I fell in love — FELL IN LOVE — with the comic book series, having binged and wrote about the last fifteen issues in the matter of about two weeks. I started watching the TV show immediately after finishing the comic book; something I had been looking forward to ever since I heard it coming out. I binged the eight episodes in about four days. Note: This was all months ago. I decided to go in order and post the final three storylines over the course of roughly 15 weeks before finalizing this particular post. I don’t know why that matters, but it felt like something to point out. I don’t really owe you an insight into my process. You’re welcome!

The Premise

Four 12-year-old girls get together to deliver papers the morning after Halloween, 1988:
–Erin Tieng (Riley Lai Nelet), the mild-mannered “new girl”.
–Tiff Quilkin (Camryn Jones), the smart girl.
–Mac Coyle (Sofia Rosinsky), the tough girl.
–KJ Brandman (Fina Strazza), the sporty girl.

All the titular paper girls! Mac’s at her bro’s house, though. Just pretend the lady on the left is a short-haired 12-year-old girl.

What begins as a normal post-Halloween morning in the sleepy Cleveland suburb of Stony Stream becomes a real hellish journey of time travel and its immediate, major repercussions. Their main goal is, and always will be, returning to their own timeline. That proves to be nearly impossible, and a couple of time travel-related war factions are kind of getting in the way of progress. The Old-Timers want to preserve the timeline by any — any — means necessary. The STF Underground wants to change the past for the betterment of the future. Needless to say, shit never stops hitting the fan, and the four girls are caught in the middle.

Among the time travel shenanigans, Erin meets her 40-year-old self and becomes disillusioned by her future lack of success! Tiff meets her 23-year-old self and becomes disillusioned by her perceived future dream abandonment and lack of success! KJ observes her 23-year-old self and learns the easy way that she’s a lesbian! Mac observes her future self and learns that she’s six feet underground! Everyone has fun with these revelations, I assure you.

Hilarious!

My Half-Baked Thoughts

This is the part where I gripe about the differences between the comic book and the TV series, right? How low would I have to sink to waste my and your time by banging out a bunch of nerd shit like that?

So there are a lot of differences between the comic book and TV series, and you’re going to hear me gripe about it!

Notably: Rob Corddry’s brother plays some guy named Larry? Please.

I was worried upon a first impression, since they pack the first five issues within the pilot episode at a breakneck pace. The kids are riding around the neighborhood soaking in all the weirdness for about half the episode, then suddenly Erin is shot, then she’s ok, then Heck and Naldo save her, then they meet Adult Erin. It was jarring. Before I learned there was a planned Season 2 — the show was cancelled anyway — I expected to see all 30 issues crammed into eight episodes. No good! I loved the pacing of the comic series, and I didn’t want some speedy storytelling in the TV series to ruin the incredibly important character-driven progression.

Where we’re going, we don’t need roads!

Relieved I was, but still wary, when Episodes 2 and 3 proved that the TV show was going to go its own way. The STF Underground faction with the aforementioned Larry (Nate Corddry, by the way). Mac meeting up with her doctor brother, who attempts a fresh start with her after a semi-hostile childhood. Then there was more: KJ returning to her own house in 1999 and discovering her 23-year-old self’s love of film studies (and her homosexuality). Mac visiting her own grave in 1999 after learning she died of cancer at age 16. Tiff founding the Quilkin Institute. Adult Erin dying in a giant Transformer robot that only she could control. The Prioress’ relentless Terminator-style pursuit of the girls by any — and I do mean any — means necessary.

Hell, even some of the characterizations were different. Tiff is pretty arrogant. Erin is pretty angsty. The other two were pretty much spot on. I gotta hand it to Sofia Rosinsky for her portrayal of Mac, she was incredible. My favorite character by far, and Rosinksy more than met my expectations. The highlight of the show, I always looked forward to Mac’s screen time. The amount of range she showed with the tough guy façade coupled with moments of vulnerability and sadness, I thought it was brilliant. Favorite sarcastic moment, paraphrased: “Yep, my birthday is July 5th. I’m a Cancer.”

Don’t be sad, Mac. I’m sure some other streaming service will pick up Season 2!

Speaking of characterization, Jason Mantzoukas as Grand Father was fucking perfect, holy god. What a great casting choice. There’s a scene where he describes to Mac (and maybe KJ, I don’t remember) the ramifications of messing with the timeline. He uses Mac’s cassette tape as an analogy wherein he describes the tape degrading each time one tapes over it, eventually snapping. He ruins her tape to make a point. Not only did I enjoy the analogy, but a whole scene involving something nostalgic like a cassette tape was fun to watch.

In the role he was born to play: a slightly grumpy, aging man who was born in 11,706 BCE! Or, if you will, “guy with a beard”.

I really don’t have much to gripe about. Although not entirely faithful to the comic, I loved watching every minute of this show and it ACHES me, PAINS me, HURTS me, STINGS me, and KILLS me that this got cancelled. Fuck you Amazon Prime Video. Fuck you Jeff Bezos, throw some money at this so that they can at least make a Season 2. It’s been a while since I liked a show this much, and now that I’ll never get more Paper Girls I’m going to enter a fit of rage from which I will never recover and/or escape!

Nah, I’m good. See ya in the funny pages! See, that’s a little bit of newspaper humor for you.

Worth the Watch?

Have you read anything I just wrote? Go watch this series right now before I take a poo all over your face.

Now with 33% more tampon theft.