After a few weeks of non white and not wealthy victims (still good looking and female, of course) and actually pretty decent episodes, we now get back to what this show really loves to focus on...rich white women victims and evil rich white guy bad guys in he said/said said stories that are overly complicated and dull! I was not a huge fan of this one, I did think that some of the twists and turns had potential, but the whole thing felt super convoluted, Olivia was throwing her self importance all over the place and doing the exact thing that she told Kat not to do (get super involved with the victims) and while it had some decent ideas, they seemed to get all clogged up in Olivia giving speeches and hitting beats that the show has hit before.
It was interesting at least that they had the idea of a women raping a woman raised in this episode, a concept that I dont think the show has really explored since season two or three, and only once that I can remember off the top of my head. Of course it turned out all to be made up, because women are always telling the truth...unless its about another woman, in which case she is probably a lying liar who lies. Luna was also apparently raped in prison by female inmates, but they didnt even talk about that very much, which was too bad, because its an issue that is very rarely explored, which is what the show is supposed to be about, but they zipped away to go back to the tried and true "female victim, evil male rapist" story, even when possibly a more interesting story was right there.
I kept expecting another twist where Luna really was embezzling, but she really never raped her employee and she really was raped by the other guy, and she would get in trouble but still get justice for being raped because rape is never justified and even criminals deserve justice, and that would have been a pretty good message, but it turns out it was a convoluted as fuck evil scheme and conspiracy to gaslight Luna, get her sent to jail, and take over the company, because they just dont like her. How all of this happened was a bit unclear to me, was her bitter childhood friend the mastermind, or the guy from Stanford? Why exactly did they want to do all of this, was Luna that bad of a boss? Or was it just corporate greed run amok? I was also really confused by the dynamic between Luna and the Stanford guy, it looked like she was seducing him and he looked uncomfortable and creeped out (I thought that he was her subordinate at first and it would turn into a thing with a female boss either being raped by her male employee or her using her position to sexually harass him) but then he just jumped on top of her and raped her as a part of this scheme? To hurt her credibility? Or just because...men love to rape women and he couldn't help himself? Not that either of those are impossible or anything, but it seems like a strange series of events. How many people were involved, it seemed like it was just three people right? So why did Olivia say that it was for the money "for the men" wasnt it one man and two women? Were more people involved?
Olivia was really going full Olivia, giving speeches about women overcoming never ending victimization to start AND end this week, first in a kind of parody way, then for real, with neither of them seeming different at all. I mean, this is clearly one of those times when Olivia decided instantly what happened, and didnt want to change her mind, no matter what the evidence said. The second she described the guy as a "Stanford Fratboy" in a tone that most people use to describe people that have sex with corpses, you could tell she decided on who the bad guy here was. There were a few female villains here, and the childhood friend didnt even try to blame her stuff on a man, but it was still rather paint by the numbers when it comes to this shows approach to gender.
No Finn, and that sucks. His snark would have been welcome. But I guess we needed more of St. Olivia, champion of all hot white female victims of a certain income bracket!
Edited February 24, 2020 by tennisgurlncG1vNJzZmien6fCrr%2BNqamipZWptq6x0WeaqKVfqbyxtcJoaGluZmyDbr%2BRapxqbV2oxKq5zKKloGWnnsGpedOhnGarmJa%2FrL%2BO