Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
There are many ways in which a show can quickly become dated. Clothing (“What is up with that blazer Elaine Benes is wearing?”), hairstyles (“Check out that big hair on Kelly Bundy!”), and technology (“Is that a brick or a cell phone Zack Morris is talking on?”) are three of the primary offenders. That said, few shows in history have been left behind in history as fully as Entourage has.
Entourage, for those who somehow remain unfamiliar with one of the most popular HBO shows of all-time or the feature film that bombed in its release last weekend, was about 4 guys from New York living it up in LA while one of them tries to makes it big in Hollywood. Notably, the HBO show ended almost 4 years ago on September 11, 2011. That same month, Occupy Wall Street began its protest in Zuccotti Park.
Whatever you thought of Occupy—and I didn’t think much—it solidified in our culture the idea of the 1 percenter and that they were markedly apart from the rest of us. The boys of Entourage, with their flashy cars, fancy houses and, ahem, $20,000 one-of-a-kind Japanese sneakers (see: “What About Bob?” from Season 3, Episode 11), existed in a time before that divide. It’s not that there weren’t mockable douchebags before Occupy, it’s just that the repetition of the 1%/99% mantra gave us easy ways to categorize people like the characters of Entourage who, for example, buy a $319,000 Rolls Royce Phantom (see: “The Review” from Season 1, Episode 2).
For the Entourage guys, it wasn’t just the money and the way they flaunted it that makes them obsolete in 2015. They also existed in a time before you were told to “check your privilege,” before “safe spaces” at colleges, before an awkward joke on Twitter could get you fired and ruin your life. Four white guys, with their super-obnoxious white agent, using, rating and discarding women while blowing through millions would launch a thousand think-pieces and hot takes if the show hit the air today. Ari’s constant racist, homophobic jokes at his assistant Lloyd’s expense (“Speak or I will intern you like it’s 1942” barks Ari into the phone at non-Japanese Lloyd in a typical scene) and his non-stop sexual harassment of Dana Gordon (“Who else is turned on right now?” Ari asks a room full of people after Dana puts a director in his place) would have protestors outside HBO’s studios. In one innocuous scene from the first season, the boys mock Vince’s new girlfriend for being a vegan. In 2015, Beyonce and Jay-Z are vegans with a line of their own vegan food. Things are truly different.
There was no way the Entourage movie wasn’t going to bomb. Even if you think a lot of modern society and today’s outrage culture is mockable—and I do—there’s no denying that the world has changed and Vince and his friends no longer fit into it. Watching Entourage episodes now is equivalent to looking at your mom’s prom pictures; it just seems long ago, far away and kind of weird.
@Karol is a freelance writer in Brooklyn. She enjoys only about 5% of movies she sees but 100% of Love & Hip Hop episodes.
