That sensibility is still there in season three, but it’s honed,
assertive and blisteringly satirical, as in a birth-control ad where
the boilerplate “Ask your doctor if birth control is right for you”
morphs into demands that you also ask your boss, your boss’ priest, and


conceit into absurdity into a faux-melodrama about the male gaze
arguing against itself. (“Am I the only one thinking with my dick
here!” one furious juror demands.) It’s a satire of how women are
assessed, and of how men are socialized to assess them, and of how pop
culture presses a standardized, and thus boring, idea of sexiness on
everyone. At the same time, it’s both a pitch-perfect satire of Sidney
Lumet-style social-issues movies and an effective piece of social
issues comedy.