Stream on Netflix
Based on 1 season, 8 episodes · through November 30, 2023
Obliterated is an action-comedy show about an elite government team who stops a bomb in Las Vegas and celebrates with a wild party. They soon find out the bomb they stopped was fake, and they must save the city while completely drunk and high. The show features a highly diverse cast, including a female CIA leader, an Asian female tech expert, and a Latina lesbian sniper. It also includes prominent storylines about a Black Navy SEAL struggling to come out of the closet and a lesbian romance.
Why 57%? See the score breakdownBreakdown
These are the editorial factors and ratings behind our score for Obliterated.
Woke representation / casting
The show features a highly diverse, quota-style special forces team. This includes a female CIA lead, an Asian-American female tech genius, and a Latina lesbian sniper. Under our scoring guidelines, the confirmed presence of two prominent queer characters—lesbian sniper Angela Gomez and gay Navy SEAL Trunk—requires an aggressive point addition. This places the casting score in a higher tier due to the visible, priority emphasis on LGBTQ+ identity signaling alongside standard racial and gender diversity, which the average viewer will easily notice.
68%
Woke political dialogue
Production
The show largely avoids modern activist lectures or social-justice preachy dialogue. The characters speak using highly crude, politically incorrect, and vulgar language typical of an R-rated frat-boy comedy. The small score reflects brief dialogue exchanges concerning Trunk's closeted status and Gomez's open sexuality, but these do not develop into heavy-handed modern political statements.
10%
Identity-driven story themes
While the main plot is a brainless action story about saving Las Vegas, the subplots contain clear identity-focused themes. This is highlighted by Trunk's emotional arc of coming out as gay to his hyper-masculine Navy SEAL best friend. It is also shown through Gomez's pursuit of a romantic lesbian hookup with a bride-to-be. The score is elevated into the noticeable range due to the required points addition for confirmed LGBTQ+ story elements, which make these identity themes a prominent part of the character relationships.
45%
Western institutional / cultural critique
The series features light satire of American exceptionalism and the hyper-masculine military culture. Chad, the Navy SEAL co-leader, is depicted as an emotionally repressed, dumb, and cocky "dudebro" who embodies toxic masculinity before learning to grow. However, the show does not offer a serious or heavy-handed activist critique of Western institutions, whiteness, or the patriarchy, and instead leans heavily into broad action tropes and crude physical humor.
25%
Woke character or canon changes
Not relevant
0%
Anti-woke backlash and complaints
Some viewers complained online and in user reviews that the series was infected with diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. They pointed to the highly diverse casting and the inclusion of multiple gay subplots in a show marketed as a traditional male-targeted action comedy. However, this backlash remained minor and fringe, as the show was more widely discussed for its extreme vulgarity and polarized critics' reception.
20%
Creator track record context
The core showrunners and creators—Hayden Schlossberg, Jon Hurwitz, and Josh Heald—have very low scores (ranging from 5 to 10) and lack a history of progressive activism. While some secondary directors and writers on the production team have moderate to high scores due to their advocacy work or focus on marginalized communities, the overall creative leadership remains heavily rooted in mainstream, apolitical comedy.
15%
