Thoughts on American Crime Season 2
Mar. 10th, 2016 07:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rainwaterspark(Spoilers below for the season finale. Also, TW for discussions of rape—which is not news to anyone who's been following the season.)
First off, a disclaimer: I haven't seen every single episode of the season, and I kind of skipped to the end because I was hoping there'd be a definitive resolution.
At first, I was very disappointed that the season never definitively established what actually happened during the night of the party, though I guess (1) it was meant to be "realistic" in the sense that fact disputes are always at the heart of rape cases in real life, and (2) the audience is supposed to draw their own conclusions.
I assume Taylor's story is meant to be the true one (over Eric's) since Taylor's actions make very little sense if he hadn't been raped, and he had no reason to lie to his mom about his motivations for his actions. Also, all of the people who were callous toward Taylor's plight end up being punished by karma (Leslie, Kevin's family, Dan, possibly Eric to a degree). So although legal justice wasn't really served in Taylor's case, justice was kind of served by the universe. Sort of.
It's still an overwhelmingly cynical and depressing show, and I was pretty bothered by the fact that the show never adequately addressed Evy's homophobia, which is particularly egregious because it's unclear whether Taylor was gay or bi and he seemed to be genuinely romantically and sexually attracted to her, at least to some degree. The only "wrong" he did to her was not telling her that he was sexually attracted to men—and her reaction to that came off as really classically biphobic. Given the finale, I'm not convinced the show did enough to tackle her homophobic reaction and explicitly make it clear that biphobia is wrong and bad.
I'm also not sure what to make of Eric's character in the end. He escaped responsibility for being a rapist, although his life seems pretty unhealthy (he rejects his family and decides to run away with a Grindr hookup who's presumably an older man). It's a weird mix of karma Houdini coupled with karma coming back in a strange way.
That's kind of an accurate summary of the show. It's morally cynical and sad, yet also not completely morally nihilistic at the same time, making it depressing but also keeping it within the bounds of realism and believability. It seems like the only "good" characters, in the end, are Taylor's mom, Dan (sort of), and Chris (although he ends up karmically punished as well). Sebastian the hacker dude interests me in that he attempts to use extra-legal means to accomplish justice—which obviously isn't served—and yet he ends up karmically punished and narratively criticized because he's unaccountable. So justice is broken, but vigilantism is also condemned for being outside accountability...in which case, what's left?
First off, a disclaimer: I haven't seen every single episode of the season, and I kind of skipped to the end because I was hoping there'd be a definitive resolution.
At first, I was very disappointed that the season never definitively established what actually happened during the night of the party, though I guess (1) it was meant to be "realistic" in the sense that fact disputes are always at the heart of rape cases in real life, and (2) the audience is supposed to draw their own conclusions.
I assume Taylor's story is meant to be the true one (over Eric's) since Taylor's actions make very little sense if he hadn't been raped, and he had no reason to lie to his mom about his motivations for his actions. Also, all of the people who were callous toward Taylor's plight end up being punished by karma (Leslie, Kevin's family, Dan, possibly Eric to a degree). So although legal justice wasn't really served in Taylor's case, justice was kind of served by the universe. Sort of.
It's still an overwhelmingly cynical and depressing show, and I was pretty bothered by the fact that the show never adequately addressed Evy's homophobia, which is particularly egregious because it's unclear whether Taylor was gay or bi and he seemed to be genuinely romantically and sexually attracted to her, at least to some degree. The only "wrong" he did to her was not telling her that he was sexually attracted to men—and her reaction to that came off as really classically biphobic. Given the finale, I'm not convinced the show did enough to tackle her homophobic reaction and explicitly make it clear that biphobia is wrong and bad.
I'm also not sure what to make of Eric's character in the end. He escaped responsibility for being a rapist, although his life seems pretty unhealthy (he rejects his family and decides to run away with a Grindr hookup who's presumably an older man). It's a weird mix of karma Houdini coupled with karma coming back in a strange way.
That's kind of an accurate summary of the show. It's morally cynical and sad, yet also not completely morally nihilistic at the same time, making it depressing but also keeping it within the bounds of realism and believability. It seems like the only "good" characters, in the end, are Taylor's mom, Dan (sort of), and Chris (although he ends up karmically punished as well). Sebastian the hacker dude interests me in that he attempts to use extra-legal means to accomplish justice—which obviously isn't served—and yet he ends up karmically punished and narratively criticized because he's unaccountable. So justice is broken, but vigilantism is also condemned for being outside accountability...in which case, what's left?
