UNBREAKABLE KIMMY SCHMIDT: A Motherfudging Dark Show

You wouldn't be wrong to think that Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is a live-action cartoon joke machine. The bright colors, the radiant/goofy Ellie Kemper as the star, the co-creators Tina Fey and Robert Carlock, the laugh-a-minute setup. The Netflix series is Internet meme-friendly, with a catchy theme song and a "single gal in the big city" premise. On a superficial level, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is perfect for our pop culture landscape, especially with its nostalgia heavy references. But underneath the bubblegum pink veneer is a grim story about trauma, abuse, and survival.

Ellie Kemper stars in the title role, playing a girl who spent 15 years under a bunker after getting kidnapped by an insane "Reverend." After an interview on the Today show, Kimmy decides to start her life over in Manhattan, since she has no life to go back to in Indiana. Kimmy gets a job, a roommate, and a whole new life. Season 1 explored Kimmy's "unbreakable" attributes--her optimism, her determination, and her attempts to regain control. Season 2 takes a different turn, with the hororr of Kimmy's life in the bunker coming up to the surface. Kimmy might be unbreakable, but she isn't quite past her trauma.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is funny, with creative one-liners, oddball characters, and precise physical gags galore. But the show finds a way to be both tragic and funny at the same time. UKS is about real issues, and the characters have evolving emotions and story arcs. The show is goofy and over the top, but still manages to write its characters with dignity and humanity--even when they are confusing a red scrub brush with a red-headed woman. The jokes have layers, and add to the development of the story instead of being random punchlines.

Tina Fey and Robert Carlock are no strangers in hiding grim story beneath jokes. Many of the characters in 30 Rock came from troubled and disturbing backgrounds. They were goofy caricatures but had storylines that added shades to them (like extreme narcissist Jenna, played by current UKS star Jane Krakowski, chasing the Janis Joplin biopic). 30 Rock loved its characters, even at their worst, and it made for better television. The same goes for UKS, which tracks their growth into their best potential.

Through comedy, UKS manages to be tell a harrowing story without resorting to exploitation or sensationalism. Kimmy is a strong hero for the show, but in a way that is conventionally feminine. Her optimism, kindness, and desire to help people are generally considered feminine character traits, and often seen as a negative or belonging to sidekicks and love interests not main heroes. And yet Kimmy is our hero, and her journey shows that females are strong as hell.

It would be easy for UKS to coast on its running gags and Internet friendly jokes, and the titles of the episodes ("Kimmy Goes to a Party!," "Kimmy Walks Into a Bar!") suggest old-fashioned sitcom hijinks, perhaps the kind Kimmy used to watch pre-bunker and wishes her life was like. But instead UKS makes ominous but obvious hints about Kimmy being raped in the bunker, shows her post traumatic stress disorder manifests itself in self-destructive ways, and delivers an honest and brutal story about alcoholism. Kimmy's optimism is admirable and refreshing, but it is also a defense mechanism that is not healthy in the long term. And to me that is an incredibly brave turn for the show to take.

Anger is bad and ugly. It's the opposite of who I want to be. So I don't get pissed off. I get pissed on. -Kimmy Schmidt

See that's a great joke, but it's an incisive and acute observation of Kimmy's mentality. She experienced such tragedy and terror while she was kidnapped, that her mind just builds a wall around itself. She's happy all the time, and her subconscious is getting fed up with that. The above line comes from my favorite episode, "Kimmy Goes to Her Happy Place!" The episode features a grotesque cartoon with Kimmy as a Snow White type princess in the forest with her animal friends and a Fairy Godmother. The cartoon is full of dread and potential danger, and Kimmy's song is terrifying. "Kimmy Goes to Her Happy Place!" is probably the darkest episode yet, and it still finds time to introduce an Italian grandmother character played by a puppet. 

Everyone is growing on UKS. Titus (Emmy nominee Tituss Burgess) faces his professional fears and enters a committed relationship. Jacqueline (Krakowski) sheds her narcissistic lifestyle. Lillian (Carol Kane) takes action against the gentrification of her neighborhood. All of these stories reflect change, and how hard it is. All four main characters come from different backgrounds, each dark and funny at the same time. As bad as yesterday was, the show argues, tomorrow can be better.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt is not a perfect show; like all shows some of its choices are misguided. But when it's good, it's pure magic. The sitcom piles jokes on jokes, but its central story has serious emotional weight. I'd easily recommend it to all viewers. I mean, if you haven't seen it yet--what the fudge are you waiting for?

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