‘PEN15’ Goes for Cringe over Binge

The title of Anna Konkle and Maya Erskine’s Hulu series, PEN15, straddles the adolescent divide between childlike naiveté and worldly disruption. It refers to a classic middle-school prank in which one friend asks another to join a pen pal club. If the friend agrees, he or she becomes the supposed 15th member and that membership is notarized by writing “Pen 15” on his or her hand.

Oddly, though, when written, the space between the word and the number is squeezed a little tight, and the five bears the unmistakable curvature of an “S.” The prank encapsulates a major theme of Konkle’s and Erskine’s show, where guileless friendship and the desire to “belong” are troubled by the emergent preoccupations of adulthood, foremost of which is the sexualization of their changing anatomy.

But, to be clear, the main characters’ bodies aren’t exactly changing. Konkle and Erskine, both in their thirties, only pretend to be 13-year-old versions of themselves, Anna and Maya. They don braces and dress to the middle-school fashion standards of the time, circa 2000. Meanwhile, the rest of the cast is true to their age:  teenagers playing teenagers.