The comfort of working in your comfort zone, the balancing act of your moral compass versus your progress that you have studied for and worked your ass off for, everything gets crushed under the weight of making everyone happy. It's not realistic to have high expectations from your boss who doesn’t see past your skin colour, a boyfriend who throws you under the bus even if you save his ass countless times with your genius.
This is Partner Track. A legal drama based on a novel by Helen Wan’s 2013 titled The Partner Track developed for television by Georgia Lee.
In an elite( stuffy, out of touch, frankly, misogynistic, racist and bigoted) New York City law firm, where bushy eyed and full of optimism and hop, a young and whip-smart lawyer named Ingrid Yun ( Arden Cho ) fights to make partner while holding onto her principles while balancing romance( love is complicated), friends and family expectations.
The most special aspect of this job is that Ingrid Yung’s life is full of firsts. A first-generation Chinese American, the first lawyer in her family, she’s about to collect the holy grail of “firsts”. She wants to become the first minority woman to make partner at the venerable old law firm Parsons Valentine & Hunt..… She eventually doesn’t reach there but faces the ugly truth of people’s evil nature that encapsulates her striving career.
Arden Cho as Ingrid Yun/ TVLine
Arden Cho is a treasure who I discovered after watching her acting chops at work in the Partner Track and I am grateful that this story realistically explores the powerful office dynamics that tear away people’s self-esteem, self-worth and self-fulfilment.
Ingrid Yun, I feel your pain going through a tough uphill climb in my career that I started in the pandemic and entering a fractured job market. This Netflix show is a testament to the living story penned down by Helen Wan who is a powerhouse with a decades-long legal career.
Best Buds: Rachel, Ingrid, Tyler / Forbes
Thank you to Helen Wan for writing her story and the cast of Partner Track ( Dominic Sherwood plays Jeff Murphy , a backstabbing ass hole ( his character); Alexandra Turshen plays Rachel Friedman, Ingrid’s best work friend who faces the barrel of sexism and a career change to play writing , yay; Bradley Gibson plays Tyler Robinson who I applaud for his stance on the racist rant by a fellow colleague at a company retreat, you go Tyler ; Rob Heaps plays Nick Laren, a ultra rich broken hearted heir and party host who is meh; Nolan Gerard Funk plays Dan Fallon, very bad word in the English dictionary is not enough to describe his character who is an abhorrent human being who gets away scot-free riding the wave of his white privilege; Roby Attal plays Justin Coleman who is a breadth of fresh air even though he is not sure of his career in the beginning; Matthew Rauch plays Marty Adler , a kind of boss that shouldn’t be in-charge as he controls the reigns, dumps the important work on Ingrid whenever he needs to save face in front of clients and uses Ingrid like a pawn to cover his inactivity towards workplace toxicity bringing it to life on Netflix.
Partner Track is now streaming on Netflix.