Entertainment

You Need To See These Female-Centric Web Series

by James Tison

In this modern, technologically advanced world, you're nobody if you don't have your own web series. (Sorry, fact of life.) Now that everybody and their dog has an HD camera on their phone, it seems like every human in the galaxy is filming their breakfast, posting it on Vine, and calling it a web series. The downside of everyone being able to make their own work is that not everyone is particularly talented; the upside is that some really, really are, and web series give those talented artists — lots of whom are women — an opportunity to take control of their work and give it a platform to shine. For instance: There are quite a few hilarious female-centric web series starring, written, and directed by women.

Whether it's a 90-second sketch like each episode of Fawzia Mirza's Brown Girl Problems, or a 10-minute, character-driven comedy like Issa Rae's The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl, web series have a small amount of time to grab a viewer's attention. The format of a web series demands a lot of creativity, and in order for a show to stand out from the rest, the writing needs to be crisp, the acting has to be top-notch, and the jokes must be laugh-out-loud funny.

With that in mind, here are some of the funniest and most inventive female-centric web series on the Internet you need to check out ASAP.

Your Main Thing

Jill Pangallo is the writer, director, and star of this little gem of a series. The New York-based comedian is brilliant as a shrewd manager of a dim-witted celebrity named Shayne McGrath, whose career she's desperately trying to revive. The supporting cast of characters are insane (some of them quite literally), and John Early is pitch perfect as McGrath. Your Main Thing is absurd, clever, and very, very funny.

Web Therapy

Before it got picked up as a half-hour comedy on Showtime, Web Therapy was a simpler, shorter web series that boasted over a hundred episodes and a handful of Webby Awards. Former Friends star Lisa Kudrow is her usual, brilliant self as the absurdly narcissistic Dr. Fiona Wallice.

Brown Girl Problems

Not only will you, like the rest of the Internet, fall in love with Fawzia Mirza the second you see her, but you will also laugh out loud at the awkward situations in which her character finds herself in this web series.

I Wanna Have Your Baby

Christine Nangle is a writer for Inside Amy Schumer , and her web series is very similar — stylistically — to what's seen on the show. In the web series, Nangle plays a tacky Philadelphia woman who, as a surrogate mother-for-hire, makes her living by having babies for rich couples. The role's crude, rude, antagonistic... and absolutely hilarious.

Day Job

Another New York-based comic, Sara Schaefer's Day Job perfectly captures (and satirizes) the drudgery that accompanies your average office job in NYC.

The Maria Bamford Show

Maria Bamford plays every character in residing her Minnesota hometown in this web series. It's absolutely bonkers in the best way possible.

The Misadventures Of Awkward Black Girl

Issa Rae's insanely good web series went viral a few years ago, and Rae's star has been on the rise ever since. If, somehow, you still haven't seen it, stop whatever you're doing and watch it immediately. Not only because it's amazing, but also to prepare for what's probably going to be your new favorite show in the future: As previously reported in February 2015, Rae has been working with HBO to create a series based on Misadventures, and after two years, the network finally ordered a pilot for the project (now titled Insecure).

Image: iamOTHER/YouTube