Venice Episode 1: The Awkward Kiss

I began this blog because I thought Venice: The Series needed to be reviewed in a constructive, serious manner.  There are far too many people out there simply saying things like, “SPLEE THIS SO GOOD OMFG ORGASM TOUCHING MYSELF!” and “Kimmy is the greatest writer since Shakespeare and Crystal Chappell and Jessica Leccia are the greatest actors in the known universe,” and “I R DED NOW PLZ HELP… srsly ppl… call ambulance… fading… quickly… gurgle… nrrrr.”   While these comments may titillate and amuse us, they’re not exactly informative reviews.  Luckily for you, I have selflessly taken it upon myself to write an in-dept review of the great white lesbian web-series hope, Venice: The Series.

Let us begin with the opening scene.  Here is a picture (click on any picture to see it larger!):

The cool part about the opening credits is that we get to see a pretty picture of Venice.  I was expecting gondolas and pizza, but then I realized Venice takes place in Venice, California not Venice, Italy.  Duh.  I get it now.  That’s why everything is filmed on a rooftop.

As we see from the opening credits, Venice has three executive producers.  I’m not in the film industry, so this struck me as a bit peculiar.  Why does a web series need so many executive producers?  I consulted Wikipedia in an attempt to have my question answered.  This is what I found: “An executive producer is a producer who is not involved in any technical aspects of the film making or music process, but who is still responsible for the overall production.  Typically, an executive producer handles business and legal issues.”  Ohhh, okay.  I wonder which member of the drunken triumvirate is a lawyer in her off time.  I certainly have a new crush when I find out.

As we move into the first scene, we can see that there are some clothes on the ground:

Naughty!  I’ve never seen this done before.  It’s such a creative way to indicate that we’ll soon see two naked people in bed.  Naked!  Naked!  Woo!  When I first watched, I could almost feel the temperature rising in the room.  My little lesbian heart beat feverishly.  I barely had a moment to look at the really cool boots on the floor.  The camera slowly panned up the side of the bed until finally… finally…

Olivia and Natalia kissed!

Oh wait.  No.  Were you hoping for that?  You’re not delusional in your current life are you?   I hope not.  However, if you are, you’re in luck!  Neither Crystal Chappell nor Jessica Leccia have a very broad range so, if you’re a member of the delusional masses, you can easily pretend the first scene of Venice occurs in jolly-old Springfield.  If the room looks too unlike the farmhouse for your limited imagination, you can imagine that the pair are on their honeymoon in Venice.  If you have trouble with the sexy duo having different names in this reality, perhaps you could give Natalia and Olivia amnesia.  This would handily explain why they think their names are Ani and Gina.   Maybe you could even write a story about it!  Remember, being delusional entertaining and fun.

Let’s talk about the kiss.  Personally, I found it fascinating to watch — very nuanced and emotion-evoking.  The kiss begins very nicely, as we see in this picture:

As I am wont to say: “Rawr!”  Unfortunately, the kiss takes a turn for the worse when Ani forces her face to go into dimple mode as seen here:

By the time Ani begins pressing her lips together in a smile that seems only meant to bring out her dimples, she looks over the whole kissing-a-girl thing.  She begins to talk a lot, backs away from Gina repeatedly, and seems to get a sudden headache.  Gina attempts to circumvent this depressing turn of events by doing a nice plunger imitation on Ani’s face, but alas, it doesn’t make her stop talking.

Somehow, after all this, we’re supposed to believe that Ani still wants to spend more time in bed with Gina.  Perhaps Ani just wants Gina to use her lips on other parts of her body.  No.  That can’t be right because she’s the one attempting to process as Gina noms on her face.  Wait.  I need a minute to get this straight in my head.  Gina is kissing Ani like she wants more sweet lovin’, Ani is backing away and attempting to define the relationship (as all good lesbians should the morning after), Gina suddenly moves to get out of bed because she has an early meeting, and then Ani pouts and says she’s not done with Gina — presumably in a sexual way.  Okay, I still don’t really get it, but at least I can understand why she’s not done.  She still has her clothes on.  I don’t know about you, but I’ve never had “amazing” sex (in a bed, at least) while wearing a tank top and underwear.  Ani is still wearing her bra:

That must have been some very “special” sex indeed!

Eventually, Gina hops out of bed just in time for us to hear Lady Gaga’s dulcet tones ooze from her red Blackberry.  Great timing!   The fun part of this call is that it’s from Gina’s sassy assistant Michelle.  I can’t wait to see her show up in an episode.  I hope she’s sassy like Kit was on The L Word, or like Token is on South Park.

Ani watches from the bed:

Now, it’s time for a deep conversation about love, heartbreak, loss, and hope.  It’s a soul-touching conversation that makes Gina nervous:

I’m not sure where to start talking about this amazingly deep conversation.  I fear the only way I can only properly capture its essence by typing it out:

Ani: I will never give up on you.
Gina: I wish I could see me the way that you do.
Ani: I see you so clearly through all of your bullshit.
Gina: I don’t think I can be what you need me to be.
Ani: I know.

Wow.  Just… I have no words.  Oh wait, yes I do.  Unfortunately, my words aren’t tired clichés.  I’ll never get a web series.  Sigh.  Luckily, this conversation is washed from our minds by thoughts of Gina and Ani taking a shower together.  As I watched Gina ask Ani to join her in the shower, my breath caught in my throat.  The excitement began to build again.  Would Ani join her?  Would we get to see them in the shower?  Would they finally take their tank tops off?  Unfortunately, I’ll never know because we don’t get to see any part of the shower.  Darn.  However, we do see that Gina was nice enough to take off her bra:

One aspect of this scene that truly confuses me is the amount of time it takes Natalia Ani to join Gina in the shower.  What could possibly have caused the delay?  My only theory is that Ani knew her hair looked pretty and she wanted to take a moment to make cute faces and revel in the pretty before getting it wet.

After the deleted shower scene, we see our two sublimely sexy heroines walk into a rooftop café.  This is a great moment.  It has no point and does nothing to further the plot, but it’s great all the same.  Why is it great?  Two words: slow motion.  Slow motion makes everything better.  It’s a bit like bacon in that respect.  It’s also great because we get to meet the sassy owner of the rooftop café.  Between you and me, girlfriend, I can’t wait to see more of him.  The sassy possibilities are simply endless.

There is one aspect of this scene that leaves me a tiny bit puzzled.  Why is Gina wearing the same clothes that she wore the previous night?   (See left side of the cool boots pic above.)  Strange.  I can understand why Ani would have on the same clothes, of course, but doesn’t Gina have any other clothes?  I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume it’s laundry day.

It is at the rooftop café where we’re introduced to Gina’s brother Owen.  I’m too gay to care much about him, but I enjoy his face in this shot:

Owen really seems to disapprove of Ani and Olivia Gina hooking up again.  Dun dun dun!   What does that mean?  Are they, indeed, really bad for each other?  I surely hope not because I want to see Olivia and Natalia kiss again.  Teehee!  It’s so sad about their amnesia, isn’t it?

The end of this episode brings up more questions than it answers.  Why does Owen disapprove so strongly?  Do Owen and Gina go out to dinner, or does chef Olivia Gina cook for them?  What kind of animal attacked Owen’s shirt?  Would Owen’s part have been played better by Jeff Branson?  Even the ending credits bring up questions.  Who on earth chose Brogno as Gina’s last name?  Why is there a craft services guy for a web series?  Couldn’t they just send someone sassy down to Subway for sandwiches? Why is there a show attorney when they have three executive producers who could handle the legal matters?

My brain is simply overloaded!  I’m glad this episode is only 6 minutes and 2 seconds.  I’m not sure I can handle any more than that!  Whew!  Fun times.

I need a snack.

Be sure to come back to read my future reviews of Venice: The Series!