Reboots are like Marmite, you either love them or hate them. For some, when a show ends we can mourn it and move on without a desire for it to come back. But for others, the show must go on (literally) and a reboot is a chance to see our favourite TV stories continue.
For me, I’m definitely part of the former. I’d rather binge-watch a show several times than watch a reboot. When several years have gone by and the world we live in has changed, I’d rather my favourite characters stay in the past than come with us to the present.
Part of my problem with reboots, is that the cast often changes and new storylines that feel jarring are introduced in an attempt to diversify the show. Representation in TV and film matters, but inauthentic representation doesn’t help anyone.
The Sex and the City reboot, And Just Like That..., is the latest show to be accused of shoe-horning in faux representation. Producers made an effort to include non-cis, non-white, disabled characters, which could have been great, if their appearances weren’t so one-dimensional.
In their review of the series, non-binary writer James Factora said the programme was “so hell-bent on correcting the sins of its past that it has become sterile and genuinely agonising to watch”.
“Tokenisation is not actually the opposite of dehumanisation,” they added.
Others agreed. On TikTok, @sapphicnoir was among many who posted criticims of the show’s attempt at inclusivity. “People of colour and queerness are the new Dior dress and Manolo blahniks,” they said. “They’re these props that give these white women status.”
It’s not the first show to get this wrong. I’m a big fan of Gossip Girl, but I actually didn’t watch the show when it originally came out. I started watching it during the first lockdown and was automatically hooked. I loved the nostalgia of the mid 2000s and the escapism of a world I didn’t belong to: the upper white middle class.
Prior to the show, I had no idea what a debutante ball was or what it looked like to go to a very privileged private school in New York city. It was a life very different to mine, but that’s part of the reason why I enjoyed it so much.
The show was very white, cis and straight and some of the jokes were border-line problematic. But the storyline was so messy and gripping that I didn’t pay attention to this. So when I heard the news of a Gossip Girl reboot I was...intrigued.
I watched the trailer and saw a completely new cast with people of colour and immediately checked out. A good reboot to me should include previous cast members, otherwise what’s the point?
In an interview with Vulture, executive producer Josh Safran spoke about his regrets about the original show. “When I look back on Gossip Girl, the only things I regret were not as much representation for people of colour and gay story lines,” Safran said.
One of the character’s, Eric, played by Connor Paolo, came out as gay in season one but that storyline wasn’t explored in depth. Additionally, the only person of colour on the show was Vanessa Abrams, played by Jessica Szohr. But when I think of the world of Gossip Girl, I imagine that it is predominantly white. Even though TV creates a fictional world, I don’t want to watch something that feels inauthentic. With the Gossip Girl reboot, it feels like they’ve just added minorities in for the sake of it.
Noura Ikhlef, a 26-year-old master’s student from London, agrees. She was a big fan of the original Gossip Girl series. Something she liked so much about the original show was how unhinged the characters were. “That was really, really fun to watch,” she says.
Ikhlef didn’t mind the fact that there wasn’t any representation in it, because it didn’t feel necessary. The original series told the story of a particular social set. So, after watching 20 minutes of the new reboot, she switched it off and hasn’t watched another episode since.
“I don’t like reboots because I don’t see the point of doing like something has already been done,” Ikhlef says. “Whether it’s movies or TVs, I just don’t like them in general.”
Leo*, a 25-year-old analyst from London, also thinks the representation in And Just Like That...is forced. “Sex In The City was so white and now you see Carrie going to Diwali celebrations wearing a sari and I just think when did you become this person?” he says. “It just feels like they’re pandering to us when they make such a transition like this.”
Leo feels that there hasn’t been any thought when writing these characters of colour. “There’s a character this season called Lisa who is a wealthy Black woman, but it just feels like she was written like a white women and the writers decided to make her Black,” Leo says.
“I think that’s the thing with representation, when you see someone from your community on screen you analyse them a little bit more. Does this person have nuance, do they really reflect us? Do they have similar experiences to me? Have they written this character well?”
Of course, TV is subjective and some are happy to see reboots trying to be more inclusive.
Rayo Yusuf, a 23-year-year old publicist from London, is currently watching And Just Like That... and is thoroughly enjoying it. “At the end of the day, they’re in the same world as us and the world has changed,” Yusuf says. “It’s nice to see the representation of Black, Brown and queer people, even though it wasn’t necessary to add them in.”
So, what does good TV representation look like?
For Ikhlef, it’s when the show doesn’t focus on the character’s identity. “In The Sex Lives Of College Girls there’s a disabled character called Jocelyn but she isn’t known for her disability, she’s remembered because she’s super funny and unhinged,” she says. “I want those characters to be remembered for their personalities, not their representation.”
For Yusuf, it’s the mix of having great talent and great writers who are from different backgrounds (he’s a fan of Michaela Coel, creator of I May Destroy You).
Leo thinks shows like Insecure and Pose are good examples of authentic representation. “You can’t really say what an authentic show feels like but Insecure and Pose just felt right,” he says. “With both shows it never felt like they were doing something to say they’ve checked a box.”
When asked what she’d like to see more in the TV industry, Ikhlef says it’s about the people behind the camera as well as in front of it – something we can probably all agree on.
“I want to see more writers, producers and runners from diverse backgrounds,” she says. “I don’t want to white screenwriters telling stories about minority people.”