This post contains spoilers for The Idol.
The first trailer for HBO’s The Idol landed nearly a year ago, promising a warped fairy tale of a mainstream pop star entrapped in a sex cult. In telling “the sleaziest love story in all of Hollywood,” from “the sick & twisted minds” of The Weeknd and Euphoria creator Sam Levinson, the teaser promised provocation, titillation, and an examination of the machinery behind it all. During the protracted lead-up to the show’s debut, HBO released edgy promotional footage, and Rolling Stone published a report detailing alleged behind-the-scenes issues, reportedly stemming from a creative overhaul and the exit of the series’ original director, Amy Seimetz, who was replaced by Levinson. In statements to Vanity Fair, HBO and star Lily-Rose Depp denied allegations of tensions on set. For his part, The Weeknd shared what appeared to be a clip from the show featuring himself, Depp, and costar Dan Levy, in which his character, Tedros, said, “Yeah, nobody cares about Rolling Stone,” with the singer captioning his post, “@RollingStone did we upset you?”
Alas, that scene never made it into the final cut of the show, one of many red herrings and unresolved plot points that seem less an incentive for a second season and more a result of misguided storytelling. Instead, viewers were treated to an abrupt role reversal that saw Depp’s Jocelyn reclaim the reins to her life from the ultimately powerless Tedros, despite what all conventional and studied wisdom about cult deprogramming suggests. Also missing from the finale were the promised backstory of Tedros’s now infamous rattail haircut and the resolution regarding that sexually explicit photo of Depp’s Jocelyn that seemed so vital in the premiere episode.
Despite The Idol’s prerelease noise, its first episode held some potential, particularly in its commentary on show business via Jocelyn’s inner circle, played by Levy, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Eli Roth, Hari Nef, Jane Adams, Rachel Sennott, and Hank Azaria. Viewed in its best light, the series felt as if it could be a warped cousin to Max’s The Other Two, which lambasted the entertainment industry for three seasons. In The Idol’s debut, an intimacy coordinator gets locked in a closet so that Jocelyn can strip in peace; in The Other Two, it’s a COVID-safety official who gets trapped so that the show can go on.
The series inherited the HBO Sunday night slot recently occupied by the likes of The Last of Us and Succession. That high profile, and a healthy dose of curiosity, lured more than 3.6 million viewers across HBO and Max in the show’s first week, but the ratings dropped precipitously over the course of the season; the penultimate episode reportedly hooked only 133,000 viewers on HBO.
Numbers for the unsatisfying season finale have yet to be released (Vanity Fair has reached out to HBO for information), but is there any metric—ratings or otherwise—by which The Idol ever truly succeeded?
Given The Idol’s reported $54 million–$75 million price tag, the show’s makers have understandably been on the defensive since its debut.
Supporting cast members were deployed to address lingering questions. In a Today appearance, Azaria said claims about the alleged “chaotic nature of the set and how it was really haphazard…[are] ridiculous.” Randolph even kept the dream of a second season alive, telling Variety: “I think that everyone’s intention is to have a second season. This was never intended to be a limited series. HBO has been very happy with it.” And Adams expressed outrage over the outrage, telling VF, “What is amazing to me is no one’s listening—I’ve not seen that before in all my days, such a dogged ‘We refuse to change the narrative,’” she said. “I especially want to say to all the feminists, ‘Go fuck yourself.’ All these women that I’m working with are talking about their experience and you’re not listening. You’re not listening!”
After an intimate moment between Tedros and Jocelyn was deemed “the worst sex scene in history” by British GQ, The Weeknd granted an interview to American GQ, insisting that there was “nothing sexy” about the scene and that any secondhand cringe was intentional. “However you’re feeling watching that scene, whether it’s discomfort, or you feel gross, or you feel embarrassed for the characters, it’s all those emotions adding up to: This guy is in way over his head, this situation is one where he is not supposed to be here,” the actor said.
The Weeknd has also been active on social media throughout the season—often posting memes, retweeting fan accounts, and clapping back at haters. And there has been a lot of online chatter. Search interest for The Idol soared by 1,134% after its debut at the Cannes Film Festival, according to a report of Google Search data by JeffBet. Research conducted by Parrot Analytics and reported by the Los Angeles Times found that audience demand for the show was more than 20 times higher than the demand for the average series. “Traditional ratings have been dismal, which suggests that people are more interested in posting about how bad The Idol is than they are in actually watching it,” wrote the LA Times. Anecdotally speaking, a post-episode search on Twitter will find engagement, yes, but mostly of the negative variety, save for the ardent stan support of Blackpink’s Jennie Ruby Jane, who plays the largely thankless role of wannabe pop star Dyanne.
Eddy Chen
Savannah Walsh
Source link
