'Too Much' Leans Into Too Many Rom-Com Tropes

With its heroine’s infamous proclamation that she might be the “voice of my generation line … or at least a voice of a generation” to the way it almost completely ignored topics like gentrification and student loans, Lena Dunham’s HBO comedy Girls premiered in 2012 as a send-up of all those oblivious and ignorant 20-somethings who descend upon New York or Los Angeles, bachelor’s degrees in hand. (I’m cringing at the memory of my old cover letters) They arrive, each year, not with the hope — but the assumption — that we will walk right into an editorial assistantship at a magazine, a supporting role in a lauded off-Broadway play, a gopher for a father-figure-like music mogul, a finance gig with a starting six-figure salary… Even casting four "nepo babies" as its leads back in the 2010s let Girls wink to its audience that it knows we know it knows what it’s doing. 

With her new series, Too Much, which she co-created with her husband, Luis Felber, Dunham goes after a trope about women of a certain age by leaning hard into it. Too Much, which premiered with all episodes on July 10, 2025, on Netflix, stars Hacks breakout Megan Stalter as the recently single-not-by-choice Jessica, who moves to London for work and also maybe with the hope of falling in love. 

Raised in a matriarchal household where viewings of Emma Thompson’s Sense & Sensibility were treated like their own hours of worship, Jess is the avatar for the girls from Girls a decade and change after they land at JFK or LAX; when they’re now at an age where it’s no longer cute or comical to not to have the whole careers, partners and life stuff all figured out. This is a great entry topic for a writer with Dunham’s background. What happens when society no longer gives the Girls of a certain age as much of a pass? Or what does it truly take to get over a gaslighting ex? Where things get murky with Too Much is when the show starts to add, well, too much. 

LIke Girls before it, Too Much wants you to know that it’s in on the joke. It opens with Jess live-journaling about all the things that TV and movies have taught her that she can be once she moves to England (A doomed 19th century sex worker! A small-town police officer with a lot of family trauma! A plucky and independent young woman who gets swept away in a romance with an aloof fellow who feels he’s above the frivolity of love.) 

The person she’s monologuing to has the surname “Jones.” and it’s not long into the series before either Love Actually or its writer-director, Richard Curtis, are mentioned. Heck, Working Title is even one of the show’s producers. 

Quickly after she’s flown across the pond, Jess meets the rakish and damaged musician Felix (The White Lotus’ Will Sharpe rocking some fantastic black nail polish). She’s also trying to fit in at work because, as opposed to the heroine of Netflix’s other voyeuristic American abroad story Emily in Paris, she’s not assertive and doesn’t think she spins gold every time she opens her mouth in a staff meeting. 

Again, navigating a story about a relationship that’s almost immediately electrifying, intense and mysterious when one party is a non-confrontational doormat can be fun to watch. What will it take for Jess to grow a backbone? How does she do this when she’s been told to taper her feelings? And a sincere thank you to Dunham and everyone else involved for never really making Too Much a conversation about beauty and body standards, especially since Max’s Starstruck already did that so well (and with a similarly named lead character!).

Where Too Much starts to live up to its name is when it becomes fixated on Jess’s philandering ex-boyfriend Zev (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’s Michael Zegen, apparently about to star in a trend piece about schmucks who don’t know how good they have it) and his new relationship. What I think the show is trying to say is that Jess wasn’t always like this and that a large portion of her lack of self-esteem comes from her years with him. I’m not sure I’ve been given enough intel to buy this, especially since Jess and Zev’s meet-cute happens because her friends leave the bar when she’s in the bathroom. 

So what’s the message here? Too Much ends with a happily ever after; something that did happen for Dunham and Felber at least as far as the public is concerned. However, for most people, this is wish fulfillment akin to the many women who read Cheryl Strayed’s Wild or Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat. Pray. Love. and then went on their own spiritual quests.

Also, there’s the question of how autobiographical this story is versus how much we’re supposed to believe it is. Dunham isn’t just a writer and director of Too Much. She also plays Jess’s older sister who is going through her own breakup because her husband realizes he’s queer. The actor who plays her separated spouse is Andrew Rannells, who also played her Girls character’s gay ex-boyfriend Elijah. 

Is this a dare to critics and audiences to draw parallels between the shows?  A Too Much flashback sees Jess and Zev adopt a dog whom he later forces her to give up. Is this meant to shed some light on the Great Lambygate of 2017 when Dunham did part ways with a foster dog? 

Is Too Much a sort-of apology and acknowledgement of the questionable behavior of Dunham’s youth? If so, I’d like one too. Is it saying that rom-coms ruin everything and that you can’t really find someone until you heal yourself? Cool. But I don’t think it’s that simple. Or is it just Dunahm being a voice of a particular subset of her generation? 

All episodes of Too Much are streaming on Netflix from Thursday, July 10, 2025.