Movies need to open with a way to grab the viewer’s attention from the start, and the Hulu original movie Not Okay certainly does that. The movie, a satire on social media trends, opens with a text warning that it centers on an “unlikable female protagonist.” Although this was meant to be ironic and part of the film’s critique, some Twitter users were confused.
Not Okay was written and directed by Quinn Shepard and stars Zoey Deutch as Danni Sanders, a social media influencer who desperately wants to be famous. She surprisingly reaches her goal, but only after surviving a tragedy. Searchlight Pictures released the movie on Hulu on Friday.
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The R-rated movie opens with the text, “Content Warning: This film contains flashing lights, themes of trauma, and an unlikable female protagonist. Viewer discretion advised.” Not Okay‘s teaser trailer started with a similar warning, reading, “Warning: This film contains an unlikeable female protagonist. Viewer discretion advised.”
Some Hulu subscribers took the disclaimer seriously, thinking it was something Hulu added. “We need a content warning for women being…human? Never have I seen a content warning of this sort for men,” one person tweeted. “Why is Hulu warning me about ‘an unlikeable female protagonist’? Do unlikeable male protagonists need content warnings?” another person asked.
A few days before the movie was released, Shepard explained the rationale behind the warning in an interview with IndieWire. She said it came after they did test screenings of the film. Members of the audience would wonder why they should care about an “unlikeable” woman.
“It’s something I’ve repeatedly heard, and a lot of my other writer friends have as well. If you portray flawed women or women who reflect societal flaws, you get notes like, ‘I literally don’t understand why you tell a story about this character,’” Shepard explained. She was puzzled since movies with unlikable male protagonists are often hailed as classics. Audiences could tell those movies were “a statement and not an endorsement,” Shepard told Indiewire, so she hoped the same could be said about Not Okay.
Not all of the content warning was meant to be a parody. Shepard wanted audiences to know that the film includes themes of trauma before they watch it. The “unlikeable female protagonist” phrase was meant to provoke a response though. “It was interesting to me that a large chunk of the audience seemed genuinely upset by the fact that the film was about Danni, and so I just wanted to kind of poke at it a little,” the filmmaker explained. ย
