My friend Lynn Gold recommended the I Am Jazz TV show as a better representation of trans life than I Am Cait. It turns out it was available on my Sky subscription, and in the On Demand section, so I have binged on the first five episodes. Here’s my initial impressions.

By far the best thing about the show is Jazz herself. She’s a delightful kid, and I’m sure viewers will warm to her. Because she’s only mid-teens, there’s far less trans theory stuff in the show than in Jenner’s. However, Jazz’s life is real in a way like Caitlyn’s never can be. Her family seem well off but are not stupidly rich. She goes to school. And most importantly she’s been living as Jazz for around 10 years. She’s totally comfortable with her identity, and so are her family. Whereas Caitlyn’s story is one of someone coming to terms with transition while a celebrity, Jazz’s story is one of an ordinary teenage girl with something slightly different about her that can at times make her life a misery.

In some ways the show is simply one about a middle class American couple raising four teenage kids. Having twin boys is sometimes just as challenging as having a trans daughter. It is about the very normal fears that any teenage girl will have when she’s about to enter high school. But for Jazz every kid in the class will know that she’s a soft target for bullying, and dating is going to be an absolute minefield. As she’s so normal in every other way, the tragedy of that is really brought home. Anyone who has ever been the “only X kid” in a class can probably relate to what she’s going through.

Of course the show, just like Cait’s, is manufactured. There are things that don’t ring true. For the first four episodes Jazz is presented as this normal teenage girl, but in episode 5 we discover that she’s co-written a kids’ book that has sold over 10,000 copies and has an international fan base. Overall, however, I really liked it, and I think it is probably doing a lot of good.