Stream It Or Skip It?

There have been a number of shows about non-criminals who get in over their heads when they get involved in a criminal enterprise. In a new South African crime drama, one of the two people involved in the criminal enterprise is an actual small-time criminal, but what she peddles is definitely something we’ve never seen on a show before.

Opening Shot: Shots of website layouts and social media posts where luxury-brand handbags are featured.

The Gist: BK Msinga (Jo-Anne Reyneke) is examining a YSL bag at a luxury store in Johannesburg, with a price tag over 200,000 rand (about $11,000). The saleswoman takes it out for her to look at, and when her back is turned, BK takes pictures of some of the markings. Just then, a loud woman with pink hair — an influencer named Pinky (Cindy Mahlangu) — comes in to try to return a Louis Vuitton bag her boyfriend gave her and finds out it’s fake, something that BK confirms.

BK goes to a restroom, takes her wig off and returns the suit she was wearing to a store in the mall. She lives in a rough Joburg neighborhood and works behind a pawn shop, sewing together quality knock-offs of luxury-brand handbags. Her main goal at this point is to save money so her neurodivergent son Leo (Mpilo Shabalala) to go to a special-needs school. But she is struggling to sell her wares. Leo is a smart kid who loves everything about space, and BK is intrigued by Themba (Lerato Nxumalo), who heads a space club for kids at the local planetarium.

BK tries to sell a bunch of bags she’s made to a group of wealthy women as well-maintained pre-owned merchandise, but ends up having to climb over a wall when one of the women sees through her ruse. She ends up losing the bags she’s crafted in the process.

Another problem is that she has borrowed money from a hairdresser/loan shark named Bheki (Modise Motaung) to fund this enterprise, and he’s sent his henchwoman Joyce (Mandisa Nduna) to threaten BK because she hasn’t come up with the cash.

Desperate, BK decides to slide into Pinky’s DMs in order to propose that the influcencer peddle the one bag she has left — a fake baby-blue Birkin — on her IG feed. At first Pinky ignores her, but when her married boyfriend cuts her off, she gets in touch with BK.

The two of them go to a club full of influencers to see if the bag passes muster; when it does, Pinky asks for 5,000 rand in order to do a proper photoshoot, which BK gets by reluctantly asking Bheki for more money. But what BK finds out is that Pinky is less interested in selling fake bags and more interested in a quick score. Pinky changes her mind, though, when the bag sells, but Bheki takes his huge piece of the pie first.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The plot of Bad Influcencer is vaguely similar to Good Girls or Ozark, where people get in over their heads in a less-than-legal scheme.

Our Take: Bad Influencer does a good job of balancing its crime thriller aspects with the somewhat funny idea that this odd couple pairing of counterfeiter and influencer will get rich selling fake handbags, and a lot of that is due to the chemistry between Jo-Anne Reyneke and Cindy Mahlangu.

The best scenes in the first episode are when BK and Pinky are arguing with each other, with BK incredulous at Pinky’s demands because of her mid-level influcencer status, and Pinky amazed that BK walks around in work clothes and short braids. She gleefully takes BK for the 5k, despite knowing that BK is broke. But once they figure out that the relationship is going to be beneficial to both of them, they’ll put up with each other’s differences to make some cash.

But we also know that this enterprise is going to get the attention of criminal types, starting with Bheki. And, we see at the end of the episode, Themba isn’t just a volunteer at the planetarium, but he’s a captain in the Counterfeit and Organized Crime division of Falcons, South Africa’s special investigations bureau. So things are going to get complicated for BK and Pinky as their handbag business gets more popular.

There are going to be some definitely serious things going on as the pair get in deeper, but the show does keep in mind that they’re not peddling drugs or guns but handbags, and that influencer culture has its own quirkiness. We see that when Pinky describes the tiers of influencers that populate the club they visit to “test drive” the fake Birkin, and we get the feeling that Pinky’s aspirations to be in the “millions” group will play a big part of how much their enterprise attracts all the wrong attention.

Sex and Skin: None in the first episode.

Parting Shot: Themba walks into his office, which is when we find out he’s in law enforcement.

Sleeper Star: Mpilo Shabalala does a good job playing Leo’s neurodivergence as a part of his life, not something that needs to be “fixed”.

Most Pilot-y Line: When BK goes to Bheki’s salon to talk to him, we see the name of his business is “Bheki With The Good Hair.”

Our Call: STREAM IT. Bad Influencer doesn’t take itself seriously all the time, which is refreshing for a show that is mostly about counterfeiting and organized crime.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times