TV Review: Girls5eva, W Network

Girls5eva is a new show on Peacock/W Network about a group of failed popstars who want to give showbiz one more shot. The show follows Girls5eva members Dawn (Sara Bareilles), Summer (Busy Phillips), Gloria (Paula Pell), and Wickie (Tony Award Winner Renée Elise Goldsberry) as they navigate their return to the music industry. Girls5eva comes back from oblivion after an up-and-coming rapper, Lil Stinker, samples their song, “Famous5eva”. I won’t spoil why Ashley (Ashley Park), the fifth member, is not around. 

Girls5eva is very funny. I’m on my third re-watch and I’m still hearing jokes I didn’t catch the first two times around. Girls5eva reflect the music from the early 2000s and satirizes it. The song “Space Boys” is a perfect send up of that genre and era. Girls5eva not only makes fun of music from that time, but it also looks and sounds like the music from that era. The early 2000s was an embarrassing time for everyone.  Low-rise jeans were everywhere. Misogyny was rampant. Carson Daly was a thing. 

Dawn, who has “perfect breasts for a mammogram,” hears Girls5eva being sampled while she’s mid mammo. Late for work, Dawn runs to open up her brother Nick’s restaurant. Nick (Dean Winters) might look familiar to Tina Fey stans. Dawn heads to the office of former band manager Larry. Dawn picks up her royalty cheque from Larry who’s in “mandatory sensitivity training.” The cheque is only for $372, much to Dawn’s disappointment. Larry’s going to throw out the royalty cheques for the other bandmates. Dawn, ever the do-gooder, delivers the cheques to Summer and Gloria.

Summer is living in New Jersey. She married her boyband sweetheart, Kev (Broadway’s Andrew Rannells). Summer’s husband Kev is an entertainment reporter for WTIT News Tampa. Summer and their daughter Stevia (not vaxxed), only see Kev “on months that have a 31st.” Summer’s “thing” in Girls5eva, is to “end songs with a sultry feminasty phrase.” She hasn’t confronted the problems in her relationship with Kev. Kev and Summer keep ignoring their issue until it bubbles over in the 7th episode of the season, A.I.R.P.I.G.. 

Gloria went from popstar to dentist. She isn’t over her ex-wife, Caroline (Janine Brito, Paula Pell’s real-life wife). When Gloria was in Girls5eva, she wasn’t out. She’s out and proud now. Dawn and Summer convince Gloria to join the girl group again. There’s a great flashback to TRL Live and Gloria says that she “loves performing as much as she loves boys, boys, boys.”  

Gloria, Summer, and Dawn find out that Girls5eva has booked a gig with Lil Stinker on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. Wickie’s assistant confirms that she’ll be attending. Wickie was in Girls5eva before she quit to go solo. 

Wickie “runs” a “fempire” and has the number one shoe line in China. In the pilot, we learn Wickie isn’t exactly doing as well as she said she was. Wickie is cursed with “the voice that God put in [her] mouth.” So, she’s back in the band. Wickie (and her piano) moves in with Dawn and her family. The piano brings about some great tension, pathos, and comedy.

Girls5eva has a lot going for it. The cast, the writers, the jokes! The jokes-per-minute or “JPM” ratio on Girls5eva easily rivals that of 30 Rock. Girls5eva uses their high JPM to reveal devastating truths. One example is after The Tonight Show treated Girls5eva nicely Gloria says, “this is a stark contrast to this morning when my disoriented father grabbed my thigh.” Truly devastating yet hilarious. 

The team on Girls5eva is enough to stun. Meredith Scardino (Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt) created the show. Tina Fey (30 Rock, Mean Girls), her husband Jeff Richmond (30 Rock, Kimmy Schmidt), and Robert Carlock (30 Rock, Friends) are executive producers. Jeff Richmond also composed the music. The score makes the show feel right at home with 30 Rock and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. The music is a satisfying throwback to early 2000s boy and girl bands. Some stands outs on the album are the theme song, Famous5eva. I never knew how many words have “for”/”four” in them. “New York Lonely Boy” sounds like Simon & Garfunkel song written by Garfunkel and Oates. My favourite song on the Girls5eva album is “I’m Afraid (Dawn’s Song of Fears)”. If you let someone with anxiety truly run wild, this is where their brain can go.

I can’t wait for season two, and I already have a theory for what they might do for next season. I’m curious if anyone else caught the throwaway line from Gloria right at the end of the finale.

Stream Girls5eva on June 3rd at 9pm on the W Network.  So what are you waiting 5?
Watch it here.