Welcome to the second recap of the first season of Faking It, a delightful new twenty-minute rom-com from the network that brought you Once Upon a Prom and Til Death Do Us Part: Carmen and Dave.Â
We open smack-dab in the nougat center of an unfortunately heterosexual situation: Karma and Liam are making out atop Karma’s bed. Liam passionately whispers, “what about your girlfriend?” and Karma passionately responds, “she’s not my girlfriend” and then Liam takes off his shirt. WHAT IS THIS CHIPPENDALES WHERE ARE THE LESBIANS
Never fear, queers — this scene is quickly cut short by the blare of an ambitious bedside alarm clock. It was all but a dream/nightmare.
Next up we have Amy’s dream, which is the kind of dream we all prefer to dream when we dream a little dream, dreamweavers, because it involves Karma rolling over in bed and kissing Amy. Nobody has morning breath because everything is always minty fresh in your subconscious.
Unfortunately, Amy’s jolted back to waking life/reality by Lauren, who’s wearing a super fancy outfit for 6 AM and measuring Amy’s room, which she plans on moving in to. See, Lauren’s pissed that these two lezzers stole her homecoming queen glory and thus is blackmailing Amy to hand over the square footage or else get “outed.”
Cut to wholesome and hearty family breakfast time, where Amy’s father Bruce is asking the good lord Jesus almightly amen to look over Amy’s Mom Farrah on this fine day as she makes the career leap from Weather to News. It’s consistently hard to remember that Amy, not Lauren, is Farrah’s daughter, isn’t it?
Farrah then registers some complaints regarding her daughter’s rejection of patriarchal hair institutions. No comment on the GAY AS FUCK Lucky Dog Leather wristcuff she’s wearing, however.
Farrah: “Amy, I’m sorry, but you have such gorgeous hair, and you just let it hang there, limp. (Farrah touches Amy’s hair, which has clearly been styled by Hair & Makeup for at least 20 minutes but whatever) And those look like a homeless man’s pajamas. Why don’t you wear that cute skirt I got you?”
Bruce: “I think she looks great. You know it takes a strong woman to wear pants every day.”
Amy: “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Bruce and Farrah wanna know if Lauren and her sockless boyfriend Tommy won Homecoming Queen and King, but Lauren laments that they lost to “a pair of lesbians.”
Bruce: “Now honey, there’s no reason to call them names just because they beat you. I raised you better than that.”
Lauren: “I’m not, Dad. We lost to two girls. I told you, the public school system in this town is broken.”
Bruce: “We should have never put that man into the White House—”
Farrah: “Marriage is one thing. But homecoming? When does it stop?”
Welp, this is gonna be awkward.
We starsweep on over to Karma’s bedroom, where Amy’s lezzing out on the bed demanding that they break up before her mom finds out. Karma insists that they stay together ’til their celebrity status is ofish cemented.
Amy’s worried that if their Big Fat Lie is revealed to the students, they’ll be burned at the stake and their first-born babies will be placed into baskets and sent down a river to Gammorah. Karma’s not worried about this ’cause she’s prepped Amy a binder on Lesbianism 101.
Amy points out that a gigantic binder isn’t exactly the most convenient way to investigate her sapphic side. The good news is that we made her a much better binder ourselves:
Time for pillow talk:
Amy: You don’t feel weird about this? Pretending to be girlfriends?
Karma: Jeez, was I that bad a kisser?
Amy:Â [obviously lying] It was like kissing my sister.
Karma: Uh, ouch.
Amy: It’s not like you enjoyed it.
Karma: I thought you were great.
Amy: You did?
Oh, reader, the hopeful look on Amy’s little face!
But before we can get into what would undoubtedly be a delightful and entertaining conversation for the whole family (and by that I mean “me”), Karma’s adorable hippie parents burst in to bestow celebratory mugs of lezbo kombucha to the two “women-with-a-y.” (!!!) Molly tells Amy she couldn’t feel more like a daughter if she came out of Molly’s own womb!
Mr. and Ms Karma ask how Amy’s mom took the news, and Amy admits she’s yet to spill the info. Being the adorable hippies that they are, they volunteer to house Amy if she gets kicked out because their home is a safe space.
“You two trailblazers have fun loving each other,” Molly says before leaving the trailblazers alone to have fun loving each other.
Amy’s annoyed that Karma already informed her parents, but Karma says she couldn’t help it ’cause she knew it’d make them so happy and would finally elevate her to a level of parental appreciation exceeding that of her Peace Corps brother Zen. Also, they’ve already joined PFLAG and are probs besties with Debbie Novotny.
Amy again pleads with Karma to end the charade, but then Karma pulls out the big guns: She seduces Amy with her eyeballs while promising to “hold Amy’s hand” the whole time. Amy is rendered effectively powerless.
We then take four buses and eight tiny canoes to The Blue Oasis In The Red State of Texas High School, where Shane’s selling tickets for homecoming and Lauren’s pissed ’cause straight couples have to pony up $50 (all proceeds go to The Trevor Project!) while the gays get a free ride.
Shane:Â “This year in support of our queens, the homecoming theme is Homecoming Out, bring a same-sex date and you get in free. Everyone else, fifty bucks.”
Lauren:Â “That’s so not fair, it’s like a heterosexual tax!”
Shane:Â “Feels icky, doesn’t it?”
Liam chides Shane for his pleasure in torturing Lauren and Shane’s like, “oh please she’s so two-dimensional she’s practically a character in Glee,” at which point I have no choice but to fall in love with this show. Also, Shane and Liam are gonna go to prom together to save $50, which is confusing w/r/t the actual depths of their dedication to The Trevor Project but is also whatever.
Then Karma and Amy show up at school and everybody claps for them! This is basically exactly what high school was like for me JUST KIDDING WHAT THE HELL IS THIS PLACE
Later that very day in the art room, Liam is continuing his assault on everything we hold dear, including but not limited to “art” and “the girl Amy wants to make out with.”
Liam:Â “Glad you got back together with your girlfriend. You two are like the school’s Portia and Ellen!”
Karma:Â “Which one am I? Please say Portia.”
Liam:Â “Trust me, you’re the Portia.”
Liam’s clearly eager to investigate her beaver but expresses hesitation ’cause he doesn’t wanna be that asshole who breaks up Hester High’s Golden Couple. Instead of what he already is, which is “that asshole,” full stop.
Karma says it’s NBD ’cause she and Amy have an open relationship, like their own private “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” Liam asks Karma if she thinks she might be bisexual, and she says she’s unsure ’cause she always felt “100% lesbionic” before looking at his stupid face and now she’s “questioning everything.”
Liam: “That is so hot.”
Karma adds that she’s not looking for a relationship ’cause her heart belongs to Amy, and then they start sucking on each other’s tonsils.
That afternoon at the family I will now refer to as The Fawcetts until we find out what Amy’s actual last name is, Amy’s staring wistfully at a framed photograph of her and her lady-love as she packs up her things for the big move down the hall.
Lauren pops in to say some shit I no longer recall, and then Karma pops in with terrible news she is very excited about:
Karma:Â “Guess who’s having a sexy secret affair with Liam Booker? Here’s a clue: It’s me!”
Amy:Â “Are you kidding?”
Karma:Â “Crazy right? He’s so into this lesbian thing that I think if I play my cards right, we could have sex.”
Amy’s clearly jealous, but rather than addressing and dealing with those emotions, has chosen the much safer and more popular route that so many of us enjoy on a regular basis: finding a reason besides jealousy to rationalize being annoyed. Thus, Amy argues that the point of this escapade was to be popular, not to play Polish the Rocket with Liam. Karma argues that those goals co-exist neatly ’cause popular people (like her) do the horizontal mambo with other popular people, like Liam!
Then Karma and Amy cuddle suggestively on the bed as Karma continues yapping about her big plan and Amy is like, didn’t you want your first time to be special? This is a very good point. Karma says doing it with the hottest guy in school is special. So basically, Karma is an idiot.
Amy:Â “Well let’s hope nobody finds out you’re cheating on me. They’d think you’re a terrible person.”
Karma:Â “You’re upset.”
What Amy Says:Â “No.”
What Amy Actually Feels:Â YES I’M SUPER UPSET BUT I DON’T ACTUALLY KNOW WHY BECAUSE EVERYTHING IS VERY CONFUSING RIGHT NOW
They flip off the lights and curl up close in the dark, looking up at the stars on Amy’s ceiling that’ve been there since they were little girls who didn’t know one day they’d have their own show on MTV. It’s one of those moments when you’re intensely aware of every inch of your body and her body currently experiencing physical content and every inch of your body and her body that could potentially shift into new territories of suggestive physical contact.
But then Mom busts in with the laundry and they hop up out of bed like something sketchy really was going on.
Overwhelmed by being caught in a gay-seeming situation, Amy tells Mom they were just chatting about their homecoming dates… with boys! Mom is so thrilled in that way Moms are thrilled when their lesbian daughter seems like she maybe isn’t a lesbian for a second. This’ll be fun!
