That 27 is the golden age is a universal truth, at least in rom-coms and sitcoms. It is the quintessential age for a heroine. She is old enough to have a career but young enough to still struggle against society’s expectations. All while panicking that she is running out of time and must figure out her love life.
Friends were around 27-years-old when the show first began. Julia Roberts’ Julianne Potter in My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997) was fully prepared to sabotage a wedding because her long-time BFF, days before her 28th birthday, decided to break their pact of marrying if they were both single at 27.
And it’s not just women. Twenty-seven is the coming-of-age age for men, too, at least, according to Hollywood logic. Ted Mosby is 27 in the first season of How I Met Your Mother (2005-2014), so is Adam DeMamp in Workaholics (2011-2017). And let’s not forget Leonard Hofstadter in The Big Bang Theory (2007-2019). I could go on, but you get the picture.
Even Katherine Heigl in 27 Dresses (2008) was willing to break up her younger sister’s wedding. Honestly, the lengths to which a 27-year-old will go to get their happily ever after are astonishing. Now, as the cuffing season hits us all in the feels, the romcoms made around these determined younglings are going to be played again and again. The unreliable protagonists dealing with the chaos of love and longing are going to be envied and emulated as well.
It is not just the films and TV shows of the 1990s and 2000s in which 27 is the golden number. In Hacks (2021-2026), Ava Daniels is a 27-year-old bisexual comedian trying to salvage Deborah Vance’s image. Eleanor Shellstrop is 27 when she dies and goes to The Good Place (2016-2020).
It’s an idea so well entrenched in our collective imaginations that now scores of people across social media platforms are consoling themselves that they still have time. They are not yet 27. However, on the other end of the spectrum are those of us who are of age and still waiting for a plot twist.
For a generation now, we have been taught and conditioned to believe that life starts at this age. You’re somewhat financially stable, old enough to know better but still young enough for trial and error. And so, dear universe, I must ask: Where the bibbidi-bobbidi-boo is my romcom moment? When will my sitcom start?
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There’s a new Club 27
Rom is dead. For a while, the last frontier of modern dating—apps—is fading away. DMs are a thing of the past (it’s cringey now). And apparently having a boyfriend is so last season (blame Vogue).
But now it seems com has left the chat too. In an era of social media sensitivity, we have lost the ability to laugh at ourselves. It’s supposedly not a “good look,” whatever that means.
Joy is lacking. Whimsy can be maxed; there’s a how-to for it. And all that matters is whether it is Insta-official or not.
It may have begun as the firstborns of social media entered their late twenties and realised that perhaps life isn’t all that. And so the only way to cope with that horrible realisation was by consoling ourselves that it’s not too late. That you have time and that maybe your plot twist is around the corner after all. Now, though, it’s telling yourself that you’re only in your first season is the same as buying yourself a sweet treat after a long hard day. Totally worth it and universally acceptable.
Twenty-seven is the prime time to rewrite your own rules and YOLO your way through life. Reinvention and self-discovery are equal measures of white-knuckle panic and pure, unadulterated high. But in the middle of all that, at the cusp of “adulthood,” there is abject fear. The pure horror of not being able to delay life, responsibilities, and the unfortunate truth that maybe you’re actually turning into your parents.
Charlotte Lucas in Pride and Prejudice (2005) was definitely onto something when she said that she was 27 and frightened.
“I’ve no money and no prospects. I’m already a burden to my parents,” were her exact iconic words. Honestly, same, girl, same.
Views are personal.
(Edited by Ratan Priya)