A League of Their Own
by Will Graham & Abbi Jacobson
CW: period-appropriate homophobia and racism, raid on a gay bar at the end of episode 6
I wasn’t planning on watching A League of Their Own when I heard it was being turned into a TV series.
The original film was such a foundational part of my childhood, how could I possibly enjoy an 8-episode series as much?
Also, I’d heard it was super gay, which made me concerned about what traumatic events we’d see, given that it’s set in the 1940’s, when it was illegal to be queer.
But, once I confirmed that no gays are buried and there’s no sexual assault, I gave it a go and I’m so glad I did!
Rather than rebooting or remaking the original film, the series goes back to the original source material: the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL). And, instead of focusing on the very straight and white perspectives of the film, it brings to the forefront the lesser-known experiences of queer and Black women during that time.
The show has two leads. Carson Shaw is a White, smalltown Idaho housewife who flees town for AAGPBL tryouts when she receives a letter that her husband is coming home.
Carson is one hell of a player, so she’s picked by the Rockford Peaches, which sets her on a journey of self-discovery.
Max Chapman is a Black woman who knows she’s an incredible pitcher, but she’s not even allowed to try out because of her race. So, Max forges her own path toward playing professionally and toward accepting other parts of herself.
I cannot overstate how joyfully queer this version is!
We see butch lesbians like Jess, Lupe, and Jo. Carson’s love interest, Greta, is femme. And, Carson and Max question why being queer requires picking one or the other.
The lesbians gravitate toward each other in a way that feels authentic and some of them form the familial bonds that are so common in the LGBTQIA community. I was especially thrilled to see a Black trans man played by a trans man, enjoying life with his wife in Rockford. They throw a house party for other queer Black people, showing us an important way that queer people came together without going to bars pre-Stonewall.
Carson’s journey was a joy to watch because she begins with zero confidence and grows into an incredible woman. She’s clearly never chosen anything for herself before and then she chooses for herself over and over, including pursuing a romantic relationship with Greta. I so hope this show gets renewed, because I need to know what’s next for Carson.
And Greta changes too, thanks to their relationship, becoming more tender and less determined to follow rigid rules for having a fling.
Max is powered by sheer determination, because she knows she’s meant to be a pitcher. While I rooted for her and enjoyed her story, I loved the people around Max just as much as I loved her.
Max’s relationship with her best friend, Clance, is one of my favourite friendships on TV or film ever, with Clance accepting Max’s baseball obsession and Max encouraging Clance’s comic-book nerdiness.
Also Clance’s relationship with her husband Guy is sooo lovely. I wouldn’t have thought my favourite romantic relationship in this show would be a straight one, but here we are, because I could watch Clance and Guy for seasons upon seasons.
Max’s relationship with her family is a key theme of the show, because Max’s baseball dreams are not compatible with her mother’s plans for her life. Max’s mother is trying to set Max up for a life that’s safe and stable, even if owning a hair salon isn’t what Max wants. That tension helps keep the story interesting, because her mom knows exactly who Max is and why life isn’t going to be easy for her, but Max can’t stop chasing her goal. Also, can we celebrate that Max’s parents are successful business owners who are wildly in love? The Black joy is just as palpable and beautiful as the queer joy, and it made my heart so happy to see.
There’s one scene that’s particularly difficult, which I mentioned in the content warnings above. At the end of the sixth episode, Greta, Carson, and Jo are at an underground gay bar that is raided by the police. The bar owner and some others are beaten and likely hauled away. It’s not easy to watch, but for me, the violence doesn’t come across as overly graphic. I appreciated that the show doesn’t dwell on the violence, but shows just enough for contemporary viewers to understand the real dangers people in the LGBTQIA community faced during this time and that beloved characters escape or avoid the worst of it.
My only complaint is that sometimes the nighttime scenes were too dark to see much of what was happening on my TV or my laptop. But the content and characters? I don’t have any complaints.
I loved this show more than I can describe. With its focus on Black and/or queer women, it celebrates community and found family, embracing yourself, and fighting for what you want, no matter the odds. I’m bugging all of my friends to watch it and I’ve already started to watch it again. I’m so glad A League of Their Own exists, so we can all marvel at the amazing things women were doing during this time.
P.S. Want to learn more about one of the real-life ball players from the All-American League? Watch the documentary A Secret Love on Netflix, which shares the story of Peoria Redwings player Terry Donahue and her partner, Pat Henschel. While it’s slow at times, it does a great job of showing how careful lesbians had to be at the time if they wanted to avoid hospitalization or criminalization. Pat and Terry were together for 72 years and I cried several times at their story, because it’s so beautiful.
Aaah, I was hoping for a ALOTO thread on Smart Bitches! I’ve had a show hangover since we finished watching it—I’m somewhat meh on Carson, but I LOVE Lupe, Jess, Max, Clance, and so many other characters. I love that basically all of the characters are fully realized even if they only have smaller roles (like Max’s parents—how much do I love Max’s parents?—and Bev, the team chaperone.)
Also, I really enjoy that Kelly McCormack, who plays Jess, insisted that her character be from Moose Jaw due to the town’s queer history (apparently Moose Jaw hosted a lesbian parade in the 1940s and had a thriving and diverse sex worker community.)
On a more serious note, I will just say that I watched this with my (pretty mature and thoughtful) 10 year old who has seen most of the Marvel movies and while the violence in the bar raid is not, to my mind, graphic or extended, she found it EXTREMELY upsetting that the police would attack people for loving someone different. It was a good reminder that things don’t have to be visually/stylistically inappropriate to be thematically inappropriate.
I want to watch this so much, but frustratingly Amazon won’t let you just rent or buy it, you have to have a Prime account. I have one grandfathered in from when you could put family members on the account and since I’m not a PRIMARY Prime holder, all this stuff is restricted. I’d probably lose that grandfathered account if I got a free trial.
Amazon being the worst is nothing new, I use them as little as possible, but it’s getting really frustrating now that they have shows like this and Rings of Power…
@AtasB: I get this frustration!! I don’t know who it was that said this (probably more than one person) but eventually someone is going to tie together all the different streaming services into one bundle and reinvent cable television. SO frustrating!
Thanks for this review, sounds like a must-watch for me. 🙂
@FashionablyEvil: Tara and I just recorded a podcast episode about the show, and we discussed your comment several times – thank you. I knew there would be folks who wanted to talk about this show. One thing I love about it is that there is such efficient visual storytelling at work in creating the characters and all their nuances. Even the raid, as you said, isn’t graphic or extended, but it’s so upsetting, in part because it is so efficient in its impact.
My series of the year. My absolute favorite show of the summer. This is a solid Squee for me, I adored it so much.
I loved this series so much! It took me awhile to get into it – some of the anachronistic dialog and mannerisms really took me out of the story. I don’t care that much about historical accuracy, but Carson’s mannerisms especially seemed like a character from the 2020s not 1940s and that bugged me.
But once I kind of relaxed into it, I just loved it. It’s so incredibly good.
I absolutely adored this series! I too was so against the remake in theory, as I have a beloved memory of seeing the movie in theaters at 12years old with my grandmother. It was a special afternoon together and she talked about her own experience with the war effort during WWII after we watched it together.
So I was very skeptical about the show, and it blew away all of my doubts. It was queer, and nuanced and funny and heartbreaking and inspiring. Clance is the best friend we all need and I would watch an entire season focused only on Clance and Max and their friendship. I binged the show about two weeks ago now and struggle to remember everything going on with the Peaches, but still feel very invested in Max’s story and her drive to play ball above all else.
It actually took me a whole episode to pick up on the modernized dialogue, as I could feel that something was a little “off” but couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Once I eased into the style though, it worked just fine for me. I also found the anachronistic needle drops were really well placed and somehow Janis Joplin worked alongside Benny Goodman.
I’m going to rewatch with my 12-year old daughter, but will forewarn her about the bar raid because I can see that having a deep emotional impact as FashionablyEvil noted. I cried too when we saw characters beaten (even though it wasn’t gratuitous) and really felt Greta’s fear afterward. D’arcy Carden as Greta is just so so good in this role. Everyone is good, as they are multidimensional characters that don’t just represent “the Black girl” or the butch one”, etc but have full lives we get introduced to on the show.
An A+ and one of my favorite things I’ve watched this year.