Seth Gordon
Atypical

In the scorching August of last year, Netflix released a series with the unmistakable name of Atypical. To be honest, semantically, the term could be subject to more than one interpretation, but connected to the world’s leading streaming platform and being made in the USA, it’s hard to be wrong and not think it's about unlucky nerds. Almost there.

Sam, the protagonist of Atypical, is a teenager with autism: the fact that he’s a nerd is probably more a stylistic repercussion of his condition. The series, in eight episodes, revolves around a specific period of his life, the favorite one of series with teenage protagonists, which is the approach to the unexplored and unfamiliar world of sex, with all the misadventures that come with it: this, combined with a 'serious' theme like autism, probably makes it the equivalent of a coming-of-age story in the age of streaming and family-friendly TV series.

Okay, I don't want to say that I didn’t like Atypical, also because it has those characteristics that make you like it inevitably: a protagonist who inspires tenderness and a good dose of empathy, funny jokes, a linear and quite engaging plot, cute references, including those to the world of penguins, of which Sam is extremely fond and constantly highlights their superiority compared to humans. Sam's asociality seems a bit like yet another depiction of a difficult teenager who makes us smile through a screen, and as mentioned before, also feel empathy, more or less, like when he says that parties without music and without people would be much better, not to mention the usual jokes about how girls are enigmatic and incomprehensible creatures, and so on with other phrases already heavily used in comedies of the genre.

The intent is undoubtedly to talk about a condition where people affected are often relegated to the margins of society due to prejudice and lack of knowledge on the matter. The series wants to break some of these false myths, like that autistics don’t feel empathy or aren’t suited for human relationships, doing so in an amusing and light way. As Calvino used to say, lightness is not superficiality. But the risk that is run, and which is stumbled upon, is that of normalizing and leveling the narrative, making it a story no different from many others, and thus assimilating the figure of the boy with autism to that of a sociopathic nerd.

Addressing abnormality at all costs and wanting to do so in a normal manner, following the same canons and stereotypes that are already too frequently adopted, does justice to no one and helps no one. Then, of course, there is an intent that for many is primary, which is to reach the largest slice of audience possible, even at the expense of the intrinsic quality of the product, but this too starts from an assumption that tends not to be questioned, that is, a product, to reach the most, must necessarily lower its level and half-heartedly grab some serious topics spicing them with a generous dose of benevolence and simplicity. In this, there is hypocrisy on both sides of the screen, because more and more often authors decide to stuff mediocre products with flashes of socially relevant topics, treating them in an all but rough manner, and on the other hand the viewer who is ready to accept the aforementioned themes only if they are sugar-coated and finely treated. And such an attitude does not help change mindsets, indeed, it leads to the production of standardized and never innovative content, with one major victim, which is cinema, besides the society it reflects.

Returning to Atypical, we could summarize it with a key image: a penguin wearing a t-shirt that says “Normal People Scare Me”. Explanation of the arduous metaphor: irresistible and brimful of clichés.