'Girls,' or 'Sex in the Gen Y City'

There's a reason HBO is the king of original content, and that's because HBO takes chances. Whether it's unusual ideas or untested creators, HBO is willing to take a shot. Sometimes it doesn't pay off, but often it does.

For example, take Sex and the City. The world wasn't exactly clamoring for a series about women behaving badly when Darren Star's beloved series began back in 1998, especially one based on a collection of newspaper essays by a little known author. But lo and behold, the gamble paid off. Cut to 15 years later, where Sex and the City has become a touchstone for a generation and traded small screen success for big screen box office. That's fine for Carrie and co., but what are we TV fans supposed to do now?

Never fear; HBO is here to take another chance on a brand-new group of women, led by a wannabe writer, making their way in the Big Apple. But any similarity to Sex and the City ends there.

This new lifestyle adventure is called Girls, and it comes from the mind of indie filmmaker Lena Dunham. That's right, it's a show about young women…actually created by a young woman, as opposed to a gay man. That's a radical concept, right?

Think of Girls as Sex and the City 's self-involved slacker niece. Where Sex and the City is all Manhattan and cosmos, Girls is strictly Williamsburg and beer.

Dunham's 2010 flick, Tiny Furniture, garnered positive notices on the festival circuit and caught the attention of Judd Apatow, who serves as executive producer of Girls. Apatow's aggressively rude comedy stylings make him an unlikely choice of collaborator for Dunham's mumblecore leanings, but maybe he's trying to atone for his past. Or perhaps he just knows talent when he sees it. Whatever the case, the result seems fresh and funny, so let's not overthink things too much lest we end up with a cameo on Girls, about which I would have to remark, "Like, whatever."

Besides Dunham, Girls stars relative unknowns Jemima Kirke, Allison Williams, Zosia Mamet, Adam Driver and Christopher Abbot, with appearances from better knowns such as Chris Eigeman, Peter Scolari and Becky Ann Baker.

Girls premieres on April 15, which is rather ironic considering these girls probably don't earn enough to pay taxes. Ah youth, how sweet the memory; how grievous the reality...