Extraordinary’s True Superpower Is Its Relatable Depiction of Female Friendship

There’s a lot to recommend about Hulu’s superhero comedy Extraordinary. It’s a genuinely hilarious, frequently foul-mouthed, and often foul-minded coming-of-age story. It’s also a genre series that uses the familiar trappings of superhero fiction to say something fresh and interesting about its characters. And it’s the rare show whose second season takes everything that worked in its first and doubles down, expanding and deepening its world and characters in both entertaining and deeply satisfying ways. 

But given its comic book-themed trappings—the show is set in a world where everyone develops a superpower at the age of 18—you might be surprised to learn that Extraordinary also features one of the best and most realistic depictions of female friendship on television right now. And, to be clear, in this genre, that’s a whole lot rarer than it sounds. For all that superhero properties have improved when it comes to female representation in their stories, finally giving us films fronted by women and allowing more than one female character to exist in their superpowered boys’ clubs at a time, allowing those women to have simple things like friends still usually seems like a step too far. (Just imagine if Wanda Maximoff had had a girlfriend to call when Vision died, is all I’m saying.)

But in Extraordinary, it is the friendship between two women that forms the unabashed emotional heart of the show. Its story follows Jen Regan, a twenty-something underachiever who still hasn’t developed a power yet. As she struggles with her complicated emotions about this lack and prepares to begin treatment at a clinic meant to help her discover her ability, she lives with her childhood BFF Carrie Jackson, and the pair face all the standard trials and triumphs that come with young adult life. The two are largely inseparable, each other’s biggest cheerleader and most frequent sounding board. And while their relationship faces its share of challenges, there’s little doubt that they’re the most important people in each other’s lives. 

“I think Carrie would kill someone for Jen,” Extraordinary creator Emma Moran tells Paste during a conversation at this year’s Television Critics Association Winter press tour. “I genuinely think she would do it.” 

Actress Máiréad Tyers, who plays Jen, doesn’t think things would escalate quite that far. “I mean… I feel like Carrie’d go to prison for Jen. Mostly because she thinks that she’d deal with it better.”

Either way, the fact remains: the Jen and Carrie relationship is the emotional linchpin around which much of Extraordinary turns, for good and ill. But whether the girls are squabbling, gleefully enabling each other’s worst tendencies, or helping one another pick up the pieces after a traumatic event like a breakup or the passage of a loved one’s spirit into the afterlife, the show never lets us forget how much they genuinely love each other. 

In a pop culture landscape that’s still heavily male-centric, too many shows that center the stories of young women fall victim to lazy stereotypes and tired tropes. Whether that means setting them in direct competition with one another—romantically or professionally speaking—or glorifying catty, toxic bonds that are more grounded in jealousy and pettiness than loyalty, it’s still entirely too rare to see female friendships like Jen and Carrie’s, in which both halves aren’t necessarily always good influences on each other, who may not even always like each other, but whose mutual support is always unwavering. 

“Their friendship is something that feels really special,” Tyers says. “The different relationships that exist within the group are all unique, but [theirs] is… they’re just thick as thieves.” 

“They’re obsessed with each other,” Sofia Oxenham, who plays Carrie, laughs. “There’s so much love there.” 

Though Oxenham and Tyers debate whether their bond is more correctly labeled “co-dependent” or borderline “dysfunctional,” it’s clear that Jen and Carrie are Extraordinary’s true soulmates. At the end of Season 1, both Carrie and Jen make big choices—from breaking up with a boyfriend to beginning treatment at the power clinic—and their lives have changed significantly in its second as a result. But, even so, their one constant still remains each other. 

“They just support each other in such a huge way,” Oxenham says. “And they know each other so well. Both good and bad.”