Netflix Original Series 'Orange is the New Black' Breaks New Ground in Television History with Female-Led Cast

By Dominique Chessor Jul 05, 2014 10:26 PM EDT

Orange is the New Black cast — (Photo : soapboxinc.com)

Netflix Original Series 'Orange is the New Black' Breaks New Ground in Television History with Female-Led Cast

The Netflix original series Orange is the New Black is unique for being one of the most wildly popular television series to feature a mainly female-led cast.The first season begins with Piper Chapman, a wealthy and newly-engaged New Yorker, who is being sent to Litchfield Women's Prison on charges of international drug smuggling, a crime she unwillingly committed only once ten years before the show begins.

Throughout season one, we watch as Piper adjusts (more or less) to life in prison, learning the rules (unspoken or spoken) of relating to the other inmates. The show is engrossing in its portrayal of Piper's fellow inmates, who are incarcerated for crimes ranging anywhere on the spectrum from drug dealing to murder. Episodes often feature flashbacks of the inmates' former lives, depicting who they were before Litchfield and what put them on the path to prison. The series is also unique in its ability to focus more on certain characters' plotlines for an episode or two, before moving on to another area of focus. OitNB is also not afraid to sacrifice a character's plotline when it appears to be getting stale or out of control, letting certain characters fall by the wayside when the audience begins to lose interest in them.

The drama pertaining to each character is never allowed to become overwhelming, which is undoubtedly which makes this series so binge-worthy. Before we are allowed to get tired of the antics of one character, we are given a break through comic relief or through the plotline of a side character, which always meshes back into the main storyline involving Piper, her fiance Larry, and Piper's fellow inmate and former girlfriend, Alex Vause. Season 2, which was released exclusively on Netflix on June 6, continues the antics and drama of Litchfield Prison in a way that definitely equals and may even rival season one.