It’s been a week since The Bold Type season one finale aired and I’m going through withdrawals! With Pretty Little Liars over and done, I needed to fill my Tuesday night show void and feel young again. I am young, what am I talking about?
On July 11th, The Bold Type premiered on Freeform fka ABC Family. I had seen ads on the network and wanted to support one of my favorite actresses in young hollywood, Katie Stevens. From what I could tell, the premise of the show: three twenty something year old women trying to juggle relationships, their careers, and life as a millennial while working together at one of the top magazines, Scarlet. One of the tag lines was “I’m not a boss bitch. I’m a boss, bitch.” If that doesn’t scream badass, I don’t what does. It wasn’t hard to convince me that this would be a show I’d like.
The Pilot episode gave us a glimpse of the trio of strong women and what relevant issues they’d be tackling head on.
First we have Jane Sloan, played by Katie Stevens. Jane is the bright eyed writer of the trio. Like her best friends, she started as an assistant and was recently promoted to “writer” at Scarlet Magazine. It’s her dream job as she often reminisces about being “a young girl in Colorado reading Scarlet magazine in my closet.” But things get a little hectic and intimidating when Scarlet’s head honcho, Jacqueline Carlyle (Melora Hardin), constantly pushes her to think outside of the box and get out of her comfort zone. In the first episode, we see Jane second guessing herself and reluctant to revisit her past for a piece, but Jacqueline doesn’t take no for an answer.
Sutton Brady (Meghann Fahy) is the one among the three that’s still slaving away as an assistant. It’s what she’s known for the past 4 years. She’s comfortable, but longs for a lot more than sitting at the front desk of Lauren Park’s office. And it sounds ever so familiar to me. Seeing her best friends move up the ranks while she stays behind is a little disheartening for her.The most out of routine thing in her life is her secret relationship with an older guy, Richard Hunter (Sam Page). Their relationship is a bit taboo as Richard is Scarlet’s legal advisor and a board member. While Sutton makes Richard feel younger, Richard supports Sutton’s endeavors to leave the assistant desk. Later on in the season, she leave’s Lauren’s assistant desk for Oliver’s assistant’s desk. But at least it’s in something she’s passionate about – fashion.
Kat Edison (Aisha Dee) rounds out the trio. After 2 years of being an assistant, Kat became involved with the social media team at Scarlet and was recently promoted to Social Media Director. When we first meet her in the Pilot episode, you could tell she is very outspoken and confident. She speaks/does things before she thinks. Things change a little when she meets Adena (Nikohl Boosheri), a Muslim lesbian, who is also very outspoken. After spending some time with Adena, everything she thought she knew about certain things went down the drain. Many times we see her deem herself as the one who doesn’t do relationships, but she becomes immersed into one. Her relationship with Adena sparks a lot of spontaneity.
The trio gets a lot of support from other Scarlet personnel. We have Alex (Matt Ward) who I think is that honorary best friend to all of the young women. He’s Jane’s wing man, Kat’s voice of reason, & Sutton’s not-so-secret admirer who is ultimately friendzoned in the end. There’s Richard who always seems to put in a good word for Sutton. However, when he meets with Kat and Jane, I think he realizes that he doesn’t quite fit in their world. There’s also Jacqueline, whom I mentioned earlier. She’s the head boss at Scarlet magazine and is definitely a motherly figure to the three young women. She helps them when in need and is understanding to their feelings, but knows when to put her hand down. She’s just not a boss to them, she’s a mentor who was once in their shoes.
The Bold Type has covered topics from feminism to politics to sexuality to social media, etc. In one episode, Jane is assigned the sex column and has to write about orgasms. Having never experienced one, she has to get very familiar with herself and ends up getting familiar with Ryan (Dan Jeannotte) aka Pinstripe. They inspire each other in more ways than one, but later on in the season Jane wants more in their relationship.
In another episode, they cover breast cancer awareness. As a twenty something year old, I think it’s not something I’m too familiar with or open to discussing. But The Bold Type gave us that perspective and put me in an emotional roller coaster ride as we learned more about Jane and her mother. During this episode, Kat and Sutton were also there for Jane knowing that it was a sensitive topic. They are friendship goals. Everyone needs a squad with a Jane, Sutton, and Kat.
The finale episode covered the topic of rape, which isn’t an easy topic to talk about. Jane decides to shine a spotlight on an activist who was a victim of rape. She goes head to head with Jacqueline on how to approach and understand the person of interest. The finale scene of this episode reveals something about Jacqueline, but it’s so full of hope, positivity, and support.
For me though, I think the recurring topic that rung to me as a viewer, was the feeling of not being challenged and getting out of your comfort zone, as I mentioned before. I graduated from college 6 years ago. I’m sure you can imagine how “stuck” I feel. At the end of the season, Jane is faced with choosing between what she’s known for years or starting with something new that could possibly (or not) be good for her career. Kat has this responsibility with Scarlet as the Social Media Director, but Adena has inspired her to see the world and leave it all behind. Then there’s Sutton. She was the assistant that was left behind, but her drive and passion for fashion got her one step closer to her dream. She wasn’t challenged anymore and she did something about it even though she had no fashion experience on her resume.
Another recurring thing that stood out to me was their meeting place. Throughout the season, we see the trio face obstacles together and often see them talking things out in a safe/neutral place, the fashion closet. The fashion closet housed many celebrations, freak outs, and of course fashion emergencies. The moments in the fashion closet were my favorite. I wish I had a place like the fashion closet to escape to at my job.
Speaking of fashion, the fashion on the show is on point. The cast of The Bold Type definitely rock their outfits confidently and I would love to raid their closets.
This review does not do The Bold Type any justice, but I highly recommend you binge watch this show if you’re looking for inspiration.
As far as I know, Freeform has yet to renew the show, but they should! Obviously, it’s very far from what Pretty Little Liars was, but if this is the direction that Freeform is going in, I’m not complaining.
You can binge watch The Bold Type on the Freeform app or online.
xoxo,
Adele
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xoxo, adele 