Hulu’s surreal kid comedy gets weirder, and more emotionally resonant.
There’s a mystical quality toPEN15, Hulu’s spectacular sitcom about middle-school friendship.
The seven new episodes, streaming Sept. 18, pick up two days after season 1’s climactic dance.
Anna Konkle and Maya Erskine in ‘Pen15.'.Erica Parise/Hulu
A pool party looms, and then a sleepover.
asks Maya, genuinely concerned.
At Maura’s candy-stocked house, her way-too-friendly mom (Dendrie Taylor) asks if anyone wants a quesadilla.
“I don’t want a fing quesadilla, you c!”
Bad fairies, and confounded moms, abound in this half-season.
(Seven more episodes will arrive in 2021.)
Maturity brings its own new anxieties.
Maya and Anna watch the argument unfold, until Maya takes Anna’s hand.
They race outside, running from suburbs into a shrouded forest.
“There were five leaves here,” Maya says, improvising supernatural shenanigans.
“Now there’s only three!”
They indulge in some vaguely Wiccan spellcasting.
I can’t do justice to the vibrant thrill of the central performances.
They can move you to tears or leave you ROFLing with just a couple wordless glances.
Erskine’s great with physical comedy.
See: her re-creation of a key moment fromAce Ventura 2.
At one point, the girls play with dolls.
Season 2 gives more attention to the ensemble of actual child performers surrounding Konkle and Erskine.
Grubbs is great in a part that calls for an unusual mix of devil-child confidence and shy-weirdo desperation.
is an omnipresent epithet.
“Do you think I’ve changed?”
“I think that we all change all the time,” Anna says.
We’re all just making it up as we go.
Good thing Maya and Anna are so good at playing pretend.A
Related content:
