Unbreakable!

“Unbreakable! They’re alive, dammit. It’s a miracle!
Unbreakable! They’re alive, dammit. Females are strong as hell!”
Set to the autotune of a fake viral video, these lyrics come from the undeniably catchy theme song of one of Netflix’s newest original series, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Highly energetic and addictive, the music reflects the nature of the show itself—an instant, binge-worthy classic.
Produced by Tina Fey and Robert Carlock of 30 Rock, the first season of the show, released on March 6, has received praise for its fast-paced jokes, witty humor, and spot-on cultural references. In addition to its sharp use of humor, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt tackles greater societal issues as well, boasting a strong feminist tone, exploring themes of homosexuality, criticizing the media and wealth, and addressing race, albeit controversially.
However, the darker undertones of the plot’s premise are often unacknowledged. The aforementioned fake viral video draws upon a news report that gives a brief overview of this backstory in a similar fashion to “The Bed Intruder Song” video that appeared on YouTube in 2010. The report describes the discovery of four “Indiana Mole Women” who have just been rescued from an underground bunker where they were captured and held for 15 years by a doomsday cult leader, Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne. Shocked to find that the apocalypse never actually occurred, the women are thrown into the world to somehow try and reclaim their old lives. All but one.
The show’s titular character, Kimmy Schmidt, emerges from the bunker with a huge grin plastered on her face. Seemingly unshaken by what she has just endured, she is determined to start a new life in New York City. Combining a childish naiveté with an endless supply of optimism, Kimmy, played by Ellie Kemper, is a ray of sunshine dressed in a daffodil yellow sweater and bubble-gum pink pants. Having spent the past 15 years in a bunker, Kimmy is utterly and hilariously unaware of current popular trends. For instance, she has never taken a selfie and thinks that hashtags are called “hash browns.”
Beyond her kooky personality, however, Kemper creates a character that is endearing for reasons other than her chirpy, girlish charm. Kimmy’s wide-eyed, smiling exterior draws from a will of pure steel and resilience. Navigating a new life in a new city while overcoming her past, Kimmy is the show’s heroine because she is a fighter. Through its satire of trauma, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt turns Kimmy’s story into one of more than just survival.
Ringing a Bell
Tackling issues such as abduction and post-traumatic stress disorder in a television show is a risk, especially when the plot of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt sounds eerily similar to actual events from recent history. The Indiana Mole Women bear incredible resemblance to three women who were kidnapped in Cleveland, Ohio and rescued in May 2013: Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, and Gina DeJesus, who was in middle school at the time she disappeared, just like Kimmy. Over the course of a decade, these women were held as prisoners by a man named Ariel Castro, who repeatedly beat, starved, and raped them.
While this was not the situation of a doomsday cult, the story of these women somewhat parallels that of Kimmy and the other Mole Women. Such resemblance to a shocking and recent traumatic event should deter audiences from watching the television series. It should horrify, offend, and disturb.
But instead it makes us laugh.
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt takes trauma and infuses comedy into every one of its should-be-shocking and should-be-upsetting elements. Each detail about life in the bunker is bizarre enough to be laughable, like the Mole Women turning a “mystery crank” over and over again for hours without knowing what it actually does. Likewise, each anecdote about what the Mole Women do to pass time is absurd enough to be hilarious. In one instance, for example, one of them, Cyndee, forces Kimmy to role-play as a boy that she likes so that she can pretend they are on a date. Despite occurring in such a bleak setting, these scenes remain lighthearted.
While such antics that ensue from boredom and isolation are easy to find funny, the show also contains much darker moments. Several other moments reveal the weight of Kimmy’s difficulty in completely detaching from her experiences in the bunker. One night, for example, Kimmy starts strangling her roommate, Titus, in her sleep, recalling the sensation of restless paranoia that she felt everyday for 15 years. On another night, Kimmy thinks that taking her relationship to “the next level” with her boyfriend translates to hitting him in the face, later realizing that what she thought appropriate was, in actuality, “way wrong.”
Although never directly addressed, it is implied that Kimmy and the Mole Women were victims of sexual violence, particularly when Kimmy blurts out that there was “weird sex stuff” in the bunker but does not elaborate further. References to trauma like this seem to subtly undermine the show’s other comedic themes in such a manner that viewers could easily miss them.
However, the humor that abounds in the series does not diminish or trivialize the hardship experienced by the Mole Women. Rather, it acknowledges and illuminates it in a liberating way. By merging pain with comedy, the show exposes the most disturbing elements of trauma by forcing us to laugh at our fears.
Kimmy is internally broken, no doubt. Her sporadic bursts of paranoia, terror, and anger are understandable—who could go through what she did and come out unscathed? She differs, however, in her conscious choice to maintain a positive outlook on life despite her traumatic past.
“I’m pretty but tough. Like a diamond,” Kimmy declares in one episode. “Or beef jerky in a ball gown.” Kimmy manages to fuse elements from her resilient beef-jerky interior and her bright ball gown exterior to create coping mechanisms for when she feels pain. While in the bunker, some of the methods she develops include smiling until she feels better—an exercise she dubs “Kimmying.” There is also her maxim: “You can stand anything for 10 seconds. Then you just start on a new 10 seconds!” These physical manifestations of Kimmy’s mentality demonstrate the development of her strength through her experiences. Through her, comedy becomes a mechanism that enables those who employ it to both face harsh reality and defeat their fears. Using that empowerment, Kimmy becomes a survivor who survives, but more importantly lives.
A Laughing Matter
In the first episode of the show, Titus tries to convince Kimmy to move back to Indiana, telling her that he is only trying to protect her. In response, Kimmy scoffs, “Protect me from what? The worst thing that ever happened to me happened in my own front yard.” Kidnapped, brainwashed, and abused by the Reverend, all in her hometown community, Kimmy draws her resilience from her experience. Her response rings another bell for producer Tina Fey, whose life offers more insight about the show.
When Fey was only five years old, she was approached by a stranger and slashed on her face. It happened in her own front yard. In her book Bossypants, she promises not to “lay out the grisly details … like a sweeps episode of Dateline.” Instead, she comically describes the kinds of people who usually ask her about her scar, from “sweet dumdums” to “egomaniacs of average intelligence or less.” Using humor to address a traumatic event from her childhood, Fey proves the cathartic benefits of comedy.
Could Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, then, be an extension of Tina Fey’s therapy? Could the show’s interspersed elements of comedy and PTSD be a way that Fey continues to process and heal from her painful past?
Whether or not the show is intentionally modeled after Tina Fey’s experience, the show speaks to the nature of comedy itself. Using television to address trauma through an unconventional approach, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt does not force social commentary, nor does it turn harrowing backstories into tropes. Through satire, Kimmy shows us that it’s permissible to laugh at our fears. In fact, laughing may free us from them.
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt redefines survival after trauma. Survival involves a sort of freedom to take control of life and begin anew as Kimmy does in New York City. To survive—to thrive—we must live every day in “hash brown no filter,” practice our Kimmying until we feel better, just take it 10 seconds at a time, and everything will be okay.
After all, as Kimmy would tell us, “Be you. Be what you want. And then become unbreakable.”
Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Netflix