Netflix's teen rom-coms have new competition. Hulu's Love, Victor brings a fresh take on a classic love story.
After the initial success of the movie Love, Simon (2018), it wasn't long before executives green lit a spin-off series. Originally set to premiere on Disney+, the show moved to Hulu in February of 2020. Hulu is home to very few Teen TV shows, the best including Looking for Alaska (2019), based on the award winning John Green Novel. Prior to Looking for Alaska and Love, Victor, Netflix was the main provider of formulaic teen rom-coms. Love, Victor brings the Gen Z audience over to Hulu. Take myself for example, I never expressed any interest in Hulu. As an avid HBO and Netflix subscriber, a streaming service with seemingly nothing but old reality TV shows and The Handmaids Tale, had no appeal to me... that is until I heard the Love, Simon spin off was on it's way to the streaming service.
When I first saw Love, Simon I fell in love with the movie. It was the first major motion picture to bring a LGBTQ love story into the teen rom-com genre. It set a new bar to include LGBTQ love stories in mainstream media. But my initial reaction to the news of a spin off was probably the same as yours... "Who and why?". Was it really necessary to continue the story of Love, Simon? If so, who would the story focus on? I was weary of the new series all the way up to a few months ago when the series trailer dropped. And then it clicked for me. The character Simon was really lucky. Most gay kids aren't. But first, let's talk about what the show is about.
Love, Victor follows a high school student named Victor, who moves to a new school called Creekwood High (the same school which Simon graduated from two years prior). He wants to use this opportunity to find out who he is as a person and his sexual preferences. He hears a lot about Simon's story from many of his classmates. His story contrasts to Simon's since Victor has a religious family, homophobic grandparents, not to mention, Victor doesn't even really know his sexual preferences. Victor reaches out to Simon on Instagram to share his own story and ask Simon for advise. The show is narrated by Victor and Simon's messages together.
The show is a very formulaic teen rom-com, especially when it comes to the character layout. You have the flawed main character, the goofy & awkward best friend, the pretty popular girl, and the mean jock. Although I just described the characters in any given teen show, Love, Victor brings fresh takes on these over-done characters. For example, Victor is part of a hispanic family with a complecated marital relationship. The rich popular girl, Mia, is not the cliche blond haired blue eyed white girl. She is a wealthy black teen girl who's mom left when she was younger and who gets lonely since her dad travels a lot. My favorite twist was on the classic mean high school jock. Andrew, is a tall, mixed stud who has a really nice character arc. These are characters that we haven't gotten to see a whole lot in film and television. The characters in the show are constantly growing and adding more depth to the storyline. The writing is at some times corny, but were you really expecting Grade A comedy? And while the show did have it's funny moments, the storyline was what really impressed me with the show. I was expecting a very bland love story, instead I got a well constructed web of stories and characters. The storyline is constantly going in new directions. The show has more plot twists than I can count on my two hands. Each episode leaves you wanting more!
Overall, Love, Victor is a fun new teen rom-com TV series that is totally worth a Hulu trial. It's fresh storyline brings light to many problems that LGBTQ teens face during self discovery. We will most definitely be seeing a season two! If you like teen rom-coms or if you saw Love, Simon, this is a MUST SEE!