Getting the Shaft

The first season of Minx left the series in a precarious place. Storywise, pornographer Doug Renetti (Jake Johnson) had screwed up his working relationship with magazine creator Joyce Prigger (Ophelia Lovibond), and with no way to get the magazine back on track he’d given her full rights to Minx so that she could pursue whatever direction she chose for it. Find a new publisher, self publish it, or just never do anything with it again. The choice was hers and he would stay out of Minx if that’s what she wanted. It left the show in a curious place, one where the audience didn’t know what would be next for the series.

This, though, was mirrored by behind the scenes troubles that also left the series itself in a precarious place. HBO, who aired the first season, decided not to air the second season despite the production team having already filmed and put in the can most of the episodes for the season. They could take the series wherever they wanted, but they’d have to find a new home for Minx. It’s an odd parallel that meant the series could be what it wanted to be, just not at the place it called home. Eventually Starz came along and picked up the show so it could air its second, and what turned out to be final, season, so at least fans could see where Joyce and her magazine would go from the season one cliffhanger. It was a small comfort at least if you actually enjoyed Minx.

Due to her growing celebrity, and the prestige that Minx had been building, Joyce could have her pick of publishers. Every major brand was interested, all with a pitch readymade to court her and lure the very lucrative Minx on board. There was only one issue: Joyce really couldn’t make up her mind. Any one of these places would love to have her, but she was afraid they’d all interfere, just like Doug had interfered, and Minx was her baby. She wanted to treat it right, hold it to the high ideals she herself felt, and none of the places courting her felt like they really understood what she was going for.

Doug knew, though, and he knew he’d screwed up. He had to make it right, and a chance encounter gave him just the person to talk to: Constance (Elizabeth Perkins), a rich heiress and shipping magnate with a lot of money to spend and a keen eye for new investments. Between Doug’s business sense (and dogged determination) and Joyce’s ideals, Constance sees an opportunity for one last, great business venture. But Joyce has to be careful; just because Constance is a woman, and seems to be on her side, doesn’t mean she won’t also change Minx. She may not be the publisher Joyce really wanted, and it’s only a matter of time before Joyce figures it out… hopefully before it’s too late.

Like any great show, Minx had a clear outline set for its seasons. The first was meant to get us into the world, to introduce us to the pairing of porn and ideals that would give birth to Minx, the magazine. The focus was on Doug and Joyce, the two leads who would carry the show, and the goal was to get us to care about each of them so we’d care about their joint venture. And, of course, when Doug screwed things up at the end of the season, we couldn’t help but understand how each character got there. It was a natural progression for their characters.

Season two, then, pushes the boundaries of what the show could be. With Doug and Joyce clearly established, more time could be spent on the other characters – Joyce's sister Shelly (Lennon Parham), former porn star Bambi (Jessica Lowe), photographer Richie (Oscar Montoya), company manager Tina (Idara Victor) – giving them more life and more to do. It helps broaden the show and make everything feel far more lived in. The series is really good with most of its characters, and getting to see their lives, their wants, their needs, really gives breadth and interest to the series.

With that said, the second season is not without its flaws. Chief among them is that the series moves very quickly this time around. Whether it was because the production team didn’t think they’d get a third season, or if this was the plan all along and they wanted this story to take only a single season, the whole arc with Constance goes by very quickly. She takes the upstart magazine that was just starting to really make waves and she turns it into a massive, global empire. It’s the kind of thing that makes sense on paper – if Minx is as revolutionary as everyone in the show says it is, then it naturally would become a big deal – but in the span of eight episodes it feels like it all goes by just a little too fast.

Since we’ve compared this show to Mad Men before, I think of this season a lot like the season of Mad Men where Sterling Cooper is sold to a British company. That season was all about the management team learning to work under a new company and seeing their own autonomy get curtailed left, right, and center. But that third season of the series was built on the back of two strong seasons that already defined the vision for the show, and the events in question happened at a local level. Sterling Cooper was taken from a small firm that had value to its two owners into a small firm that had value to its British owners, all so they could then sell the company to someone else. It was a big change, but it only felt big to the characters.

Here, though, the change is massive, and not just to the characters. That kind of massive evolution needs time to play out, and we need to see it in action. That’s something that never happens on Minx. Any time the show wants to inform us that the magazine is doing well it has a character say, “now that Minx is doing well…” It’s telling, not showing, and it leaves us in a place where we can’t really understand how much of a cultural impact the magazine is making. We knew it as a tiny little upstart and now, we assume because of Constance, it’ll be a mass market rag in twelve different countries. It’s an evolution too big for the series to handle. We just can’t understand it, not the way it is presented.

But the show also still struggles to make us truly care about Joyce. I hate to keep beating this drum but Joyce is the least likable character in the series, and that even includes the empire building Constance. At least we understand Constance, a woman who sees something that can be molded all so she can make more money. Her motivations are clear and she’s performed well by Elizabeth Perkins. Joyce, though, still feels like an uneven character. Her ideals are all she has, and she wears them like a shield. It’s to the detriment of her character because she never learns or grows, even as she pushes people away. Any time she faces hardship she comes away thinking, “I’m still right, it’s everyone else that’s wrong,” and it makes her hard to care about.

I really do think that’s the biggest flaw with the show, and what inevitably sunk it: Joyce Prigger is not Don Draper. He was an enigmatic lead that was surrounded in mystery. You liked him in part because he was hard to figure out, but there were these moments where a piece of this interesting, likable character shone through. Joyce, though, is pretty one note. There’s nothing interesting or mysterious about her. She slides through life only worried about herself, and she gets to say “damn the consequences” over and over without it ever affecting her. For a show that is, in effect, the female alternative to Mad Men, Joyce doesn’t have the depth of character needed to be the anchor for this show.

And it’s sad because there’s so much I like about Minx. If the show had gotten a third season I would have happily binged it, too. But I still likely wouldn’t have liked Joyce, and I can’t blame anyone else if they hated her and tuned out of the series because of it. This is the Joyce Prigger show, more than anyone else and, man, Joyce sucks.