And the scriptwriters this season are definitely not resting on their laurels.
Not to FREAK YOU OUT, and if you’re like us, you’ve probably been counting down the days to June 9 anyway, but the ground-breaking, diverse, painful, joyful piece of filmic genius that is Orange Is The New Black has returned to our (laptop) screens today with its fifth season in full, now available for streaming on Netflix.
In Australia, different states will go live at different times – 7pm in New Zealand; 5pm in QLD, NSW, ACT, VIC, and TAS; 4:30pm in SA and NT; and 3pm all the way over in WA.
Criticize what you want about OITNB – yes, Piper’s character is about as interesting and deserving of the lead role as an unbuttered white bread roll – but this show has been an absolute game-changer for diverse, meaningful representations of women on our screens. Not to mention that most of these female characters are prison inmates, a class of people that has for the most part of history been relegated to the position of social outcast and presumed lesbian scum.
Reviews from the US are already suggesting that this season is going to be intense, taking place over the course of three days, following on immediately from the jaw-dropping final scene of Season 4 (if you somehow don’t remember, Daya wields a gun at a prison guard, and the prison is about to go into full on lock-down tbh).
So gird your loins, LOTL-ites. We’re in for a crazy ride.