The Sex Lives of College Girls: Mindy Kaling’s irreverent and fun new comedy

The Sex Lives of College Girls adds to that pantheon of campus life as depicted in the likes of the bawdy Revenge of the Nerds, the chaste Gilmore Girls and the deadly The Secret History but with a fresh voice and a bold attitude.

Co-created by Mindy Kaling and Justin Noble, The Sex Lives of College Girls is centred on four freshmen roommates exploring sexual desire, identity and that sweet taste of no parental supervision.

It’s a seductive, adrenaline-pumped series that captures the characters’ highs and lows thanks to sparkling writing and performances that pop.

It is also very funny and very frank. From naked parties to six consecutive hand-jobs, The Sex Lives of College Girls doesn’t blush at its characters’ sexual adventures – and it certainly doesn’t judge them.

It does what it says on the box, and does it with no apologies and no moral hand-wringing about young women’s natural desires, embracing a generation that doesn’t have to be shamed into the same hang-ups as those before them.

The setting is the fictional Essex College in Vermont, not far from Kaling’s real-life alma mater, Dartmouth in the neighbouring state of New Hampshire. It’s a ritzy, ivy-covered school that looks like it has history, prestige and a hell of a lot of rich alumni donors.

One of those donors is Leighton’s (Renee Rapp) father and she has no qualms about throwing around the fact her family’s name is on the building. Despite her prickly attitude and superiority, Leighton has a secret that she’s not ready to share, for fear it will come to define her.

Also in the dorm is Whitney (Alyah Channelle Scott), a star athlete trying to make a mark away from the influence of her politician mother, and Kimberly (Pauline Chalamet), one of the few students at Essex who has to work her way through college.

Lastly, there’s Bela (Amrit Kaur), a candid Indian-American student who’s as keen to explore sex as she is to start her comedy career as part of the school’s humour magazine, an institution dominated by dismissive men.

The fictional world of Essex created by Kaling and her co-writer, the Yale-educated Noble (Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Never Have I Ever) is a vivid place of discovery and privilege, drawn from their own experiences and more recent visits to ensure the series wouldn’t be some nostalgia trip.

The four leads are relatively unknown – Rapp is a Broadway transplant and Chalamet (older sister of Timothee) has mostly had bit roles – but they anchor the series with confidence and verve. Kaur is particularly striking as the vivacious Bela, the most well-drawn character in the first episodes.

While The Sex Lives of College Girls has a very different vibe to its youthful contemporaries such as the Gossip Girl reboot, Genera+ion or Euphoria, this series is more accessible, especially to viewers over 25.

The show is inviting you to be part of the group and the fun, rather than feeling like you’re being excluded from the cool kids and you should be so lucky to get a voyeuristic glimpse into their angst-ridden cliques.

It’s still a little patchy in its rhythm and flow – it doesn’t bed itself in as fast as Kaling’s Never Have I Ever on Netflix – but The Sex Lives of College Girls has given every indication that it’ll get there sooner rather than later.

Like its protagonists, it has a little growing up to do but the good-humoured The Sex Lives of College Girls is instantly charming.

The Sex Lives of College Girls is streaming now on Binge*

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Originally published as The Sex Lives of College Girls: Mindy Kaling’s irreverent and fun new comedy