“I Love LA” Isn’t Satire. It’s Unfortunately Just the Thing It Claims to Mock
Source: The Lede (Bell Media), August 25, 2025. https://tinyurl.com/3xfet59y.
HBO describes I Love LA as a story about a tight-knit friend group reuniting after years apart, navigating ambition, relationships, and the passage of time. That may be the intent. It is not what comes through on screen. What does come through is a show struggling to justify its own existence.
I Love LA leans heavily on sex in a way that feels calculated rather than earned. Ten seconds into the opening scene, we’re watching Rachel Sonnet ride Josh Hutcherson. The intent is obvious–”See, Rachel Sonnet is uninhibited. See, Rachel Sonnet is sexually free and enjoys being choked. See, Rachel Sonnet comes...even during an earthquake.” The moment adds nothing narratively and offers no insight into character or plot. Its function is purely visual. What does not follow is compelling writing or an engaging story. The result feels hollow, as if provocation is standing in for substance.
Watching I Love LA is frustrating not because the characters are unlikable, but because the show confuses irritation for insight and self-awareness for substance. As someone who grew up with Broad City and Insecure as reference points, it’s impossible not to notice how heavily this series borrows from both, without capturing what made either work. The sincerity is missing. The specificity is missing. The humor feels borrowed rather than earned. And, as always, “token Black girl” – check.
There’s a defense circulating online that goes something like this: the characters are supposed to be annoying, vapid, painfully online. If they bother you, the show is working. It’s satire. It’s poking fun at LA culture and influencer fame. Viewers who hate it “miss the point.”
But satire still has to be interesting.
I Love LA mistakes being chronically online for being clever. Every character is an exaggerated version of the same LA content-creator archetype. Influencer accents, Valley Girl cadences, vocal fry stacked on top of irony stacked on top of self-awareness. The result is not sharp commentary, but noise. There is no character to root for, not because they’re morally flawed, but because they’re hollow. They feel like impressions rather than people.
The show wants to satirize influencer culture, yet it ends up replicating it almost beat for beat. There is nothing here we don’t already see endlessly on TikTok or Instagram. No new angle. No deeper observation. Just a glossy reflection of a world already oversaturated with people performing importance for attention. Watching it feels less like parody and more like scrolling, except louder.
Supporters argue that critics are being unfair, that one-star reviews from people “outside the target audience” skew perception. That viewers went in wanting to hate it. Maybe some did. But disinterest isn’t bias. If a show isn’t compelling, it isn’t compelling. A lack of a moral compass isn’t the issue. Plenty of great shows feature deeply flawed people. The issue is that I Love LA offers nothing beneath the surface.
There’s also an uncomfortable sense of privilege baked into the project. It feels like a show made by and for people who are already insulated from consequence, mistaking proximity to culture for commentary on it. The confidence with which it landed at HBO, despite such thin writing and underdeveloped storytelling, only amplifies that impression. Beyond its creative shortcomings, I Love LA feels disconnected from the reality of Los Angeles itself. The title suggests affection or intimacy with the city, yet the show ignores the crushing cost of living and the visible homelessness that defines large parts of LA today. Streets lined with encampments are treated as nonexistent, replaced by a glossy fantasy that feels willfully blind. The result is not escapism but denial, which makes the show feel out of touch rather than aspirational.
I wanted to like this show. Rachel Sennott is genuinely funny elsewhere. I hoped it would improve. But after watching, the overwhelming feeling is fatigue. Fatigue with shows that confuse irony for depth. Fatigue with influencer culture being mirrored back at us without critique. Fatigue with being told that if something annoys us, that means it’s smart.
Some people may find this fun. That’s fine. But fun isn’t the same as good, and satire isn’t satire just because it says it is. I Love LA doesn’t interrogate the culture it portrays. It wallows in it. And in doing so, it becomes exactly what it claims to be laughing at.