If you are a huge Girls fan like me then you may want to watch the recent “Invitation to the Set” promo released in anticipation of season 5 starting on February 21st. It looks as though its going to be a game changer of a season and could possibly end the frustrating undulations of poorly judged life choices and impulsive decisions.
The teasers and promos have been fairly vague so far with just a few hints to what the season might hold for our leading ladies, but in the “Invitation to the Set” video, Lena Dunham exposes some interesting information that has provoked some interesting thoughts. I shall follow the same format as the promo and start with Hannah.
The big questions with Hannah are; how serious is her relationship with Fran? What is left of her relationship with Adam? What is she doing for work? The answers to those are yes, nothing and who knows! Dunham mentions that the whole cast are growing up and are facing much more mature problems that adults face in their mid to late twenties. This includes being in a serious relationship and dealing with the dramas that reveal themselves as a result of a long-term commitment to someone else. Her and Fran are in a serious relationship and that is clearly going to be something of a focal point for Hannah this season. On the flip of the coin, her relationship with Adam appears to be non existent now as shown by an unfamiliar and cold exchange between the two in the clip. That said, there doesn’t seem to be any bad blood there, just nothingness.
Shoshanna IS in Japan, it is confirmed and there is actually going to be parts of each episode where she is living and working in Japan. I am interested to see how this will fit in with the others and how she is maintaining her friendships with the girls in the group. I can’t imagine she will talk to Marnie too much, but I am expecting a Skype call with Jessa now and then, they are cousins after all! Shoshanna looks like she has really found herself in Japan, she has a very cool new haircut, she looks relaxed and happy which is clearly exactly what she needed after having a pretty bad time in New York recently.
Marnie is getting married. I had thought that maybe she wasn’t going to be marrying Desi as the last trailer for the new season implied that Marnie was marrying someone she barely knows, but even though neither trailer has explicitly said that she is marrying Desi, I think it is clear that she is. Dunham says the season will be exploring who Marnie really is in much more detail and pulling 
back the edges of her personality. After watching season one and two again, I can sympathise with her a lot more. She was let down by her friends when her and Charlie broke up and since that total car crash of a situation, she has just been trying to gain some control. That explains the weight-loss, the obsession with singing and her overpowering personality. That said, she was so irritating in season four, I really hope we do get to see the real Marnie again. I’ve missed her.
Jessa wasn’t very present in the last season and didn’t have much of a storyline, this is probably due to Jemima Kirke’s family commitments as she has children of her own to be with, but I think at least this season there will be something going on for her. I think she could be going on something of a journey of self discovery in this season and Dunham says, she is finding 
out who she really is, what kind of value she is to her friends and where she fits in to their lives. I feel like she has drifted a lot, but I hope she is a little less self destructive and a little more forward thinking.
At the end of the promo Lena Dunham says that this season is about the realistic nature of friendship groups in your twenties. How the older you get, the more you drift apart and how it can be a real struggle to maintain the strength of your friendships when you were 21. I think this is an important bit of information to take into the season. We can’t expect to see the four girls hanging out all the time and having fun, dancing around their bedrooms and always being there for each other when times get hard. What I hope we do see is that these girls love each other again, that even though they are drifting apart they still care about one another. This was missing in season four, their connection that made them all so relate-able and loveable was replaced by jealousy, malice and annoyance.
I am excited to see some adult challenges facing the girls as they enter their late twenties and realise that life can be incredibly unkind, that relationships sometimes need a lot of effort to work and that friendships fade away.
Take up your “Invitation to the Set” and have a look at the fun and games these wonderful women are having:
