Ginny & Georgia

A show like "Ginny & Georgia" plays like a product of Netflix's algorithm – a little Stars Hollow and a few parts "13 Reasons Why" with a touch of "White Oleander" to add some spice. But that only proves that it knows its audience and trusts in its awareness of the world we live in now. ... We know its places and its people. That may be why we can relate more to the Millers with all their unenviable flaws and the melodrama mother and daughter create around them.

The series tries to do so much in these first 10 episodes, and it’s more than admirable, but the result is a show that is so overstuffed it cannot successfully service each of its storylines in a satisfying way. Fortunately, the show remains immensely watchable regardless, and that is because of the quick pace, a seamless blend of genres, and Howey’s engaging performance.

Surprisingly, it pretty much all works. The dark secrets (there are many) balance with the apparent fluff, making for an engaging, never-dull series. Maybe the Gilmore Girls should have had guns.

If you're a fan of coming-of-age high school shows and scandalous small-town thrillers, you'll happily fall victim to the algorithm that smashed them together and created Ginny & Georgia.

Underneath Ginny & Georgia's patina of cutesy quirk lies a somewhat depressing story about two unhappy children who repeatedly suffer the consequences of their mother's broken moral compass.

There were some very funny moments, but they mostly involved the supporting characters (more on that in a moment). The connection between Ginny and Georgia (and, we guess Austin, but he’s just stuck in cute-kid-land for the entire first episode) needs to be warmer and stronger for us to completely buy in.

Plot-wise, G&G delivers. Good trash-plotting is like a river in full spate. A lot rushes past you, it all feels Very Dramatic (although, unlike a river, mostly because of the way it is scored) and you feel like the source will never run dry.

The differences in narrative style and tone between Gilmore Girls and Ginny & Georgia are striking enough that the attempt to feed the algorithmic beast could backfire. But for those who don’t mind their heaping spoonfuls of small-town drama mixed into a much pulpier stew, this new series may satisfy as much as the older one.

Lampert, Fisher, and company are at their best when writing for Ginny, and Gentry doesn’t miss a beat; it’s a performance that manages to be earnest without ever becoming saccharine, and wanders into fraught territory without crossing the line into self-indulgence. ... In the Georgia half of the proceedings, things are considerably rockier.

It’s an uneven and over-long show that shambles toward the last episode in fits and starts. And yet, if you ignore the large-scale structural problems and the question of why this tower of nachos had to be built in a can so big with so many different cheeses, Ginny & Georgia offers plenty of narrative threads to pull you along through the season.

There’s a decent YA show in here somewhere, but along with its abundance of plot, Ginny & Georgia needs to step away from the plethora of Gilmore Girls references to get there.

It all makes for an uncomfortable mix of gentle small-town shenanigans and gritty crime twists, and neither of the two are sharp enough to really hook you. Ultimately, Ginny & Georgia feels like it was made to fill a space in the “Because You Watched” row on Netflix… and for a streamer intent on keeping you binge-watching no matter what, maybe that’s enough.

A twitchy mystery is tacked on to the shallow character studies, a device through which “G. & G.” can launder sermons on self-loathing and self-love, family ties and social alienation. We are teased with a race catharsis between mother and child that never comes to fruition.