Crack is whack (HBO)

These questions regard last night’s episode of HBO’s Girls. Please answer the prompts with specific examples from LAST NIGHT’S EPISODE, though supplementary material will be accepted as a secondary source. Please write legibly. #2 pencils only. You have an hour to finish this test. See below for questions and example responses.

1. The episode begins at a warehouse party. Describe the scene in light of Bakhtin’s Theory of the Carnivalesque. How are characters altered and the relationships upended by this event, when the established societal rules are briefly suspended (i.e., “tits out for Christmas”)?

Bakhtin’s's theory of carnival was actually published in a later version of his essays, Problems of Dostoyevsky’s Poetics, and the term "carnival" was used to explain what he considered the Russian author's ""polyphony": the ability of many voices to speak at once, interact with each other, and most importantly, strengthen individual arguments while finally being heard by one another.

While so far the show has focused on the four girls, with their male counterparts existing as comic relief or foils, this episode turns that around. Did anyone notice this was the first time Adam had been shown outside of his apartment? (Let alone with his shirt on?) We learn Adam is a much more complex character than just "Hannah's jerk of a sex-buddy"; he's a recovering alcoholic, an avid reader, and is building a barge to flow down the Hudson on the 4th of July! Also, he, like most characters, thinks Hannah is a narcissist for essentially using him for sex and for her "writing."

If you go back and watch the previous episodes, especially the ones leading up to this one, Hannah's relationship with Adam completely takes on another tenor. When he says "Relationships have an expiration date...you're not having fun anymore," Adam is actually hurting from Hannah's "rejection." She told everyone else he was her boyfriend, but she never expressed it to him. So when she came to his door and gave him that non-ultimatum ultimatum (He even prompts her, "So what are you asking?" to which she responds, "I'm not asking anything,") we now know the altered subtext: Adam is waiting to hear what Hannah wants out of the relationship besides a fuck-buddy, and she never let him believe that he was boyfriend material, because she's not the kind of girl who wants to go to brunch, or something.

Then there's that reversal of Charlie and Marnie's relationship: in classic Rachel/Ross fashion where the one character who has been keeping the other at arm's distance only realizes how much they "need" their partner when they see them with someone else. Although whoa, Charlie must be some kind of pussyhound to find a new girlfriend in two weeks. Are we supposed to believe he had been cheating on Marnie? Is that where her disbelief stems from?

And even Elijah, Hannah's gay ex-boyfriend, comes back from a one-note character to become a more fully fleshed-out character. His interaction with Marnie is priceless: I spent the entire episode trying to think which two characters make out in Rent. Was Marnie supposed to be Mimi and Elijah played Roger? I mean, I know this show gets criticized for being white-washed but come on. Plus, Elijah provides some insight into Marnie's own egoism: she's narcissistic about being necessary. Her world basically collapses when she realizes that every one of her friends (and her boyfriend) can live their lives as a semi-functional human being without being spoon-fed her sage wisdom from her 24 years on Earth.

Also, we learn that Ray is kind of into girls that hit him in the nuts. So he finally has something in common with Adam. We learn nothing new about Jeff, except that he can be a total asshole in addition to a creepy dad.

2. At the party, Shoshonnah smokes “a glass cigarette,” i.e., crack cocaine, resulting in a frenzied slapstick race with Ray. How does this scene shed light on the crack epidemic of the 1980s and ’90s, the thousands of lives lost and ruined, and the unfair sentencing guidelines that resulted in long prison terms for many minority offenders?

For me, this scene is less about crack and more about the fact that if a girl runs down the street screaming "rape" in Bushwick, apparently no one comes to her aid. Where are the crusties when you need them?

3. Use the phrase “a tiny Navajo” in a sentence. Compare and contrast Hannah’s bike ride with Adam to the “Long Walk” of 1864 and the exploitation of native peoples by the American Government.

"My favorite book growing up was The Indian in the Cupboard, which was about a tiny Navajo who came to life." As for Hannah's unfortunate-ending bike accident as a metaphor for the ethnic cleansing of the Native American people....I'm not touching that with a ten-foot pole. That's like saying the whole episode can be compared to the Schindler's List because a bunch of Jewish characters spend time in the ghetto before being herded into a small warehouse.

That being said, I think "dropping a pin" on your iPhone so your friend can pick you up in a taxi after you get into a fight with a guy is exactly like Kit Carson's "scorched earth" campaign. Also, I loved how the ending shot was basically the opposite of The Graduate's, with Hannah between Adam and Marnie in the taxi, trying to look forlorn and lost, but not being able to quite hide the smile of victory and sheer glee from spreading across her face.

4. There are several physical injuries in this episode (Jeff is beaten, Hannah is propelled from Adam’s bicycle handle bars, Shoshonnah mistakenly ingests cocaine). How do such incidents highlight the frailty of the body as well as its resilience?

You are forgetting Ray getting hit in the balls! Actually, this episode did have slapstick-y quality that didn't quite work for me. The only repercussions you see from any of these injuries is Jeff's bloody nose, and even that seems light for a guy who was basically American History X-style curb stomped after getting punched in the face. If you fly off the handlebars of a fast-moving bike, I don't care if you are wearing a backpack on your tummy, your face is going to look like hotdog. And there is no way Ray is condition to compete physically with a toned, kickboxing Type-A 20-year-old who happens to be on CRACK. And then he gets hit in the balls and solar plexus? That guy needs a little more than a crotch-massage...at the very least his body would probably go into shock or he'd pass out from lack of oxygen.

This episode weirdly reinforces the idea that 20-somethings are as invisible as they think they are, while adults actually suffer after being grievously injured.

5. After Jessa invites pathetic Gen-X daddy Jeff to the party and then blithely induces two partygoers to kick the shit out of him, he asks her to sleep with him, and she declines. Aren’t there any other kids in Manhattan she could babysit?

Wait, what's the question here? That Jessa, after giving so many "go-ahead" signs to Jeff, should have slept with him and found a new job? Or that if she knew she didn't want to sleep with him, she should have found a new family to babysit for? The epiphany Jessa reaches in this episode is that while sleeping with guys like Jeff is usually what she does...in fact, she's been leading up to it all season...in the harsh, fluorescent lights of that hospital, she realized she could do better for herself.

And sure, there are other kids in Manhattan, but does Jessa really want to babysit them? Does Jessa even like babysitting? Was she also an au pair, because she was around that apartment an awful lot.

EXTRA CREDIT: Did you really want me to come to your birthday party last night, and if so, why did you whisper the invite in a crowded newsroom at 6:12 p.m. on a Friday before a major federal holiday? 

Didn't you get my text? It said "BEST PARTY EVER" and had the address of a crackden in Bushwick. I was looking for you all night!

And I have no control whether my birthday falls on a federal holiday weekend or not. You'll have to take that up with my mom.

The Hamburglar.

Oleg Kalugin, a man some credit with helping to foil the hard-line coup attempt against Mikhail Gorbachev in 1991—and others, including Vladimir Putin, have dubbed a traitor—did not appear to partake of the catered spread on Wednesday afternoon in the basement meeting room at the Discovery Times Square exhibit space. The occasion was a press luncheon pegged to the launch of SPY: The Secret World of Espionage, a traveling exhibition of Cold War memorabilia, and Major General Kalugin, now a professor with the Centre for Counterintelligence and Security Studies in Alexandria, Virginia, was there to offer support—and perhaps to serve as something of a living relic himself.

Actually, maybe he wolfed down a turkey sandwich when we turned away. We can’t be sure, which is why we are not in the espionage game. But Maj. Gen. Kalugin has good reason to be careful. The former head of foreign counterintelligence for the KGB, he publicly denounced the agency, spoke up against corruption and vilified Mr. Putin as a war criminal over the war in Chechnya.

A compact man with silvery hair, he noted that a former colleague had let it be known that Mr. Kalugin “would have been dead a long time ago” if he’d emigrated to Europe, instead of the states. “There has not been a single case of a political murder by the Soviets or Russians on the territory of the United States, and I would know,” he said, flashing an impish grin.

Mr. Kalugin actually began his espionage career in New York in the late ’50s, pursuing various clandestine activities while employing the cover of a Columbia student, studying journalism on a Fulbright. (James Franco, are you listening?)

He’s now a U.S. citizen, so it’s all good.

Speaking of political murder, Mr. Kalugin played a role in one of the most sensational rub-outs of the Cold War, the killing of Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov, a journalist for the BBC Radio and Voice of America. Mr. Markov was felled by a ricin-coated micropellet fired from an umbrella gun on London’s Waterloo Bridge. While admitting he’d been privy to the planning of the assassination, Mr. Kalugin was careful to note that the Soviets did not have any operational involvement in the hit but merely provided the Bulgarians “technical advice”—including, of course, the poison and the umbrella itself, which is now on display in the exhibition.

The weapon is part of the voluminous trove of spy memorabilia collected by the show’s organizer, H. Keith Melton. Among his other treasures on view are Robert Hanssen’s Palm Pilot, Aldrich Ames’s coffee cup, and cuckoo-clock camera of the sort that the Stasi placed in hotel rooms throughout East Germany.

Mr. Melton also managed to wrangle the cooperation of the CIA, which lent dozens of items, including a pigeon camera, an “Insectohopter” miniature spy drone shaped like a dragonfly, and the last flag to wave over Checkpoint Charlie.

The Insectohopter

Mr. Melton said the goal of the exhibit was to educate the public about the vital role played by our intelligence services and encourage young people to consider careers as spooks. “It begins with the kids,” he said.

Perhaps not surprisingly, given the enthusiastic involvement of the Company, the exhibition delivers an appealingly romantic view of tradecraft. There’s no “yellowcake” on display. None of that cocaine trafficked by the Nicaraguan Contras with an assist by Langley. No mention of Curveball, or Valerie Plame or aluminum tubes. No Bay of Pigs. No waterboards.

Perhaps the most precious item is the ice axe that was used to assassinate Leon Trotsky by Stalinist agent Ramón Mercader. Mr. Melton obtained it for a princely sum. “Modesty prevents me from discussing it,” he said.

Though he wore a shiny CIA lapel pin at the luncheon, Mr. Melton was never a spy himself. He made his fortune as a McDonald’s owner-operator in South Florida, ultimately amassing 36 restaurants before cashing out a few years ago after a contract dispute with McDonald’s corporate. In a legal complaint filed in that case, Micky D’s accused him of wiretapping a negotiation.

The Observer couldn’t help wondering if Mr. Melton had been putting his gadget collection to personal use.

“I’m too smart to do things like that,” he said, explaining that the court threw out the charge, which had been based on a misunderstanding. “We said we had a ‘record’ of a conversation and they thought that meant we’d taped it, although we made it clear we just took handwritten notes.”

The suit was settled “very amicably,” he added. “I retired as the most successful McDonald’s operator in history.”

SPY: The Secret World of Espionage is now on view at Discovery Times Square.

(Courtesy: AndreaPeyser.com)

The New York Post’s tender-hearted angel of mercy, Andrea Peyser, is best known for the deeply humanistic perspective with which she handles the sensitive criminal proceedings of our legal system. Less well appreciated is her concern for the good physical hygiene of those society has cast aside.

“My advice to Pedro: Don't pick up the soap.”—on Sen. Pedro Espada, Jr., May 15, 2012

“Enjoy the communal showers, Sen. Piggy.”—on Sen. Espada, Jr.,  April 27, 2012

“...the boys can dine on the prison's famed kosher cuisine while enjoying warm showers.”—on Sen. Carl Kruger and Micahel Turano, May 3, 2012

“... guaranteed to spend years in the company of large and hairy individuals you wouldn't want to meet in the shower.”—on Cameron Douglas, April 21, 2010

“...he's going away for a very long time—permanently trading life in a mansion for...shared showers with men half his age.”—on O.J. Simpson, December 6, 2008

“...Bernie might be singing in the communal prison shower by now.”—on Bernie Madoff, January 13, 2009

“The monster who once hid in the shadows and called the shots must from now on cower in the shower.”—on Peter Braunstein, May 24, 2007

“As she spends her days stocking up on unfamiliar cotton underwear and liquid soap—safer for those communal showers—it might seem high time for the sponge-headed blonde to take responsibility for her crimes.”—on Paris Hilton, May 8, 2007

“Aha! Now we know how Martha Stewart triumphed through five months in the federal pokey. Two words: Liquid soap.”—on Martha Stewart, July 21, 2005

“Today...Martha Stewart gets busy stocking up on her supply of liquid soap—safer for those communal showers....”—on Martha Stewart, March 6, 2004

Remedial narcissism

These questions regard last night's episode of HBO's Girls. Please answer the prompts with specific examples from LAST NIGHT'S EPISODE, though supplementary material will be accepted as a secondary source. Please write legibly. #2 pencils only. You have an hour to finish this test. See below for questions and example responses.

1. Lena Dunham has been described as “the voice of her generation.” Her generation’s other contributions to American culture include artisanal house-made infused vinegars and responsibly sourced small-batch chocolate bars. How is girls Girls the premium-cable equivalent of a pizza from Roberta’s, and how is it not?

Merriam Webster's Dictionary defines the word 'generation' as, "A body of living beings constituting a single step in the line of descent from an ancestor." That doesn't really seem to apply to Girls, since Hannah is an only child. Marnie and Shoshanna are cousins, so perhaps that's it.

In this essay I will compare and contrast Girls to a pizza from Roberta's near the McKibben lofts in East Bushwick (Slogan: "What, your restaurant doesn't double as a radio station?"), using examples from both real life and the show. I will also compare and contrast Girls to the general aesthetic of what our culture defines as quote-unquote hipsters.

There are two questions here: Is Lena Dunham's cultural zeitgeist a byproduct of hipster culture, and does the content of the show deal with inherently hipster subjects. The answers are "maybe" and "not as much as you'd think, but sort of, I guess."

When Brian Williams went on Morning Joe in 2010 and mocked Williamsburg for being a magical land of artisanal cheeses, ironic eye wear, and an economy based on trading colorful beads, he probably did not expect that his very own daughter would soon be the Times Square poster child for the post-hip landscape. Hipsters, once thought of as flighty, superficial creatures who peacocked around creating terrible art while living off their trust funds, have been giving a makeover, thanks in large part by shows like Portlandia. Fred Armisen and Carrie Bradshaw's portrayal of the West Coast Williamsburg emphasize the "hippy in hipsters. They make art projects. They put birds on things. They might be subjects of ridicule, but unlike previously held stereotypes, Portlandia showed us that hipsters create, not just judge.

But the entertainment industry is not created, or funded by hipsters. Indie films could ostensibly fit into a definition of hipsterdom, but HBO doesn't. Nor does Judd Apatow, no matter how funny his movies are. Just look at the tragedy of hipster artist James Franco, who tried to straddle the line between mainstream success and the hipster duality of eternal academia and incomprehensible art openings.

So while Ms. Dunham's first film, Tiny Furniture, might be considered a hipster product (it is Criterion after all), the anti-corporate condescension of a culture who refuse to pay for TV, let alone premium cable, exile Girls from the land of Crystal Castles and freegans. So much the better.

As to the second question: The hipsters of today are not like the hipsters of previous generations, although they have common attributes, such as creativity, a love for atonal music, and lots of speed. The general consensus of millennial hipsters (henceforward: Hipsters) is that they love to make art projects by hand, don't eat meat, and define all their handcrafted exports as "artisanal." They look down on Normals (a catch-all pejorative terms Hipsters use to define "Otherness," or anyone who has a job with health insurance), graduated from a liberal arts college, and dress in the uniform of their subculture to convey their uniqueness. (Example: Rompers, ironic t-shirts, weird hats, suspenders, pork pie hats, anything that can be worn on a fixed-gear bike.) Despite common misconceptions, not all Hipsters live off their trust funds: Some of them get really famous for their art and only use their parents money to throw lavish parties in their galleries while dressing like the homeless. They can be identified by their apolitical, anti-theological belief system that everyone who believes in that crap is a "Normal," and should be shunned. Unless they are into Buddhism or something, which is okay because yoga pants are cute.

The characters in Girls are, for the most-part, not Hipsters, though each embody some of the aesthetics from their generation. Shoshanna, the least "hipster" of the bunch, went to Jewish sleepaway camp, and references popular culture as entertainment, as opposed to camp. (See: Baggage, a show not even its producers knew was a real program until it was featured on Girls). Shoshana is also only girl to show any interest in producing: her inspiration board is the only hobby or artistic endeavor--outside Hannah's journal writing--that we see on the show.

Jessa may be the most hipster of the bunch, as evidenced by her dress (weird hats, bright red lipstick, unkempt "bedhead," a loosely interpreted wardrobe of Diane Keaton's outfits in Annie Hall), and choices of mates (father figures; mixologists who date girls named Gillian; men with facial hair popularized in the 18th century), and disdain for bourgeois society. She also has a cool accent and daddy issues. But on closer inspection, Jessa is not a Hipster, because hipsters hate children, as the latter generally receive more attention for their cute outfits and finger paintings than they do.

Marnie, whose job is the most Hipster (a receptionist in an art gallery), also defies the social paradigm by being way uptight and not being able to handle a goddamn pot brownie. She also wears suit dresses to work, like, unironically. Marnie is sexually uptight and her ethos is feminine without a feminist agenda, which goes against the Androgynous sexuality and alt-worldliness of modern day Hipsters, all of whom know the importance of a good blowjob. Her only Hipster cred came from dating a soft-spoken guy in a band, the card of which she relinquished this episode.

Hannah, the star, might seem like a hipster because her body type makes her unconventionally attractive. However, by showing her breasts on premium cable, she's just about as "subversive" as a SuicideGirl. (Or more specifically, those 'documentaries' about SuicideGirls that occasionally run on late-night premium cable channels.) Hannah lacks self-awareness while being the human embodiment of solipsism is a credit to her Hipsterism, as does her co-dependent relationship with a shut-in who demands to be dominated sexually (see also: the illusion of agency), though her botched seduction of her boss with the line "I want you know that it is okay to act on this fantasy, because I am gross and so are you," belies a level of self-awareness and a total lack of discerning taste that is very Not Hipster.

In conclusion, Girls is not pizza from Roberta's. It's a late-night diner owned by a family of Greeks and has an obscenely extensive menu that can be enjoyed by Hipsters and Normals alike.

Ray: The voice of our generation of coffee-monkeys?

2. Ray is a barista at Cafe Grumpy who criticizes a female customer’s attire and tells her, “I don’t even want to hate fuck you. It’s that real.” Imagine you are the owner of Cafe Grumpy. Would you allow HBO to film in your establishment? Why or why not?

If I were the owner of Grumpy's, I'd allow Girls to film in my establishment. It is free advertising, and its a well-known fact that the meaner the reputation of a coffee shop's baristas, the more Hipster clients they attract. I wonder if there's a FourSquare Girls badge I can get for checking in to Cafe Grumpy's? Cross-promotion!

Are we a society of Shoshannas?

3. After Jessa discovers that Shoshanna has been watching her have window-sill sex with her hat-wearing ex-boyfriend, she accuses her of being a “batshit little perv.” Given that the television audience is also avidly watching this sexual encounter, are we not also “batshit little pervs”? Should someone step on our balls?

Jessa is most likely on meth, and if the argument is that by watching a (fictional) sexual experience, we are somehow all voyeurs, than we have a lot bigger problems on our hands. I would probably be thrown in gross jail already for all the To Catch a Predator marathons I've sat through. Anyone who watches Law & Order: SVU would be chemically castrated. Also, the news.

Part two of this question deals with Adam telling Hannah to step on his balls. For this, I will refer to a "Savage Love" column from 2005:

I’ve been sleeping with this man for two months. The sex is phenomenal – he loves to eat pussy, he tosses my salad, there’s some digital anal play. That’s all good. My problem is, he’s into rough ball play. It turns him on when I knee him in the balls, punch them or squeeze them. I’m OK with all this, but he wants me to "pop his balls." He’s a young-ish doctor, so he knows this is dangerous. I don’t want to make him a eunuch but he’s hell bent on me "destroying his manhood." Should I do it for him? He says he doesn’t want to have kids and that he doesn’t care if he loses his ability to have an erection or ejaculate. Should I do this for him? I’m 23, if that helps.
Reluctant Ball-Popper

Popper,
Before you destroy your boyfriend’s manhood, RBP, there’s one question you need to ask yourself: how will you feel if five years or, hell, five minutes after you do this for him, your boyfriend decides it was a big mistake? And I promise you, RBP, if you go through with this, your boyfriend will come to regret it – and when that day comes, he will resent and/or blame you. So just say no to ball popping, RBP, OK?
And while I don’t think it’s possible to have a healthy, long-term relationship with someone so insanely self-destructive, RBP, I can understand why you might want to keep seeing this nutjob in the short term (phenomenal sex, enthusiastic cunnilingus, tossed salads, etc). There are ways to indulge his castration fetish without destroying his balls. Buy him a male chastity device (just Google "CB-3000") and throw away the key. If that’s not extreme enough for him, chemically castrate him by injecting him with Depo-Provera, a drug that sexual predators are sometimes ordered to take and one he could, I presume, prescribe to himself. Maybe after experiencing a short-term, reversible castration, your boyfriend will conclude that castration is a better fantasy than it is a reality.

In conclusion, never step on a man's balls, unless it is figuratively. Even if he asks you too. It could literally kill him. Hannah's reaction "Are you fucking kidding me?" was an appropriate response. So was taking a $100 from his dresser, because she deserves it!

4. A flashback sequence is set at the Galactic Safe Sex Ball at Oberlin in 2007. Were you at this particular event? Is the party favor that makes Marnie so fucked up really called a “poprati” with a Jell-o shot on top, or did I hear that wrong? What is it? Can you hook me up?

I think it's a pot brownie with a jell-o shot on top, which is something I've never personally experienced. However, if you look closely in the background of that scene, you can see me and my taking turns being blindfolded and swinging at a Klonopinata, which is like a regular pinata but filled with delicious pills. It is also true that all our parties were in someone's off-campus basement, and we only listened to the Scissor Sisters. Every three months in Brooklyn, alumni gather for a reunion where they drink 40s, eat too much pot, and then spend the rest of the night giving one another panic attacks. Maybe that was the "poprati" or "pot party" being referenced?

Ira Ames is so confused (HBO)

5. Hannah invites her boss, Rich, to have sex with her because “I am gross and so are you.” But seriously, why does she do this? Why does she subsequently quit what seems like a pretty good job?

Hannah tries to sleep with Rich because Jessa told her too, and Jess is the expert when it comes to healthy boundaries at work. Hannah believes that sleeping with her boss will give her great material for her upcoming collection of personal essays, which she is not wrong about. ("The time I slept with my gross boss" is definitely a New Yorker piece in the making.) After being rebuffed by an older man who had previously shown sexual interest--or at least was really touchy--Hannah is understandably upset. No one wants to be the person to gross to get molested, especially if the molester looks like a rabbi and is best known for playing the dad on Bored to Death. (Or ex-boy scout Stanley Uris in It, with Tim Curry as the scary clown.)

In this scene, it is Rich who acts nonsensically. No boss in history would continue to employ someone with no skill set because she's "great." Especially after said employee threatens to seduce her superior, quit, and start a class action-lawsuit against her boss for sexual harassment. In that order. Unless Rich secretly wants his balls crushed, Hannah's behavior is not only nonsensical, but cause for a restraining order.

Just chatting about 'Girls' (HBO)

In which the voices of their generations (or two voices…of two generations) discuss The World’s Most Important Show, seeking common ground on the series’ hot-button issues. Like that stuff that comes up around the sides, etc.

Back to Races; Meditations on Creepy Father Figures

Generation Y:  I'm so glad we didn't jump the gun with accusing the show of racism before Lena Dunham got herself some Mexican eyebrows.
Generation X: We also had a black nanny. And maybe a Tibetan nanny.
Generation Y: And a gay redhead nanny...
Generation X: And Jessa very eagerly taking up their cause.
Generation Y: We're learning a lot more about Jessa, I think. Because how creepy is that dad that she's always digging? And why do really beautiful, confident women always end up with daddy issues?
Generation X: Jessa's confidence has always seemed a little thin.
Generation Y: Though it does round out her character. She's now more than just "snobby Brit."
Generation X: And if I may speak for the creepy dads out there. We're people too.
Generation Y: Aaron, I see you as more of the best friend of the creepy dad. So: what is with your "ass like Rihanna" comment? Do old people know about Rihanna's ass? Is it great?  I feel like Shakira would be a better, more outdated reference.
Generation X: I think Rihanna is a beautiful woman. but yes, I'm a devotee of Shaki. I interviewed her once and remain wholeheartedly in love. Partly because she was wearing a Psychedelic Furs t-shirt and, well, they were this band that like, in the 80s... Drew, I imagine you've done some babysitting. How creepy are these dads?

Generation Y: I've actually never babysat. I'm pretty sure no one will let me hold a child, let alone watch one.
Generation X: Now you never will.
Generation Y: I've had a lot more of Hannah's boss than I've had Jessa's.
Generation X: Yes, another creepy older man. This seems to be a recurring motif. I have to say I'm beginning to feel as if my demographic is really being insulted by this series.  I'm your boss... I don't believe I've ever been that handsy. Have I?
Generation Y: nope
Generation X: I mean nominally your boss...Your editor.
Generation Y: I do think there's definitely a thing, a "trend" you can say, of bosses being able to turn the sexual harassment thing around. By addressing it and making sure you're down.
Generation X: Really?
Generation Y: Like I've had bosses say "You're okay with this, right?" implying that of course I had to be, and that to say "no" would involve a lot more weirdness.
Generation X: I'm taking notes... HAHA. Just kidding!
Generation Y:  ...
Generation Y: Anyway,  I worked once with this guy, a former MTV exec, and he'd listen to Howard Stern ALL DAY and just make comments about my weight.
Generation X: Right. Well as I noted before I was trained back in the 90s to be terrified of harassing people. It's really held me back in my career I suspect. And personal life. What comments did your boss make about your weight?
Generation Y: I had a cold once and I had the sniffles. My boss looked at me and said, "I thought cocaine was supposed to make you thinner.”
Generation X: Wow. I'm sure you have a claim.
Generation Y: As a temp (which was what I was) you don't really have a claim, because you don't really work there. I think the two coworkers of Hannah's had the same attitude I did. Which was like "Whatever, he lets me come in late." It's the #1 most important quality in a job for me...
Generation X : Right. Which got me thinking maybe I'm playing it too safe?
Generation Y: Yes Aaron, I think if there's anything holding you back from being a Raiki-loving dental hygienist, or whatever, it's that you don't grab your employees' asses enough. Also why was that office circa The Tracey Ullman Show?
Generation X: Well I believe reiki is actually done without touching. For all you know I'm doing it to you right now. I might be reiki-harassing all the girls in the office.  The boys too.
Generation Y: I've actually had experience with reiki, my ex-boyfriend's mom did it to my face. You have to be kind of close to the person, but not touching. It's not a Jedi mind trick (it's kind of a Jedi mind trick).
Generation X: Well fortunately the rules at the Observer are clear. Nobody here would ever date anyone else who worked here, under any circumstances, so...
Generation Y: I just Google image searched "reiki face" and everyone is getting touched in it.
Generation X : Hmmmm....Perhaps I'm doing it all wrong.
Generation Y: Haha. Once again, your problems stem from a LACK of touching.

Sextism and Body Image

Generation X: So about this dick pic. Need a quick lesson here. Is that the same as sexting?
Generation Y: Yes. Kind of. Sexting is like, God....everyone has their ideas on it. It can get a little vague and all-encompassing. But dick pics are like, the definition of sexting. That is what you should be worried your kids are doing in school with their post-9/11 cell phones.
Generation X: So this is a common thing? Have you ever actually received one of these photographs?
Generation Y: Not of dicks. Dicks are gross-looking.
Generation X: I...um...
Generation Y: I mean to get as a photo. Who is looking for that?
Generation X: That's what I would think... But it seems to be a common thing among people of your age.
Generation Y: Maybe on Grindr.  Boob photos are always thumbs up.
Generation X: No doubt.
Generation Y: Though for some reason I've always used email to send those kind of pictures on my phone. Higher resolution, i think.
Generation X: But less immediate.
Generation Y: Life is full of trade offs. I did kind of love how that's Hannah's response to finding out Adam sexted the wrong person. Like, you know she's going to text him back. But then: BLAM! Boobs!
Generation X: Yeah, was that the first time she really went full on?
Generation Y: In this program, yes. Though I feel like Lena Dunham, as an actress, has taken off her shirt so many times that it's making me uncomfortable. Like I don't see my friends or sister naked as much as I see Lena Dunham.
Generation X: I would not be surprised if overweight people start getting a bit more action because of Lena Dunham's amazing courage.
Generation Y: Woof. Want to unpack that one? First: it's not "courageous" to show boobs on HBO, just because you aren't a size 4. They're still boobs. She's not obese or disfigured.
Generation X: Well at first I was like, "How brave of her to show her average body." But by the fifth time she got naked I was like, "Man....she's hot!"
Generation Y: Right?
Generation X: She is desensitizing our whole culture to fatness.
Generation Y: I don't think she's fat! But maybe I'm just a lot more body-conscious than you.
Generation X: I can't really afford to be body conscious. I'm old.
Generation Y: Well on another level, I totally agree with you. Because I remember years ago, I told Lena that she was going to be the female Seth Rogen and get guys to be into the chubby girl thing....and then i felt bad about it, even though it ended up being exactly true.
Generation X:  Did she seem offended?
Generation Y:  No...but then again, I probably went into her journal that night.

Boning with Siblings

Generation Y: I was surprised she went so analog with the journal thing. I think that realistically, Hannah would just have a Twitter feed called @Charlie'sMangina or like, a LiveJournal.
Generation X: Right. Well that journal is where she works on being the voice of her generation.
Generation Y: So a Tumblr, then. Or a Thought Catalog entry.
Generation X:  What I don't believe is that exchange between Charlie and Ray.
Generation Y: What didn't you believe about it?
Generation X: Well this sex talk. I don't really see guys doing that. Ray saying he'd like to tie Hannah to a post or whatever?
Generation Y: I mean, first of all, doesn't charlie NOT live with them? So what the hell was he doing, letting his friend snoop around? His reaction was also totally whack and not in-character. Like, everything we know about Charlie says that a) he'd respect boundaries and b) he'd never do something confrontational in public.
Generation X: It felt very contrived. Most interesting element of that for me was Ray saying "For once I want to have sex with someone who looks like me."
Generation Y: That's a thing.
Generation X: I couldn't help thinking it made for a sort of veiled retort to Jenna Wortham and the race issue.
Generation Y: Nah, this was written way before that.  But I think wanting to have sex with an attractive version of yourself is reasonable. I was oddly proud of this guy in college that I dated, because everyone confused us for siblings.
Generation X: But it is an interesting counterpoint. He cites his family members as potential hookups. I guess I would prefer to date someone hotter than myself.
Generation Y:  Right, well, there's a difference between looking like someone and being related...
Generation Y: I guess.

'Jewish Camp'

Generation X: On to Shoshanna's hookup. Did you go to a Jewish camp?
Generation Y: I went to a Catholic camp, but my boyfriend cracked up at every single line in that bit about the girl who gets stuck between two kayaks, so I assume he did. But for some reason, Delaware didn't have a Jewish camp, so we went to the Catholic camp instead.
Generation X: A catholic camp? What the hell?
Generation Y: Yeah. They had mini-communions, and we made Eyes of God with string and Popsicle sticks.
Generation X: You could always have gone to Maryland...
Generation Y: Well you take a time machine and tell that to my parents 20 years ago.
Generation X: I don't know what to say about Shoshanna's encounter. I feel creepy even talking about it.
Generation Y:  It was AMAZING. I love how the dude is like "You can touch it." You think he's talking about his leg in the brace, and then it pulls back to reveal his massive boner. And Shoshanna says "Not without kissing."
Generation X: She's right. Good for her.
Generation Y: Do you feel creepy because they sexualized the virgin? Or because Zosia Mamet might actually be a good enough actress that we buy the whole virgin act?
Generation X: Yeah. She's young and she seems even younger. Even thinking about her sex life feels wrong. I buy every minute of her performance.
Generation Y: I cannot reconcile Shoshana with (Mamet's) character on Mad Men, where she's the fast-talking, hard-drinking lesbian.
Generation X: Indeed. She's a really amazing actress.
Generation Y: I think that Shoshanna might just be a one-note character because she's not developed then, and not because of Ms. Mamet's performance. I kind of hate her dialogue, but that's not her fault. The way she kept saying "I'm not a bleeder, I totally won't get attached," when the guy wouldn't have sex with her.
Generation X: "I'm like the most unvirginy virgin ever." I think she has some layers. But the character’s also fairly consistent. Whereas some of the others don't seem to quite know what they're becoming.
Generation Y: Hey, kind of like 24-year-olds all over!

The Voice of Occupy Wall Street's Generation?

Generation X: I did think the scene, like a lot of this episode, was undeveloped and a little cheap.
Generation Y: I mean, that's what the show has going for it: no one can be "a Samantha" or "a Carrie" because these characters keep trying on different roles, as confused new grown-ups tend to do.
Generation X: For me the show is already in a slump. Feels by-the-numbers.
Generation Y: How so?
Generation X: Another example: Jessa's losing of those kids played very flat to me. I have lost my children so I can tell you it's a bit more dramatic than that.
Generation Y: Well, she found them right away. Or that other nanny did...wait, you've lost your kids before?
Generation X: Why lose them if you're going to find them in 30 seconds? I mean, from a writing standpoint.
Generation Y: To show that side of Jessa: that she's all this bluster about union-forming when she's too flaky to actually do her job. She IS the Occupy Wall Street generation, Aaron.
Generation X: Yeah, I get it. Maybe that's the problem.  The mechanism of the show is starting to creak a bit.
Generation Y: Maybe you just hate my generation?
Generation X: I think you guys are awesome. You're just not as awesome as you think. Or maybe you are. I don't give a shit. Fuck you all.
Generation Y: Look: obviously we do not care about you guys, why should you care about us?
Generation X: Um, because you are trying to kill us?
Generation Y: Lena doesn't write older characters very well, as we've already established, and this show is very navel-gazing. So i would get it completely if it doesn't ring true for you oldies, because watching a generation of self-absorbed 20-somethings must be as realistic as like... me trying to relate to Friends, pre-Fat Chandler.

Cheers and Jeers

Generation X: Okay, so I know you are dying to talk about Hannah's speech to Adam.
Generation Y: SO GOOD...and moving! Fake eyebrows and all.
Generation X:  I agree. Beautifully done.
Generation Y: No one can write Lena like Lena.
Generation X: Funny how that works.
Generation Y: Also, i know it's kind of cliched in comedies to give that kind of speech, and then immediately act counter-intuitively. But like I said, I think it does show growth in the character.
Generation X: Yeah. I have seen that before. On Cheers.
Generation Y:  God you love Cheers.
Generation X: I hate Cheers.
Generation Y: You mention Cheers like, twice a recap.
Generation X: I hated almost everything we had to watch back then. But there was nothing else on.
Generation Y: Is Girls our generation's Cheers? No one has asked that question.
Generation X:  We hate-watched a whole two decades go by.
Generation Y:  you guys had hate-watching back then?
Generation X:  We didn't have a name for it because it was just what we did. It was like breathing.
Generation Y: Fascinating! I thought Gabe Delahaye created hate-watching to write True Blood recaps for Videogum.
Generation X:  Reagan was president.
Generation Y: Max Headroom was king.
Generation X: If I said 'Shazbot" would you even know what I was talking about????
Generation Y: Is that something Gary Shandler said? or called himself?

Questionable Taste

Generation X:  So. What did you think of Questionable Goods? Charlie's band.
Generation Y: I definitely know bands like that. that was all of college, summed up in a band. Except for our campus' ONE heavy-metal band, which did Mountain Goats covers,  and practiced at my house.
Generation X: It made me feel a lot better about not getting to Williamsburg more often.
Generation Y: I will say: I feel like if I ever saw a show's like Charlie's in Williamsburg, complete with a journal reading, I just might burn down everything from Kent Ave. till I hit the Marcy projects.
Generation Y: In conclusion, fuck williamsburg and music.

The End...?

Generation X: I feel like we should say something about this incredible invasion of privacy. But frankly, I didn't buy it. I thought the thing about your generation, as you noted, is that you have no private lives.
Generation Y: yeah
Generation X: Which is it? Secret journals or dick pics. You can't have both.
Generation Y: I think that this would have worked better as a conceit in general, to have Charlie find out Marlie's feelings via Facebook, or Tumblr. Because in reality, that's how most of us find out our relationships are over.
Generation Y:  "Oh, they clicked that we are no longer in a relationship. better call and see what's up."
Generation X: I do think Charlie proved he doesn't have a vagina after all by doing that performance. It was fairly ballsy.
Generation Y:  it was kind of a bitch move, though, because he's getting this from a third-hand source. Like his girlfriend's friend's diary is the barometer for his relationship? That might be WORSE than Facebook.
Generation X: Yeah... I thought storming off the stage sort of ruined the effect. And Marnie's reaction was a little silly.
Generation Y: Jessa's reaction was nonsensical. "Awesome"? Was seeing your friends completely humiliated really "awesome," Jessa?
Generation X: This is where I think the show is beginning to teeter a bit. It's cheapening itself for those easy dramatic moments or yuks.
Generation Y: Well, only one way to find out! If there was a cooler, more 2.0-way to say "tune in next week" that'd be what I'd say here.

Style

Generation X: I noticed an interesting leitmotif in this episode—people not dressing the way they're supposed to. It starts with Charlie's haircut, then we have Hannah's goth look, Jessa's see-through dress, and Elijah, the gay ex-boyfriend, with his scarf. And there’s even a discussion of him shaving his beard in college, which made Hannah cry.
Generation Y: Yes. Sometimes people in our generation dress differently, because they are still trying to find their identity, or because someone in their office has cancer, or, I think in Jessa's case, because she is a giant weirdo.
Generation X: But what's funny to me is they actually don't really dress that differently at all. You look around the city and everyone is in uniform. There used to be these things called punks, for instance, with mohawks...
Generation Y: Um, hipsters are DEFINED by an image, Aaron.
Generation X: True. Anyway, I find it interesting in the show that so many conversations are aout people enforcing a narrow set of costumes for each other.
Generation Y: They are defined by their deep insecurities of how people will perceive them
thus: a scarf, to represent one's wordliness, a goth outfit, to represent that you are in a weird, slutty mood. When Hannah gets all gothed up, I read that as her "you can't tell me I'm a little girl" retaliation. Like, she was putting on an identity that Adam wouldn't be able to infantalize.
Recently, a friend came to this really fratty party I invited her to, dressed totally in goth and when I asked her what was up, she said "It's called looking GOOD on a Saturday night!" But the thing is, she never dresses like that. I think it was a reaction to going to a preppy event.
Generation X: I bet she did look good.
Generation Y: No, she really didn’t. Think black lipstick. (Also it was my sister.) Charlie could have handled this better than having his girlfriend close her eyes and surprising her with an "American History X" haircut.
Generation X: I supposed I particularly enjoyed that scene because when I was in my 20s, my girlfriend once cut her hair off, and I was horrified. It was a big deal. She looked like a “lady.”
Generation Y: I had Charlie's haircut all through college.
Generation X: Really!?
Generation Y: Yup. Shaved head. I looked dope.
Generation X: Can this internet thing display images?

Generation X: Cute.
Generation Y: See that giant bruise? I was a baller. I could pull of a shaved head because i have good bone structure! In terms of changing my look every five minutes to fit my identity, yes, i definitely did that.
Generation X: Did you find it upset guys?
Generation Y: This guy dumped me the first time I shaved my head, and subsequently through college we would hook up, but everytime I would cut my hair he would refuse to. Eventually I learned my lesson, I guess?
Generation X: Maybe it helped you weed out a bad suitor... You tested him and he failed.
Generation Y: True. Eventually I learned my own self-worth, and grew my hair out!
Generation X: I stuck it out with my short haired girlfriend and now we are married. And her hair is grown out.
Generation Y: Wow! Score one, Generation X! So when Charlie told Marnie why he shaved his head, she says something like "Oh, now I'm the asshole because you did it for cancer!" The levels of solipsism in this program are truly amazing.
Generation X: Right, which extends the theme we saw last week during the famous vaginal exam, in which Hannah joked about wanting AIDS—the notion of being too blithe or shallow in the face of something deadly serious. This anxiety about not being serious enough is really central to Girls and perhaps to the generation you belong to. It’s repeated when the little girl Jessa is babysitting says "I wish I was homeless.”
Generation Y: Anxiety of not being serious enough...or just not taking things seriously enough?
Generation X: Not living a real life i suppose. A sense of inauthenticity, which certainly we had as well in my day, but maybe not so acutely...
Generation Y: Well, that's why babysitting is so great for Jessa. She gets to live in a la-la world of over precocious children, and she is an overly precocious child
i thought the "dad trying to smoke pot and hit on the babysitter" cliche was kind of tired.
Generation X: I hope so because my daughter is now babysitting.

STDs

Generation X: So Hannah did actually have some serious news this week, her HPV.
Generation Y: But again, how serious is that? Here is where I found the MOST hedging and Lena wanting it both ways, because HPV is pretty serious, but as a culture we're still not sure HOW serious. We’re told everyone has it, and there are shots for it (which Hannah is still eligible for), and there are like, different types of strains of it, most of which them don't do anything? Herpes would have been better. Or maybe it's the perfect disease, because we're still in the dark about it and people don't know how to act about it.
Generation X: It's a metaphor. Um, illness as a metaphor.
Generation Y: But can I make several points here? (1) Guys CAN get tested for HPV
(it's just not that common, unless they have symptons). And (2) You can't really get HPV if you wear condoms. I think those were my main two points.
Generation X: Okay, but (1) no they can't. Just checked the internet! And (2 ) what about that notorious stuff that comes up around the sides?
Generation Y: I stand corrected.
Generation X: Either way there is a vaccine and we should probably all go get itl If we're under 28 or something. The preceeding has been a public service announcement from the New York Observer.
Generation Y: See, okay, perfect example. Apparently I am just as clueless as Hannah about HPV, so maybe that shows it's the perfect disease to use on the show. Also: it's very 'in' right now, because of the Republican debates.
Generation X: So Adam is lying. We establish that. But Hannah feels bad for accusing him and wonders, "Will you still have sex with me?"
Generation Y: My first thought was he was lying, then I thought "this dude probably gets tested a lot" and doesn't notice whether he's being tested for HPV.
Generation X: That scene reminded me of this terrible but indelible episode of Taxi, where this very overweight woman has a date with Judd Hirsch. And he blows her off and then she says, "Can I still call you...like if I need a hug?"
Generation Y: Your ability to bring up old Nick'at'Nite shows to compare to Girls is amazing.
Generation X: Nick at Night? Listen we didn’t have cable. These annoying sitcoms like Taxi were all we had. This is the most excruciating scene on television ever. Judd Hirsch and Alan Alda are the sort of men guys of my generation were taught to be. Which is why Charlie has a vagina. Please enjoy. Start around 6:00.

Generation Y: So in this scenario, Lena is the fat girl?
Generation X: I didn't say that. I would never say that. Because I was raised on things like Taxi.
Generation Y: I dont know who this is more offensive to, Jews or fat people. Anyway, back to the matter at hand, would you feel the need to tell an ex if you found out you had HPV?
Generation X: I thought Shoshanna had very sensible advice, but maybe too sensible? More than a year later, with a non-deadly disease, perhaps one wouldn't bother. Is that bad?
Generation Y: I totally agree.
Generation X: Maybe just tweet it out, it and if he's a follower, great.
Generation Y: She calls up an ex she hasn't talked to in TWO YEARS, invites him out to dinner
for the express purpose of telling him he might have given her HPV...
Generation X: It's played as a demonstration of her narcissism, and what a great scene. Elijah is played by Andrew Rannells from the Book of Mormon.
Generation Y: Amazing.
Generation X: To me the really extraordinary thing here is that Hannah is really upset. She tears up at the idea that he was gay all along. That's the first time we've seen her show real emotion.
Generation Y: It makes sense. That was her only real relationship... Then he confirms that she was "handsome," basically that he could tolerate sex with her because she was manly.
Generation X: It feels very honest, because she's terrified under all her bravado she's not attractive, and this sort of confirms her worst fears. Meanwhile, she's talking about how she lets Adam "hit me on the side of my body." Which...um...
Generation Y: That happens.
Generation X: It’s not playing as funny for me as it might be intended.
Generation Y: Yeah, i think it tries to strike (no pun intended) a certain tone that it misses.

Baggage

Generation X: Ok, next issue. I spotted a black person on this episode. Who was it?
Generation Y: Maya Angelou?

Generation X: Nope. It's a trick question! We don't actually see her. The woman from Baggage. Shoshannah is watching this show on the Game Show Network. And they identify a contestant as black. The one whose little baggage is that she "spends a month on a weave."
Generation Y: So does Kim from real housewives. She's white.
Generation X: But it brings up an important question: What is your baggage, Drew?
Generation Y: Oh, that's difficult! Smallest baggage: I fell asleep for an hour in the bathroom stall yesterday.
Generation X: Good one.
Generation Y: Medium baggage: I am more impressed by celebrities than real people. I would be a starfucker if I didn't have a boyfriend.
Generation X: He kind of is a star... come on, now!
Generation Y: Largest baggage: Um, I totally understood why it was funny that Hannah gets punched during sex.
Generation X: Well, I wondered where that bruise of yours came from, but I wasn't going to say anything...
Generation Y: At the time, I thought it was funny, and now everyone is like "Drew, you know that time you were super proud of those bruises? That wasn't cool."
Generation X: Well, I'm glad that's over and your hair is longer and your boyfriend is semi-famous.
Generation Y: And he doesn't beat me during sex! Just to clarify! Different dude!
Generation X: Not that you asked, but mine in no particular order are that I have three kids, a dog, a minivan (red), and I am at least an inch shorter than I think.
Generation Y: Haha, that's actual baggage. That's like me saying "I have a suitcase that's really heavy."

Hotness on the High Line

Generation Y: Okay, on to Jorma from Lonely Island. how hot was he?
Generation X: Well... yeah. I don't know! Marnie seemed impressed.
Generation Y: I was very impressed. That line was the casual equivalent of beating a chick during sex, or wait.
Generation X: Whoa.
Generation Y: Take two:
Generation X: No. IT WASN'T.
Generation Y: What I’m saying is he takes Adam-like ownership—
Generation X: Disclaimer: The New York Observer and its affiliates do not endorse...
Generation Y: And is like "I am going to have sex with you, and it's going to be scary.” I was very into it.
Generation X: Right. That's hot. I'm using that line. Or I would if I didn’t have three kids, a wife, a minivan. It is a classic line though: "because I'm a man and I know how to do things..."
Generation Y: It is confusing...do what things? Sex things? Why would that be scary?
Generation X: I don't know. To me it sounded silly. I can’t imagine Judd Hirsch saying that. But if it works for her, ok!
Generation Y: Maybe he's referring to a Don Draper level of dominance...
Generation X: He had me at "the High Line is kind of bullshit." Talk about daring television. NOBODY disses the High Line.
Generation Y: That's baffling. The High Line is the best.
Generation X: By the way, I thought the gallery scene sucked—as most art-world satires do.
Generation Y: But that's how gallery parties are!
Generation X: And if anyone should be able to get the art world right, it's Lena Dunham who did a web series all about it and grew up in it.
Generation Y: Those parties all suck so bad you want to gnaw your own wrists off.
Generation X: I count that scene among the worst art world send-ups of all time.
Generation Y: There's a Sex and the City episode—(sorry!)—where Charlotte is working in a gallery and a movie star tries to buy the fire extinguisher that was very Duchamp. Also, I don't think you have to hide in a bathroom if you want to masturbate in an art gallery.

Babysitting

Generation X: Moving right along. The baby sitting seen with James LeGros scene was a nice generational detente. I do relate to that forlorn dad, sort of pathetically going out to see a friend’s band...
Generation Y: But also: super creepy? Don't smoke pot with a babysitter.
Generation X: Right. Never ever.
Generation Y: Even if they want to.
Generation X: Note to self.
Generation Y: Even if they offer. It's just bad news
Generation X: Favorite line: "Daddy, are you eating my school snack?"
Generation Y: Haha.
Generation X: “Sometimes Daddies need snacks...” Yes, when we’re HIGH.
Generation X: Okay, the episode ends with a very lovely girl-bonding moment dancing to, um...
Generation Y: Robyn!
Generation X: Oh, that’s right.
Generation Y: My sister told me. We might need to bring her into this, since this show is apparently tailored to 24-year-olds.
Generation X: A millennial? God, no.
Generation Y: But as to that scene, Marnie seemed...more loose than usual. I wonder why?
Generation X: I think it's adorable to see Hannah owning her HPV on Twitter—that was so Sex and the City and also so Doogie Howser, M.D.
Generation Y: But also like neither of those things because it's TWITTER, so you can't write it like a diary. You have to be vague.
Generation X: And then dancing with herself which I thought was really sweet until Marnie came along and acted so painfully adorable. Nothing against Alison Williams but I am begining to think she thinks she’s in a different show. A much sappier, more mainstream show.
Generation Y: Her character doesn't fit with anyone else.
Generation X: I had a premonition of all the bad movies she is going to star in in years to come.
Generation Y: Ha! I saw her on Letterman she was literally the worst, most boring interview ever, but she's very nice in real life. Proving, I guess, that nice, well-adjusted people don't make for good television. Long Live Girls!

In which the voices of their generations (or two voices...of two generations) discuss

SEX

Gen X: This deal between Hannah and Adam, help me out. Is this like the “fuck buddy” thing I have heard so much about? Or is it Friends with Benefits? Or is it maybe the famed NSA?

Gen Y: Isn’t that the government? They are friends with benefits, I think that's pretty clear. Or no. Fuck buddies. That's what we call them, because they aren't friends.

Gen X: Ah...

Gen Y: They don't move in the same social circle, so they are fuck buddies. That is the definitive word on their relationship until he asks her to marry him. (SPOILER ALERT?)

Gen X: Ha. So this is a real thing you kids do? I'm intrigued. How does such a relationship work? I just really want to understand...

Gen Y: Well, you see them around. And you text. Usually, this is where most sexting happens, because girls want to prove they are down with it and guys are testing the boundaries of what is sexually acceptable without doing it with a girl they like too much and are therefore fearful of upsetting.

Gen X: Let’s talk about the bad sex controversy. How bad is this bad sex? And is consensual sex ever really all that bad? Like, compared to no sex at all?

Gen Y: She likes it. What makes it bad? It's awkward and it's uncomfortable for us to watch but to jump to the "she's having abusive sex because she has low self-esteem" is kind of...I don't know, too pat? I feel like even if everything else in her life was going great, Hannah would still like Adam, and he does seem genuinely interested in her at moments, and far be it for us to judge other people's fuck-buddies. He might also be the only person in her life calling her out on bullshit.

Gen X: I have to agree on this. I find Frank Bruni and Katie Roiphe, both of whom seem to be a little traumatized by these sex scenes, suspiciously over-eager to denounce this terrible sex. My theory is that this is generational. The problem is, we're old. We're not young and hot like you kids. So all we've got is, we basically have figured out how to do it. Saying the sex in Girls is horrible and dispiriting is a way of saying, “I have great sex all the time and I love it.” The more fumbling and awkward this Gen Y sex is, the less despondent middle-aged shlubs have to feel.

Gen Y: You figured out how to have sex that looks good on TV? I think you are in the wrong business, then.

Gen X: Well, it would look good in theory if we were somewhat more trim. Maybe? I mean, no. But I think the subtext in that criticism is, “We may be old but at least we know whether to move back and forth!”

Gen Y: Realistically, most people's sex would look awkward and weird to anyone watching. She's showing something different than normal TV sex, which is frightening to people, because it's not sexy-sex. The thing is, people love to talk about Lena being so "brave" for always putting herself in awkward sex scenes in her own movies. The last time anyone was that "brave" was Jason Segel going full-frontal flaccid in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and that was not in a sexual context.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is: fuck the haters. Literally. and Awkardly. Because that's what sex is. Girls sex is 100 times more authentic than any sex I've ever seen on tv or online, and that includes porn.

FINANCES

Gen X: I’ve got to say, I graduated amid a terrible economy, too. I didn’t even know it. It wasn’t treated as a national emergency, and unlike now, the society as a whole made no expression of concern about what kids my age were going to do. They called us slackers. It was ugly for awhile, but we worked it out. The idea of taking money from our parents was unthinkable. This was the Die Yuppie Scum era. We’d sooner have found a squat. (Although my folks did pay for me to go to NYU, which was very generous of them.)

I wound up taking some pretty bad jobs, including a very brief stint at a “mens’ sophisticate” magazine. Totally bleak, but I learned Quark and how to write fake sex confessions on deadline. What I want to know is, is everyone your age really having your “groovy lifestyles” bankrolled by mom and dad? Have you kids no shame?

Gen Y: I feel a mix between Adam and Hannah's character here. Like no, I don't take my parents money! I mean, my dad's checks helped SUBSIDIZE me when I was laid off from blogging at Jossip but I totally paid him back later, I think?

Gen X: You also hustled up some money working for this website ASSME.org that I used to run. You were a go-getter. And the link is now dead because basically I remain a slacker.

Gen Y: True! A friend is in a similar situation, having just graduated, and without her parents help she wouldn't have landed a paying job after months of unpaid internships. So, in response: yes, we take your money after you just bankrolled our liberal arts education. But it will pay off dividends when we give you a shout-out in our memoir.

Gen X: If you treat us anything like Lena Dunham is treating Hannah's parents, no thanks!

PARENTS

Gen Y: Wait, those parents were AWFUL. The mom from Freaks and Geeks has gotten so mean!

Gen X: What assholes. I don't buy them for a second, do you?

Gen Y: Nobody's parents are BOTH professors. And if they are, they aren't getting a lakehouse. Also, professor parents wouldn't just cut you off like that. You can tell the dad is wavering, as he should be.

Gen X: I think cutting someone off without any notice after two years of paying the full freight is a stretch.

Gen Y: Yeah, and it IS cheaper to be on a family cell phone plan!

Gen X: True, although not if she's doing a lot of streaming...

Gen Y: Right: it's like, what's the mitgating circumstances? They came to town just to give her horrible news? Do they expect her to move back in with them, which would be the other option?

Gen X: I do think Lena Dunham is trying to have it both ways in this scene. Hannah is written as self-absorbed and spoiled, but she's turned the parents into monsters as a way of rationalizing Hannah's behavior.

Gen Y: Maybe it's a scare tactic: sink or swim. Although we definitely see that push hurting Hannah in terms of her internship.

INTERNSHIPS

Gen X: I wouldn't have ever considered taking an internship after college. I'm not sure that was so common in years past. We worked at porn magazines instead. Admittedly, I've hired and exploited a few interns over the years. But they can be more work than they’re worth.

Gen Y: How believable was that? That an employer would fire you from an internship? (I already know the answer to that question, by the way, as I have been relieved of many internship duties.) It's true about Photoshop though.

Gen X: Those Asians with their Photoshop!

Gen Y: Why doesn't anyone tell you in college that Photoshop will be the ONE THING you need in the real world?

Gen X: I think Hannah’s employer is another example of a thinly drawn character whose only purpose is to make her seem more likeable, which to me shows a loss of nerve on Dunham's part.

Gen Y: I mean, he's played for humorous effect...I don't think it's a "loss of nerve," because look, the show is a comedy and not a documentary or a Herzog film. And it's true that if you hit up employers for jobs after interning, they'll be like "Why buy the cow?"

Gen X: In terms of sex, it is practically a documentary or a Herzog film! That aspect is plenty nervy. But Dunham is more willing to show her character's supposed physical flaws than her moral or emotional ones.

Gen Y: You sound like you should write her memoir, Aaron.

Gen X: I think she's nailed the sense of entitlement, though. It’s pretty clear that in more than a year as an intern, she hasn't done much to make herself necessary to the company. Still, she expects to be given a job just because she wants one. The guy is an asshole, but a year seems like plenty of time to figure out a way to become useful.

Gen Y: True. She hadn't been doing their twitter feed? What WAS she doing? The entitlement is true to life. I've been in so many fights with roommates waiting for their parents' checks to clear for their rent.

Gen X: We've had interns here at the Observer who were hired full time, and others who weren't but really wanted to be. It's hard to disappoint people, but even the Gen Y kids aren't quite full enough of themselves to believe, like Hannah does, that just asking is enough.

Gen Y: Sure she could have started that Twitter feed on her own. That would have shown motivation.

Gen X: I do think the internship scene tells us something about Hannah that will hopefully be explored a bit more, which is that despite being the smartest person in the series, she's got some tremendous blind spots and has not quite earned that beleaguered attitude of hers.

Gen Y: Agreed.

GIRLFRIENDS

Gen Y: But moving on: what's really unbelievable is that she's been living with her best friend for two years and they don’t hate each other. I lived with my only two female friends in one apartment after college. Guess how many of them I still talk to? And/or haven't blocked on Facebook?

Gen X: I love it how you girls all wake up spooning each other. I think I saw a post on your Tumblr where you and your sister were doing that.

Gen Y: Yes, but we're sisters. Also, we don't shower together.

Gen X: How about shaving your legs?

Gen Y: Nope. But we had a small tub. Also, even though we lived together, my sister never plodded around the house in her underwear when my boyfriend was over.

Gen X: And did your boyfriend walk into the bathroom all the time, then stand there awkwardly watching the girls take pregnancy tests or whatever? Is that a thing nowadays?

Gen Y: To be fair, he was high. On that stuff I've never even heard of! Opium twigs?

Gen X: Opium tea. A nice touch. I thought.

Gen Y: Is that really legal?

Gen X: We should see if you can actually buy that in the flower district.

Gen Y: Shit, I'll be down in Chinatown, catch you tomorrow.

Gen X: Send an intern. Maybe they can figure out how to make a living!

Gen Y: (I'm actually going to Chinatown tomorrow, I can check.)

Gen X: I think it would be more on West 28th street, Chelsea. You might be thinking of Chinatown in, like, 1895?

Gen Y: Haha. Right. Where there are opium basements and sometimes Sherlock Holmes is there.

Gen X: I did like that shout-out to Twix. But back to sharing the bathtub...

Gen Y: Girls might do that. Depending on how long they've known each other? I guess? At Oberlin (where Lena went), I remember this one chick always inviting me over for baths. And not in a gay way.

Gen X: The pilot has two bathroom scenes in one half hour—both with two girls and then a guy coming in.

Gen Y: Same guy. Charlie, you need to learn how to knock! I hate scenes where girls pee in front of each other and hand toilet paper over. They did that in Empire Records too.

Gen X: I suppose the bathroom scenes are the modern equivalent of "powdering our noses" in the little girls room.

Gen Y: Sure.

Gen X: But also sort of infantilizing.

Gen Y: I do love how nonsexual it is though.

Gen X: Maybe it’s Dunham's way of showing "realness." Because toilets are real and don't tend to show up on TV that often. “It's HBO, let's show them peeing.”

Gen Y: It takes away the fantasy of what happens when girls bathe together? Or pee together? It's weird that Marnie would watch Jessa pee when she seems so uptight. It just seems like a strange time to lecture.

Gen X: Agreed. Marnie would not hang out in there. And not to get too graphic, but Jessa seems to be sitting down for a long time. Until she mentions the pregnancy I had to wonder what exactly, you know, she was doing...

Gen Y: Lol. We don’t know Marnie and Jessa's relationship.

Gen X: I can accept that girls pee together, fine. But do they also do the other thing? Or would they say, hey, like, I'm going to do more than pee right now, so let's continue this chat later?

Gen Y: Aaron, I hate to dispel your male fantasy, but girls do not shit in front of each other, no matter how much opium Twix they are on.

Gen X: Good to know!

NAMECHECKS

Gen Y:  I have to say, I am very confused as to how good an actress Zosia Mamet is.

Gen X: I love her. But then I am a closet connoisseur of uptalk. I think we will have to redefine "Mamet-speak."

Gen Y: I loved her in Mad Men. But this weird JAP-py infantilization thing creeped me out.

Gen X: She is sort of the only character who is clearly defined out of the gate—you might say cartoonishly so. But the show does suffer a bit from the modern affliction of having just about every character sound the same.

Gen Y: Also I don't think we needed that Sex in the City reference, because the show is obviously trying to set itself apart from that, while recognizing that it will inevitably get compared to it. But a lot of people go OMG! It's trying to be Sex and the City!

Gen X: I also have to wonder about the Mary Tyler Moore reference. First, because it made no sense: in fact the show does not sound at all strange through a wall, or at least no stranger than anything else. But also because MTM is the pinnacle of situation comedy and to invoke it in the first episode of any show is simply madness.

Gen Y: Someone did compare Lena to Rhoda. Wasn't Rhoda the sister?

Gen X: Are you kidding? No! Rhoda was the friend. I couldn't help thinking of the pilot of that show, when Mary interviews with Lou Grant, which is perhaps my favorite sit-com moment ever.

Gen Y: YouTube'ing it!

During the cocktail hour preceding the screening, the premise of the show gave us an excuse to ask everyone : Who is your favorite vice president? Fortunately, guests were in a festive and charitable mood. No doubt they were already anticipating the post-screening filet mignon awaiting them at Porter House.

“You know what? I’ve never been asked that before,” Fran Lebowitz replied when we tracked her down in a corner of the 10th-floor reception area. "That’s a great question.” She thought a little. “Well, there was Johnson, and he became the president. Which is why you can’t nominate someone like Sarah Palin.”

Still, he wasn’t exactly her favorite. “I believe it’s possible that I do not have a favorite vice president. And if you asked a president he might say the same thing.”

Ms. Lebowitz was asked whether she’d been following the Republican primaries. “I feel more like they've been following me,” she said. “I see Santorum suspended his campaign today, so he doesn’t have to lose in his home state.” The Observer pointed out that Mr. Santorum was even unpopular in his home town. “Well, that isn’t such a bad thing,” she replied. "That’s why many of us came to New York!”

We put the question to her pal, Frank Rich, who is executive producing. “That is a great question!” he said. “Favorite? Not the greatest, right? I guess Lyndon Johnson. Lotta drama, Macbeth-like conniving...”

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly went with John Adams. “He was the first one, he had to figure out the job. And he had a son who became president,” he said. “So if I had to pick one...”—yes, you can only pick one, that’s the challenge—“Adams. There was an HBO series about him!” Asked whether he’d consider the role himself, he replied, “I have the best job in the world.” He always says that.

Bill Keller thought it was a great question. (We were beginning to think this was a stalling tactic.) “It’s gotta be gotta be Spiro Agnew. As a journalist, how could there be anything better than that? I mean the wristwatch in the safe? Come on!” (Did he actually say this? We think so. But when we Googled "wristwatch safe Agnew," we got nothing, so maybe that particular nugget never made it into the paper of record.)

“The rest of them are all pretty much a bucket of warm spit,” he added. (This, he definitely said—quoting FDR veep John Nance Garner.)

What did Mr. Keller think were the most important traits of a successful veep, we wondered. “A masochistic tendency for subservience,” he replied. Not to say they aren't strivers. “Ambition is the ambient quality for anyone seeking a top job in politics—heart-attack-making ambition,” he elaborated. “But in order to be vice president you have to be willing to supress that ambition so totally that you’re willing to be somebody’s bitch for four years.”

“Or eight,” we noted, before remembering he was no longer in any position to give us a job, so why try so hard?

“Yes, or eight.”

Prompted by Mr. Keller’s surprising use of the B-word in a non-canine context, we asked how he was adjusting to life after giving up the reigns of the Times (translation: was he maybe kind of losing it?). “I’m very happy,” he said. “I’ve got a lot more control of my life. I don’t have to be in a lot of meetings. I don’t have to be in any meetings, as a matter of fact. Life is good.”

We grabbed art-world scourge Morley Safer and hit him with the evening's query. He was quiet for a moment. “Trick question,” we said.

“Even worse for him—he’s Canadian,” offered his wife, Jane.

“I’d say Lyndon Johnson,” Mr. Safer said. “He became a great President. Though he didn’t like me very much.” Mr. Safer didn’t elaborate, but we suspected he was referring to his report on the burning of Cam Ne, which helped turn American public opinion against the Vietnam war.

Johnson hated the piece, of course. No doubt the nabobs of the art world know just how he felt. We asked Mr. Safer how they’d reacted to his latest 60 Minutes salvo, in which he visted Art Basel Miami Beach and wondered pointedly whether contemporary art wasn’t perhaps “the biggest scam since Hans Christian Andersen trotted out the Emperor’s new clothes.”

“The Gray Lady of The New York Times didn’t like it very much,” he said. “But she’s clueless.” In case you weren’t sure just which gray lady he meant, he added, “Ms. Smith,” i.e., Roberta Smith, who had pronounced the segment “tired and formulaic.” Mr. Safer added, “Critics like Ms. Smith are part of what’s wrong with contemporary art. She writes in this impenetrable prose that makes it all seem important. But that’s why what she says is meaningless.”

We moved on to the subject of his own art. Mr. Safer is himself a painter, who described his work as “mostly" figurative "but not necessarily.” Years ago, he even had a few shows. Is he still at it? “I’m desperate to do it but my day job keeps me pretty busy,” he said.

Later, we ran into Ms. Lebowitz again (yes, her day job is still writing a book—two, in fact). She had a question for us. “Did anyone name Al Gore?” she wondered. They hadn’t. “Aw, that's too bad,” she said.

Fred Rogers and Benjamin Wagner on Nantucket.

There are certain people one must simply never criticize. Call them the untouchables.

Nelson Mandela is one. Gandhi. Tina Fey. That guy from Wilco.

Even in this illustrious pantheon, though, Fred McFeely Rogers is in a class by himself—quite possibly the most universally beloved and venerated human being of all time. Even Jesus had a few enemies, right? Nobody doesn’t love Mister Rogers.

And yet, it has to be said: the minister turned low-key children’s television pioneer, the gentle soul who made the Keds Champion sneaker cool (and never took a dime of endorsement money)—did us wrong. In a what was no doubt a genuine attempt to protect young children from the brain-numbing evils of commercial television, he inadvertently helped to deliver us into the diabolical clutches of the enemy. By painstakingly cementing an ardent emotional attachment to the medium in his impressionable viewers, he groomed us for a lifetime of exploitation.

Although Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood hasn’t aired in several years, and it’s been nearly a decade since the host hopped that last trolley to the Neighborhood of Make-Believe, the legacy of Mr. Rogers lives on, and not merely in all those cardigan sweaters one can spot on the L train. The cult of Fred, which has already spawned a number of books (including The Simple Faith of Mr. Rogers: Spiritual Insights from the World’s Most Beloved Neighbor, by Amy Hollingsworth; and I’m Proud of You: Life Lessons from My Friend Mr. Rogers, by Tim Madigan), gives birth to another sacred text on March 20, with the PBS premiere of Mister Rogers & Me, a buttery pound of documentary fudge seemingly designed as the opening salvo in a Fred Rogers canonization campaign. (Mr. Rogers was not a Roman Catholic—he was an ordained Presbyterian minister, who was actually “directed by Church officials” to persue his divine calling through children’s television, according to a 1988 profile in the Chicago Tribune. But maybe an exception can be made.)

This unctuous hagiography, which a cynical viewer might see as an extended propaganda piece for public broadcasting at a time of funding challenges, came about because first-time filmmaker Benjamin Wagner, a producer for MTV, had the good fortune to summer on Nantucket, scarcely a stone’s throw from Fred Rogers’ “modest gray shake-shingled house,” as he puts it in a cozy voice-over.

Not that anyone is throwing any stones, mind you. While Mr. Wagner’s title pays homage to Michael Moore’s 1989 excoriation of GM ceo Roger Smith, it’s fairly evident from the film’s opening moments, in which the director is seen walking thoughtfully through Hell’s Kitchen in a pea coat, shades and earbuds, that his is a more reverential approach.

Ben met Fred in 2001. It was late summer. September 11 was still more than a week away. Mr. Wagner was celebrating his 30th birthday, and Mr. Rogers ambled over to say hi. (Maybe he was bored—it was just a month after he’d taped the final episode of Mister Rogers Neighborhood.) Mr. Wagner was then working for MTV, and feeling guilty about it. He was a guy with “a PBS mind,” as he puts it, “in a jump-cut, sound-bit MTV world, trying to figure out just what I can do to make it a better place.”

Mr. Wagner’s narration must be reproduced at length to fully demonstrate the challenges posed by aiming for heartfelt sincerity when one’s deepest emotional utterances make Henrietta “Meow-meow good-feeling meow!” Pussycat sound like a hard-bitten nihilist.

“He asked about my plans, my hopes and my dreams,” Mr. Wagner recalls of that fateful afternoon. “I sang for him, and when I finished, he clapped and we drank another glass of lemonade, and I smiled and smiled and smiled, because Mr. Rogers really was my neighbor.”

Having thereby established his ironclad credentials as one of the true apostles of Fred, Mr. Wagner yields the floor to some other of Mr. Rogers “neighbors,” all of whom seem to feel the broadcaster was a pretty special guy. They include the aforementioned Rogers groupies Mr. Madigan and Ms. Hollingsworth, Tim Russert (another untouchable); NPR veteran Susan Stamberg; Marc Brown, the creator of Arthur the Aardvark; broadcaster Linda Ellerbee, and This American Lifer Davy Rothbart, whose 2001 radio segment on Mister Rogers managed to be considerably sweeter than Mr. Wagner’s film without being nearly as sappy. There’s also Bo Lozoff, a spiritual guru and cofounder of the Human Kindness Foundation, who taught meditation and yoga to prison inmates for decades before sexual harassment accusations surfaced in 2008. The film doesn’t touch on those, but they must not have been all that bad, because Mr. Wagner went ahead and had Mr. Lozoff officiate at his wedding.

All of neighbors testify to Fred Rogers’ goodness, and there’s little doubt that he was a wonderful person. The film recalls one signature moment in Rogers lore, in 1969, when he single-handedly persuaded a Senate subcommittee to retain a $20 million grant for the nascent Corporation for Public Broadcasting that President Richard Nixon was looking to cut in half. In his testimony, Mr. Rogers cast himself as a slow-talking, feelings-endorsing bulwark against the “bombardment” of cartoons the commercial networks were aiming at the nation’s children.

Of course, that blitzkrieg has intensified. As Dr. Susan Linn, founder of the Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood and a longtime Fred friend, notes in the film, “Comparing the marketing of yesteryear to the marketing of today is like comparing a BB gun to a smart bomb.”

Indeed, according to Mr. Wagner, children now watch an average of  seven hours of TV a day (some of which might even include the work of Mr. Wagner, but whatever), and by the time they’re 18, they’ve “witnessed 200 thousand acts of televised violence and 1 million ads.”

Mister Rogers Neighborhood has long been viewed as an antidote. But what if we have it backwards? For more than three decades, the program was the first thing most American children saw on television. We watched it with our parents’ hearty encouragement, because they believed, as Ms. Ellerbee puts it in the documentary, that they “were putting [their kids] into the hands of a man who would never do them any harm at all and would in fact do them a great deal of good.”

Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood wasn’t like other things one might see on TV. The host talked and sang directly to us, which was sort of amazing. He recognized us, and didn’t seem disturbed to find us already waiting in his house (or was it his house?) when he arrived each day from...work, or somewhere, dressed in a trench coat and suit jacket. He asked us questions in a measured, slow voice, and he listened carefully to our responses. He said we were special just the way we were. It was a little strange, really, how he changed into his play clothes every day but kept on his tie. But it was a ritual, and we needed some ritual. We were 2.

Most important of all, he liked us.

Eventually, though, it began to dawn on many Mister Rogers viewers—maybe around the time we discovered Sesame Street—that we’d been duped. That guy in the TV didn’t know us at all! Television was a one-way deal, it turned, out, and he couldn’t really see us or hear our eagerly shouted replies to his questions. We stopped talking back to the screen (except for Knicks games), quietly humiliated at our naivete. Soon we moved on to other shows, programming for big kids, with violence and commercials. And maybe deep down we wondered how special we actually were if Mr. Rogers was really just talking to a camera all along.

WTF, Fred?

Still, by then the damage had been done. The message had been imprinted on our tender minds: The television is your friend...the people on the screen are your neighbors...watching them makes you feel better, happier, more likeable, less confused.

No wonder we couldn’t stop staring at the screen.

I know he didn’t mean it, but Fred Rogers couldn’t have designed a better gateway for the “plug-in drug”—as it was dubbed in 1977 by journalist and anti-TV warrior Marie Winn—if he’d tried. Incidentally, a few decades before she published her best-selling anti-television screed, Ms. Winn was a champion on the game show Dotto. That is, until a rival contestant found a notebook in which she’d jotted down the answers in advance, an event that led directly to the quiz show scandals, perhaps the nation’s first collective reckoning with television’s dark side.

Still, if Ms. Winn’s success comes with an asterisk, so does our “specialness”—in both cases, the game was rigged.

I was toddler in the late 1960s when Mr. Rogers first became a national children’s TV star. I watched some of the first episodes of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and I have it on good authority that I sometimes even talked back to the screen. I often wonder whether Fred Rogers didn’t help get me hooked on the passive joys of television back then. By tricking me into believing that watching his show was a genuine lived experience, he helped turn me and many other kids into perfect targets for those 1 million commercials we’d soon be exposed to.

Still, if Mr. Rogers taught me anything it was to be nice to my neighbors. Mr. Wagner seems like a fine fellow. He made a movie. That must feel pretty special.

This was the “noodle show,” a demonstration of starchy prowess that has occurred every night for 44 years.

The Observer was seated at a two-top, doing research (the best kind) on the federal lawsuit then being tried in Miami pitting Mr Chow against the upstart Philippe by Philippe Chow, a strikingly similar chain started in 2005 by a longtime member of Mr Chow’s New York kitchen staff.

There’s a noodle show at Philippe as well—performed by Mr Chow’s former noodle man, in fact—but that wasn’t what had the guests in tight minidresses pulling out their point-and-shoots when The Observer arrived a little later that same evening (stashing our Mr Chow doggie bag on the way in). Despite Michael Chow’s contention that Philippe had ripped off his concept wholesale, the difference in ambiance was striking.

Whereas Mr Chow was refined and understated, the vibe at Philippe could be described only as bumpin’. The bar was tightly packed. Servers wore red Chuck Taylors. Smashing Pumpkins was blaring on the PA. A woman in a tube top was sitting on a banquette in the entryway, eating out of a take-out container. Everyone was texting.

The excitement that evening turned out to be on behalf of the several New York Giants who were following up their Canyon of Heroes moment with a celebratory dinner in an upstairs dining room, while a photographer working for Cîroq vodka captured the scene.

We approached defensive end Osi Umenyiora to ask what the appeal was. “Great restaurant,” he said.

Maybe so, we thought, but whose?

The Chicken Satay at Philippe—flattened ribbons of tender breast meat the color of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, gently perforated with bamboo skewers and bathed in a milky, khaki-color gravy—seems an unlikely object of interest for a federal court. It’s exquisitely bland, the latex baby-binky of premium appetizers.

Yet the Chicken Satay, and in particular its marked similarity to the Chicken Satay served several blocks away at Mr Chow, was one of the key matters in the suit. (The 18 pages of testimony about the recipe, which was created at Mr Chow’s original restaurant in London in 1978, remain under seal, but several details that emerged over the course of the trial indicted that the secret sauce involves a lot of cream and a widely available Thai “spice packet.”)

Michael Chow’s complaint, which sought $21 million in damages, alleged that the team behind Philippe, including chef Philippe Chau, restaurateur Stratis Morfogen (also behind the well-received Ciano) and several codefendants, appropriated the Satay recipe and 11 other Mr Chow standbys, the “modern” decor of Mr Chow’s restaurants and even the name Chow—thereby engaging in deceptive trade practices, swiping trade secrets and infringing on the Mr Chow trademark.

In essence, the suit claimed, they’d tried to become Mr Chow—the Invasion of the Body Snatchers of haute Chinese cuisine. “They want to not just clone me, they want to take the whole thing,” Mr. Chow testified on the stand, sporting his trademark owlish glasses and a bespoke Hermés suit. “They want to wipe me—just replace me completely, including my personal identity.”

Philippe countersued, seeking $25 million for defamation following the description of its chef by Mr Chow’s former attorney as a “fraud” in a Miami Herald article. They also challenged Mr Chow’s trademark—“that knife that he uses to try to chop up the competition,” as defense attorney Anthony Accetta put it—claiming the company neglected to defend it. (They cited, among other things, the failure to use a period after M-r.)

Last week, following a mouthwatering four-week trial that featured a T.I. song played in open court and touched on everything from the elusive Qiao-mer, which Mr. Chow described as “know-how, trick, knack, technique, and kung fu” of Chinese cookery, to the difference between a banquette and a baguette (a distinction that bedeviled Mr. Accetta), the jury delivered a mixed verdict. While finding in favor of the defendant on the issues of trademark infringement (which has a three-year statue of limitations) and stealing recipes, they determined that the Philippe team had engaged in “false advertising” and “unfair competition by deceptive conduct.” The defendants were ordered to pay $1 million. Philippe’s counterclaims were rejected by the jury.

Mr Chow’s public relations firm promptly unfurled a press release that hailed the decision as “a complete victory,” in the words of Mr. Chow’s attorney, powerhouse entertainment litigator Bert Fields, best known for representing Jeffrey Katzenberg in his suit against the Walt Disney Company.

Mr. Morfogen told The Observer he was having what he called a “celebratory lunch” with his partners and legal team at a spot near the courthouse when his cell phone began buzzing with texts—friends writing to offer their condolences.

“I said, ‘You got to be kidding me!’” Mr. Morfogen recalled. “That’s Bert Fields’s ultimate spin. If I had lost 15 out of 16 counts, my response to the press would be, ‘I respect the justice system. We lost and we’re going to appeal.’ But don’t embarrass yourself. Have a little dignity.”

Playing catch-up, the Philippe team then issued a press release of its own, in which Mr. Accetta declared that the “landslide victory … serves as a testament to the American dream.” Mr. Morfogen followed up tweeting a link to the Philippe version of events to everyone who tweeted press reports on the case.

He also sent out an open invitation to a victory party at Philippe’s New York location, after which he ended the day on a combative note.

“@PhilippeChow was very touched by the huge turnout tonight ! F the ‘wire tap’ FIElDS and the PUPPET michael chow !” he wrote at 4:21 am, following up a few minutes later with a dig at Mr. Chow’s daughter: “china chow is a joke! Take the loss and be silent!” His wife, former Vogue editor Filipa Fino, got into the act too, tweeting, “Poor @mrchowdining. Cant accept protege success.Would MrBalenciaga b upset at Nicolas? Can’t we have both?”

Mr. Morfogen’s wiretapping reference recalled the case of private detective Anthony Pellicano, who was convicted in 2008 of eavesdropping on various celebrities. Mr. Fields was one of Mr. Pellicano’s clients, but he wasn’t accused of wrongdoing. “I was never charged with anything,” Mr. Fields told The Observer. “I was never even a target of the investigation.”

As to the contention that Philippe actually won the case, he said, “You don’t count counts! When I file a lawsuit, I often have 10 different theories on which I can win. Would we like to have gotten greater damages? No question about that. But who won is about who got the damages, who paid the damages, who was found to have committed a wrong, who was found not to have. It’s just stupid to say otherwise.”

Countered Mr. Accetta: “Of course we’re the prevailing party. It was the best verdict I could have asked for. We prevailed on a majority of the main issues.”

The case dates back to the summer of 2005. At the time, Mr. Chau was working in the kitchen at Mr Chow, where he’d held a variety of jobs since 1980. A note about his name, which was the subject of seemingly endless debate during the trial: Chak Sam Chau, who was born in Canton and testified about swimming four hours to freedom in Hong Kong, towing a friend behind him, was dubbed either Philippo or Philippe or both by Mr Chow’s then-head chef, Sik Chung Lam, when he began working in the kitchen at age 16. In 2006, he became a naturalized citizen, changing his legal name to Philippe Chow Chau. (Chow, Chau and Zhao are all translations of the same Chinese character.)

The plaintiffs asserted that the name change was part of a deliberate campaign to confuse the public. The defense insisted that the switch had been initiated—though not completed—before the restaurant plans got underway. (Philippe Chow Chau directed questions to Mr. Morfogen.)

Over the years, Mr. Chau worked his way up to fryer, dim sum man and chopper, finally becoming head chopper-expediter, a title that does not fully capture the significance of his role. Though he used a translator in his court appearances, Mr. Chau was one of the better English speakers in the back-of-house, a valued go-between between the restaurant’s management and its kitchen staff. He also substituted for most other positions, and so learned to make just about every dish on the menu.

When Chef Lam retired, Mr. Chau fully expected to be named to the top position. Instead the gig went to Kwok Hor, who had been recruited in Hong Kong and trained at the London restaurant, according to Mr Chow’s usual practice. Mr. Chau was despondent. In one of the trial’s more dramatic moments, he recalled his frustration. “My family was not very happy with what happened because I had been working in that restaurant for 22 years, and everybody thought that I would be the one [to be promoted to] head chef,” he said, bursting into tears. “I do not understand why Michael Chow [treated] me like this. My wife thought that I would be the chef after Lam’s retirement.”

After a two-minute break, he returned to the stand and apologized. “I really feel so bad,” he said. “My heart hurts me so bad.” (Interestingly, the moment recalled Mr. Fields’s most famous case, which began when Mr. Katzenberg also felt passed over for a top job. A turning point in that trial occurred when Mr. Fields drew out Michael Eisner’s admission that he just might have called his No. 2 a “little midget.”)

Mr. Chau worked under Chef Hor for two years. Then one day in the summer of 2005, a busboy slipped him a business card from a customer. It said Au Bar on it. Mr. Morfogen, who had been a regular customer at Mr Chow for a decade, was in talks with another upscale Chinese bistro, Paris’s Davé, to open a New York branch, and he was looking for a chef.

Mr. Chau called the business card “a gift from God.”

He tendered his resignation not long after, and in December 2005, Philippe by Philippe Chow opened its doors on East 60th Street. Like Mr Chow, the space was chic and minimalist, and the menu featured a number of Mr Chow’s “signature” dishes, albeit with a few key differences: Chicken Joanna became Chicken Jo Lau, Ma Mignon became Me Mignon, and With Three became Three Within. Such talmudic nuances recalled the 1988 Eddie Murphy comedy Coming to America. “Look, me and the McDonald’s people got this little misunderstanding,” explains the owner of an independent burger joint. “See, they’re McDonald’s. I’m McDowell’s. They got the Golden Arches, mine is the Golden Arcs. They got the Big Mac, I got the Big Mick …”

As the New York Post wrote in a review of Philippe, “It looks like the most flagrant case of culinary cloning since Peter Luger deserters set up shop in Manhattan.”

Indeed, such restaurant feuds are nothing new. There is, for example, the Famous Ray’s-versus-Original Ray’s showdown, the Manganaro’s rift, and the curious cockfight between Park Slope’s Los Pollitos and Los Pollitos II. Recently, when Mario Batalli got wind of an Otto pizzeria in Portland, Maine, that seemed to overlap with his Otto in New York and Vegas, he tweeted, “these folks are d bags and thieves,” deleting the message in short order.

Rebecca Charles, owner of Pearl’s Oyster Bar, has sued two former colleagues who left to open similar restaurants, Mary Redding (Mary’s Fish Camp) and Ed McFarland (Ed’s Lobster Bar). Neither case made it to court. “Copying somebody’s business from A to Z should not be legal,” she said. “I had it happen twice. It’s unutterably painful.”

Way back in 1904, according to an item in The New York Times, a Chinese-American man named Lem Sen claimed to have invented the chop suey, which caught on like scallion pancakes, only to have it stolen by what the unnamed reporter, mimicking an accent, called a “Mellikan man.” Lem Sen sought an injunction preventing anyone else from making it the dish, supposedly telling The Times, “Now me wantee … all stop makee choop soo or pay me for alowee do same.”

Incidentally, it was just one year later that Mr. Morfogen’s grandfather, Paul Morfogen, who co-owned a restaurant called Pappas on 14th Street, introduced the Greek salad to New York, according to Mr. Morfogen. “But to say he owns it would be ludicrous,” he added.

Initially, Mr Chow was slow to act. “Why would you let me go three years and eight months?” Mr. Morfogen asked. “Not one cease-and-desist letter, not one smoke signal, not one email, not one phone call! And guess what? My wife and his ex-wife worked together!” Mr. Chow, who is now married to Eva Chow, was briefly married to Grace Coddington, later Ms. Fino’s boss at Vogue, which one imagines made for some awkwardness when the suit was filed. (Ms. Fino left the magazine in June 2011 and now runs an online magazine, Fino File.)

In explaining the apparent delay in filing suit, Mr. Chow testified he initially thought Philippe would just open in New York “and they may not last very long,” admitting he was “in some sort of denial.” Then he read news reports about Philippe planning openings in Las Vegas and L.A. As Mr Chow prepared to expand into Miami, Philippe opened “literally 100 yards away from us.”

He began to feel like the victim of “stalking,” he said, “or tailgating, like, a car.” (He has since become more proactive, suing Giuseppe Cipriani over the name of his new restaurant in Beverly Hills, Mr. C. That dispute is currently in mediation, Mr. Fields said.)

Philippe quickly gained a following in New York—in part due to its prime location (60th and Madison), its slightly more affordable food and its celebrity clientele, including Rihanna and Kanye West. (Like T.I., Wale and Young Jeezy have also called out the restaurant in their lyrics, though their tracks were never brought up in the trial.)

But the jury found that fair competition wasn’t the whole story, concluding that Philippe had engaged in a pattern of false advertising, seemingly designed to convince the public that Mr. Chau had been the real heart of the Mr Chow operation. Though Philippe’s public relations firm issued press releases touting Philippe as “the architect of Mr Chow’s menu for the past 27 years,” Mr. Chau admitted on the stand that all of the signature dishes were on the menu before he arrived. Another release asserted that the chef was “acclaimed as one of the top Asian chefs by one of the most prestigious food critics,” though Mr. Morfogen later admitted Mr. Chau had never been mentioned in any media report at all. Mr. Morfogen also boasted to the press that “we have basically their core kitchen” and stated that “60 to 70 percent of the menu is similar.”

“The feather that broke the camel’s back,” Mr. Chow testified, was his discovery that Mr. Morfogen had purchased the search term “Mr Chow” on Google, Yahoo and AOL, in a bid to direct users to Philippe instead. (The text of the sponsored links contained the term “Mr Chow” but Philippe’s address.)

“I realized that this thing is not going to stop, not going to go away, and left me no choice,” Mr. Chow said.

The battle was personal, but it was also commercial. As Philippe became one of the city’s hottest restaurants, Mr Chow’s profits in New York “dropped like a stone,” Mr. Chow said. After increases every year since 1995, they began to flag in 2006 and decreased by a million dollars every year thereafter until the lawsuit was filed. “Fifty-seventh Street is dead in the water,” Mr. Chow testified. “We survived the last three years, just barely.”

Mr. Fields said profits were better in Beverly Hills and Miami, where the lawsuit, which was filed a few months after Philippe’s launch and the week of Mr Chow’s, “took a lot of steam out of their opening.” Mr. Morfogen claimed that was the purpose of the suit all along.

The restaurant business, particularly in New York, is not an arena for gentle souls. Behind every passive-aggressive server wondering if you’ve “dined with us before” is a knife fight for survival. Margins are low, tastes are fickle, and competition is relentless. Things have only grown worse with as the stock market has fallen and web entities like Yelp, Eater and OpenTable have grown in power.

Neither Mr. Chow nor Mr. Morfogen seems to have gotten where they are without breaking a few ramekins. In 2007, Mr. Chow was sued by three former employees for harassment. One, now a partner in Philippe, claimed he had been forced to lie on the floor and humiliated during a staff meeting. The suit also claimed that Mr Chow had failed to pay overtime and distributed tips to ineligible employees through a complicated point system, in violation of labor law. The case was settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.

Mr. Chow could not discuss the case due to the terms of the settlement. Mr. Fields, however, maintained that “Mr. Chow never harassed anyone.”

Meanwhile, several former associates of Mr. Morfogen’s, who declined to speak on the record, were highly critical of his business methods, variously describing him as “manipulative,” “abusive” and “bullying.” More than one called him “the devil.”

“That’s their opinion,” Mr. Morfogen said. “Look, I’m a boss that has 300 employees. I’m not running for a popularity contest, I’m not running for mayor. If I’m a bully I’m a fair bully. That courtroom was full of employees I’ve been good to.”

A former manager of Philippe, Tim Pappas, said working with Mr. Morfogen was “a great experience,” adding, “He gave me an opportunity to shine, and I did.” (Mr. Pappas is set to open his own restaurant, Neraï, in the spot formerly occupied by Oceana.)

Restaurateur Michael Stein, whose late father, Howard Stein, was a nightlife impresario who owned Xenon and Au Bar and later brought in Mr. Morfogen as a partner, told The Observer that Mr. Morfogen once called him screaming. “He threatens he’s going to kill me, saying I stole from Au Bar,” Mr. Stein recalled, insisting that he had done no such thing.

Mr. Morfogen scoffed at the story. “Howard was heartbroken, saying, ‘My son stole from me,’” he said. “I was touched by that. It wasn’t my money. I told Michael, ‘Don’t come back to Au Bar.’ I don’t say ‘kill.’ That’s not in my vocabulary. What I probably said was, ‘If you set foot in here I’ll get a lawyer and have you kicked out.’”

The plaintiffs in Chow v. Chau presented evidence that Philippe may have engaged in “unlawful compensation,” or paying employees under the table. Attorneys deposed a number of workers who pleaded the Fifth Amendment to avoid answering questions about the matter, including Mr. Morfogen’s then-business partner Michael Reda. Ultimately, the judge ruled the allegations prejudicial and irrelevant to the case.

Mr. Morfogen called the charges “allegations” and “smoke screens.” He added, “I’ve been investigated by the IRS, the state sales tax, and our restaurants are still operating, and we have a clean bill of health. A couple  of chefs would come in and get cash to go down to Chinatown and buy supplies. That’s the only cash, and now it’s all done by check. But that’s not my area. I run the front of the house. Mike Reda told me he didn’t do it, and I believe him. I was against him taking the Fifth Amendment, but when I asked him why, he said his personal attorney advised him on it.”

(Attempts to contact Mr. Reda were unsuccessful; Mr. Morfogen said he is no longer involved with Philippe.)

“My opinion is the issue was used to intimidate, harass and slander my client,” Mr. Accetta told The Observer, adding, “It’s not relevant to this case.”

It may seem strange that at a time when Asian cuisine in New York has come to be defined by colorful figures like pork-belly provocateur David Chang and Eddie Huang, the bad-boy of bao—chefs who serve up artery-clogging delicacies with a touch of aggression—such a hard-fought battle has been waged over a style of cuisine that foodies dismiss as old-hat and critics routinely savage as greasy and bland.

“Not to say they’re not good restaurants,” hedged Danielle Chang, creator of the Asian food festival Luckyrice, who has eaten at Mr Chow and Philippe. “It’s a different brand of Asian food, dressed up for American palettes. I don’t mean to be derogatory, there’s nothing wrong with it.”

“The vibe and the menu seem very old-school and outdated now,” said Jennifer 8. Lee, author of The Fortune Cookie Chronicles, who admitted she has never been to either restaurant. Ms. Lee attributed the success of Chinese food in America to precisely the sort of borrowing at the heart of the case. “Chinese food has always been iterative,” she said. “That’s how General Tso’s Chicken and fortune cookies got spread. It’s like open-source innovation. In that sense, this situation is part of a long tradition, though it is a little more sketchy.”

Mr Chow has had a truly spectacular run. The Beatles and the Stones became regulars after the first restaurant opened in London in 1968 (John Lennon’s last supper was eaten at Mr Chow on 57th Street). The Beverly Hills location, which launched in 1973, became a favorite power spot (it is still a regular location for those TMZ paparazzi videos). The New York restaurant was a favorite of the Warhol crew and later became a draw for hip-hop artists—all with a menu that has little changed in more than four decades.

That said, celebrity patrons are not known for adventurous culinary taste (e.g., Elaine’s, Michael’s).

If the outcome of Chow v. Chau does anything, it will be to help Mr. Chow preserve this astonishing legacy—one that was bound to spread, legally or otherwise. In an email, Mr. Chow told us, “With my restaurant, I bridged the palates of the East and the West and have made this my life’s work. I felt I had to stand up for myself and my life’s work when I was wronged, and I have done that. A Miami jury awarded me over a million dollars in damages, and I feel vindicated. I now want to move on and continue to focus on my business.”

For his part, Mr. Morfogen vows to appeal the verdict, insisting that the jurors misunderstood how Google advertising works. Meanwhile, with locations in Miami, Manhattan, Long Island, Mexico City, West Hollywood and Boca Raton, he is again looking to expand, eyeing Las Vegas, as well as Fort Lauderdale, Dallas and Dubai.

With the jury’s sanction, all of them will serve Green Prawns, Chicken Satay and House Me Mignon.