The Mycenaean

Orange Is the New Black is the new Netflix hit series about a woman in her thirties, who is sentenced to 15 months in a federal prison for a 10-year-old crime committed with an ex-girlfriend. She juggles life behind bars, a fiance and maintaining her sanity for the duration of her sentence.

I’m officially obsessed, and here is why you should be as well:

 

5. The Inmates

OINTB isn’t only the story of Piper Chapman. It also follows a group of eccentric women and follows their stories of life before prison as well. Upon Piper’s sentencing, she immediately finds herself gaining an unexpecting group of friends and enemies alike. There are mother-daughter relationships, romantic relationships and rivalries that are in no way worth missing.

 

4. You’ll Question Your Beliefs

What do you actually know about serving time in prison? Before OITNB was a hit series, it was a book. The book was an actual recount of life in prison and the thoughts and feelings of the real Piper Kerman. Granted, some of the show is fiction, but many of the show’s events are dramatizations of real life events. Piper Kerman, an upper-middle class white female was sentenced to 15 months in a federal prison for importing drugs for her girlfriend once,10 years prior to being caught. For a long time, Kerman believed she didn’t belong in prison and eventually had to come to terms with her current reality.

 

3. The Controversial Relationships

This show does a perfect job of portraying controversial, and sometimes uncomfortable, relationships. While serving time, Piper runs into her ex-girlfriend, Alex, with whom she committed her crime. This causes Piper to confront her past and face her future. Another controversial relationship, and perhaps my favorite is the one with recurring inmate, Sophia Burset. Sophia is a transgendered female who, before her sentence, was male firefighter with a wife and a son. Sophia is still currently married to her wife, and the show slowly reveals the struggle as Sophia tries to hold onto her family.

 

2. The Drama

Although a comedy, the drama in the show can be captivating. Piper’s fiance, an aspiring writer who believes Piper’s sentence is a sentence for two, deals with life without his girlfriend. As Piper deals with the feelings for her ex-girlfriend behind bars, her fiance is also dealing with his own feelings of regret, jealousy, and betrayal towards Piper.

 

1. The Humor!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is probably the funniest show I’ve seen in a long time. The drama in the story is lessened with funny one-liners, and the many many ridiculous situations. Suzanne Warren, aka “Crazy Eyes”, is another recurring inmate that becomes quickly infatuated with Piper. When rejected by Piper, whom she knows as “Dandelion”, she gets enraged and takes her feelings of rejection to another level. “I threw my pie for you!”