“A lot of people counted us out, but we are back and we are better than ever,” claims Jake Johnson’s Doug Renetti while attending a Los Angeles film premiere (Deep Throat’s, unsurprisingly) in Minx’s second season. The strangely lovable sleaze is, of course, referring to his Bottom Dollar publishing company and its flagship title, last seen struggling to overcome various in-fights, lawsuits and the prudishness of middle America. But it’s a statement which, by coincidence, could be applied to the show itself.
Indeed, Minx looked to have become yet another victim of Warner. Bros/Discovery’s cultural purge when it was culled from the former HBO Max last Christmas… with only a week of its previously greenlit season left to shoot. Admirably, creator Ellen Rapoport and her cast/crew agreed to plow on regardless, a “show must go on” approach which paid off when they were picked up by Starz just a month later. And now, at a time when the data-driven streaming model responsible for its brief demise looks set to collapse, the period dramedy is deservedly back on our screens to further highlight Hollywood’s general cluelessness.
In some ways, it’s business as usual. Free-spirited centerfold coordinator Bambi (Jessica Lowe) and bored housewife Shelly (Lennon Parham) are still trying to navigate their unlikely extra-marital affair. And although they appeared to bury the hatchet in last season’s finale, Doug is still constantly at loggerheads with Ophelia Lovibond’s Joyce Prigger, the feminist editor determined to add a touch of class to the world of low-rent 1970s erotica.
However, with Minx the magazine now a fully established, and relatively respected, part of the cultural landscape rather than a fledgling novelty, Minx the show is able to explore a world outside grungy warehouses and local protests. Joyce – now slightly more buttoned-down – gets to rub shoulders with everyone from Joan Didion to Linda Ronstadt as she becomes both a fixture of the party circuit and a reluctant cover star of Rolling Stone, while there are trips to Las Vegas, Vassar University and slightly perilous wilderness retreats.
But it’s Minx’s new major player, Elizabeth Perkins’ shipping magnate Constance Papadopoulos, who provides the most glitz and glamor. Introduced in brilliantly camp fashion – posing for a photoshoot at her lakeside mansion with a nude male model resting on her lap – the billionairess has a wardrobe so opulent she makes Elizabeth Taylor’s resemble a thrift store. Yet as shown in a flashback where she sets her equally immaculately groomed dogs on a business rival, she has a ruthlessness to match her fabulousness, making her, on paper at least, the perfect candidate to guide Bottom Dollar to international success.
As you’d expect, Constance immediately makes her mark on the ragtag publishing team, whether it’s questioning the commercial viability of titles such as Yank My Doodle, Kung Fu Cuties and Feet Feet Feet (it’s not good news for readers of the latter) or offering some slightly harsh style advice (“You do not need to dress like a man to earn the respect of one”). Impressive as always, Perkins imbues what could have been a cartoonish character with enough nuance to keep you guessing whether she’s a force for good or a potential nail in the company’s coffin.
Despite the increase in scope, Minx hasn’t forgotten the issues – sexual liberation, women’s rights, female empowerment – it previously handled so deftly. Joyce jumps into bed with multiple different bearded rockers, and joins the mile high club, without any judgment, while Lenny (Rich Sommer) and Shelly’s attempts to save their ailing marriage by joining the local swingers’ association is played relatively straight rather than for pure laughs.
Perhaps to answer criticisms that its avocado green and burnt orange world was a little too liberal for its time, there’s now an acknowledgement of the era’s homophobia, too. An article about a woman’s journey of same-sex discovery is turned down over fears the magazine will start attracting the wrong kind of audience, as is a pitch for a male bathhouse spread: deciding to shoot the latter anyway, photographer Richie (Oscar Montoya) also exposes how brutally cops treated the gay community.
If this all sounds a little heavy-going for what was initially billed as a bawdy satire, then there are still plenty of laugh-out-loud moments: see the cinema reel mix-up which sees a slumber party treated not to Bedknobs and Broomsticks but the decade’s most prominent porno. And Lowe regularly steals the show as Bottom Dollar’s deceptively smart cookie. “I was Hot Lips’ hotter protégé but then I died in a submarine accident,” she proudly tells Lenny about her background work on M*A*S*H. “In a land war?” comes the response before she replies, “Yeah, they never take my notes.” Let’s just hope she ignores the darkly comic advice to join a fledgling church group run by a pastor named Jim Jones.
Certain viewers will also be happy to learn Minx is still rivaling Euphoria when it comes to male full frontals, and in similarly inventive ways, too. See the inspired recreation of Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs’ Battle of the Sexes where Shelly competes against a naked model playing with a racket attached to his manhood. Expectedly, it’s not tennis leg he then has to worry about.
Minx inevitably loses some of the narrative tension now it’s in high-flying mode: Succession excepted; the rags-to-riches tale is typically more compelling than the riches-to-riches. However, Lovibond and Johnson’s continuing yin-yang dynamic, so often the best thing about its first season, ensures their quest for publishing supremacy still entertains. Cleverly sowing the seeds for a third series, a spontaneous heist in the closing stages suggests this battle may become an all-out war.
Who knows whether Minx will be able to avoid the arbitrary axe of the streaming age next time around? Who knows when any show will ever go into production again? But having further proved publishing, politics and phalluses can mix, it’s more than deserving of at least one more journey around the soft porn block.
Jon O’Brien (@jonobrien81) is a freelance entertainment and sports writer from the North West of England. His work has appeared in the likes of Billboard, Vulture, Grammy Awards, New Scientist, Paste, i-D and The Guardian.