Upsetting Day: Drop Dead Diva

Hell is a fat woman. At least, that’s the thesis of the TV show Drop Dead Diva. This show falls into the category of things I can’t believe we let happen, especially in 2009, when you think we would know better. It aired on the Lifetime channel for four seasons before being canceled, and then uncanceled, running for another two seasons because it was extremely popular with the Lifetime demographic, and I can see why. It’s got women being murdered, sad women, and chunky statement necklaces, everything the 2009 Lifetime demographic loved.

The main character of this television show is crushed to death by grapefruits in Act 1. Wait, let me back up. First, you need to understand why she deserved this ironic grapefruit-based death. The main character is attractive, you see, and for this she deserves punishment. If you’re going to open with a shallow, self-absorbed main character, I want to see her kick a baby opossum, or run an orphan crushing machine, maybe plot to overthrow the government of Florida, you know, classic bad guy stuff. We’re supposed to know that our main character, Deb, sucks because she eats a grapefruit with two Splendas for breakfast and is excited for a job interview on The Price Is Right.

In the next scene, we learn there is no morally perfect breakfast when we’re introduced to Jane, sort of also the protagonist. She’s a lawyer who’s worked all night at her law firm, and she’s eating a cinnamon roll for breakfast. Ew, also ew. We’re meant to be equally angered by both breakfasts. Here I made you a breakfast mortality chart.

While driving erratically on the way to her audition, Deb hits a grapefruit truck and dies. I love it when a show delivers on its premise, and that diva dropped dead immediately. There’s a lingering shot of her Mini Cooper covered in grapefruits, otherwise undamaged, but trust me, that diva is dead.

Cut to heaven. Where our diva learns that she is a rare 0-0 soul who did no good or bad deeds on earth, a distinction usually reserved for children. The angel checking her in tells her that she’s not a bad person, just shallow. That angel would go on to win an Emmy nomination for cutting his nipple off on Mad Men just three years later.

Deb the Diva gets annoyed with the angel. She notices a big sign that says not to push the return key on his keyboard, so of course she pushes it and finds herself returned to earth, but not in her own body; she’s in the body of Jane, the cinnamon roll snarfing lawyer from earlier. You see, Jane also died that day after a man brought a gun into her law office to threaten her boss, who was sleeping with his wife, and accidentally shot her instead. This is not a big deal. Everyone at the office pretty much acts like it happens once a week. When Jane shows up to work in her hospital gown the next day with mild amnesia, everyone thinks that’s cool and normal, and Jane should get back to work.

This is the first twelve minutes of the pilot. If it seems like they sort of blew through the whole death and reincarnation of the main character, it’s because they did. At its heart, this show is just another post-Ally McBeal law show. They needed a fun twist for their lawyer show, and what they landed on was a reincarnated thin woman in a fat woman’s body. The only real supernatural element to the show they keep is the angel who is now assigned to be Deb/Jane’s guardian angel on earth. He also works as a courier at the law firm, so he can still be involved in all of the law plots.

The rest of this show is mostly just a law procedural that goes through two different court cases. As soon as Deb gets back from the hospital, Jane is dressed in her typical drab lawyer clothes by her assistant, who is played by Margaret Cho, by the way, again, what is she doing here? Who cast this show? She’s instantly sent off to court to defend a young widower. Despite some sabotage from her skinny co-worker, Deb does well in court because she has Jane’s brain full of law knowledge. She also has Jane’s appetite, and we do a bunch of funny scenes where she wants to eat, which, I might remind you, is hilarious.

There’s a scene where she can’t stop staring at donuts during a meeting, a scene where her assistant squirts cheese whiz into her mouth to calm her, and one where she calls up her best friend and convinces her that she is Deb reincarnated, where she then almost immediately tells her friend she’s craving chocolate. Fantastic comedy beats for the show. I’m not going to watch the rest of the series, but I can see where we’re going from here. Jane sends the leader of the drug cartel to the electric chair AND eats Cheetos in court. Jane gets a five-million-dollar settlement from the orphan bone crushing plant, while housing Ding Dongs. Jane argues before the Supreme Court, and chugs a quart of gravy.

They make sure to mention in the show that Deb is a size 0 and Jane is a size 16, which is almost the smallest you can be while still being considered plus size. Jane’s fatness is the main thing Deb has to overcome in her new life, not at all being a lawyer. She’s immediately a fantastic lawyer, she’s rich, she drives a Porsche, but this whole being fat thing is a completely insurmountable obstacle that will take six full seasons to tackle, I guess?

The other big storyline that runs throughout the series is that Deb's former fiancé, Grayson, works at Jane's law firm but absolutely won't date Jane for fat reasons. Jane makes it very clear that even if he someday did figure out she was his dead fiancée, Grayson only dates tens, so she doesn't even bother to tell him it's her at first. Apparently, in later seasons, Grayson dies and is reincarnated into the body of a death row inmate who is not fat. Grayson has nothing to learn from his reincarnation, but Jane does have to struggle to rescue him from death row.

If you think it's weird that Jane just dies, and I guess fuck her? She probably goes to heaven or some shit, but honestly, who cares? Jane does eventually also return to Earth in season 5, inhabiting the body of a model named Brittney. So, she gets something like a happy ending. Kind of wild that it took them five seasons to consider it was a little sad that a woman did die in the pilot and then wrap that up.

This TV show had so many incredible guest stars of the era: Paula Abdul, Rosie O'Donnell, Brandy, Clay Aiken, Mario Lopez, and even Kim Kardashian in one of her first acting roles. Everyone wanted to be on this objectively insane show that aired on the Lifetime Channel between Dance Moms: Miami and Little Women: LA. Two shows where no women get murdered or have sex with a Christmas tree farmer, so I'm not even sure how they lasted so long on the Lifetime channel. People genuinely enjoyed it, though. So much so that there were remakes in South Korea and Latin America.

There were even talks of a possible reboot in 2021 that would be called Drop Dead Dave. That's right, this time a fat man would have been swapped into the body of a thin woman. I'm sure it would have been extremely sensitive, with only two or three titty honking jokes in the pilot. So, not only am I shocked that cheese wiz-chugging ghost lawyer got made in 2009, I'm shocked it got made again in 2017 and 2022, and almost rebooted in 2021. It’s a plot for any era!

This article was brought to you by our fine sponsor and Hot Dog Supreme: Lane Haygood, who fought hard for six seasons and a movie, but not for this show. Never for this show.

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