Killing Eve Has The Best Pussy On TV

Killing Eve is my favorite show right now, not just because it’s run entirely by women with storybook names (the show was created by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, who turned the show-running duties over to executive producer Sally Woodward Gentle and actress-writer Emerald Fennell for Season 2). I’m attracted to Killing Eve in the way I’m attracted to most women. I gravitate toward stylish angry business ladies with femme-dom energy. And Killing Eve has given me female characters that I haven’t seen before. They’re complex and mean and vulnerable and not defined solely by their trauma!

Killing Eve is a cat and mouse game where both leads are the cat and the mouse. They equally pursue and evade each other. It’s also about lesbian desire. But Villanelle and Eve’s relationship is deviant for reasons other than their genders. The show is about Eve’s fall from grace. It’s about secrets, shame, lies, and of course, murder.

Eve is the heroine of the story but she’s certainly no hero. She’s far too selfish and deceitful to represent goodness to the viewer. Still, you root for her because you understand her boredom, her fascination with the forbidden and her lack of satisfaction in her marriage.

TV is often afraid is show women’s dark sides with out demonizing them. In Killing Eve I get to see a woman struggle with her darkest desires, her shame, her fear, while still seeing her as a whole woman and not a “whore” or villain who exists to antagonize the man. The show begins with the quietly brilliant Eve bored of being overlooked, of not having her opinions valued, or her insight appreciated. Now, Eve has power, and an open door to the darkness she spent years repressing. Eve wants Villanelle, a violent psychopath who murdered her partner and tormented her husband. On paper, it isn’t ok. If I was Eve’s friend I’d definitely worry about her sorry ass. But as a viewer, I enjoy seeing a character uncover what, in reality, we are all trying to hide: lust, greed, selfishness and downright dirtiness.

I can’t talk about Killing Eve without bringing up the aesthetic euphoria, particularly of Jodie Comer’s character, Villanelle. She’s almost too perfect of a television character: the beautiful psychopathic assassin. She’s unbreakable and uncatchable, lead astray from her murder path only by her obsession with Eve Polastri. Does she love her, lust after her, or want to kill her? Villanelle gets in trouble the way a murderous psychopath does best, in a violent play for attention and desire for near worship. Of course, in fabulous outfits, soundtracked by 60s pop, and groovy, haunting originals by Unloved. She’s a sexy comic book villain, grounded by a dynamic performance by Comer that maintains believability.

But her outfits are delicious! Villanelle (more accurately, her costume designer Charlotte Michell) is as unafraid of bold color and pattern mixing as she is of armed men and government pursuit. She delights in the details and the performance. She dresses for the occasion, whether is a power suit or vintage couture. When Villanelle visits Oxford University, she sports a cream ensemble (à la Man Repeller’s #stickofbutter campaign) with a cable-knit sweater knotted around her shoulders. The unspoken truth is that she bought this outfit to have a 3-minute conversation in an alleyway. That is the flamboyance that makes her such a joy to watch.

I’ve watched the marketability of (often faux) girl power grow exponentially in my lifetime of media consumption. Perhaps it was around the peak Hunger Games craze when I started to realize people were suddenly marketing Powerful Kickass Women at me HARD. Then we started seeing male-centered series get remade with female casts. It’s shocking to no one that most of Hollywood’s Female Empowerment is directed by men. For generations, men have made money off of women’s insecurities. Now they’re making money off of telling us to get over those insecurities and love ourselves and also kick ass. This article from Buzzfeed does a good job rounding up the female empowerment entertainment of 2018. It is a distinct delight to enjoy a piece of media about women that is actually made by women. For that reason alone, I’ll keep defending Killing Eve as having the best pussy on television.

What Phoebe Waller-Bridge does best is hold a mirror up to what women are most ashamed of, and then smile about it. She does it on her Amazon original Fleabag and again on Killing Eve. I suppose, I like seeing women whose minds are as dark as mine, whose desires are as “deviant” and whose behavior is as regrettable. I’ve been trying, so ardently, to become comfortable with myself as I am. I’m so sick of trying to change. I can’t rewrite my code. I’m not saying I’m going to fuck a sociopathic assassin, but I sure-as-shit might wear a bold printed pant-suit and lust after some folks with questionable behavior. I might even wear head-to-toe cream and leave my husband for woman. Who knows. Whether or not I decide to actually take inspiration from the women of Killing Eve, I will continue to enjoy seeing women wrestle with darkness on TV. Because we’re wrestling in real life and it’s ripe with entertainment value.