A League of Their Own Is The First Great Gay Movie-to-TV Reboot
TV reviews, TV opinions and also sometimes other opinions
**This talks about some plot points in the show A League of Their Own on Prime Video, but doesn’t feature any spoilers**
We are all tired of reboots, we know this. While there’s been a continual onslaught of old TV shows being rebooted, the movie-to-TV reboot is rare and it rarely works. For every Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Fargo and Cobra Kai, there’s a Limitless, My Big Fat Greek Life and that other season of Fargo to show how hard it is to get it right. When a reboot of the beloved film A League of Their Own was announced, I was immediately skeptical.
First of all, as a gay, A League of Their Own is a cornerstone of my existence. I forced my mom to rewatch that movie with me week after week as a kid. What could a TV series possibly bring to this story?? On top of that, it’s the story of the Rockford Peaches, my hometown! Growing up down the field from their stadium only made the movie cooler, but I feared a TV adaption couldn’t accurately capture the city or the intense segregation that makes up Rockford, IL. The Rockford Peaches are precious to us Rockfordians and we do not take kindly to people getting the story wrong. If you thought I got mad over The Bear creating an Upside Down Chicago, an incorrect portrayal of Rockford, IL would truly unleash my fury.
Also, I wasn’t in the writers’ room and let’s be real, there are only like, 4 TV writers from Rockford, IL and without any of us in the room, how would they get it right? Would it just be another Hollywood production that generalizes the Midwest? As a real Rockford peach, I had nothing but worry.
When I got the screeners, I put down everything and dove in right away. And well, they fucking got me. I know you were all just as worried about the Rockford accuracies as I was. They mostly get it right, even though they filmed in Pennsylvania and California and largely use CGI to recreate old businesses. This only negatively impacts the show’s ability to capture the Rock River, a literal, physical marker of the town’s segregation as whites lived on one side and minorities lived on the other. Still, there’s an attention to detail and respect for the city when places like Logli’s and The Office are referenced. The writers and consultants did spend time in Rockford and clearly came to appreciate that weird, little city. I never thought I’d see the gay bar of my youth on a Prime Video tv show.
So, with concerns (that only I had) about Rockford out of the way, let’s get into the actual series. The show uses the same characters from the movie, but gives them new stories. Basically, everyone is gayer! The gay that lived in the subtext of the movie is brought to the forefront in Carson Shaw, Greta Gill, Jo Deluca, and Lupe Garcia. The racism of the era that was erased from the movie is addressed head on through Maxine Chapman, a new character who isn’t allowed to join the Rockford Peaches because she’s black.
This update works because it makes the story feel more realistic. The film is limited by its idealistic need to be a positive sports story with a happy ending. The TV show gets into the reality these girls faced moving to a new city to play a sport that made them targets for homophobic attacks. And while this may piss off old racists and homophobes who believe this is just a “woke” remake grasping at diversity and no one was really that LGBT back then, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. It turns out lady baseball players really were super gay! Black women did want to play ball! These people aren’t upset because a classic movie has been changed, they’re mad because of a desire to cling to a whitewashed past. This isn’t a remake that was made for the sake of inclusion, it’s a remake focused on untold stories and that’s why it works.
I could go into the real history, but I don’t need to! The show’s co-creator, Will Graham, put together a wonderful thread of resources on the queer and racist history of the AAGPBL.
Yes, they were gay! Yes, there were Latinx players in the league! Yes, black women did go out to play ball! Look, if the show’s creators were willing to spend time in Rockford, IL (Forbes #4 Worst Place in America) for the show, I am more than certain they were willing to read some books and articles for accuracy.
Once you get past all of that, the show is just heartwarming. It feels like a big gay party where you want to be friends with everyone. The friendship between Maxine and Clance is already one of my favorite female TV buddy pairings of all time. Both are more than token black characters, they’re fully realized. Clance, a rare straight character in the show, is in a happy marriage, loves drawing comic books and gets an episode to shine when she’s pushed to the edge while planning a party. Maxine is a talented, cocky know-it-all who doesn’t realize she has so much more to learn in life (she is me, I am her, Rockford gay girls are really like that! So accurate).
If you’re afraid it’s going to be all sad and gay and racist, don’t worry! The cast finds a rhythm as an ensemble, finding comedic moments whenever they can. Obviously, a show with Abbi Jacobson, D’Arcy Carden, and Kate Berlant (and Molly Kearney, a comedian you need to know) was going to get the laughs right, but it’s incredible how every character is given a moment to shine. The show is constantly spinning 14 plates in the air at once. Also, Roberta Colindrez, who you may know from Vida, is an absolute star who has stolen my heart and I am obsessed.
Anyway, I am not just thankful this show treated Rockford like a sacred place, created funny black/LGBTQ characters with depth and let me stare at Roberta Colindrez, it finally makes a legit case for movie-to-tv reboots (making them gayer). But, it isn’t about jamming diverse characters into white situations, it’s about peeling back that white paint and finding the stories and people who were erased because of their differences. That’s where A League of Their Own really succeeds.
Go watch it all on Prime Video and when you fall in love with it, be sure to give it 5-stars or a rotten tomato review or whatever! Racists and homophobes are really angry about this show and are trolling it with bad reviews!
Who’s On The Pod This Week?
This week, I turn to Dicktown sleuths (and co-creators) John Hodgman and David Rees to figure out why some old white TV guys are so afraid of teenagers, the key to successful “phrogging” and the joy of Alan Tudyk’s face!
We also dive to the bottom of where Dicktown comes from and where it’s going, covering community, generational connectedness and small town stories. Watch both seasons of Dicktown, streaming now on Hulu.
What did the three of us watch this week?
Resident Alien (Syfy/Peacock)
Phrogging: Hider in my House (Lifetime/Hulu)
P-Valley (Starz) - Finale
Below Deck (Bravo/Hulu/Peacock)
The Anarchists (HBO Max)
The Bear (FX/Hulu)
This Fool (FX/Hulu)
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (P+)
Reservation Dogs (FX/Hulu)
What Else?
Tell Me What You Really Want
Let’s be real…do you really keep up with me when it comes to TV? Have you watched everything above already because you’re a real TV addict who clings to trash like Love After Lockup and Intervention? Then you need to join the TV Club Patreon where I’ll be doing recaps of Smothered, random 90 Day Fiancé stuff, Below Deck takes and more!
You can also still send in requests if you want to tell me what to watch! This will be the place we can talk about episodes of different shows every week, but you gotta tell me what you wanna talk about.
Getting Personal
I just finished doing a few shows around the Midwest and Texas and now I’m back in LA. I’ll be co-hosting Hotsy Totsy Comedy with Amber Rollo on 8/25 at Harlowe if you’re around. Here’s a joke I did at Caveat at NYC:
Otherwise, I am mostly just writing and listening to Renaissance all the time. I’m happy to be back home because, like everyone right now, I am exhausted all the time. I’ve been doing a lot of work on my memoir and remembering the various loves of my life is draining. It’s been making me think about my decade of polyamory, a subject I hate bringing up. Poly people get a reputation for never shutting up about it, but I’m well beyond the part where you yell about it because you think you have to prove something. Now, it is just a boring part of my life, but I do enjoy when people ask me about it like with the Observer. I’ve also been watching Seeking Sister Wife, a show I hate, but continue to consume when I want to make myself angry. It made me think about this:
Anyway, being back in LA also means less dating and more introspection. Everyone knows the best time to fall in love is on tour.
I also achieved a lifelong goal of having my own weed accessories. I started my podcast alone in my bedroom, recording on a cheap microphone. I’d pay some company in Canada to edit it, but it was a totally solo operation. It’s wild to watch it grow to the point where I have merch and a team. Having support and help is so good! I’m a Sagittarius, so I have a hard time with that. Anyway, it would warm my heart if you watched TV and smoked weed with my goods.
Wow thank you Morning Brew for highlighting your site. I’m going to be here a lot. Love your content.
While you are right that the show brings racism and lesbianism to the forefront, you failed to mention that the writing and acting is achingly subpar with the exception of Chante Adams. Abbi Jacobson is so bad it is painful to have her on screen ( just as she was in Broad City). Darcy Cardens character is written with so many inconsistencies you wish she would be traded already.