In general, the media has not caught up to my more body-positive attitudes, though. We’re often comfortable with giving individual women credit in mass media for being “brave” when they’re honest about their body. But we’re a long way from a television landscape that just allows fat bodies like mine to exist, to be beautiful, to take joy in movement of all kinds.
That’s what’s so transformative and incredible about the “Pool” episode of Shrill: Annie’s joyful swim through the pool has the same effect on viewers that the pool party’s guests had on her. The show’s writers and actors are inviting us all to join them, step into the dance circle, and learn to have a great time no matter our body size.
Shrill is quick to show that fatphobia is still an unfortunate force in society. The episode’s last third demonstrates that Annie’s boss holds some harmful assumptions about fat people. Try as we might, we can’t spend our lives in the bubble of the super-positive pool party. But I would argue there’s still hope to be found in the “Pool” episode of Shrill and Annie’s ongoing love story.
We at Frolic are readers who treat love as a key value in our lives and entertainment. But the “romantic” stories in Shrill don’t usually leave me swooning. The real love story is like the friends-to-lovers and enemies-to-lovers tropes all got smashed up into one human being: Annie. The real love story in Shrill that takes off in “Pool” and continues through the rest of the short season is a love story between Annie and herself. And just like all good love stories, there’s often conflict, confusion and growth found in the plot. One joyful swim at a pool party doesn’t “fix” all of Annie’s hang-ups,
Annie still has a long way to go when it comes to wholly loving her body and respecting herself and her choices, but the fat-positive women in “Pool” offer an invitation to try. It’s like the great inciting incident in a regency romance, when everything changes because of one chance encounter at a ball. And I think Shrill is now furthering the work of inviting all of us to follow our hearts into our own great self-love stories.
So, as a fat babe who is on her own journey, let me extend the invitation to the party: Treat yourself to watching Shrill. Do something unexpectedly kind for yourself this week. Challenge yourself to pursue an activity just because it brings you joy.
Jump in! The water is fine!