That was inevitable.
Spoilers Batwoman - Season 2
- Thread starter dahj
- Start date
That was inevitable.
It was a pretty nuanced survey of the issue, presenting a spectrum between Sophie as the Good Cop, Jacob as the burnout, the Implicit Bias Cop who came down hard on Black people at the slightest hint of provocation but coddled a clearly unstable white man, and then Tavaroff as the proverbial "bad apple" who's clearly unsuited for a public safety role and should've been fired with a black mark on his record to keep him from being hired somewhere else, but was protected by an insular and defensive police culture and allowed to spread his infection of shittiness throughout the mediocre, easily swayed, go-with-the-flow population of the Crows. Granted, a show about a vigilante who resolves crimes by beating of flamboyant crime-lords and their endless supply of street toughs can't really take the position that the concept of "law enforcement" is intrinsically evil and everything would be fine if we just went on the honor system (no matter how much "All 'Crows' Are Bastards" graffiti they show in the background), but it definitely looks like they did their homework and didn't fall into the typical cop-show trap of solving the problem by showing it's as simple as no-true-Scotsman-ing a couple of crooked cops who were hiding in plain sight with no one else on the force any the wiser, and then everything is fine.
I can see the argument that it's contrived to put the contemporary police brutality issue under the microscope in one specific episode, but aside from Implicit Bias Guy, this was all seeded throughout the prior episodes, the second season, and, to an extent, the first season as well. This is still a TV show, not some Netflix binge-a-thon twenty-hour movie, and from a narrative coherence perspective, it makes more sense to foreground the real-world police violence issue all at once in a discrete episode focusing on it, with all the running aspects of it echoing and reinforcing each other, rather than having a series of small, separate climaxes throughout the series where it keeps being a side-show. Batwoman fights the Riddler, and also Sophie becomes disillusioned with her job. Mr. Freeze has kidnapped all the Good Humor Men, and, by the way, there's this dick cop who hassled Ryan like she was about to beat him up at any moment but thinks the guy pointing the ice-gun at him is perfectly reasonable. The Joker hacks everyone's cell phones, and Luke gets shot by the most violent Crow for reaching into his pocket. Having it be a semi-random way to ruin the characters' day throughout the season is a more realistic depiction of police corruption and racism, but I don't think it's the most narratively effective one.
How much "world building" do they need to do? It's a show that takes place in 2021 America: this part of their world unfortunately came pre-built.
Bit of a spoiler for the end of season 2.
The actress taking over as Kate Kane posted a picture, however something was visable.
Batwoman 1.0 vs Batwoman 2.0
Big Fight
Given Kates current state, I'd hardly consider that a spoiler.
I'm not sure what your point is. The kind of police racism portrayed in this week's episode is unfortunately very, very much the present-day reality in this country.
And I rather doubt that the kind of bad cops we saw here would've been allowed to thrive back when Jim Gordon ran the GCPD. It's probably gotten worse since he retired, or whatever became of him.
Which, again, is just as much today as yesterday. The past few years have driven home that things I'd convinced myself were receding into the past have actually never gone anywhere.
A series that takes place in 2021 will reflect what is happening--especially through the eyes of a black male. The crushing hammer that is America's justice system is felt by and interwoven in the daily reality of black people. Its is not incidental as seen (or not seen) in the journey of Luke since the pilot. Despite his telling Wilder what he had to do to get by in his school years, his recent behavior with the Crows (in this episode's finale) painted him as incredibly unrealistic / naive. No black male who has been alive for more than a minute just forgets that reaching into his coat for any reason--to representatives of a law enforcement body..and in this series, one he knows are A) responsbile for his father's murder (Robles), B) have a history of corruption and brutality, etc. could lead to a bullet. That is our black reality, but the showrunners are so detached from said black reality, that they painted a black male living in this America as being naive to a degree that does not track with the experiences and life-built sixth sense when dealing with law enforcement.
You do not see any major character--no matter their social, educational or economic status being so clueless on Black Lightning. No matter where that series' characters hail from, the Akils, Scott, et al. developed characters who knew what the price of being black in America, and its a running theme set in motion since moment one of that series. But on Batwoman, there was zero attempt to weave that struggle into the lead black male's life at all, hence the reason this latest episode failed with what was supposed to be THE big message.
Why in the world do you keep stressing "male" when two of the show's three black leads, and four of its six main-title regulars overall, are female? The show is named Batwoman, for Beebo's sake, not Batwing. This episode was not just about Luke Fox's experience with racism. It was every bit as much about Ryan's and Sophie's, and even Imani's experience of it was touched on. That intersectionality, that exploration of multiple black perspectives differing by economic class, background, etc., was the entire point.
I get your point here, but let's see how they deal with it going forward. Is this a "one off" or is it a change of direction for the series. To be fair, there have been a lot of changes--the writers had to get used to the change in the lead. Often series that have shake ups like this take some time for the writers to adjust and to play on the strengths of the actors. I would say that we shouldn't judge based on what has happened but based on what happens going forward.
I remember how long it took the writers of The Daily Show to figure out they weren't writing from Stewart any longer and how the show should be written for Trevor Noah.
Posted like a white liberal male who--instead of actually knowing what he's talking about, starts referring to intersectionality and ignoring the realities of the unique dangers faced as part of the black male experience in America. Black males die from use of force encounters with the police at numbers greater than any other group. Black males represent the largest population of state and federal prisons. Black males are more likely to remain in poverty if born & raised in that condition than any other group--and that's barely scratching the surface of issues. Finally, Luke was the one who was shot--not Sophie or Wilder. The writers--two black women--were clearly trying to draw a parallel to the large number of police shootings of black males, particularly in recent U.S. history. They did not use Wilder or Sophie as they knew which character's shooting at the hands of the Crows (stand-ins for law enforcement in general) would have a chance at having the greater impact.
You would not know this, because its not your life and experience, Bennett. Its not a everything-is-the-same-for-everyone, "Its as much their story as..." matter. That's patently false and consciously playing a sociopolitical game--one that poses a threat to black males by attempting to lessen the overwhelming disparities uniquely faced by them, which makes combating problems in the American criminal justice system more of an uphill battle than you will ever know. You can say that the show is called "Batwoman" all damned day long, yet its writers focused on the most glaring race-related, race-impacting problems of this era, and when they wanted to cap off their script with the most fiery of all criminal justice issues in America, they used a black male--ever the "lead" in this dangerous play called Life in America.
While the departure of Ruby Rose did force a shift in whatever plans the showrunners had with her version of BW, Luke was always there--he was the constant, and if the showrunners developed this series with the intent to address serious real world issues, those faced by real world Lukes should have been part of the "tapestry" / sub-plot of injustice in Gotham all along. Regarding the future of the series--who knows? Will the showrunners attempt a course correction that should have happened in season one, or will the story of what happened to real world people in his position just work its way out of the larger plots? Well, we will find out how its addressed
This show is a cartoon.
In the shadow of real life Black Lives Matters protests, Luke deescalates a situation because he's privileged. His past is all about being the son of a multimillionaire, and that every one knows who his father is, and they treat him like a man of substance, or the son of a man of substance. Three steps out of the world where his father is known as great and powerful, Lucius is shot dead buying a burrito.
Ryan all but calls him an Uncle Tom.
Fighting that slur, the intense shame, Luke decides to prove that he is a real man with huge stones by doing something stupid.
Three things stupid.
1. He walks towards a crime he has nothing to do with.
2. He talks back to the cops.
3. He reaches into his jacket for something that may be a gun.
If Ryan had not messed him up, Luke would have walked away from that crime he had nothing to do with, he would have not talked to the police, and he would not have threatened the police.
Yes, of course I know that, but this is Batwoman. You've already got Black Lightning if you want a male lead. My point is that women's perspectives matter too, and you don't seem to care that the women on this show even exist. You're talking as if you see Luke as the only black character in the show, as if you expect it to revolve exclusively around him. Recognizing that as unrealistic is not about race, it's about looking at the title of the show.
I know this is a serious post, but the way you structured it I imagined the Hamilton singers. "There are three things that you have to know..." when I was reading it.
It certainly has some catroony ideas approved by the showrunners.
Interesting idea about Wilder's effect on Luke--as if he had to "prove" himself in the eyes of Wilder.
As noted yesterday, the episode's writers used Luke as their ultimate point of the episode--a stand-in for the black males who have been shot and/or killed by the police, but yes, the writers also painted him as incredibly unrealistic / naive, as no real world American black male has the luxury of forgetting that reaching into his coat/pocket/car/anywhere for any reason--in the presence of law enforcement in this America could and has led to death.
There's still no police commissioner.
It seemed like Sophie was going to run.
Luke vs. Sophie in the election?
You don't have to be a cop to run.
Imagine...
They fire all the white cops on day one.
Can you see Chief O'Hara from Batman 1966, saying some cringingly racist shit when he was a beat cop?
It seemed like Sophie was going to run.
Luke vs. Sophie in the election?
You don't have to be a cop to run.
Imagine...
They fire all the white cops on day one.
Can you see Chief O'Hara from Batman 1966, saying some cringingly racist shit when he was a beat cop?
I'm sure that's largely true, but I resist blanket generalizations about any category of human beings. No matter what you can say about the majority of a group, there are always some people out at the far ends of the bell curve.
The episode's writers, Ebony Gilbert and Maya Houston, are both black women, so it stands to reason that they have black men in their lives. Maybe some of the men they know occupy a different part of the bell curve than the ones you know.
Every city is different. Some Sheriffs and Police Chiefs are elected too.
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