All seven seasons of Younger, the show which first debuted on TV Land in 2015, arrive on Netflix this week. The show about a 40-year-old single mom posing as a 26-year-old so she can get a job at a book publisher, stars Sutton Foster, Miriam Shor, Hilary Duff, and Debi Mazar and features an amazing ensemble of supporting a guest actors. Ten years after its debut, the show makes for the ideal comedy binge.
YOUNGER: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: Liza (Sutton Foster), a 40-year-old single mom, sits with two women who are at least ten years younger than her in the office of a book publisher. She’s interviewing for a job but the women interviewing her are not shy about letting her know that the 15-year gap in her resume – the time she took off to raise her daughter – is a red flag for them and that she’s not getting hired.
The Gist: Before starring in Younger, Sutton Foster cut her sitcom teeth in Amy Sherman-Palladino’s Bunheads, the showrunner’s fast-talking, quippy follow up to Gilmore Girls. Darren Star, Younger‘s creator, has worked for decades in television but he is perhaps best known for creating both Sex and the City and Emily in Paris. I’m reminding you of all of this important TV history because Younger definitely feels like a classic middle child, sandwiched between those two more popular and recognizable shows, despite the fact that it holds its own as a great series, one that definitely feels like it owes some some of its structure, like its fast pacing and reliance on pop culture references to predecessors like Gilmore Girls. After six seasons on TV Land and one on Paramount+ and Hulu, Younger has arrived on Netflix, where a new audience can explore the charms and comforts of it’s clever scripts and excellent cast.
Foster stars as Liza, a 40-year-old former book editor who is now ready to re-enter the workforce now that her husband left her for a blackjack dealer and her daughter is headed to college. With the encouragement of her best friend Maggie (Debi Mazar as a sharp-tongued Brooklyn lesbian), she fudges her resume to make it look like she’s 26, gives herself a makeover, and applies for a job as an assistant to a marketing director named Diane (Miriam Shor) at a book publisher. After getting the job, she has to keep up the ruse of being 26 to Diane and her new coworker, a 25-year-old associate editor named Kelsey (Hilary Duff), and the cute new guy she just met and eventually starts dating, Josh (Nico Tortorella).
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Younger feels akin to Girls5Eva, Gilmore Girls, and The Bold Type. While each of these shows feels like it exists in a very specific, wacky universe, the sharp writing and rapid-fire dialogue help move along a very specific premise.
Our Take: Sutton Foster’s looks have often drawn comparisons to Mary Tyler Moore, and in many ways, Younger feels like an attempt at a revamped and modernized version of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. It will obviously never achieve the same status as that show, but it’s really hard to ignore some of the physical similarities between the women and the fact that they’re both gifted comedic actresses in workplace comedies.
Even a full ten years after it first aired, Younger still feels current (references to Taylor Swift and Harry Styles are as fresh as ever), but what’s even more impressive is how it exposes the subtle but real differences between women of different generations in a way that feels especially relevant right now. As a 40-year-old hanging around 25-year-olds, Liza is exposed to all of the differences between their generation (the way they tolerate their boyfriends’ bad behavior, for one thing, and the fact that they wax all their pubes off, for another) and her own. Because of the whole age ruse, Liza is forced to identify with these younger women, despite the fact that she’s not one of them. It’s an eye-opener to her (and maybe for some of us, too) to see what a difference a 15-year age gap can be, and to discover the fine line between being a young woman and being aged out of society and considered too old for certain things.
The show is generous to the cast who all perform their parts well. Foster is so naturally quick and funny, and we also get a great reminder that Hilary Duff is better than her work on the unsatisfying spinoff How I Met Your Father. Plus Mazar and Shor are perfectly cast in their supporting roles that allow them to be just a touch too kooky for real life, but just the right amount of kooky for a sitcom. Though Younger initially debuted on TV Land, it never really fit the model of what that network was, a breeding ground for shows featured sitcom stars of yore. While it was beloved by a small, faithful audience, hopefully it will have a broader resurgence now that it’s arriving on Netflix.
Sex and Skin: There’s nothing terribly graphic shown, but plenty of references to sexting, nipples, and other sex-adjacent fodder you’ll hear in typical adult conversation.
Parting Shot: Liza stands outside a bar after hanging up from a phone call with her daughter Caitlin, who is having a breakdown and wants to come home from a trip in India. After talking her down, Liza starts to walk away from the bar when Josh, the 26-year-old tattoo artist she’s supposed to meet there steps out the door and asks her where she’s going. “Just coming to meet you,” she says with uncertainty.
Performance Worth Watching: There’s nothing Debi Mazar can’t improve, and her presence on the show is an effective bit of casting. She’s the much-needed sardonic sidekick who serves as both an angel and devil on Liza’s shoulder.
Memorable Dialogue: “Apparently nobody under 30 looks a day over 12 down there,” Liza says, referring to the fact that all of her younger coworkers, except for her, wax their pubic hair.
Our Call: Honestly? I had completely forgotten about Younger. It’s a show that, unfortunately, hasn’t really remained at the front of anyone’s pop culture consciousness, but hopefully its arrival to Netflix will result in that mythical Netflix bump because it truly deserves it. It’s got a fantastic cast and, despite the kinda silly age premise, it’s a genuinely great bingeable comedy. STREAM IT!
Liz Kocan is a pop culture writer living in Massachusetts. Her biggest claim to fame is the time she won on the game show Chain Reaction.
The post Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Younger’ on Netflix, Starring Sutton Foster As A 40-Something Pretending To Be 26 To Get A Job appeared first on Decider.
