When the People Who Program first discovered, around the time of “The Sopranos,’’ that TV viewers were willing to watch antiheroes, they ushered in a sea change. They raised the level of TV realism – about the dualities of human nature, about the jittery moral compass of viewers – and brought forth the likes of “Breaking Bad,’’ “Dexter,’’ “Mad Men,’’ “House,’’ “Rescue Me,’’ and “The Shield.’’ Turns out we didn’t need to watch TV with the tint always turned to rosy.
But our antihero fascination had a major flaw, one that triggered more than a few critical think pieces as it spoke of our culture at large. There were few shady women in the mix – almost none, in fact, besides Glenn Close’s shark lawyer in “Damages,’’ Edie Falco’s destructive addict in “Nurse Jackie,’’ and maybe Claire Danes’s ailing agent in “Homeland.’’ It was a troubling reflection of what American viewers may not be willing to let women do, a kind of collective Madonna complex dictating that women ultimately needed to remain caretakers.
In 2013, though, Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black’’ arrived as a giant step toward a solution to the problem. It delivered a large ensemble of very flawed women, all of them in prison and ethically compromised, many of them violent, some of them sociopathic, and at least one of them, Taylor Schilling’s Piper, narcissistic to an abhorrent degree. Sure, the writers worked to evoke sympathy for the women, particularly with the use of resonant flashbacks, just as David Chase gave us glimpses of Tony Soprano’s psychological injuries at the hands of his murderous, castrating mother. Every modern TV antihero needs to be attractive in some way, and not just a full-on evil person in a morally black-and-white world. But still, many of the women in “Orange Is the New Black’’ were morally compromised and, like Kate Mulgrew’s Red or Taryn Manning’s Pennsatucky, proud of it. And providing pop culture with female scoundrels is, strangely enough, a form of parity.
But watching this last season of “Orange Is the New Black,’’ I found myself cringing over and over again as too many of the women of Litchfield Penitentiary were turned into flat objects of pity and reverence. The deplorables were turned into adorables. After five seasons, the writers seem to have thrown in the towel on challenging us to sympathize with offending women; instead, they’re rubbing our noses in the bottom-line goodness of these convicts, some of whom come off as saintly by the end of the season-long riot. I know, there were ugly moments involving Daya shooting the prison guard, and Taystee triggering the police’s storming of the castle, and meth heads Leanne and Angie enacting the most irritating comic relief the show has ever pursued.
But the effort to push us into pity and sentiment for the prisoners was consistent and, for me, evidence of a show whose characters have become a bit too beloved. Part of the problem was the premise for the riot that spanned the season: Poussey’s death. It set a tone of victimhood over the grieving women, and Danielle Brooks’s Taystee in particular. Her sorrow over her lost friend — one of the sweetest characters on the show — quickly turned her into a mawkish mess. It also turned her into an irresistible Voice for Justice. Poussey’s girlfriend, Kimiko Glenn’s Soso, became an oh-so brave and loyal soul, instead of the thoroughly annoying character she was before the murder. Meanwhile, we were asked to feel heartbreak for Gloria, crazed with worry over her son, who is in the intensive care unit of the hospital.
Despite the fact that the women had taken over the prison, victimhood and mushiness seemed to have crept into every nook and cranny of the building by the end. The big bad of the season was Brad William Henke’s rampaging Piscatella, who tortures women like a horror movie killer. Red has a war going with him, but you root for her and hope she succeeds in stopping him; she is doing good works. Ultimately, though, the women don’t kill him. He is done in by a riot officer, accidentally, and no prisoner will now need to carry responsibility for his murder on her shoulders. And then Pennsatucky loses her brittle power and determination, it seems, and winds up submitting to the man who once raped her. By the end, Piper and Laura Prepon’s Alex decide to get married, the complex romance between them now very soft, their hard-won characters suddenly making little sense.
Obviously, I wasn’t a fan of season five. All of the subplots wandered aimlessly, ultimately leading nowhere. The character arcs were dull and misguided, and they frequently didn’t match up with the characters as we’d come to know them. But the worst offense was the ultimate choice not to paint in gray, to turn these embattled prisoners into cuddly and simplistic women to root for.
Matthew Gilbert can be reached at gilbert@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @MatthewGilbert.
