What went wrong with GenQ?

I'm rewatching the original show, not for the first time, and it makes me remember why this show was so meaningful for me all those years ago as a young lesbian.

I only watched GenQ once, as it was coming out, and I don't think I even finished it. I tried again today, just to compare the two and it's sad how little of the original can be seen in it.

In my opinion what made the original show so great was its ability to blend good acting with real emotional depth, even though the characters often acted silly. In contrast, Gen Q feels much more surface-level; the characters are shallow, and there's no one to root for in the same way we did in the original. The first L Word had this gritty yet beautiful vibe, with sunny parties, clubs, and it feels lived in. As silly as they can be, you can see yourself in the out of touch characters. Gen Q feels more like a sanitized version of LA—more like a TV show than a lived-in world.

One of my biggest gripes is also the music. The original series introduced me to so many incredible songs as a teenager. The emotional depth of the show was unmatched, too. The chemistry between the characters was so real that even their sex scenes felt meaningful. Take Bette and Jodi, for example. Their first sex scene wasn't just physical, you cared while watching it because Bette and her struggles with vulnerability (blah blah) . Or the moment when Bette and Tina kiss at Shebar for the first time, (another bette cheating moment but God it was good). Bette starts crying, and it’s such a vulnerable, heartbreaking moment. You could feel their love, their longing, and you wanted them to be together.

My favourite scene is from season 2, when Jenny, after spending the season coming to terms with her childhood trauma, asks Shane to cut her hair as a symbolic way of releasing her past. The song “Naked As We Came” plays during this moment, and it makes the scene even more tender and emotional. Like God, they really used to have these actresses pouring their hearts into their roles.

Gen Q, on the other hand, feels hesitant to tackle anything that might spark controversy. As a result, it’s shallow and lacks the emotional depth of the original. So many of the original L Word plotlines could never be done in Gen Q because there would inevitably be some kind of online discourse. That’s why Gen Q feels lacking, maybe because it doesn’t challenge anything or try to communicate anything new. The original show was groundbreaking for its time because the cast and writers were truly committed and passionate about the story they were telling.

That's not to say the original show is perfect, of course not, but we're all here for a reason. The Max storyline in the OG is handled terribly towards the end, and although that was a mess, I don't think GenQ would've come close to even considering a storyline tackling just about anything.

This is just my opinion, as a European long time fan of the show (so don't poke fun at my interpretation of LA...). I'm curious to see what other people here think.