[7.6/10] The weird thing about this one is that I thought all of the Schlafly material was great. There’s a really interesting family dynamic at play there, and a solid examination of how the shifting family dynamics and gender roles affect even the most staid and conservative families. But I also just didn’t get most of the stuff with Brenda, Marc, or Gloria. Maybe I’m just an old fuddy duddy, but most of it didn’t really track with me.
My wife had a good take though -- that the episode is about how both sides of the ERA debate think that they have the answer, or at least an answer, to how modern life and marriage ought to be. And yet both sides, including the one that believes in a 1950s view of gender roles and one that believes in an “equal marriage”, goes through hardships and difficulties that can put an incredible strain on their relationships.
I guess I just don’t get the stuff with Brenda and Marc. There is definitely something interesting to the idea that Brenda and Marc have to present themselves as the perfect couple on The Tomorrow Show for the greater good, while they’re falling apart at the seams off-screen. The problem is that I think the show wants us to empathize with Brenda, at least a little, and yet most of what we see her do is cheat on her husband and then kind of be a jerk to him about it. Sure, it’s understandable that she’s confused with her new feelings about sexual attraction to women, on top of unexpected pregnancy, but that kind of adds to it, given that this conga line of developments feels a little too condensed and contrived for a quick TV vignette.
I’m even more confused by Gloria’s storyline. Again, I guess the point here is that every marriage has challenges and that nobody on either side of the ERA debate is an angel. But it’s not clear to me why she sleeps with the Justice Dept. guy. Was it just to read her FBI file, or is this her quiet rebellion against the domestic life she’s both drawn to and repelled from, or is it just a sign that despite her position as the face of a movement, she’s not really sure what she wants? Maybe it’s intentionally supposed to be a little opaque, but it was hard to connect with for that reason.
Still, the Schlafly stuff was very well done. I love the contrast between Phyllis and Fred here. Phyllis feels insecure about her status because she’s the only non-lawyer at the debate. She’s out there, in her own mind at least, trying to change the world, and yet she feels handicapped because she’s one of the few major figures doing it without a law degree. She feels less-than, to the point of making things up to sound smarter and more accomplished, and even taking the LSAT , in the hopes that it will put her at the same level as everyone else in her field.
And yet, at the same time, her husband is feeling emasculated and less-than as well. His newspaper profile only dubs him as “Phyllis Schlafly’s lawyer husband.” In a fraught moment, his wife demeans him for “only doing estate law” rather than trying to save the country. He’s relegated to a different office after being dethroned as senior partner.
It all ties back to the central irony that started this show -- Phyllis is out there arguing against the ERA and in favor of traditional roles within a marriage, at the same time she’s scratching for her own liberation and recognition, and her husband is feeling threatened by it. There is, as Brenda notes at the tense but compelling debate, plenty of hypocrisy to that, but also just that sense of tragic irony. The Schalfly’s scene back at the hotel room is fraught and sad and regrettable, even when you disagree strongly with what these characters believe in and or fighting for.
The same goes for Phyllis’s thinly-veiled talk with her son. Blanchett and the writers do such a great job of showing the Schlafly patriarch communicating her point, and her son understanding it, without them ever addressing it head-on. It adds dimension to Phyllis here, showing her as someone who loves her son even as she’s basically banning him from loving who he loves. Much of the text and subtext of this episode centers around LGBT acceptance and the long distance away from it. That closing scene both drives the point home and ends on a note that both deepens and complicates the relationship between a mother and her eldest son.
Overall, I’d say that this one was half fantastic and half a head-scratcher, but maybe that’s what the folks behind the show were going for.
Shout by PongpengVIP 2BlockedParentSpoilers2020-04-30T07:04:22Z
I was so nervous during the debate because putting it right after Brenda and Marc's heated argument might mean their side will go wrong in some way, but seeing their joined smirks and catching each other's eyes at the Schlaflys torpedoing themselves was soooo satisfying. Just positively delightful and joyous!