Summary
BK and Pinky slip deeper into the underworld in “Fake Bags! Fake Bags!”, but it’s the smaller relationships between characters that really resonate.
This isn’t a new or even particularly interesting observation, but the thing about influencing is that you only see what you’re supposed to see. You have no idea what’s going on beneath the reels. All those people who want to be in photos with you probably don’t want you sleeping on their couch. It’s a facile, transactional culture, which is fine when you’re the beneficiary, but less so when you’re in dire straits and need somewhere to stay. This is the situation Pinky finds herself in at the start of Bad Influencer Episode 2, after upsetting her “blesser” in the premiere. And it’s how she ends up in a much more dangerous world that she isn’t as readily able to navigate.
None of Pinky’s so-called “friends” is willing to do her a favour, and neither is her own mother, who, through very brief flashbacks, we get the sense might have had a specific way of making money when Pinky was young that is liable to leave a child with some unhealed wounds. Naturally, then, Pinky turns to BK. But spending the night on the couch means buying into her obviously ill-advised scheme to create and sell fake handbags through Pinky’s socials. And that means venturing into a seedy market in Hong Kong Towers, where BK buys half-decent fakes to break down for their “hardware”.
This would be bad for Pinky at the best of times — every second she spends in that market is very funny — but the situation is made infinitely worse when Themba’s team raids the place, and BK and Pinky end up arrested for being there. Not that they were doing anything wrong at the time, but BK’s presence doesn’t go unnoticed by Themba; he even tries to call her before the raid, and lets them both go when they’re arrested. But BK hasn’t quite realised he’s a cop yet. That can be saved for later.
With the Towers having been shut down, BK needs to go somewhere else for handbag hardware, which means turning to Bheki and Joyce, and then to Bheki’s boss, who’s even more unpredictable and dangerous than he is. Luckily, the quality of BK’s fakes and the uncertain situation following the police raid give BK and Pinky some negotiating power. A deal is struck for cash and hardware up front and a return on investment down the line. But it means producing and selling 40 bags a month, which is easier said than done, and involves BK directly with the man who turns out to be Themba’s operational prime target.
The real strength of Bad Influencer Episode 2, though, isn’t anything to do with this — it’s Pinky’s relationship with Leo. “Fake Bags! Fake Bags!” shines some more light on Leo’s specific needs; he’s on the spectrum, doesn’t like loud noises or surprises, and needs a structured routine. You’d think this would be Pinky’s worst nightmare, but she bonds with Leo immediately. When he has an incident at school where he wets himself and tries to escape from the chanting crowd by climbing up some scaffolding and refusing to come down, it’s Pinky who reassures him. It’s also Pinky who goes off on the schoolteacher for not handling the situation correctly. She obviously has a certain finesse for vulnerable children — based on those very small flashbacks, she used to be one.
This stuff helps to develop Pinky and BK’s friendship, but it also gives their arrangement more believability. Sure, they’re getting in much too deep, much too quickly with all the wrong people, but the show has done a decent job of establishing that BK’s fakes are good enough for the idea to be valid, and that the need to get Leo into a more appropriate school is so pressing that it’s worth the risk. Pinky’s role in the first two episodes has been making us laugh, primarily, but she’s also quickly becoming a source of real heart as well.
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