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i've watched the ending scene three times now & it still makes me cry.
A while back, I posted a strong, angry response to the season premiere of Sons of Anarchy. I almost gave up the show. I was disgusted. I turned it on again the next week, expecting to see it handled badly. Instead, I began to have hope that they were going in a certain direction. With every episode since then, I've grown more and more sure, and tonight finally confirmed it. Spoilers for tonight's Sons of Anarchy, and for most of season 2, behind the cut. But outside of the cut: I was wrong. Not that Kurt Sutter and his team of writers will ever know that I was even unhappy, much less that I've now changed my tune, but I was wrong. Again, written so that even if you don't follow the show, you should be able to follow along.
Discussion of rape follows; potentially triggery.
In the season opener, Gemma -- the motorcycle club's strong, ruthless, fabulous matriarch -- was gang-raped in order to send a message to her husband and son, the president and vice president of the club (God, the show has gotten even me talking in euphemisms. The gang; it's a gang). It infuriated me and it disgusted me and I still haven't seen the scene all the way through, because the little bit that I watched through my fingers left me shaken and shaking and feeling like I was going to throw up. I was angry because it felt like essentially a live-fridging. This strong, fierce female character -- by far the show's strongest and fiercest, one of only two female regulars -- was beaten and degraded and raped, all in the name of affecting the show's male characters. I was angry, especially when the little 'next week on Sons of Anarchy...' teaser seemed to show the men gearing up to go to war. 'Oh great,' I thought, 'now I have weeks of male rage and everyone pitying Gemma, who is far too awesome to ever be pitied, to look forward to.'
And then the next week, I watched, and I saw that Gemma was refusing to tell anyone. In part because of shame, and in that sense her silence probably isn't the most empowering thing ever, but majorly because: the sons of bitches who raped her? She wouldn't let them win. She didn't say a word. The only people she told were the police chief (and old friend) who found her, and the female doctor (her son's girlfriend) who treated her. For the last nine episodes, we've watched her pull herself together and work out how to go on with her life, largely by herself and through only her own strength. She hasn't told a soul; thanks to the help of the police chief, they all thought she was in a car accident. It's been painful to watch, because I love Gemma and because Katey Sagal is terrifyingly good, and because the people around her didn't understand what was going on. She had epic fights (mostly verbal, but borderline physical in one case that I can remember) with her husband because he couldn't understand why she wouldn't have sex with him and would freak out when he touched her; he cheated on her because of it and she knew it (I'm convinced of that). So no, the show certainly isn't all about empowering all women all the time.
But in tonight's episode, Gemma finally came clean about what happened to her. And that was empowering to me, and a vindication of sticking with the show, and this is why: Gemma did it on her own terms. When she was first assaulted, she didn't allow herself to be live-fridged; despite the rapists' threat of coming to find her and doing it again if she didn't pass on the message to her husband, she didn't pass on the message. The writers allowed her to maintain her strength throughout all of this; she may have cried a few times and we may have seen her afraid (something that was nearly unthinkable in season 1), but they never let the viewer forget that Gemma is a goddamn force of nature to be reckoned with. In tonight's episode, her son was about to leave the gang over irreconcilable differences with her husband (his stepfather), and Gemma had had enough. She made them both come to her house, she forced them to sit at the dining room table together, and she told them.
She told them in order to keep Jax in the gang. She used the news of the assault to manipulate Jax and Clay into doing what she wanted. I was afraid, these last few weeks, that they would find out from someone else; the white supremacist who ordered the gang-rape would tell them and that all of Gemma's hard work to keep the rape a secret would be for nothing. I thought she might be metaphorically screwed over yet again. Today, I was thrilled to see that it was her choice; she set the terms, the setting, and spoke it in her own words. I was thrilled that Tara, the doctor who had known all along and who had been supporting her (which I've been watching with delight, as these two ladies hated each other's guts last season, but have come together as a two-woman army of fierce this one), was there when she told. It was so good to see a friendly female face at that table. The men reacted like I always knew they would (which is why Sons-watching friend and I have been chanting TELL HIM, TELL HIM, TELL HIM in anguish for weeks, with the identity of 'him' sometimes shifting between Jax and Clay): silent fury and then deep sorrow. Jax pounded his fist on the table when she was done telling the entire story, then came around the table and kissed her hand. 'Kissed her hand' doesn't really do the moment justice, but it was loving and warm and so, so sorry. After Jax goes, Clay reaches out to Gemma and gently touches her face. The last image of the episode is the two of them with their foreheads touching, both crying.
I didn't watch the episode with my usual watching buddy last night, as I was asleep, but if I had been awake, I'm sure the incoherent AIM commentary would have been like this: YEAH, YOU SHOULD BE SORRY FOR CHEATING ON HER, CLAY!!!
This is less related to my point in this post, but the acting on this show is tour de force. Seriously. Just watching the silent reactions as Gemma spoke was incredible; watching Jax's expression slowly shift actually had me clutching at my chest, as if I could somehow clutch my heart. The moments when both Clay and Jax reached out to Gemma were heartbreaking, just right, and what I've been dying to see since September. And Katey Sagal, as I've said several times, is just killer. I'm so happy that the show's creator exorcised his right to nepotism and hired his wife. She's amazing. She hit it out of the damn park. I'm not ashamed to admit that I wept like a little girl.
I'm not saying that the show doesn't beat on women and have serious gender issues; it does. In this very episode, a man speaking to his stepdaughter's biological father coerced the biological father into doing something by implicitly threatening to molest the girl. A few episodes ago, a gang member's wife was beaten to death by the side of the road in the name of sending the club a message. Women aren't treated well by the show. What this episode changes for me is that I'm 100% sure now that the writers are well aware of the problematic nature of what they're doing. They took what could have been (and probably, in some aspects, was) a live-fridging of their main female character, and they turned it right the hell around and made her all the stronger for it. I no longer think that Gemma's rape was written in for shock value. I can't really speculate as to why it was written, but I can say that it has changed her while still maintaining her strength and her hard edge, and it has also allowed her to take what was done to her and use it for her own benefit, and that made me happy.
I don't know if this made any sense; maybe it didn't, maybe you needed to see it for it to hit home or maybe it was just me. Whatever it is, I started cheering the second that Gemma told Tara that she knew what Gemma was about to tell the men.
P.S. - Gemma's gambit worked; Jax stayed in the gang. That alone delights me. Gemma always used to win, and that's the way life is supposed to be on this show.
The clip for next week's episode featured a Clay-and-Jax moment (Clay and Jax, who have been beating the shit out of each other verbally, emotionally, and physically all season long) in which Clay says 'What do you want to do?' and Jax replies 'Kill them all,' and I squeaked. What is this show doing to me!! That should not have been a YES YES YES moment, but it was. KILL THEM ALL, PLEASE, AND LET GEMMA HAVE A FEW.
There are only three episodes left in the season; I am both excited and very, very afraid.
Discussion of rape follows; potentially triggery.
In the season opener, Gemma -- the motorcycle club's strong, ruthless, fabulous matriarch -- was gang-raped in order to send a message to her husband and son, the president and vice president of the club (God, the show has gotten even me talking in euphemisms. The gang; it's a gang). It infuriated me and it disgusted me and I still haven't seen the scene all the way through, because the little bit that I watched through my fingers left me shaken and shaking and feeling like I was going to throw up. I was angry because it felt like essentially a live-fridging. This strong, fierce female character -- by far the show's strongest and fiercest, one of only two female regulars -- was beaten and degraded and raped, all in the name of affecting the show's male characters. I was angry, especially when the little 'next week on Sons of Anarchy...' teaser seemed to show the men gearing up to go to war. 'Oh great,' I thought, 'now I have weeks of male rage and everyone pitying Gemma, who is far too awesome to ever be pitied, to look forward to.'
And then the next week, I watched, and I saw that Gemma was refusing to tell anyone. In part because of shame, and in that sense her silence probably isn't the most empowering thing ever, but majorly because: the sons of bitches who raped her? She wouldn't let them win. She didn't say a word. The only people she told were the police chief (and old friend) who found her, and the female doctor (her son's girlfriend) who treated her. For the last nine episodes, we've watched her pull herself together and work out how to go on with her life, largely by herself and through only her own strength. She hasn't told a soul; thanks to the help of the police chief, they all thought she was in a car accident. It's been painful to watch, because I love Gemma and because Katey Sagal is terrifyingly good, and because the people around her didn't understand what was going on. She had epic fights (mostly verbal, but borderline physical in one case that I can remember) with her husband because he couldn't understand why she wouldn't have sex with him and would freak out when he touched her; he cheated on her because of it and she knew it (I'm convinced of that). So no, the show certainly isn't all about empowering all women all the time.
But in tonight's episode, Gemma finally came clean about what happened to her. And that was empowering to me, and a vindication of sticking with the show, and this is why: Gemma did it on her own terms. When she was first assaulted, she didn't allow herself to be live-fridged; despite the rapists' threat of coming to find her and doing it again if she didn't pass on the message to her husband, she didn't pass on the message. The writers allowed her to maintain her strength throughout all of this; she may have cried a few times and we may have seen her afraid (something that was nearly unthinkable in season 1), but they never let the viewer forget that Gemma is a goddamn force of nature to be reckoned with. In tonight's episode, her son was about to leave the gang over irreconcilable differences with her husband (his stepfather), and Gemma had had enough. She made them both come to her house, she forced them to sit at the dining room table together, and she told them.
She told them in order to keep Jax in the gang. She used the news of the assault to manipulate Jax and Clay into doing what she wanted. I was afraid, these last few weeks, that they would find out from someone else; the white supremacist who ordered the gang-rape would tell them and that all of Gemma's hard work to keep the rape a secret would be for nothing. I thought she might be metaphorically screwed over yet again. Today, I was thrilled to see that it was her choice; she set the terms, the setting, and spoke it in her own words. I was thrilled that Tara, the doctor who had known all along and who had been supporting her (which I've been watching with delight, as these two ladies hated each other's guts last season, but have come together as a two-woman army of fierce this one), was there when she told. It was so good to see a friendly female face at that table. The men reacted like I always knew they would (which is why Sons-watching friend and I have been chanting TELL HIM, TELL HIM, TELL HIM in anguish for weeks, with the identity of 'him' sometimes shifting between Jax and Clay): silent fury and then deep sorrow. Jax pounded his fist on the table when she was done telling the entire story, then came around the table and kissed her hand. 'Kissed her hand' doesn't really do the moment justice, but it was loving and warm and so, so sorry. After Jax goes, Clay reaches out to Gemma and gently touches her face. The last image of the episode is the two of them with their foreheads touching, both crying.
I didn't watch the episode with my usual watching buddy last night, as I was asleep, but if I had been awake, I'm sure the incoherent AIM commentary would have been like this: YEAH, YOU SHOULD BE SORRY FOR CHEATING ON HER, CLAY!!!
This is less related to my point in this post, but the acting on this show is tour de force. Seriously. Just watching the silent reactions as Gemma spoke was incredible; watching Jax's expression slowly shift actually had me clutching at my chest, as if I could somehow clutch my heart. The moments when both Clay and Jax reached out to Gemma were heartbreaking, just right, and what I've been dying to see since September. And Katey Sagal, as I've said several times, is just killer. I'm so happy that the show's creator exorcised his right to nepotism and hired his wife. She's amazing. She hit it out of the damn park. I'm not ashamed to admit that I wept like a little girl.
I'm not saying that the show doesn't beat on women and have serious gender issues; it does. In this very episode, a man speaking to his stepdaughter's biological father coerced the biological father into doing something by implicitly threatening to molest the girl. A few episodes ago, a gang member's wife was beaten to death by the side of the road in the name of sending the club a message. Women aren't treated well by the show. What this episode changes for me is that I'm 100% sure now that the writers are well aware of the problematic nature of what they're doing. They took what could have been (and probably, in some aspects, was) a live-fridging of their main female character, and they turned it right the hell around and made her all the stronger for it. I no longer think that Gemma's rape was written in for shock value. I can't really speculate as to why it was written, but I can say that it has changed her while still maintaining her strength and her hard edge, and it has also allowed her to take what was done to her and use it for her own benefit, and that made me happy.
I don't know if this made any sense; maybe it didn't, maybe you needed to see it for it to hit home or maybe it was just me. Whatever it is, I started cheering the second that Gemma told Tara that she knew what Gemma was about to tell the men.
P.S. - Gemma's gambit worked; Jax stayed in the gang. That alone delights me. Gemma always used to win, and that's the way life is supposed to be on this show.
The clip for next week's episode featured a Clay-and-Jax moment (Clay and Jax, who have been beating the shit out of each other verbally, emotionally, and physically all season long) in which Clay says 'What do you want to do?' and Jax replies 'Kill them all,' and I squeaked. What is this show doing to me!! That should not have been a YES YES YES moment, but it was. KILL THEM ALL, PLEASE, AND LET GEMMA HAVE A FEW.
There are only three episodes left in the season; I am both excited and very, very afraid.