There’s Nothing on TV Like <em>We Are Lady Parts</em>
Early in the second season of We Are Lady Parts, a delightful British series about an all-female Muslim punk band, a musician draws inspiration from the most radical person she knows: her adolescent daughter. At the start of a jam session, Bisma (played by Faith Omole) tells her Lady Parts bandmates about a recent argument with Imani (Edesiri Okepnerho), who was suspended for throwing eggs at a teacher over the history of slavery being removed from her curriculum—and who likened this action to Malala Yousafzai’s fight for girls’ education. After a quick chuckle, the other members encourage Bisma, the only mother in the group, to channel her exasperation into writing new music.
The resulting song is “,” a rollicking, irreverent country anthem that’s an ode at once to the Pakistani activist so special. From its first episode, the series has chronicled the band’s attempts to cultivate a meaningful creative identity in a world that often fails to see its members as complex people, much less artists. In tracing how Lady Parts comes together, and what it takes to keep the group together, the series elevates the familiar narrative of a musical origin story into a poignant, inventive exploration of self-expression and community building.
