We enjoyed Season 1 of Single Drunk Female because creator Simone Finch not only made her main character, Samantha Fink (Sofia Black-D’Elia), someone who went into sobriety kicking and screaming, but she also did a good job creating a world around Sam that’s full of layered characters who have their own issues. The building of that world immediately pays dividends in Season 2, because we see Sam embracing her sobriety in a way we would have never expected during most of the first season.
Opening Shot: We hear Samantha Fink going through a metal detector in a prison. But this time, she’s not landing there because of something she did; she’s with her parole officer Gail (Madison Shepard), talking to a group of inmates about being sober for eighteen months. “Sobriety Calculator: 549 Days.”
The Gist: Six months have passed since the eventful wedding of Joel (Charlie Hall) and Brit (Sasha Compère). Sam has a new job making listicles at a Boston-based lifestyle website, and she’s been killing it. She’s been doing so well that her boss Alex (Ricky Velez) gives her an actual desk — it’s next to the bathroom, but Sam says “I’m kinda into it.” She invites Alex to her birthday party — yes, it’s her birthday — but he begs off, figuring he’s her boss and he just gave her the toilet desk.
Sam still lives with her mom Carol (Ally Sheedy), and now it seems that Carol’s boyfriend Bob (Ian Gomez) has moved in. She still hangs with her former drinking buddy Felicia (Lily Mae Harrington), who now seems to be friends with Brit, as well; they both bought Sam journals for her birthday. Felicia is still dating Peter (Ben Thompson), the medical resident she met at Brit and Joel’s wedding. Brit and Joel are still “close friends” after she decided to leave him after the wedding, at least that’s what Brit tells everyone; Joel, though, is in understandable pain.
Sam finds out from her sponsor Olivia (Rebecca Henderson) that she’ll be greeting everyone at the AA meeting they’re setting up; that’s when James (Garrick Benard), who Sam had to cut off romantically after he started drinking again, shows up. She invites him to her party, pretty much the opposite of what Olivia would have done.
The party, complete with a taco truck and photo both, is eventful for a lot of reasons: Brit and Joel’s fragile “friendship” is on display, James shows up and thinks he and Sam can romantically pick up where they left off; Alex shows up unexpectedly with some bad news about his job, which is actually good news about their attraction to each other. Plus, no one’s eating the tacos. It’s a lot for Sam, and she confides in Olivia while hiding in her closet.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? At this juncture of its existence, Single Drunk Female is starting to resemble a “hangout show” along the lines of Grand Crew or Everything’s Trash.
Our Take: Even though Sam is embracing her sobriety in the second season of Single Drunk Female, that doesn’t mean that there won’t be situations that test that. Sam faces two of them in Episode 2: Nathaniel (Jon Glaser), the slimy boss she drunkenly hit with his desk phone when she was still in New York, is installed as her new boss in Boston, and she gets news from Olivia that sends her into a tailspin. So it’s not like Season 2 is going to be ten episodes of Sam saying that everything is fine. She may not be fighting being sober anymore, but the fight to stay sober will always be present for her.
But we get more about everyone else in Season 2, which flows directly from what Finch set up in Season 1. Brit and Joel sort out just what they are to each other after their divorce; Felicia feels that she and Peter are living in two different worlds; Carol continues to give unsolicited advice to Sam; James struggles with his sobriety while trying to get back with Sam. Because we enjoyed all of these characters in Season 1, we have no issues with moving away from Sam and exploring these stories a little more.
Sex and Skin: None in the first two episodes, but it’ll come up this season at some point, even if it’s sent through the filter of basic-cable standards and practices.
Parting Shot: Olivia gets a text from her wife: “Did you tell her yet?” She responds: “Not yet.” Uh oh.
Sleeper Star: We’re going to give this to Charlie Hall, who gets a lot more comedic heavy lifting as the jilted Joel. We also enjoyed his guest stint on The Sex Lives Of College Girls. It’s not hard to see why he’s such a good comedic actor: He’s the son of Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Brad Hall.
Most Pilot-y Line: When Sam told James “Because I want to be friends with you” after she pushed away from his kiss attempt, we cringed like nobody’s business. We did love his response: “We’re not friends; we’re just two people who met in a bar.”
Our Call: STREAM IT. By taking the focus off Sam for a bit in Season 2, Single Drunk Female does wander a bit from what made it such an appealing show in its first season. But since we liked the support system that formed around Sam so much, it feels less like scope creep to us and more like a show evolving and settling in for a long run.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.