Orange is the New Black Season 5 (aka the one where they riot)

I was hesitant to watch the fifth season (AKA the one with the prison riot) of Orange is the New Black because I was worried about the way the show’s thematic messages were being read by a critical sphere that I’ve made no secret in knowing I have issues with. To review, the show’s fourth season ends with the cruel reign of MCC culminating in a revolt. Poussey Washington, one of the show’s many breakout characters, is accidentally killed by one of Litchfield’s greenest  officers, Bailey Baxter, in the ensuing chaos. The ideas being floated around in response to this episode – that Baxter was representative of the recent wave of newsworthy police brutality against the black population or that death of Washington was analogous to some sort of in-show racism – seemed antithetical to the spirit of the show itself. 

Through its first four seasons, OitNB has been an extremely illuminating show that teaches empathy for people at all ranks of society. Villains and heroes emerge from every rank and position, regardless of race or sexual orientation and regardless of whether one is a correctional officer or prisoner (although we find ourselves having a surprising amount of sympathy for the prisoner). The idea that the Litchfield experience has been less fair to the black population is simply not true although that’s not to deny that the backstories illustrate those inequalities outside of Litchfield quite well.

This is a show that, for the most part, has never told its viewers what path it should take in terms of differentiating wrong from right. This is why it’s somewhat upsetting that it never makes much differentiation between manslaughter and murder in terms of Bailey. Another move that doesn’t move discourse forward is filling Bailey with no emotions but guilt. The narrative has no interest in giving Bailey a man with any forward path to redemption or even sound restoration of mental health. The narrative is geared towards its viewers  who are upset about the persecution of blacks in the U.S. but don’t have the effort to think about the logistics about anything else. In other words, Bailey is a projection of what Black Lives Matter must want for the purveyors of black violence to do and think, and he’s just as easily a projection of their lack of anticipation that someone like Bailey could be anything else. 

The fact is Piscatella was clearly the villain of the fourth season whereas Baxter was one of the more humane members of his guard. Taystee and her fellow negotiators could be forgiven to some degree for having imperfect information,  but by how much? People more invested in the Black Lives Matter movement than myself will find nobility in her cause. 

I, on the other hand, spent my time thinking about how counter-productive her actions were and how they mirror the danger of tunnel vision with advocates pushing too strongly for any one cause of which Black Lives Matter is no exception: She did little to stop the PTSD-inducing experiences her fellow inmates were giving the guards, she felt “justice for Poussey” was more important than advocacy for Daya or keeping the only trained medic out of harm’s way, she failed to recognize the logistics involved in MCC’s limits when she was negotiating, and she didn’t take into account the needs of other prisoners when negotiating. 

The final episode posits Taystee as a Javert-like figure who’s seen the errors of her ways, but the question remains how other viewers interpreted the season. I’m not going to delve into the reviews and it’s not the responsibilty of the show to tell us how to think one way or another. It’s only my wish that the critical movers and shakers in TV see Taystee’s downfall as a legitimate part of her arc that makes sense in-universe. 

On the whole, though, the creative minds behind this show balance dozens of character arcs and get more leeway to mess up a couple. This season still gets a raving review. It has the same levels of nuance and masterful plotting and possibly deserves more credit for experimenting with the time frame. The whole season takes place over a four-day period in which the prisoners go bonkers and this world is turned upside down. Watching this season 16 months after it premiered without any knowledge of how this madness would end was quite thrilling. 

Random notes:

-This season is built like a classic tragedy. It's a study in human folly. What generally happens with tragedies in moviedom and on stage is the story spirals down to the worst case scenario and the title credits roll and we're left to think about the irony of people who could have done good having messed everything up. Audiences traditionally don't want to wallow in the aftermath because that's just plain sad. Let's see how Season 6 will navigate such a tricky balance. 

-I felt more than ever like skipping over the flashbacks. We are glued to the storyline at hand we don't need anything to break the tension at this point. They are completely unnecessary.

 

-I can't remember the name of the Hispanic prisoner who used Gloria's strategy against her but, ethically, it was entirely fair and I'm glad someone got pardoned by the governor.

-There should be a lesson here about how pharmacology and medicine are highly precise science and you shouldn't play God with other people's medicines. It was kind of amusing how Morello felt like "the new doctor" but that plotline could have carried more weight.

-The season kind of reminded me of the film "King of Hearts"

-Biggest plot hole: If Caputo's hands weren't tied, couldn't he have just taken his chances against Leanne and Angie when they were shoving him along to the poo. He had the element of surprise, and at that point, pretty much everything was going to become screwed.

-The show relies pretty heavily on pair bonds in various forms.  There’s: The unlikely friendship of Boo and Pennsatucky; the extremely likely friendship of Leanne and Angie who serve as this season’s most effective comic relief; the aggressive courtship of Nichols to the now-married Morelo; the reconnection of Sophia and Gloria after one hurt the other, and the Chapman/Vause romance that’s now being framed as true love rather than toxic co-dependency. This was a season in which a lot more couples- Flacca/Maritza, Pennsatucky/Boo, “Von Barlow”/Boo, Nichols/Morelo, Chapman/Vause, Angie/Leanne were going through positive phases and weathering the storm significantly better because they had someone by their side. It’s a stark contrast to Taystee and Soso who both felt isolated because they felt the weight of their friend.