Crime
Grosse Pointe Garden Society
The seemingly charming members of The Grosse Pointe Garden Society hide their involvement in a murder in NBC’s drama.
It’s rush week at Manchester College.
Fraternities and sororities across campus plan epic parties to recruit prospective new members. Rush is always a big deal, but this year, tensions are particularly high.
Last semester, a hazing incident involving Scott Russell—son of a prestigious congressman—put Greek life under scrutiny. As a result, the university has placed its fraternities and sororities on probation, and activist Beatrice Worth spearheads anti-sorority protests.
Caroline, the president of Delta Phi, realizes that this rush week is vital to maintaining her sorority’s status.
And when she learns that Annie Grover—the daughter of the United States’ vice president—will be attending her college, Caroline decides she’ll do anything to recruit Annie to Delta Phi—even if it means making a deal with her playboy stepbrother and Alpha Gamma treasurer, Lucien.
Despite Lucien’s sexual escapades with countless women on campus, his eyes are set on his stepsister, Caroline. So she takes advantage of his feelings and makes a deal with him: If Lucien can manipulate Annie Grover into pledging Delta Phi, Caroline will sleep with him.
When the original Cruel Intentions film debuted in 1999, Plugged In referred to its content as “perverse, obscene and deeply offensive.” And it seems the 2024 reboot plays homage to the original by significantly intensifying these content issues.
Almost all of the primary plotlines deal with romantic manipulation in one form or another. Even more alarming: Many of these romantic manipulators appear to be protagonists. For instance, Caroline betrays her boyfriend and encourages Lucien to record himself having sex with a virgin, yet Caroline is painted as a nuanced and even sympathetic character. Similarly, Lucien, who pressures various women into letting him record their physical intimacy, is never fully condemned as a villain or a sexual predator.
And these are just the beginnings of the problems when it comes to sexual promiscuity.
Lucian clearly harbors quasi-incestuous desires for both his stepsister and stepmother, which he hints at throughout the series. Furthermore, characters engage in sexual intimacy, including a student with a professor. Other than some bare backsides, nothing critical is seen during these various sexual encounters—though the noises and movements clearly allude to what is happening.
A few plot lines feature LGBT romance. It is implied that two of Lucien’s frat brothers in Alpha Gamma have slept together, and we see them cuddling in bed wearing only underwear. One of these guys later officially comes out as gay. Additionally, when Annie confesses that she’s never kissed anyone before, Caroline “helps” by making out with her in front of a group of girls hoping for a bid from Delta Phi.
For a show that claims to be for people as young as 16, there’s a surprising amount of adult material beyond the sexual content.
Characters liberally use harsh profanity, including the f-word, s-word, c-word and misuses of God’s name. In the first episode alone, we hear close to 40 uses of the f-word.
College students indulge in alcohol at wild parties, and some underage individuals sneak into bars. Additionally, as a nod to the original movie, Caroline wears a cross necklace around her neck, which contains an easily accessible stash of cocaine.
And with an embezzlement subplot, harmful fraternity hazing and very few redeeming characters, I feel fairly confident in stating that Cruel Intentions is probably not the show most of you will want to gather around the television for.
Unlike the original, which ends with a very slight glimmer of redemption, Prime’s reboot of Cruel Intentions drops any positive messaging in an attempt to be subversive and avant-garde. The effect is a shallow plot line with equally shallow characters.
(Editor’s Note: Plugged In is rarely able to watch every episode of a given series for review. As such, there’s always a chance that you might see a problem that we didn’t. If you notice content that you feel should be included in our review, send us an email at [email protected], or contact us via Facebook or Instagram, and be sure to let us know the episode number, title and season so that we can check it out.)
Delta Phi sisters Caroline and CeCe prepare for sorority rush week despite pressure from the university to limit Greek life. After Caroline discovers that Annie Grover, the United States Vice President’s daughter, is starting college, she enlists the help of her stepbrother, Lucien, to win Annie for the Delta Phis.
Lucien is infamous on campus for his romantic flings with various women. And his promiscuous attitude seems to have spread to many other students at Manchester College. In addition to several scenes that feature physical romance (detailed below), several characters treat their romantic partners as steps in their quest for popularity and power. And they’ll resort to cheating and betraying their partners when necessary.
Two characters film themselves having sex in a bathroom, and the bare backside of the man is briefly shown. A male character strips completely naked in front of two women, who did not consent to this action. Other than his bare backside, nothing critical is seen, but one of the women makes a crude comment about his anatomy. A man flirts with his stepmother and stepsister, and the stepsister promises to have sex with him if he completes a task for her. It is implied that an unmarried couple had sex, and we see a man covering his intimate areas with a blanket afterward.
A fraternity brother grabs the backside of another man. Later, it is implied that these men have had sex: We see the men hanging out in a room in their revealing underwear, and the men intimately caress one another.
A woman wears a low-cut dress at a formal party, and several men are seen without shirts throughout the episode. There is one scene in which a woman wears only a bra. A painting in the background of a scene features several unclothed women. Couples kiss each other on the lips. Men speak crudely about women.
Characters liberally use harsh profanity, including 37 uses of the f-word, two uses of the s-word and one use of the c-word. We also hear “b–ch,” “a–hole” and multiple misuses of God’s name, twice paired with “d–n.”
Lucien sneaks an underage woman into a bar. At various sorority and fraternity parties, college students drink alcohol and joke about becoming drunk. In one scene, students throw heavy beer cans at fraternity inductees as a hazing exercise. One of these men passes out when a can hits him in the head. Another scene features a college student doing drugs.
Caroline and CeCe use their leadership positions in Delta Phi to bully and condescend to their sorority sisters. Two characters briefly discuss Darwinism.
The seemingly charming members of The Grosse Pointe Garden Society hide their involvement in a murder in NBC’s drama.
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