Never Have I Ever...been gaslit by Netflix

*This post includes spoilers for Never Have I Ever*

I’ve written before that Netflix originals are capable of creating trauma. Never Have I Ever is no exception. The show stars Devi, a young Indian-American high school sophomore struggling to move on from the death of her father. This year, Devi wants nothing more than the “American high school boyfriend” experience (whatever that means), specifically with hot, popular jock Paxton Hall-Yoshida. The show’s writers are obsessed with the politics of teenage intimacy, nominally because that’s what the teenagers they’re writing for want to see. After watching it, the target audience seems not to be not teenagers who are obsessed with intimacy and sex, but rather teenagers that have never had sex, been intimate with someone, gone to a high school, or lived in America. 

The show’s lone voice of reason is Devi’s therapist, Dr. Ryan, played by Niecy Nash. Nash’s character critiques Devi’s obsession with Paxton and having a boyfriend more generally, suggesting she still hasn’t moved on from the death of her father and is fixating on this as a distraction. This is a sound observation - one that teenagers who are developing unhealthy coping mechanisms like Devi’s might do well to hear. What renders this totally and completely mute, is that Devi is “rewarded” with Paxton in the end. The show ends with Devi getting in the last episode what she wanted at the beginning of the first. Now, it would be one thing if she “got” Paxton under different terms - despite wanting him superficially for his attractiveness and status, she actually grows to like him and then wishes to pursue a relationship with him on a deeper level. Paxton and Devi do become friends, somewhat (the writing is so bad I honestly can’t tell) -  but in the last episode Devi still asks: “Are you here [at prom]  as my friend or as my boyfriend?” A Devi that had matured would forgo labels - all that would matter would be whether she cared about who she was with. The Devi that ends Season 2 of Never Have I Ever only cares about status, about parading Paxton around as a trophy (or being paraded around by Paxton). All the show’s characters seem to be entranced by the politics of high school relationships - who is with who publicly, and who is having sex. But I want to examine this more critically. 

The show’s target audience is presumably teenagers. This means the (very adult) writers are spending a lot of time thinking about teenage intimacy, which is justifiable only because they are writing for teenagers (who will watch the show and make Netflix money). But everything is not as it seems. The show’s writers actually produce the reality they purport to reflect: it is they who are obsessed with playing out the politics of teenage love stories, not teenagers. Teenagers are like every other human in that they want to see good television. They are more than capable of enjoying (and spending money on) Schitt’s Creek and Game of Thrones - stories that have nothing to do with the petty high school bullshit that Never Have I Ever seems so eager to rehash. Teenagers are also like every other human alive in that sometimes they’ll watch anything, even if it’s bad - Netflix originals included. 

This is not to say that representation doesn’t matter and that we shouldn’t have TV shows about teenagers in high school, we just shouldn’t pretend that Never Have I Ever is representative of an average high schooler’s experience (or any high schooler’s experience). What separates Never Have I Ever from a show like Riverdale is that Riverdale’s plot is so outlandish that no rational viewer could construe it as representative of an average high schooler’s life. Glee is in the same boat but uses a different tactic - the writers are self aware, and crack jokes to let you know that they view their own characters as ridiculous, and you should too. Never Have I Ever seems to be self-aware at points, but it drifts in and out of consciousness too much to be certain. The reality checks Devi gets are usually minor or forgotten by the next episode - she also never gets that final knock in the head of seeing Paxton as a human being rather than a political status symbol. Where the show’s ridiculousness (vaguely acknowledged or not) becomes dangerous is when it gets viewed by people who are imagining what high school in America is like (or, more appropriately, should be like). It’s the expectations (and the normalization of the bullshit Never Have I Ever claims to unpack) that harm not the people who are in high school but the people who are imagining it before they come. The same people who watch Never Have I Ever now will go into high school and, on some level, draw on all of their previous cultural references (including Never Have I Ever) to measure their success, decide what’s normal, judge who has value, and more importantly, judge who does not. In this way, Never Have I Ever produces  what it purports to capture - it gazes not at American high schoolers’ authentic aspirations, but into a foggy mirror. 

There are some issues with queer representation as well. The show has a lesbian couple, Eve and Fabiola. When they register to run for prom queen and queen, they are initially told it can’t be done. Fabiola (justifiably) becomes mad and starts bringing up classic queer one-liners and talking points. (No doubt in a parody of social media “SJWs” the show’s writers want to poke fun at). After Fabiola finishes speaking, she is told the registration can’t be done in the moment because it involves the printing of another ticket form to change it to queen and queen (a problem that Fabiola fixes by crossing out “King” and writing “Queen”). Aside from the implausibility of this scene, it reflects a larger trope that’s becoming more popular as gay characters see increasing representation - “not everything is about you being gay.” There’s an obvious irony here. The same writers who implicitly tell gay people that not everything is about them being gay proceed to turn around and write an entire series about a straight girl being straight. To be clear - it’s not a series about a girl who happens to be straight and wants to pursue straight relationships, Devi’s heterosexuality is (ostentatiously) front and center throughout the whole show. 

There’s a second issue here as well. The writers seem to be poking fun at Eve and Fabiola’s defensiveness (and by proxy, the defensiveness of queer activists who “get triggered” and read homophobia into every current event or happening in their life). The message is that these activists are overreacting, that progress has been made, and that we now live in a world where the worst thing that could happen to a lesbian couple is an administrative inconvenience. I hope it goes without saying that the writers are wrong - just because they may run in progressive circles and live in areas where lesbians could run for prom queens doesn’t mean everyone does. The speed with which Fabiola whips out an (impressive) arsenal of queer talking points suggests she’s been on guard for awhile; in another situation her acuteness might come in handy, be lifesaving even. The same queer activists that annoy the (presumably mostly straight) writers of Never Have I Ever are still doing meaningful, dangerous work, both in the U.S. and around the globe. To suggest that they aren’t, or that they’re over-reacting to non-issues, even by proxy, is frankly weird and manipulative. (I believe the technical term is gaslighting). Moreover, it’s deeply disrespectful of queer people who now live in spaces where they can let their guard down but feel they still have to be on notice because trauma has rendered them unable to do otherwise. Long story short, do better Netflix.