Riley Brennan
Features and A&E Editor
With the addition of new shows and movies to Netflix, YouTube sensation Colleen Ballinger plays her fictional character, Miranda Sings, on her new show, which has recently been added to Netflix. Ballinger created her character in 2008, when she started posting videos of the comically talentless, self-absorbed, quirky character. In her videos, Miranda Sings, shares her very confused ideas and misconceptions, gives tutorials, discusses her day to day life, collaborates with other YouTubers, and fires back at her haters by reading hate comments, which she responds to with her slogan and the fitting name of her new Netflix series: “Haters back off!”.
Over the past eight years the Miranda Sings Youtube channel has raked in over 1.1 billion views, seven million subscribers, and five million Instagram followers. She’s one of the most watched channels on Youtube, and rightfully so. Ballinger is able to transform herself into a completely different person with nothing more than some red lipstick, hair pins, a blue pinstriped shirt, animated facial expressions, and a different tone of voice. Viewers find entertainment in Miranda’s inability to correctly pronounce words, her emotional instability, singing voice, and her overall persona.
Miranda fans had high hopes for the series, anticipating the same quirky humor they had come accustomed to, but the show has received mixed reviews since its debut on Oct. 14. Most complaints with the eight-episode series center on the supporting cast, not Miranda herself. The series doesn’t so much as feature other characters, but follows them just as much as Miranda herself. By including these other characters to the extent the show does, the series has a heavier plot, which at times can end up being more awkwardly upsetting than humorous. The cast of characters and their own stories make the series less comical and more downcast than Miranda’s YouTube videos. This might be because the season features Miranda’s rise to fame and building her YouTube channel, whereas on her channel she is already “famous.” Regardless, what the show lost in humor, it gained in awkwardly portrayed sadness.
