Review: Sugar Mommies & Caddy Daddies
What ‘Hacks’ understands about the queer obsession with older women
Before we get to our silly post about Hacks and MILFs, we wanted to take a moment to acknowledge that Israel continues to commit genocide against Palestinian people and recently carried out a massacre in Rafah, what they’d previously designated a “safe zone”. We were inspired by
over at Dyke Domesticity, so if you make a donation in any amount to one of the Gaza families listed in this helpful directory, email us a screenshot (theyearningnewsletter@gmail.com) and we will give you a free month of a paid subscription to The Yearning.
The Yearning Rating: ✰✰✰✰
Romance: ✰✰
Sex: ✰✰✰½
Storytelling: ✰✰✰
Performance: ✰✰✰✰✰
Yearning: ✰✰✰✰✰
Remember, always tip your waiters…and like our Yearning posts!
Some S3 spoilers ahead.
Written by Ali Romig
As you probably know by now, Hacks is back for a third go ‘round the scorching Las Vegas sun. After last season’s emotionally charged finale—which saw Deborah (Jean Smart) fire Ava (Hannah Einbinder) after they launched her successful standup special, encouraging the younger comedian to “climb her own mountain”—I wasn’t sure what else the show could possibly have to say. To me, that felt like the perfect send off—but of course I wasn’t going to complain about getting more! And as Hacks is wont to do, it quickly reinvented itself, disproving any doubts I may have had. In Season 3, this odd couple buddy comedy is as sharp, audacious, nuanced, and charming as ever.
The new season kicks off exactly one year after the last season ended, with our two leads still estranged. Deborah is riding the high of her special—being honored as one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People of the Year, and having her likeness replicated by glitzy drag queens in Vegas—and Ava has become co-producer on a Daily Show-esque news comedy, On the Contrary. Luckily, Hacks understands that Smart and Einbinder’s chemistry is what makes the show truly magical, and so doesn’t keep them apart for too long. After a slow-burn reunion involving Tom Cruise’s famous coconut cake, they quickly become inseparable once again, texting at all hours of the day and night as if they were two lovesick, horned-up teens. When Deborah decides to make a bid for a newly vacant late-night hosting gig, she brings on Ava to help her…and the rest, as they say, is Debstory.
There are already numerous reviews out there lauding Hacks for its acerbic wit, its numerous scene stealing performances (hi, Meg Stalter!), and its surprising emotional resonance. So instead of offering more of the same, I thought I’d humbly pop into your inbox today with a close reading of what I think is one of the show’s greatest strengths—and that is its fundamental understanding of what older, slightly delusional women mean to the queer community.
Hacks has always understood the gay fascination with fabulous females. After all, Deborah Vance’s character is one big nod to this time-honored truth. Her legions of homosexual fans have kept her career afloat in it’s less lucrative moments, and show up in droves to the ‘House of Vance’ Palm Springs activation to gleefully buy mugs and pillows with her face plastered on them, alongside sayings like, “tax loopholes are my love language.” In a metaverse moment, Jean Smart is herself a gay icon, previously known and praised for her work on the lip-sync worthy sitcom Designing Women. The gay man and the “diva” is an oft-lampooned, if accurate pop culture staple.
But what about the ladies? Last season, Hacks confronted the ways in which these same (often straight) “divas” don’t always play as well in sapphic spaces by having Deborah bomb on a lesbian cruise. And while this is probably one of my favorite episodes to date, it also felt like only half the truth. Despite getting less cultural air time, lesbians and sapphics have worshiped at the altar of the older woman for just as long as gay men. Some of these women have cross-over appeal—Cate Blanchett, being the obvious example—but we also have our own lexicon to work with. Tracy Chapman, Melanie Lynskey, the entire OG cast of The L Word. I mean, just look at Sarah Paulson and Holland Taylor! They are the walking manifestation of this phenomenon and theeee current sapphic celebrity power couple.
Whether out of simple curiosity or genuine intention, I know for a fact many twenty-something sapphics would admit (if pressed) to having perused Seeking Arrangement in search of the ever elusive yet coveted Sugar Mommy. So where is this representation, I ask?
Well, this season of Hacks has finally addressed the fabled sapphic adoration of intimidating, mature women. Enter Christina Hedricks of “I can't wait until next year when all of you are in Vietnam” fame, playing a kinky gay Republican who pursues Ava at a golf resort.
Hendricks plays an unnamed “gorgeous golf queen” and she appears on our screens in a masterful, brief burst of terrorizing excellence. After scolding a male caddie for suggesting she use the “women’s tee” and then demanding Ava “get on her knees” to patch Deborah’s divot, she quickly establishes herself as the kind of dom you’d be hard pressed to form full sentences in front of. Later, she almost wordlessly propositions Ava at the resort bar, which leads to a makeout sesh between the two. But it’s here where things get really interesting. Because the first words out of Golf Queens’ mouth during this steamy exchange is “oh yeah, you stink.” A “normal” reaction to this kind of vitriol would be negative—after all, what’s more of a turnoff than someone pointing out the very insecurity most people are battling while hooking up?
But no, the sapphic reaction is not a negative one. In fact, it was this line of pointed verbal abuse that reassured me the writers knew exactly who they were talking to! It is inherently queer to want someone to tell us that we are going about life all wrong, and yet remain perplexingly attracted to us. It fits into our own unique self-perception: someone who is bucking the traditional, while managing to be desirable to those who function within it.
Basically, being queer is often about being proudly different—but we still want to be hot!
Of course, Hendricks doesn’t stick around for long. As soon as Ava discovers that she’s a Republican Oiler, she can’t go through with their hookup. She even questions how Golf Queen could possibly be gay AND a fracker (oh Ava, it’s more common than you think…). This too is an astute homage to the women we queers tend to naively idolize—most of them are not actually good people. Their fabulousness is directly tied to their wealth, which is of course wrapped up in their loyalty to capitalism. After all, no woman (or man!) can be that obliviously untouchable without having made a deal with the devil. This is just one of the many things that Hacks gets right.
The Hacks Season 3 finale will become available on Max May 30th.
Very good!