Musings of a Phlegmatic

I’ll start out by just saying point blank: I liked episode 10, and I liked it as the finale for this specific season. I went in knowing that reviewers and the show runners had described it as an epilogue to the climactic moment of episode 9, so perhaps I came into it with more apt expectations, but I appreciated JPL’s capacity to break their own season-arc formula, as the typical big twist/betrayal/hurt at the close would have felt like a contrivance and a repetition (without meaningful difference, pace Derrida!).

I’ve seen a lot of folks who wanted this to be the premier of season 5, but I personally would have hated this as a premier for a few reasons. For me, the hugeness of Deborah’s choice in 4.09 and the growth it represents requires an emotional aftermath, especially given the consequences that exceed what she had anticipated (which were themselves already huge even before learning about the 18 months left in the non-compete, which she and Jimmy should have known about but anyway). As an epilogue-style finale, the elision of 8 months of time that culminates in a gasping awakening from the stupor Deborah had descended into in Singapore works well. As a premier, it wouldn’t have, and I especially think it would not have landed well among the fandom (even worse than this ep did). For one, there would have been enough distance from the on-air quitting to have Deborah’s depression and her bouts of harshness toward Ava feel like emotional whiplash when many viewers would likely have used the between-season break to come to terms with this “new” Deborah and lose sight of who she has long been (more on that, too, later). It may thereby have landed as a kind of betrayal in a much more intense way. But at least for myself (and I’m someone who saw this kind of partial regression as the necessary fallout of Deborah’s growth), to have this fallout neatly contained into a single episode arc when you have an entire season sprawling out in front of you would feel like a betrayal of the weight it carries. With just one episode left and following exactly on the heels of ep. 9, though, the montages work as narratively efficacious devices to unsettle the grandeur of sacrifice (sacrifice doesn’t just hurt in the moment; it fucking aches in the aftermath). And now, with the ending as it is, we’re set up to start off season 5 in a really different tonal register without having to do a massive jump between episodes 1 and the rest of the season, which makes for a more cohesive arc.

Now onto Deborah… I’ve said it in several of my reviews, but I appreciate that JPL largely do justice (with Ava as well) to the idea that growth isn’t linear. Deborah upended everything at the end of episode 9 for Ava and creative autonomy in a moment of intense moral clarity after a lifetime spent more-than-willingly languishing in the morally gray, in the world of artistry measured by success over authenticity, in the notion of feminism defined by the success of individual women, etc. I think this episode did a beautiful job of encapsulating the idea of growth that comes in painful fits and starts, and the montages worked well to illustrate it. We open with the frustration of a series of increasingly desperate attempts at finding a loophole—attempts that lead Deborah all the way to sleazy billboard lawyers—and of course that frustration gives way to the self-isolation of a wounded animal retreating to lick her gashes in peace. She’s self-destructive because what self is there worth living for? She eats like shit because she’s no longer hyper-visible on stage and camera every night. She languishes in bed because there’s nothing to wake up for. She drinks Coke from a bottle because she doesn’t find herself worthy of the pleasures of having things perfectly to her liking anymore. And we see it age her rapidly, down to the weak little cough as she walks around a cheap tourist store. Then suddenly, a loophole materializes. It’s not growth, no, but it’s familiar, and god, there’s something to the comforts of the well-known after the whirlwind of upending absolutely everything again and again and again (from losing her residency to doing the new hour to life on the road to late night to throwing it all out again). But those old comforts provide merely the simulacra of pleasure now. They feel good enough, but ultimately ring hollow. They satiate without satisfying. And so Deborah spirals outward, seizing on everything that could possibly fill that void. Drinking. Gambling. Touristy shit. And for a little bit, the euphoria of finally being back on stage, supplemented with the rosy-hued tint of the honeymoon/vacation, is enough. But eventually…it’s not. Especially as Ava grows less and less enamored with this life, finally culminating in the boat confrontation scene.

And now here’s the thing. Deborah does lash out, trying to send Ava away with excuses that are only half factual. (Again, wounded animal, etc. etc. of course she does.) But it’s fucking huge that she doesn’t throw it back into Ava’s face that Ava is the reason for all of this. Think about the fight at the end of season 1. Where we are now is growth, even if it doesn’t feel like it compared to episodes 6 and 9. It’s subtle, but it’s there. Because Deborah has almost never hesitated to go for the jugular, but here, it doesn’t even seem to be on the tip of her tongue. She could destroy Ava, but she doesn’t. She doesn’t even hover on the precipice. Instead, she throws things out that sound vaguely like insults, but are just another way of giving Ava an out—a pathway toward becoming something, anything, other than Deborah when “being Deborah” feels miserable as hell.

I’m really curious and cautiously optimistic about season 5 now that they’ve set up a shift toward external tension as the narrative and emotional driver, rather than the internal tension between Ava and Deborah (not that I think things will be smooth sailing, but that there’s no massive betrayal haunting the background of their reunion in the way it has in past seasons). Deborah on the offensive has always been Deborah at her fiercest, and I’m excited to see the ways it may bring her back into the orbit of characters like Marcus (who seems poised to make a massive career pivot of his own, and I really, really hope JPL bring him back into the main fold and narrative focus) as Ava faces a future that’s far less scripted than the path she’s followed with Deborah until now.