliments for it that are hilarious, but also painfully recognizable. One coworker praises her for how brave she is to be so normal-looking. Another character sings: “Unfortunately I wanna have sex with you. I don’t know what happened. Maybe you lost some weight” (from Let’s Have Intercourse in S02E11). Her mother straight-up insults her: “By the way, you’re looking healthy and by healthy I mean chunky. I don’t mean that as an insult, I’m just stating it as fact” (from Where’s the Bathroom in S01E08).

The shallow and super skinny mean girl Valencia gains a few pounds during a personal crisis and is initially dismayed and embarrassed. But she quickly stops being preoccupied with her weight when she quits her job as a yoga instructor. To be fair, she is still one of the slimmest characters and conventionally beautiful. So, she outwardly still receives the same amount of skinny privilege. Also, her body and the way it looks are no longer central to her professional success which makes it easier to separate it from her sense of identity and self-confidence. And besides, she starts dressing differently exchanging body con dresses, and leggings-plus-sports-brah outfits for power suits and flouncy blouses. Out of sight, out of mind. Her shape is less visible which probably leads to her doing less body checking. Ultimately, it is good that she handles her weight gain well and (seemingly) without doing a lot of emotional work, but it is also likely not a difficult task. This also goes to show that Valencia may not naturally be vain.

Also, the camera angles and lighting are not always flattering and in some scenes, there are bare-faced female characters (Rebecca and Paula) even looking older and a bit washed-out without their makeup. In short, most characters look like normal people.

While other shows usually have main characters that eat fast food while their actors look jacked, every CXG character who is super shredded (Josh, White Josh, Valencia, and Nathaniel) is explicitly shown depriving themselves of certain foods and obsessively working out to maintain their physique. They are also not presented as being necessarily more happy or successful than the characters that are not skinny. It is a refreshingly honest portrayal of lean adults and the restrictiveness of their lifestyles.

CXG also centers female health issues that other shows might misrepresent or shy away from entirely. At different points in the story there are instances of: a mother getting an abortion, characters dealing with UTIs, yeast infections and bacterial vaginosis, a woman having diarrhea, a woman having a heart attack, and heterosexual couples having period sex. All of these things are portrayed as normal parts of life and not freaky body horror or even particularly gross or ideologically charged situations.

By telling these stories, CXG contributes to the destigmatization and more accurate representation of female health on TV. For example, TV abortions are usually performed on young and childless women while more than half of all women who get abortions irl already have one or more children. Female TV characters are also rarely shown as having heart attacks which means that most of us associate them only with the symptoms that are typical for heart attacks in men.

The show uses its unique format to fight the taboo and ignorance around female reproductive and vaginal health through quirky comedy songs:

• I Gave You a UTI (my personal favorite) in S01E17
• Period Sex in S02E08 and referenced in later episodes
• Funky Cat Metaphor (= bacterial vaginosis) in S04E10
• Itchy Cat Metaphor (= yeast infection) in S04E10

I want to give an honorable mention to the song The Miracle of Birth (S03E13), a sweet lullaby about the horrifying specifics of childbirth. Yes, sitcoms often feature childbirth, but I do not think any of them are ever as hilarious and graphic as this song, so it could still count as CXG breaking the mold.

3. Consequences

Many characters on CXG make life choices on a whim. Without much deliberation, they move, quit jobs, cheat, break up, and even commit crimes. I am omitting many examples to avoid spoilers. These one-time decisions come back to haunt the characters who made them for sure, though not as severely as their persistent psychological problems and inconspicuous bad habits.

At first, it seems as though the characters’ bad habits will never lead to any serious consequences which is pretty common for sitcoms. That is why I was pleasantly surprised that in CXG, people are eventually punished for their unhealthy and overused coping strategies such as people-pleasing, relationship-hopping, stalking, lying, overspending, drinking, self-medicating, overworking themselves, pathologically involving themselves in other people’s drama, overeating, and procrastinating. The show warns that if unchecked, the smaller behaviors that were supposed to make the person feel more in control will become their emotional crutches and then take over their lives.

4. Realistic relationships

Parenthood: CXG subverts the sexist expectations of all women aspiring to motherhood and parenting being something that all mothers are naturally good at. The show has a child character who chooses her tender and mature father over her irresponsible mother in a post-divorce custody dispute. One mother is shown to be a controlling, almost narcissistic bully. Another one is just not passionate about parenting which results in resignation and neglect. There are also two mothers that sabotage their adult children’s independence by coddling them and shielding them from their adult responsibilities. On CXG, the only main character who finds parenting fulfilling, pursues it and does it well is a man — though there are also Rebecca’s dead-beat father and two other fathers that are alcoholics. Meanwhile, there are female characters who donate eggs for IVF and serve as surrogates without getting attached to the baby in question. This challenges the idea that all women are broody mother hens whose maternal instincts are just waiting to be activated.

Romantic love: While I do not condone cheating, I like that CXG shows a realistic example of a couple who slowly, but successfully repair their relation after an infidelity. To their confusion and dismay, the betrayed partner goes through a phase where they get sexually aroused by fantasizing about the cheating incident and imagining themselves as the ‘homewrecker’. The show also takes the path less travelled by depicting decentering romantic relationships as an important part of personal growth, having its bisexual characters not default to ending up in relationships with men and men generally not being considered the ultimate prize. Spoiler: Most romcoms culminate in a wedding as the happily-ever-after, but CXG does not.

Nerve / Where is it brave and takes risks?

The show’s creators showed a lot of guts by giving it a satirically sexist title, including autobiographical elements about mental health, having its protagonist be a cringey antiheroine and often narrowly avoiding censorship.

1. Marketing

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is a sexist title. The show itself acknowledges that as well. It is a reductive and demeaning stereotype of the woman who is overly emotional and irrational. The ‘crazy ex-girlfriend’ label is used to delegitimize and pathologize women’s complaints of mistreatment, often by implying that they are misunderstanding, overreacting or making things up. It frees men of being accountable for their role in toxic dynamics. The trope allows them to ‘win’ the conflict without trying to listen to, understand, and consider the ‘hysterical’ woman’s perspective.

That is why many feminist women were put off the show and never even watched its first episode. The title is intended to provoke people, but also to draw in viewers that might enjoy this sexist trope. Possibly due to its marketing not targeting the audience that would love it the most, CXG holds the record for the TV series with the worst ratings that was never cancelled. It concluded after the four seasons it was alway planned to have and stayed the literally most underrated TV show all the way through. The title was an artistically smart, but strategically risky choice that demonstrates a lot of nerve and ultimately came at a huge cost.

2. Autobiographical elements

Rachel Bloom, the lead actress, is also the show’s co-creator (along with screenwriter Aline Brosh McKenna). Actually, the character of Rebecca is based on Rachel’s real-life romantic obsessiveness, depression, anxiety and OCD. CXG is set and filmed in Rachel’s actual hometown, West Covina, where she is a Jewish woman playing a Jewish woman. There are probably even more parallels between Rachel and Rebecca, as Rachel herself has often said that she puts a lot of her real self into her writing and acting.

”My obsessions with men were like emotional cutting. I was constantly going in and out of depression. I would let people take advantage of me. The craziest thing was how I debased myself and lied to myself. That’s what still sticks with me and humiliates me. Rebecca is an exaggeration of things that I’ve wanted to do or felt.”

Rachel Bloom said in her 2016 interview with Psychology Today.

To be clear, unlike Rebecca, Rachel does not have BPD, divorced parents or a narcissist mother. She got married in her twenties, studied theater instead of law and, unlike Rebecca who, as we learn in S04E04, can only stay on pitch in her daydreams, is a professionally trained singer. So, the show is not completely and literally autobiographical, but it is an example of radical psychological self-disclosure.

CXG does not shy away from making its viewers mistrust und dislike the protagonist. Yes, Rebecca is clever, relatable and pretty, but she is also embarrassing, volatile, delusional, needy, and manipulative. She often knowingly does the wrong thing for selfish reasons. There is even a song about it: I’m the Villain in My Own Story (S01E14). Besides, she is an unreliable narrator as her interpretations of situations are packaged in musical numbers and it remains unclear which, if any, of the lines in those musical numbers are really spoken between the characters. For example, it later becomes clear that Greg never actually asked Rebecca to ‘settle’ for him like he does in the song Settle for Me (S01E09).

3. Censorship

The show’s original pilot was developed for the premium cable network Showtime—which would have allowed for explicit content and uncensored language. But because CXG came out on The CW which is broadcast network television, every episode had to go through The CW’s Standards and Practices department which ensure compliance with FCC guidelines by preemptively self-censoring anything that could be considered profane (foul language), indecent (sex and nudity) or obscene.

Doing so without betraying the show’s feminist vision was a difficult balancing act, because although CXG is never pornographic or even erotic, it is a transgressive show when it comes to the female body and sex. It portrays sex in a way that is funny, but also radically nonjudgmental, honest and educational which sets it apart from many US-American TV shows of its time. The writers wanted their show to accurately “show what sex is really like”, Rachel Bloom said in an interview with Mic.

To comply with FCC guidelines for profanity, words like ‘shit’ and ‘fuck’ had to be bleeped and many lyrics were edited to be cleaner. The explicit versions were however still produced and published online. The most extreme example of this is the song Period Sex of which only the first line makes it into the show. The character starts singing it and is immediately interrupted. Anyone who wants to listen to it in full length has to go on YouTube or Spotify. Exactly how the network drew the line between what is and is not too explicit for TV was often a bit of a mystery. For example, on October 21st, 2017, on Twitter (now X), Rachel Bloom pointed this out when talking about the lyrics of Strip Away My Conscience (S03E04):

“The original lyric was ‘Dude, I’m so wet’ but that was too dirty so we changed it to ‘let me choke on your cocksuredness’ and that was fine.”

To avoid getting in trouble for indecency, a lot of the time, the show strategically uses ambiguity. For example, it shows a woman push their partner’s head down for what adult viewers will assume is oral sex. But because that is an inference that a child might not make and it is technically possible that something else is happening, the scene does not need to be censored as Rachel Blooms explained in an interview with Sam Jones on Off Camera.

However, the creators stood their ground and made history with S03E03 in 2017 by explaining what a clitoris is on broadcast television. Before, the word ‘clitoris’ had been used twice on US-American broadcast TV: Family Guy (S02E04) used the joke “the clitoris, nature’s Rubik’s Cube” in 2000 and on The Office (S02E02), Dwight asked “What is the clitoris?” in 2005, though he does not get an answer. CXG was the first TV show to mention where the clitoris is located and its importance for the female orgasm. The scene was educational in nature which was the argument that got it approved.

Note: The show did not contain any graphic violence to begin with, so it did not transgress there. Also, being a German millennial and a feminist, I was not shocked by the language, sex, or nudity on this show at any point.

4. Flaws?

I appreciate that the show swings big and it is a masterpiece, but I found it hard to suspend my belief in some ways. It is unrealistic that multiple men would be so obsessed with Rebecca. In this, I share White Josh‘s opinion who also does not see it and asks “Why are all my friends in love with this girl?” in S02E02. Also, how do people forgive her so easily even when she commits crimes? The show needs dramatic things to happen in order to create tension and excitement, but in its haste to then move on to the next thing, it does not always properly address the consequences of Rebecca’s biggest mistakes. She has too much social plot armor.

One of the roles had to be recast halfway through the show, because the actor’s contract ran out and he was already scheduled to be in other projects. So, his character was written out of the show at the beginning of season 2, stayed gone for a long time and then came back halfway through the final — played by a different actor. It was a risky move, but the show had a whole bit about how he seems to have grown and changed so much as a person that Rebecca barely recognizes him. The character also reintroduces himself in the song Hello, Nice to Meet You (S04E08). Ultimately, I think they pulled it off and I am glad the show decided to take this small risk for the sake of finishing the character’s story arc.

The final season’s pacing is slower at times, because the show wants to give every character a fitting, satisfying ending — which, to be fair, it does. Personally, I would not want it to be the other way round. I would rather the show stick the landing with a perfect conclusion than keep a consistently high pace throughout every episode.

Talent / How well-made and critically acclaimed is it?

The actors give phenomenal performances, the writing is brilliant, and the music is amazing. That is why the show was such a critical success and had such a passionate fan base.

CXG has won four Emmys (two for its choreography, one for its editing, one for its music and lyrics), one Golden Globe (Rachel Bloom as best actress in a musical or comedy TV series) and one Critics Choice Award (Rachel Bloom as best actress in a comedy series), to name only its most prestigious accolades. Plus, it has a 98% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

1. Quality of Cast Performances

Most of the cast were not mainstream celebrities before the show. They largely came from musical theater. Patti LuPone (plays Rabbi Shari), Tovah Feldshuh (plays Naomi Bunch) and Donna Lynne Champlin (plays Paula Proctor) are Broadway legends and Santino Fontana (plays Greg Serrano) is the singer and voice actor behind the character of Hans in Disney’s Frozen.

Every actor in a main role had to sing, dance, and act. The show’s creators let no talent go to waste. They wrote vocally challenging songs for the best singers and composed them for the specific range and register of their voices. Similarly, the cast members who specialized in dancing were given hard choreography and dance numbers that suited their skillset. This tailoring the musical numbers to the cast and playing to their strengths is why everyone gets to shine.

For me, the most impressive individual performances are Donna Lynne Champlin’s singing, Gabrielle Ruiz’s (plays Valencia Perez) and Vincent Rodriguez III’s (plays Josh Chan) dancing and Rachel Bloom’s acting. The song Maybe This Dream (S02E04) was written to showcase Donna’s skills as a coloratura soprano, the Triceratops Ballet (S02E05) was included because Gabrielle is a trained ballet dancer and Angry Mad (S01E17) was choreographed so that Vincent’s acrobatic and martial arts abilities would be on full display. The rest of the cast is phenomenal, too. And the consistent excellence of everyone’s work is why the quality of the show is what it is.

2. Quality of Music and Songwriting

The majority of the songs was written by Rachel Bloom, Jack Dolgen, and Adam Schlesinger. Most people know Adam Schlesinger from his time as the bassist in Fountains of Wayne where he wrote the song Stacy’s Mom. As a songwriter, he won three Emmys (one of them for his work on CXG) and a Grammy for Best Comedy Album. He tragically died from Covid in 2020. 

In its 62 episodes, CXG has 157 original songs. They probably scared off some potential viewers, because there is a reasonable assumption that the musical numbers could be too cheesy and/or too distracting to do the show any good. However, CXG’s music does not interrupt the story, but moves it forward. It is an eloquent, expressive medium that transports a lot of meaning in a short time and adds extra layers of meaning. The song makes the complicated emotions of the characters accessible.

Sometimes, musical style and lyrical content match and support each other unambiguously. For example, A Diagnosis (S03E06) is written in the style of a classic Broadway “I Want” song to express Rebecca’s newfound hope and optimism. It has a building tempo, sweeping orchestral strings, and vocals that build from a soft, tentative parlando until they launch into triumphant belting. Lyrics, visuals and music frame a psychiatric diagnosis as an exciting part of Rebecca’s heroic quest for self-knowledge, not something scary and clinical.

Sometimes, musical style and lyrical content are ironically juxtaposed. For example, The Sexy Getting Ready Song (S01E01) is a sultry R&B number in its musical and visual style, but its actual topic is the ugly reality of women’s beauty regimens, going so far as to include injuring one’s asshole trying to wax it.

Another musical storytelling technique CXG uses are its reprises of songs and motifs. When a melody gets reused in a later episode, sometimes sung by a different character, it recontextualizes the original meaning and thematically connects different moments in the show.

It is impossible to objectively compare the quality of the songs, because they are just so different from each other. Which song is your favorite usually depends on which one resonates most with you personally. Everyone I know who has seen the show has ‘their’ CXG song that they identify with. Mine is a tie between I’m a Good Person (S01E05) which mocks a person’s need for others to affirm their moral goodness and Let’s Generalize About Men (S03E01) which pokes fun at the way feminists vent their frustrations.

3. Quality of Writing

When it comes to the show’s writing, IMDb lists 17 authors for CXG, but the bulk of the episodes was written by co-creators Rachel Bloom and Aline Brosh McKenna. Aline Brosh McKenna is the screenwriter of 27 Dresses and The Devil Wears Prada meaning she already had a lot of critical acclaim within the genre prior to CXG.

Besides the points already discussed (complex characters, deconstructing stereotypes, realistic relationships, unreliable narrator), there are clear indicators of the writers’ caring effort, intelligence, professional craftsmanship and creativity. These are marks of impeccable writing:

Research: The writing team did a great job portraying mental illness in a scientifically accurate way which shows that there was careful and extensive research. Plus, the show often provides factual medical information (childbirth, heart attacks, UTIs, …). It is also clear, that the writers had authentic insights into the cultures of the communities that characters on CXG belong to. They really did their homework.

Structure: They also carefully structured the story crafting their setups and payoffs across the whole series which follows a clear arc of tragedy and recovery: Rebecca misguidedly chases a fairytale to solve her deeper issues, has a mental breakdown and then puts in the hard work to confront her problems, heal, and find happiness and purpose. On second viewing, events feel inevitable and scenes gain more meaning. The story’s main themes (mental health, female sexuality, parenting, friendship, and identity) are carried all the way through tying the story together.

Conversations: Dialogues in CXG range from smart, enjoyable banter to realistic, hurtful, and deeply personal arguments. There is a lot of subtextual communication layered into all characters’ conversations further enriching the story. A lot of things are left unsaid, but can be inferred. Some dialogues are funny because of a characters’ sharp whit and some are funny, because one or more characters are oblivious and the audience is in on a joke. Also, every character has their own recognizable vocabulary, cultural references, and sense of humor.

Character development arcs (that are not Rebecca’s): Last, but not least, besides being complex, characters’ personalities on CXG are dynamic. They change and evolve. Even characters that are introduced as archetypical or purely antagonistic do not remain so. The skinny mean girl grows to become a supportive friend; the sidekick learns to be less codependent and follows her own dream; the popular jock has to grow up; the cynical alcoholic gets sober and decides to apply himself.

In conclusion, ‘Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’ has an abundance of charisma, uniqueness, nerve and talent and although it feels like it was made for me, I think everyone should watch it and join its cult following.