{"id":1355,"date":"2025-04-30T12:19:49","date_gmt":"2025-04-30T18:19:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/?p=1355"},"modified":"2025-04-30T12:20:41","modified_gmt":"2025-04-30T18:20:41","slug":"embrace-the-cringe-with-a-new-summer-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/2025\/04\/30\/embrace-the-cringe-with-a-new-summer-show\/","title":{"rendered":"Embrace the Cringe with a new Summer Show"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Looking for a new summer flick? Check out the delightfully playful and often painfully awkward <em>Pen15!<\/em> The MTV original show that premiered on Hulu in 2019 brings light to a pivotal and excruciating time in a young girl\u2019s life: middle school. While the title may be raunchy, and the show certainly leans into its crude humor, it also offers a surprisingly nuanced and heartfelt exploration of the universal adolescent experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Creators Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle step into the roles of their 13-year-old selves\u2014Maya Ishii-Peters and Anna Kone\u2014lifelong best friends navigating the chaos of seventh grade. The comedy series places the duo in a variety of embarrassing and personal situations that test the boundaries of their relationships and amplify their internal anxieties.&nbsp; As the girls deal with crushes, heartbreak, and the rigid expectations of middle school hierarchy, Maya and Anna offer a refreshingly optimistic and relatable look at what it means to be one of the \u201cweird girls\u201d in middle school.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As a retired \u201cweird girl\u201d myself, this show holds a very special place in my heart. Throughout its run, I saw pieces of myself reflected in both Maya and Anna\u2014sparking memories of all the cringeworthy conversations and questionable decisions I made when I was 13. Erskine and Konkle\u2019s performance fully transported me back into middle school. I could feel their excitement, their sadness, and their embarrassment to my core\u2014there is no show that encapsulates that uniquely awkward phase of life quite like <em>Pen15<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It may be jarring at first to see two women in their mid-thirties portraying 13-year-olds among actual adolescents, but their charm and incredible performance quickly dissolve any disbelief. By the end of the show, you\u2019re fully convinced they\u2019re simply two young girls\u2014fearful of rejection yet deeply inspired by one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Pen15<\/em> spans two seasons and is available to stream on Hulu. I highly encourage you to give it a watch. Fair warning\u2014there will be moments so awkward you might want to hide behind a pillow\u2014but that\u2019s part of its charm! The honesty, humor, and heart packed into every episode far outweigh any secondhand embarrassment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Looking for a new summer flick? Check out the delightfully playful and often painfully awkward Pen15! The MTV original show that premiered on Hulu in 2019 brings light to a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issue-41","clearfix"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1355"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1357,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355\/revisions\/1357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.mcm.edu\/herald\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}