GLOW Review

Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch built GLOW for Netflix after finding a 2012 documentary about the real Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling, with Orange Is the New Black's Jenji Kohan producing. Alison Brie plays Ruth Wilder, a struggling actress who auditions for a women's wrestling show in 1985 Los Angeles, only to find its star is Debbie Eagan (Betty Gilpin), the soap actress whose husband Ruth slept with. Their feud, worked into the ring as a Soviet villain against an all-American heroine, is the engine.

The writing is quick, specific and generous to a large ensemble of women rarely handed a lead, from Britney Young's gentle Machu Picchu to the real wrestler Kia Stevens, whose character is given a racist gimmick, the Welfare Queen, and knows exactly what it is. Marc Maron is excellent as Sam Sylvia, the sardonic B-movie director who grows fond of his cast despite himself, and Gilpin earned three Emmy nominations.

The second season is the peak, with The Good Twin, an entire episode staged as a broadcast of the wrestling show itself, and Ruth's walkout on a harassing network executive. The third moves the troupe to a Las Vegas casino and drifts pleasantly. Netflix cancelled the planned final season in 2020 because of the pandemic, so the story simply stops.