Season 3 of Hacks ended with Ava, knowing that Deborah slept with the married head of the network that will air Deborah’s new late night show, used that knowledge to weasel her way into the show’s head writer position. Though she was proud she took a move out of Deborah’s playbook, don’t expect Deborah to be anything but volcanically pissed off about it. Season 4 picks up at the very moment Season 3 ended.
HACKS SEASON 4: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: Directly after Ava (Hannah Einbinder) used blackmail to get Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) to name her the head writer of Deborah’s Late Night show, the two exit the writers’ room with Rob (Dan Bucatinsky), the show’s executive producer. The tension is palpable as they walk down the hall. Dramatic, soap opera-esque music plays.
The Gist: Even though Ava used a bit of strategy that Deborah may have used to make her way into the head writer’s chair, it’s not like Deborah is admiring the move. In fact, she’s pissed. So pissed, in fact, that she starts waging a campaign to get Ava fired, starting with sending Rob a used pair of Ava’s underwear. Ava unconvincingly tries to pass it off as a prank, “like George Clooney (does)!”, but the tension between the two is right on the surface.
Of course, Jimmy (Paul W. Downs), who is both of their agents and is a producer on the show, quickly tries to get both Ava and Deborah to cool things down. But even he’s pissed at how Ava got the job, saying that doing it this way isn’t the way Ava should get a job like this. As far as their working relationship, Ava thinks that “the spice won’t stick to the chicken,” meaning that Deborah is motivated by the work and nothing else. “Don’t worry about her feelings. She doesn’t have any; she’s heartless.”
In the meantime, as Josefina (Rose Abdoo) and Damien (Mark Indelicato) try to get Deborah’s new Hollywood Hills house set up — not realizing it’s surrounded by coyotes — Marcus (Carl Clemons-Hopkins) has to figure out when and where to tell Deborah that, because of the conflict between her hosting Late Night and her presenting her merch line on QVC, that he’s sold that part of her company to the shopping network and is planning to leave.
Also in the meantime, Kayla (Megan Stalter) promises to find Ava an apartment while she brings in kids and dogs to the agency offices she and Jimmy have opened. Deborah has a difficult introductory press conference, leading to network president Winnie Landell (Helen Hunt) to lean on a New York Times Magazine profile to make hay for the show; she and the show’s PR rep eventually hit on the angle of Deborah and Ava being in the article together.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? As we mentioned before Season 3, Hacks has definitely morphed into an ensemble comedy a la Ted Lasso.
Our Take: Downs and his co-creators, Lucia Aniello and Jen Statsky, have figured out the way to keep Hacks from repeating itself every year, and it lies in continually changing the dynamic between Deborah and Ava. They can’t always be getting along, and they can’t always be at each other’s throats. But it does feel like the end of every season resets things between them, while changing the stakes of their relationship.
Here, the stakes are pretty high: Launching the late night talk show Deborah has been spending the last 40 years regretting she never got. There’s a reason why Deborah decided to hire a more experienced head writer before Ava played her power move; she needs to make sure she has all the bases covered and not take risks, because she won’t get a second chance at this job. She also never wants Ava to get complacent about their relationship.
But with Ava’s power move, things have changed. Ava is more confident in herself than ever, and feels that operating from Deborah’s playbook is the way to go. What she doesn’t realize is that, while Deborah has had a lot of success using moves like Ava deployed, it’s also led her to become isolated, both professionally and emotionally. We’re not sure Ava is done trying to get inside Deborah’s fortress, but at this point it sure seems like she’s OK lobbing shots over the walls.
That dynamic, along with Jimmy trying to navigate his partnership with Kayla, are going to be the big drivers of comedy — and drama — this season, and in the first two episodes, the tension between Ava and Deborah gets things off to a strong start.
Sex and Skin: None in the first episode.
Parting Shot: During the photo shoot for the Times article, Deborah tells Ava that, however long the show lasts, that when it’s over, she’s never going to speak to Ava again. Ava’s response: “Good.”
Sleeper Star: We’ll give this to Mark Indelicato as Deborah’s personal assistant Damien, who seems to cheerfully put up with anything Deborah tells him to do, including spraying bear piss around the property to ward off coyotes.
Most Pilot-y Line: After yet another one of Deborah’s attempts to get Ava fired — she sends Rob and the other writers to a seafood restaurant under the guise of being Ava’s “assistant” — Ava hitches a ride on a studio tour tram; when the tour guide tells her to get off, she goes, “It’s OK, I work here!”
Our Call: STREAM IT. Hacks continues to mine really funny, and at times really dramatic, material from the Deborah-Ava relationship, and even in the fourth season it finds a different dynamic for the two of them to navigate. It should be fun watching the two of them launch the new late night show and maybe soften their mutual anger at each other in the process.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
The post Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Hacks’ Season 4 On Max, Where Deborah And Ava Try To Launch A Late Night Show While At Each Other’s Throats appeared first on Decider.
