In the fifth season premiere of Orange is the New Black, we return to the scene of the crime — the literal crime (murder) and the literal scene (Litchfield). But metaphorical crimes and other scenes, too. The crime of killing a black lesbian character on the scene of a television show. A Black character killed to make a point about injustice for a scene that remains largely imaginary: thousands of white viewers who’d never heard of Black Lives Matter or cared about it but were suddenly moved by Season Four Episode 12 of their favorite Netflix show to develop human compassion. The perhaps less serious and undoubtedly petty crime of (yet another! yet another!) show that we relied on going wholesale problematic and heart-breaking in a way that makes continuing to discuss it far less popular and way less fun than it was before. (For more on that particular situation, read my comment here.) Furthermore, Season Four was pretty fucked throughout, you know? It wasn’t just that episode that hit the wrong note and highlighted OITNB’s desperate need to get women of color into the writing room.
But we’re gonna do it. Why? Well, a few things: we were one of only a few major publications to be openly critical of rather than heaping fawning praise upon OITNB’s decision to kill Poussey. Even the cast, in interviews, expressed despair over losing the character but solidarity with its intended message. The show’s already been renewed through Season 7, so boycotting coverage won’t change anything (not like it would regardless, but). Finally; as one of a dwindling number of queer women’s sites left, and a site built on television writing specifically, reporting on what happens on this show is how we do our jobs. Most television writers are not lesbians or queer women, which’s why their television writing is often unconsciously (or not) homophobic and transphobic. Have you ever read mainstream coverage of a television show with a lesbian storyline or a trans character? THEY HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THEY’RE DOING. I cannot read one more straight white cis man explaining why Poussey’s death doesn’t fit into the “Bury Your Gays” phenomenon. Sophia Bursett remains the most visible trans woman of color in television history, so we’re gonna stay here for that too.
We continued recapping Pretty Little Liars after the six-season manipulative homicidal villain was revealed to be a trans woman, who was then killed. We recapped Glee andThe Real L Word, which… well, you were there. We think it’s important for Autostraddle to remain a part of this conversation, we think what happens on this show is important to our community and we want to report on it.
Lastly; I’m not willing to forgive Orange is the New Black for killing a black woman to teach white women a lesson, but I also feel conflicted about abandoning the incredible, racially diverse group of women who star in this show and love this job because of a choice made by white showrunner. But we will also say to this show: PLEASE HIRE WOMEN OF COLOR TO WRITE SEASON SIX.
Some interesting pieces I’ve read this week about Orange is the New Black:
- Filtering Prison: “Orange is the New Black”‘s Instagram Chooses Fandom Over Social Justice (Bitch Magazine)
- Why I’m Still Mad About Poussey’s Death In “Orange Is The New Black” (Blavity)
I’ll be recapping this first episode ’cause I haven’t recapped anything for a while, so I’ve got some recap energy in reserve to gift upon you. Subsequent episodes will be reviewed, not recapped, because recaps take forever — Heather is doing the next two but the majority of Season Five episodes are being reviewed by writers of color.
Which brings me back to the scene of the crime — Daya, with a gun, pointed at Humphrey, surrounded by inmates possessing varying opinions about her next move. This 13-episode season will take place over 72 hours following the riot ignited by Caputo’s choice to protect poor innocent water-tower-climbing baby-faced useless white guy Bayley from fallout over KILLING OUR FRIEND, so we’re picking up right where we left off. Why Daya, of all characters, is the one with the gun, is a puzzling narrative choice, but well, so is… so much.
Piper and Alex are gonna lay low, stay out of trouble, and seek comfort in each other’s problematic arms.
So we’ve got Humps on the ground, fearing the merciful end of his pathetic and insufferable tenure upon this earth, attempting to elicit sympathy from Daya in the typical cinematic fashion — telling her authentic tales from a his ridiculous life. Apparently, ocne upon a time, unforgiving classmates called him “Tommy the Toad-Boy.” Also, he has two sisters who, let’s be real, probably hate him.
“See, he doing that thing trying to make us see that he’s a person and shit,” Taystee observes. Meta! When Daya screams for Tommy the Toad-Boy to shut up about his fucking life, he simply changes course, continuing his story IN SPANISH. Daya doesn’t know Spanish, Tommy the Toad-Boy! So she shoots him in the leg, just barely missing his genitals.
Just a reminder: Tommy the Toad-Boy was the guard who thrust Suzanne and Maureen into the ring of his own personal Fight Club last season.
Meanwhile, CO Blake and CO Stratman are chilling by the soda machine, probably talking about how underrated Crystal Clear Pepsi was and how RC Cola is pretty okay. Stratman was one of two geniuses who let Tommy the Toad Boy through the metal detector with a gun in his boot, so when they hear shots fired, he’s pretty sure it’s Tommy’s gun and who knows, maybe he’s “pulling a Columbine.”
Thus we get rolling on this episode’s truly basic and profoundly unfunny running joke, wherein everybody in the building who didn’t witness Toad Boy’s Last Stand thinks that he’s an “active shooter,” and thus references Columbine, Aurora, Charleston, etc., while discussing the present situation.
Some inmates wanna finish Toad Boy off and start kicking him, which was the first moment this season when I considered maybe not watching it after all! Black Cindy doesn’t wanna get guard blood on her pants, Daya’s got the gun and Gloria would like everybody to chill out for a minute and not murder somebody. In the shuffle, Maria dumps out Judy King’s lil box of possessions and the inmates grab what they can and fill the emptiness with their name-tags while they also begin stripping off their prison scrubs, which is a great opportunity for fashion in a show that has not done a lot for fashion. Think about everything Shane did for fashion, and how little Stella did for fashion. Don’t forget fashion.
Oh right, and Linda’s still in the bathroom:
The lockdown alarm blares on and the women hit the floor — until Maria reminds them that they’re in charge now, rules are off, and so is, apparently, CLOTHING!
This is as good a moment as any for Linda to exit the restroom:
The inmates break off into interest groups: Big Boo and Pennsatucky break into the commissary to enjoy an episode-long banquet of sweet and savory snacks and to dole out requested items to other inmates on a case-by-case basis.
Ange and Leanne, predictably, have headed straight for the drugstore, and can these characters just get transferred to a van down by the river already? I think they’re here to make us laugh, ’cause they’re stupid and have stupid ideas, LOL!, but Orange is at its best when it’s a true dark comedy, in which both tragedy and humor move the story forward at equal pace, underscoring and enhancing each other. But here, now, it’s different. The tragedy remains, shot through with chaos, frustration, anger, division, fear; but the comedy, at least so far — and Maritza/Flaca are relegated to playing this game too, this episode — is just jokes. Justttt… jokes for their own sake.
Nicky’s also keen to break into the drug emporium, but Morello’s a bit nervous about a drug addict taking charge of a room full of drugs. She suggests other hobbies now available in the Newer Better Litchfield such as “making a ham radio.” But Nicky’s thinking bigger. Like, BIG PHARMA bigger.
Nicky: This is a purely practical, tactical move. I mean the weak-wristed, short-statured, white-girl contingent that we represent, we need a stronghold. If I’ve learned anything from this grand corportocracy we call America, Big Pharma rules, right? SO does Little Pharma, Medium Pharama, and Pharma of all sizes. Let them eat Prozac!
Mr. Toad is taking a wild ride in a laundry bin to Sophia’s salon of beauty and chill. Gloria’s not gonna let Tommy the Toad Boy die, ’cause then Daya will go to max and never see her baby again. Gloria wants Sophia’s help ’cause she’s got EMT training from her years as a firefighter. Her first suggestion is a tampon to stop the bleeding. Zirconia reminds her that tampons are like raw gold around here, where has she been? “She don’t use tampons, don’t be insensitive,” Pidge retorts, and she’ll be receiving a fresh batch of ally cookies this evening! No cookies for Toad-Boy, though, who snaps back, “I need a surgeon, not a fucking fire-tr*nny!” Sophia informs him that he’s welcome to die and go to hell while she reads her magazine.
Flaca is upset that Maritza went to the riot without her but it’s okay, they’re gonna recap it to each other instead.
Meanwhile, Cindy, Taystee, Allison and Watson are hitting up the main office of this beastly building, where Josh the PR Man is taunting Caputo about his eminent job loss. I cannot look at this man’s moustache for three more seasons so please fire him.
“Are you insane?” Caputo asks Black Cindy when she orders Josh to the ground, threatening him with the chair of a table and the rusted nail atop it, and Taystee replies, as you do, “No, she’s angry. We’re all angry. You done my girl wrong, Mr. Caputo. And you’re gonna fix it.”
Caputo launches into, “Taystee, this is a very sensitive situation—” but before he can finish, Taystee punches him in the face. A victory for all of mankind. This is when I decided I would watch this show after all. Look at that!
Blanca’s working to secure all the exists, while Gina’s trying to enlist Luscheck’s help to turn off the blasting alarm that’s adding an extra layer of discomfort to this buffet of despair. The best way for Gina to do this, and really the best way for anyone to do anything, is to smear her face with period blood to look injured to inspire pity to get her way into the Room of ReWirement. GET IT?
In the library, among the towers of books, we find the chronically depressed, wildly grieving, still-mostly-friendless widow, Brook Soso. Well, we find her and also so does Judy King, still in her best winter jacket.
Soso doesn’t think she can go on, and neither do I, I’m already crying.
King: In this lifetime you will be amazed by what you can get over, darling. Babies get thrown in dumpsters and survive, teenagers crash their cars and break their hearts and OD on coke and they live. Adults get worn down and compromise and fail and they’re still keeping track of their steps on their cell phones. We are so fucking resilient even when we really don’t want to be.
Soso: Uh, I already tried to kill myself once.
King: And you are still here right? It’s not so easy to shake this mortal coil.
Soso: Until someone sits on you ’til you die.
King: Yes, well… yes, there is that.
This moment delivers another flash of clarity (the first being Taystee saying what she said and then punching Caputo in the face) — that yes, babies and teenagers and adults can do things and survive, but Black women with criminal convictions can do nothing, and still die.
Blake and Stratman, thrilled by successfully seizing Frieda mid-peanut-butter grab and locking a few white supremacists in a cage, decide to lock themselves in the kitchen to avoid the uprising.
Nicky and Morello, looking to steal CO Dixon’s key right off his ring to get into the drug box, smash into the TV room where he’s got six white women on the floor fearing another San Bernardino.
As soon as the Ladies of the Floor learn from their comrades that the prisoners have seized the prison and obtained several hostages, the misandrist rage that lives deep inside all women (except for maybe the ones searching for fairy garden ideas on Pinterest) for all of time forevermore is unleashed upon his poor dumb body. Bye!
Daya, though — Daya’s all over the place. She needs a nap, she wants to keep the gun, she doesn’t know what’s going on or how to deal, and Maria’s getting increasingly concerned about how this is gonna play out.
Shit gets real way too fast when Flaca and Maritza start debating what Daya’s nickname will be in Max after she gets sent away for felony murder.
Daya’s possession of the gun gives her a small bit of power she doesn’t seem comfortable wielding, but isn’t ready to give up, especially when everything else feels so out of her control, and has for so long.
Gina, with Luscheck’s not-help, accidentally cuts off the power before finally cutting off the alarm, which means it’ll get dark soon and then what.
Back at HQ, it’s time for Caputo to go live on the iPad. He’s got a brand-new script, way better than the one he improvised in the Season Four finale. Like this one was written by four women of color and will be shot and directed by women of color!
This is Caputo’s chance to do right by their girl, and also Cindy’s gonna have some of that sweet coffee beverage over there, and also Josh is tied up in the corner, which is the perfect location for straight cis white men in a writer’s room.
As Caputo begins reading the script — about how Poussey was kind and a good librarian and didn’t deserve to die — the fury Taystee’s got riding at the edge of her heart loosens a little, her grief pushing its way to the surface of her skin, her face crumpling, almost to tears. But when Caputo won’t read the last sentence — about Bayley murdering Poussey — anger elbows itself back up again and Taystee turns the camera on herself, “She was murdered. By C.O. Bayley.”
Meanwhile, Piper and Alex have found the nice bathroom, where the soap smells like almonds and the lighting is romantic and Piper kinda wants to make out, but Alex wants to dwell further on her #1 Favorite Conversation Topic: that guard she killed!
Piper pleads, “Come on my fingers? They’re so clean!” Alex reluctantly consents to Piper’s wish for them to find a place to be horizontal but before they can give the ladies a sex scene that maybe 30% of OITNB’s viewership is still invested in, a buzzing starts a-buzzin from the room’s occupied stall….
Sophia and Gloria have reached the limit of their medical abilities in the beauty salon and have to load this sack of shit back into the cart and over to medical, where one heroic doctor has been waiting there all episode long to do his scene.
After last season’s unbearable and never-ending torture of Sophia, it’s nice to see her given a job to do that is a job she feels good about doing. It seems to wake her up, just a little.
She may not give a shit about Tommy the Toad-Boy’s life, but she’s gonna save him for Gloria, and it’s a relief that when she tells the doctor he’s gonna need help, and that as a former fire-fighter and EMT, she’s gonna give it, the doctor gladly accepts it. This makes him the first authority figure to apply reason and logic to a situation since the drama teacher who got fired in Season Three.
Well, Alex and Piper are now tasked with the keeping of Linda, who works for MCC, and is determined to make it out of this kerfuffle alive, with her shoes on, ’cause the floor is dirty.
Two threesomes meet at a fork in the woods: Alex/Piper/Linda and Zirconia/Pidge/Luschek. Zirconia and Pidge want her jacket. “It’s an outfit,” Linda explains, to everybody who cares which is nobody. Alex tells her it makes her look boxy. Zirconia also suggests taking the shoes to use as a weapon, not to wear, because “they represent the patriarchy and the oppression of women, and they hurt like fuck.” Ha.
Morello and Nicky have their keys and are back to get some chill pills, after arguing over who’s gonna hold the keys. Morello’s taking her caretaking of Nicky really seriously, now — she’s not gonna let her girl get away. Or let her girl forget that she’s married and therefore cannot make out.
Back in HQ, Watson’s stolen an outfit that gives her a slight Boyz II Men circa 1993 vibe, by which I mean my everlasting crush on her continues to burn like all of the candles leading to the bed in the music video for “I’ll Make Love To You.”
Unfortunately our crew faces some tech issues, like Taystee can’t get the iPad unlocked. Josh finally gives up his password: “number 6, lower case p, capital K, lower case a, b, s.” Aw, what a tender man with body parts. But all those days / weeks / months / years away from technology have left the group stumped for their next move:
Taystee: How do I post it. [pause] Man, WHERE do I post it?
Watson: I got an old MySpace account. Still might work.
Allison: Snapchat. I hear it’s all about Snapchat now.
Josh:[snort]
Taystee: What? Why’d you make that snort noise?
Josh: Snapchat is a closed system and it only lasts a limited time. But if you tweet with a hashtag and a link, Facebook, Instagram, et cetera, really increases your chances of going viral. You’re gonna want a quick, catchy clickbait. Something to really grab the liberal market — that’s who you wanna appeal to.
Caputo: Why are you helping them?
Josh: Because their message still exonerates MCC, so what the hell do I care? Bad apple guard, sympathetic victim, justice will be served. That’s what I’ve been trying to convey since the beginning.
Caputo cuts Josh off to once again relay his unwelcome message that Bayley was just a stupid kid in over his head. For sure, yes, this is the system’s fault, for having untrained unqualified numbskulls and sociopaths running a women’s prison, and for not paying a wage high enough to attract qualified professionals. But Caputo was gonna lose his job anyhow — so he should’ve said that. He should’ve indicted MCC, or Piscatella, or Humphrey. But to make it sound like a simple accident? Nope.
Taystee: He was a kid who killed my friend. My friend who was a person and you didn’t say her name or ntohing about her.
Caputo: I know, and that was wrong, but I was trying to prevent one tragedy from becoming two.
Caputo wants to know their endgame. After all, he thinks, they’ll notice these girls are missing during count — yup, Caputo’s still totally in the dark (GET IT?) regarding the current state of affairs in the prison he may or may not still be in charge of. Black Cindy relishes her chance to deliver the bad news: there’s been an uprising. There will be no count.
“How long can this go on?” he wants to know. “As long as it takes,” Alison assures him. For what to happen?
Taystee: “For Bailey to get arrested. For the guards to get fired. For the food to get better. For classes and better jobs and maybe like basic dignity.”
Caputo says he hopes that aside from that arrest, they get what they want, ’cause he wanted all those things but never could make it happen. Or, he wants all those things but will always prioritize access to sex with hot women over any all of them, at any moment, always and forever, the end.
Daya’s losing it, rocking back and forth, crying in the dark. Maria says she’s gotta pull her shit together or give Maria the gun, but she won’t. Daya doesn’t know what she wants, so she jumps up, yells at everybody, waves her gun around, and runs off.
Dixon and McCullough, hostages in the guard cage, try to reassure each other that help is on the way.
Nicky, having successfully drugged Ange and Leanne (thank you Nicky) has returned her attentions to Morello, who she’s craving with increasing intensity that verges on predatory but hey, this is Litchfield, so, look at these lovebirds!
Sophia and the doctor wheel a patched-up Tommy the Toad Boy into the infirmary. Sophia promptly handcuffs him to the bed, and the doctor questions the necessity of this move. “He brought a gun into the prison,” she says. “We could have been looking at a Fort Hood situation if he had not been disarmed and shot.” He says he thinks they did good work. Sophia agrees.
Another example of good work: Tommy the Toad Boy’s placement in the Litchfield Infirmary Sleeping Chart.
We then return to the world wide web, a magical land of racism and kittens, where the video has been posted to appropriate social media accounts and is ready for prime time. The MCC Board Director sees it:
Piscatella, perched at a gay bar in the Village — he sees it.
Linda’s petrified about her future as somebody’s bitch but Alex would prefer if Linda could take her problems elsewhere.
Piper suggests maybe helping her instead, and Alex suggests maybe not if she wants to get out in three months and also Alex doesn’t wanna be on TV ’cause by the way if you forgot, she murdered a guard? They buried him in the garden which got dug up at some point? Yeah, a guard. Alex murdered a guard. Murdered him. Killed him. But Lolly went away for it, so. But he’s dead now, murdered.
Piper: “She’s so pathetic. She reminds me of me. How I was, but more annoying. And I never wore suits or worked for a big corporation.”
So they toss her some scrubs and welcome her to the club.
The ladies of Litchfield now have Davis, Luschek, Dixon and McCullough all packed into the same guard hut, hands tied. Flores has got the entire place secured — nobody is getting in or out.
Blake and Stratman remain in the kitchen, eating peanut butter out of the jar, as does in the case of a power outage.
Oh right so, all this time, Red and Shelley have been holed up in Piscatella’s office — initially, they were looking for items of theirs he’d confiscated, but they found so much more than they expected. A whole new world, if you will.
So, when Daya shows up to the office, that’s who’s there, and she uses her gun to boot them out of the fine time they’ve been having, just Two women in a tiny room with a binder of unambitious and slightly racist table decoration schemes.
Daya calls her Mom. And it rings three times before voice mail picks up — Daya goes “Mom?” just as she hears Aleida’s voice, but before Daya can start leaving a message, she’s clocked over the head with a statue from Piscatello’s weirdo desk. A black boot steps on the gun.
And that’s that.
In conclusion, Orange is the New Black should add some writers of color to their writing team so they can write episodes of its television program! Heather’s review of Episode Two will be up tomorrow.
