Based on the YouTube
sensation Miranda Sings – musical theater alum Colleen Ballinger's parody of a
talentless YouTube singer who is too coddled to know her faults- the show is
one you might find yourself rooting for if you follow someone on YouTube and
feel some pride as one their adopters (AKA YouTube groupies) when they hit it
big.
But a simple caricature (and one that's mean spirited in origin
at that) isn't much to base a show on without some massive expansion. The tv
world of Miranda Sings populates her delusion with enablers in the form of
a weak willed mom, an uncle who's all kinds of simple minded, and a long
suffering crush. The control is the level headed sister, Emily, and when you
(pretty instantly) become aware of
the pain Mirandas delusions inflict on Emily and others in her path, Miranda stops becoming likeable or remotely rootable. In this sense, the show was able to redeem itself by making Miranda's story a tragic one: she gets what she wants but at the loss of everyone around her.
the pain Mirandas delusions inflict on Emily and others in her path, Miranda stops becoming likeable or remotely rootable. In this sense, the show was able to redeem itself by making Miranda's story a tragic one: she gets what she wants but at the loss of everyone around her.
The whole thing is
augmented by a Tim Burton vibe the color scheme seems borrowed from Edward
Scissorhands and the protagonist seems defined by a beautiful sense of
weirdness (though her actions aren't beautiful, the hope is that she'll
eventually get there).
Season two risks detracting
from the ending if it resets everything back to normal, yet the cast had to get
back together, and it walks that fine line relatively well. Miranda s ex
boyfriend and her mom Bethany re-enter get life but with terms and conditions.
mom has just gone to some bible-themed adventure land, and the suffering
Christian imagery isn't lost (unless you want to ignore it, I’m fine with it if
you are). Bethany might be the hero of the story, but as soon as the screentime
reverts to sister Emily we’ll see that it’s really a story about a blossoming
Cinderella with an evil step sister.
It's a delicate balancing
act for the show to gain our sympathies once again just as it is for Miranda
and her mother to reform a relationship. We also get a glimpse of daddy here
(UCB's Matt Besser) and he's also a man child of sorts. The second and third
episodes have Miranda raising red flags to society at large. She terrorizes an
airport in the former, sneaks into an elementary school and kidnaps a child in
the latter. Lord our father up in Heaven, let there be consequences.
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