With a few exceptions, most American media about female friendships are all overwhelmingly positive. Two girls or more girls pictured on screen are presented as the best of friends, and neither of those friends ever seem to have complicated feelings about one another. None of them are abusive, classist, or racist. Just sunshine and candy canes for the most part. And any mean girls who present in the wild are fully declared rivals. No hiding, no lies. But real toxic people don’t work that way. This is an important lesson for my audience.
Real Toxic Bastards prefer to make friends with their prey.
In our Pilot, we see Vanessa hanging out with Lyra, her only so-called friend on screen for the episode. Lyra is not actually her friend. She takes great pleasure in making Vanessa feel insecure, poor, and worthless. Why? I’d like to say we’ll find out later, but her jealousy is too easy to spot. I’m being so unsubtle and loud about who Lyra is and what her intentions are. She’s an emotional vampire hell bent on taking everything away from Vanessa, and laughing at her tears about it. She hates her. She wants to see her humbled brutally. And this is the scene where Vanessa finally clocks it.
In this scene, Lyra has contacted Vanessa pretending to be concerned about her tough times at school, but really it’s an attempt to concern-troll her. No, she does not actually give a shit about Vanessa’s well-being. Lyra wants to watch her suffer, but things don’t quite go her way when she sees where Vanessa is: a gorgeous tropical paradise.
And Lyra is…not in a tropical paradise.
I wanted to show Vanessa finally channeling her power as an Island Girl and firing back at her haters, but in the most hilarious way possible. Why be angry when you can just brag about being on vacation? It’s very difficult for Lyra or Phillippe, the other OP in the situation, to break through Vanessa’s good vibes. They can’t make Vanessa angry or upset, when they’re up against the power of sunshine, whales and piraguas.
Let this be a lesson to the rest of us Neuro-spicy kids. Haters will come for us because we’re special and they’re not. They think we’re easy targets, but that’s a projection. Nobody’s more vulnerable than an emotional vampire. We just gotta be unshakeable, and remind them that we’re on the vacation they wish they were on. We have the gifts and they do not. Follow up with a heaping dose of pity. Narcs hate it when we feel sorry for them.
We all have bad friends. The best thing you can do is make them so angry they throw themselves out of your life. Good luck.
-Love, Joolz