What if the key to living your best life is to die first? That’s the premise of the new Netflix limited series, “Boo, Bitch.”
Lana Condor (“To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before”) stars as Erika Vu, a high school senior weeks away from graduation who’s spent her entire life playing it safe. Then, her best friend, Gia (Zoe Colletti), urges her to break out of her uptight, anxious shell by going to a party. There, Erika flirts with her longtime crush, Jake C. (Mason Versaw), who just happens to be single now that he’s broken things off with his queen-bee girlfriend, Riley (Aparna Brielle). It’s the best night of Erika’s life until she and Gia are walking home, excitedly planning their future, only to have the conversation interrupted by a terrible accident.
Now, Erika is dead. Or is she?
“Boo, Bitch” answers that question over the span of eight 30-minute episodes that flash by like the TikTok fever dreams currently crowding the young-adult pop culture landscape.
After the accident, Erika wakes up in her bed, unable to remember what happened the night before but feeling like she got hit by a truck. What she thinks is a hangover, however, soon turns into a nightmare when she and Gia return to the crash site to retrieve a lost necklace. There, the friends find pinned beneath it — Wicked Witch of the East-style — the legs of a girl wearing Erika’s sneakers.
“我是鬼吗?”Erika问道。她和吉尔然后囚禁k on a mission to discover why she’s still around, why everyone can still see and talk to her, and what she’ll need to do to move into the afterlife.
What happens next unfurls at a breakneck pace as the show’s writers pack in as many plot points as possible. There are “Mean Girls”-esque verbal catfights and a glittering prom; there is social media fame and ensuing scandals; just for fun, the writers also threw in bullying, anxiety meds and overly permissive parents.
The series is also rife with ghostly tropes that include flickering lights, glitching electronics and an ensemble of occult-obsessed nerds out to solve the paranormal mystery of Erika’s existence. There’s also a surprise twist that may or may not be that surprising if you follow the series’ trail of spectral clues. It’s all a little extra — haphazard and heavy on cliched teenage story lines that race forward with plot holes big enough to fit a coffin.
“Boo, Bitch” — co-created and executive-produced by Erin Ehrlich (“Crazy Ex-Girlfriend”) and Lauren Lungerich (“Awkward”) — also lists Condor as executive producer, and it’s the actress, armed with a bubbly presence and the ability to deliver even the clunkiest of lines with razor-sharp charm, who anchors the show’s silliest moments along with her co-star, Colletti. Together, the pair radiate enough chemistry and enthusiasm to imbue “Boo, Bitch” with an undercurrent of intrigue and amusement.
On the surface, “Boo, Bitch” is about addressing one’s “unfinished business” — or (UFB, as its characters insist on calling it). Beneath the inanity, though, the show is about growing up and into oneself. By the time the series reaches its ending, its characters have evolved just enough to render its inevitable afterlife bittersweet.
L“Boo, Bitch”:Limited series. Starring Lana Condor and Zoe Colletti. Created by Tim Schauer, Kuba Soltysiak, Erin Ehrlich and Lauren Iungerich. (TV-14. Eight approximately 30-minute episodes.) Premieres Friday, July 8, onNetflix.