# Orange Is the New Black (2013)

> A privileged New Yorker is sent to a women's prison, where she forges unexpected bonds and conflicts with an eccentric group of fellow inmates.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/1340

## Facts

- Seasons: 7
- Episodes: 91
- Episode runtime: 58 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, comedy, crime
- Created by: Jenji Kohan
- Network: Netflix
- Cast: Taylor Schilling, Laura Prepon, Kate Mulgrew, Natasha Lyonne, Michelle Hurst, Selenis Leyva, Elizabeth Rodriguez, Dascha Polanco
- TMDB rating: 8.0/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2372162/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: layered
- Violence: moderate
- Tone: bittersweet, darkly comic, tense, warm, melancholic

## What critics say

Audiences broadly rate the series positively for its ensemble cast, sharp writing and humanizing portrayal of prison life, with ratings holding steady across seven seasons.

## Synopsis

Orange Is the New Black (2013-2019) is a Netflix dramedy series created by Jenji Kohan for Netflix, a seven-season serialized prison drama. Taylor Schilling plays Piper Chapman, a middle-class New Yorker who must serve time in a women's prison for a crime from her youthful past, trading her comfortable life for a harsh and eccentric community. Laura Prepon plays Alex Vause, her former lover, while Kate Mulgrew plays Galina 'Red' Reznikov, a kitchen power broker, and Natasha Lyonne plays Nicky Nichols, a volatile inmate. Each season follows a crowded ensemble of inmates and guards through flashbacks that reveal their tragic pasts and the reasons they ended up behind bars. The engine of the show is the tension between Piper's outsider status and the fragile alliances, rivalries and romances that form among women fighting for dignity under an indifferent bureaucracy. Thirteen episodes per season build a steady sense of institutional pressure, from cafeteria politics to shifting prison administrations. The tone blends sharp, bittersweet humor with melancholic and sometimes harrowing moments. Set in the modern American prison system, it is a sisterhood-driven story that will appeal to viewers who enjoyed the ensemble intimacy of Wentworth and the social scope of The Wire.

## Shows like Orange Is the New Black

- [Prisoner (1979)](https://ember.film/tv/4062)
- [Inventing Anna (2022)](https://ember.film/tv/80764)
- [Locked Up (2015)](https://ember.film/tv/55523)
- [Wentworth (2013)](https://ember.film/tv/40750)
- [The Convict (2021)](https://ember.film/tv/101888)
- [The L Word (2004)](https://ember.film/tv/3305)
- [En el barro (2025)](https://ember.film/tv/172971)
- [The Horror of Dolores Roach (2023)](https://ember.film/tv/137898)
- [The Good Place (2016)](https://ember.film/tv/58661)
- [Cold (2026)](https://ember.film/tv/1105128)

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