wiffy

Kusimayu tells Carol, "I want to be with my aunt. I want to be with my cousin." The caption adds, "[No mother figure mentioned]"

interview: "I realized it's kind of like the most patient mom in the world instructing their little infant toddler," Gilligan says. "They might say, 'I hate you, mommy.' But you don't take it seriously. It doesn't hurt your feelings. You know they're just acting out. They're a little kid. They kick you in the shins. It hurts a little, but at a certain point, for their own good, and for yours, maybe you give them a time out. So I think they're just giving Carol a time out. They do it in an over-the- top way: Half a million people leave town. They can't lay hands on her. They would never lock her up. They love her too much. They can't do any of that, and they wouldn't want to if they could. But they can leave, so they do."

interview: [Karolina about Carol]

What I would love that, there was a lot of different things that we talked about, and one of them was being an indulgent mother with Carol. And also the way I would put it is someone that holds space for someone's feelings. And like you would with a kid when they're having a tantrum, you're like, okay, they're having their moments, but I know that once they join us, they're going to know the bliss and the power and the beauty of what we're experiencing.

Carol is talking to Zosia, who is in a hospital bed. Carol says, hands on her hips, "Freedom Falls. You know what that means, don't you? Of course you do. You know everything. Tell me about it. Tell me about Camp fucking Freedom Falls."

Zosia replies, "You were sixteen. Beginning to understand yourself. And your mother, she sent..."

Carol says, "Yeah, go on. What'd she do?"

Zosia says, "She sent you to... a conversion therapy camp in Covington, Tennessee. Camp Freedom Falls. You never forgave her."

interview: [Samba about Koumba]

they called him Mr. Koumba, and I was like "Mr. Koumba? In Mauritania, Koumba is a woman's name." But I did the audition, and once I got the part, I told Vince, "I actually loved that you called him Mr. Koumba, because in my culture, the only way a man takes on a woman's name is if his mother has passed away during childbirth. That informed me very much about who this guy is." If you notice, he does not have family members like the other Originals. He's surrounding himself with supermodels. So I think he came from a place of not having family around him, not having real people that he cares about.

[…]

We kept the name, because I thought it really informed who this guy was: He didn't have a mother figure, he probably didn't have any close family growing up. So of course now that he has this candy store, his desire as a child, he's going to walk in and try to try everything, because finally he can. So that was a beautiful fluke that stuck in a beautiful way.

Koumba sits in a bathtub, looking dismayed as Joette buttons her dress up.

Laxmi shouts at Carol through the phone, "How dare you make my son cry. You do not ever make my son cry again."

Manousos picks up the phone. Carol shouts at him, "¡Chinga tu madre, cabrón!"

Manousos tells a Hive member with his mother's body, "Don't call me son. You're not my mother. My mother's a bitch."

Manousos's scapular burns. It hangs from his rearview mirror and depicts Mary holding baby Jesus.

We see her lose her partner, her rock and anchor point, in such a traumatic way and then have to deal with an apocalypse on top of that in the span of maybe 2 months? Kudos to her for lasting even that long because if my partner died in front of me like that, even without the end of the world, I’d also be considering trial by fire(work) if you catch my drift.

And yes, Carol’s not overly concerned with niceties and can come off as a mean drunk, but who wouldn’t? There’s a quote that basically says when the whole world is blind, the man who can see is called crazy. And that’s her perspective - for some reason, nobody is as alarmed as she is and she can’t figure out why. She feels like she’s the only person who can see how bad things are (because, to be fair, she’s had the worst go of it).

She didn’t want the translators because she didn’t know at the time that the Hive couldn’t lie and didn’t trust them to not manipulate her words, not because she’s inherently racist. It’s crazy that people are upset with Carol for not considering the feelings of the other survivors when hardly any of them considered her. What she was going through? Why was she the way she was? How could you blame her for being angry and inadvertently causing deaths from that anger when she didn’t know that would happen? Did anyone ask her why she was so angry and haunted? (Anger is one of our foundational emotions, btw. I think it’s very deliberate that they wrote a situation where her anger is essentially policed.)

Carol is someone who values truth, choice, and agency, things that have all been denied to her at some point in her life, which in part fuels her misery and discontent.

And I think, something that gets lost, is that Carol cares. She cares about her fans (even though she pokes fun at them) through her actions. She kept the crocheted items, she interacted with them so beautifully during the book-signing, she remembered some of their usernames/details. Carol shows through her actions that she cares. She goes on the trips with Helen despite not wanting to because it mattered to Helen. She throws up and feels so obviously remorseful every time she loses her temper. She cares so deeply about the Others because they’re people and their freedom/choice/individuality was stripped of them without consent, which is something that’s obviously important to her given how she views Koumba’s actions. The Others’ lack of want, desire, agency, etc. is clearly upsetting to her.

Furthermore, post-isolation, she gets a lot of flak for breaking down and sleeping with Zosia as if the Hive was not purposefully manipulating her toward this end, playing on her need for connection to foster dependence. Zosia initiated the kiss. It was maybe one of the few times we see Zosia take an action that she didn’t ask for consent for first, didn’t wait for Carol to tell her, etc. Hell, it even had me questioning if that was a moment of agency. A sign of want. Something that would matter to Carol.

I tell people all the time that social connection and love are both up there with food, water, and shelter in terms of basic human needs. The person deprived of them has a hard time accessing their higher thoughts/self-actualization traits. It’s one of the main reasons many places are starting to look at solitary confinement as cruel and unusual punishment. The damage done to our psyches in the presence of loneliness isn’t just mental; physically speaking, prolonged loneliness causes issues in our bodies too.

Like yes, at the end of 40 days of essentially solitary confinement, she trips up, but we see that caring nature deep inside her when she starts asking Zosia questions about herself, and ensuring that she eats too, etc. Carol cares about people even if she is gruff about it. Even if she knows, in this context, it is going to be used against her.

Like in a way Carol and the Hive both have something the other is missing, and her inability to be placated for very long because of how strongly she values choice and autonomy and agency is something I think that draws the Hive to her in a unique way. Carol’s individualism and original experiences is fascinating to the Hive; the Hive’s connection and community is something Carol has always wanted but could never have.

When you think about it, Carol has lived her entire life feeling that some of her agency and choice have been taken from her. She is closeted, essentially, because she fears that being her authentic self will cost her the life she was come to enjoy and the comfort of it. She lost her family/lost the illusion of them loving her unconditionally over her sexuality, and that kind of betrayal from them is enough to have her guard up with everyone else. I think that’s why the idea of agency and consent rings so true to her core motivations. I think it’s different than just “oh she’s an American, of course she values individualism.”

Maybe I’m too close to the subject matter to see it, but I grew up in a southern US town and still live in the “Bible Belt.” I’m fortunate that I didn’t have to come out until I was out of the house and less dependent on my parents. The fear of conversion therapy was there for me, albeit more as a nebulous, vague idea like Hell, but it is still there for some in a far more tangible way.

And besides, even if you aren’t sent to a conversion camp, you’re often disowned or you’re socially ostracized. It’s honestly so similar to the Hive. You are different from these people and you both know it; they wave at you and smile but you have your guard up because you know deep down, if they could, they would change you. They would make you like them.

And the mother stuff, don’t even get me started. Carol specifically mentions her mother for a reason. I can understand why Carol is so bitter, why she assumes the worst: why wouldn’t she? Why wouldn’t she assume the worst when the one person in the whole world who is supposed to love you unconditionally (your mother) doesn’t love you? Or doesn’t love you unconditionally, at least.

So, long-winded, but it’s her empathy, her caring nature, her core fundamental love of humanity, that pushes her to resist the Hive so much. Because she doesn’t want to see what happened to her happen to billions of others. Let them have the choice, because Carol knows what it’s like when you don’t. When people try and take that away from you. When you live a life miserable because of how much of yourself you have to hide from the world.

Carol is deeply empathic person at her core. She’s just also abrasive and not a “people” person. Those aren’t the core traits to her, though. She’s not just purely selfish, she’s reliving the worst thing she has ever experienced and she’s entirely alone after spending a long time having at least one person by her side who showed her that she wasn’t unlovable.

We have seen the trope over and over again of the hero almost losing the one person they loved the most and doing anything in their power to stop it. Carol did lose that person, and she’s having to figure out how to cope with that.

TLDR: I think Carol deserves some grace because at her core, she’s an empathetic and caring person.