A Review of Luca Guadanigno’s We Are Who We Are

We Are Who We Are has come to an end, and although it was only 8 episodes long it has definitely had a lasting effect on its viewers. A beautiful portrayal of the human experience captured in the messy journey of adolescence, with brilliant performances and a soundtrack that will be on many people’s playlists for a long time to come. Here’s a review of Luca Guadanigno’s modern classic.

“I hope the audiences feel love. I hope they feel confusion. I hope they feel restlessness. Eventually, I hope they understand all of the people that we describe. And I hope we leave We Are Who We Are with the desire of loving and being loved” – Luca Guadanigno

Luca Guadanigno’s latest project is something very special, a pocket of magic amidst the dreariness of this strange year. We follow a group of teenagers living on a military base as they navigate the maze that is being a young person, with all the hurdles of adolescence, sexuality, and identity being prominent themes. It sounds like a classic coming of age show, and that would be partly right, however, Luca’s apparent essence makes it unique from anything else on television now. It’s one of those shows that comes around every so often that you know is going to live on forever as a classic. A combination of pure talent has been thrown into the mixing pot to create ‘We are who we are’, one of the best, and most unexpected, shows of 2020.

Our protagonist is Jack Dylan Grazer, who shot to fame after playing Eddie in the 2017 adaptation of IT, a neurotic teenager who served as the comic relief amongst the horror. After seeing Call me by your name in 2017, Grazer immediately decided that Luca was someone he wanted to work with, and only a few years later that has come true. His character here, Fraser Wilson, is very different from Eddie, or any other role he has played in the past. It was obvious through Jack’s earlier performances that he was a real talent, and now it is clear he is unmistakably one of the best young actors of this moment. Fraser is a unique person, a fashion crazed outcast who is always stuck in his imagination with earphones glued in his ears. There are parts of him that are in all of us, but he is also, for a lot of the show, an enigma. Many will perhaps find him annoying, but that in itself is a compliment on Jack Dylan Grazer’s behalf. The ability to make an audience feel a certain way towards a character, no matter what that is, is a success. The moments of discomfort that make us cringe only do so because they are so full of passion and realism, those flares of rage that many of us have experienced are captured through Fraser’s frustration at his mother, his friends, his life.

Aside from Jack Dylan Grazer, the rest of the cast, including Kid Cudi and Francesca Scorsese, also provide stellar performances. Newcomer Jordan Kristine Seamon plays Caitlin, a teenager questioning their identity, with such tenderness and subtlety. A lot of her performance is built from gazes that are filled with doubt and longing as the cogs in her mind turn, trying to understand what she is feeling. Chloe Sevigny is great as always, playing a strong mother and newly assigned colonel who only shows vulnerability in small glimpses. She perfectly captures the way the many of us put up a guard to hide our weaknesses. All of the main characters are rounded and complex with their own individual situations spreading across the map of plots going on in the show. We see the good moments and the bad moments in almost every individual, which is what makes it so realistic. Everything is laid bare, we see the most intimate moments of these people’s lives which is what opened up my heart to the characters and made certain incidents so emotional. For an example, not every viewer will have experienced living on an army base or having relatives in the army, but most of us will know grief and the life-changing moment of being told someone you love has passed away.  The audience are connected to the characters through the universal feelings they experience in the world of the show.

It is not often that such a beautiful platonic relationship is portrayed on screen, but through Fraser and Caitlin the show explores the boundaries of friendship and the importance of finding your people. We are given hope that soulmates are not some made up fantasy. It is clear that the show was made with nothing but love and a real desire to tell the stories of these characters in the sincerest way possible. With so much going on, and so many characters being explored, you would think there were moments when the show would faulter. However, it’s the opposite. We feel we are part of this strange little world, this secluded army base, and are living alongside the people that it inhabits. The camera lingers on facial expressions, runs with the characters, the motivated camera movements being a standout of the show. There are several shots that break the fourth wall which are a punch in the gut, they are so effective and connect the audience so well to the situations that Fraser, Caitlin and the rest of the group find themselves in. Snapshots of life are captured in an expression, an object, or an action. The freeze frames make us reflect on what we are watching and give us time to relate it to our own lives.

There is so much to discuss in this show, making it difficult to properly do it justice. It’s messy, heart-breaking, joyous and everything in between. The soundtrack is a perfectly suited sign of the times, with Luca Guadanigno’s usual flawless direction and brilliant performances from the cast making a gem of a show that shows the human experience in all its chaotic glory.