#brittanalyses

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In Brittanaland, “With feelings, it’s better” has long been a watchcry, but also potentially a misleading one if taken literally, because, honestly, with Brittana, the feelings have never been lacking.

The real issue? Acknowledging feelings for what they are. Communicating straightforwardly about how one feels. Not obfuscating or sidestepping. Just being honest. 

This issue lies at the heart of Brittana’s journey from emotional distance to peak emotional intimacy. As the girls learn how to disclose to each other about how they feel—and essentially to “call a spade a spade” when it comes to what their relationship means—they’re able to move from confusion, heartache, and unnecessary angst to connection, certainty, and emotional openness like never before. This evolution as a couple tracks closely with Santana learning to embrace her sexual identity and with Brittany learning to advocate for herself and stand up for what matters to her.   

We see this process start early on, when Brittana presents something of an “emotional intimacy paradox,” insofar as the girls are simultaneously both incredibly emotionally intimate in some ways and incredibly emotionally closed off from each other in others.

On the one hand, they are best friends of the closest kind:

They confide in each other.

See, for example, in 2x12, when, after maintaining her “bitch” front in the face of everyone else, Santana finally breaks down in the hallway with only Brittany present, revealing the depths of her upset.

They are attentive to each other’s feelings.

See, for example, in 2x02, when Santana sticks up for Brittany when she catches flack for not wanting to perform Britney Spears like the rest of the glee club.

They support each other’s successes.

See, for example, in 2x09, when they are excited about each other’s respective dancing and singing solos at Sectionals.

They make use of an extensive lexicon of intimate touches through which they communicate with each other (e.g., pinky-linking, back rubs, playing with each other’s hair, sweet lady kisses, etc.).

See all of S1, while they’re sitting on the back row.

They understand each other’s quirks, tics, and personality traits like no one else does.

See, for example, in 2x19, Brittany’s defense of Santana during the Blurt Locker scene.

We don’t get to witness a lot of their “alone time” together play out on screen, but anyone with eyes can tell that they are extremely close to each other—more so than they are with anyone else on the show. They talk to each other more than they do other characters. They act differently toward each other than toward other company. They demonstrate all sorts of care for each other in myriad different ways. Both of them are more “themselves” in each other’s presence than they are otherwise. 

Of course, on the other hand, they also have a giant emotional wedge between them which impedes their emotional intimacy—namely, Santana’s unwillingness to acknowledge the true nature of their relationship and/or their respective sexual orientations (or to allow Brittany to do so).

For all intents and purposes, Brittana are in a romantic relationship with each other throughout the entire history of the show, and yet in the early seasons, Santana refuses to either acknowledge or to permit Brittany to acknowledge said relationship as romantic. She’s so terrified of anyone knowing the truth about her sexuality that she tries in every possible way to bury it. 

Even though she and Brittany are sleeping together, hanging out all the time, and doing quintessentially coupley things, they aren’t (according to her) girlfriends; they are “best friends.” 

Even though they have a passionate, regular sexual relationship—that is even seemingly monogamous between episodes 1x16 and 2x06—what they’re doing isn’t (according to her) serious; it’s just a recreational time-kill in the absence of boys. 

Per Santana, sex isn’t dating, and cuddling in the choir room isn’t a big deal. What she feels for Brittany is only best friendly affection, not passionate love. She rationalizes and downplays and represses EVERYTHING, insisting that Brittany do so, as well, freaking out and retreating any time Brittany even gets close to suggesting that their relationship is at all romantic.

—and because Brittany fears that if she freaks Santana out, she’ll lose her, she goes along with Santana’s charades, as ridiculous and unconvicing as they sometimes are. If Santana says that sex isn’t dating, then sex isn’t dating. If Santana says that they have to get with boys, then they have to get with boys. Brittany, at this point, is a passive entity. Her m.o. is to go along to get along and not do anything that would possibly cause Santana to spook.

She keeps her mouth shut, even though she knows in her heart that what Santana’s selling her is bullshit.

In Santana repressing and in Brittany humoring her, Brittana experience complications with their emotional intimacy, including (among other issues):

While they are both skilled readers of each other’s cues, they often can’t discuss what they see going on with each other. They have to pretend that they don’t know why the other girl is upset or conflicted or angry or sad or confused—or at least they have to tiptoe around the subject very carefully, being cautious not to mention their feelings for each other or sexual orientations in the process. 

For example, in episode 2x12, Brittany knows very well that Santana’s upset about Valentine’s Day has a lot to do with her gay panicking and fear that she is going to be alone for the rest of her life. However, because of Santana’s moratorium on talking about feelings and the topic of their sexual orientations, Brittany can’t very well say to Santana, “Don’t worry. You won’t end up alone! One day, you’ll be with a girl you love—and I hope that that girl is me.” Instead, she can only look on with concern while Santana flails, offering physical comfort but no address to the underlying problem.

Santana’s repeated verbal devaluation of her and Brittany’s relationship  conflicts with the physical cues she sends Brittany, which causes Brittany a kind of emotional whiplash. On the one hand, what Santana says can be downight cruel (“I’m not making out with you because I’m in love with you and want to sing about making lady babies. I’m only here because Puck’s been in the slammer for about 12 hours now, and I’m like a lizard. I need something warm beneath me or I can’t digest my food”), but, on the other hand, what she does, from the back rubs to the kisses to the lovemaking, is so sweet and attentive. Between the two extremes, Brittany doesn’t know where she stands or to what extent she is allowed to make known her own feelings.

Hence Brittany’s occasional “flubs,” where she wears her heart on her sleeve and tells Santana how she feels, believing, based on Santana’s recent behavior, that her expressions of affection will be reciprocated, only to have Santana suddenly shoot her down (e.g., in 2x04).    

The girls perpetuate a dizzying cycle in which every time Santana allows hereself to be emotionally vulnerable with Brittany—in some way revealing how much she needs, wants, and loves her—she then panics and emotionally retreats, attempting to date boys (and encouraging Brittany to do the same) in order to reassert their “heterosexuality.” This behavior causes both girls heartache and confusion, as every step forward they might take—for instance, their long period of monogamy between episodes 1x16 and 2x06—is then immediately wiped out by the proverbial two steps back—for instance, Santana roping them into a double-date with Puck and Artie, which eventually segues into her (once again) sleeping with Puck and Brittany (for the first time) sleeping with Artie.

In this sense, the girls are also very emotionally closed-off from each other, insofar as they can’t acknowledge their feelings for each other in any other way than on a physical level. They don’t talk about their romantic relationship in terms of it being a romantic relationship. They don’t talk about what the sex means, even though sex for them is incredibly meaningful. They deliberately mischaracterize their interactions as “platonically friendly” and attempt to hide the fact that they are each other’s primary partners, even though such is clearly the case.

The walls Santana builds up as a self-protective measure create emotional dissonance between them, which eventually results in Brittany deciding to take her at her word—i.e., that they’re not dating, despite all evidences to the contrary—and pursue a relationship with someone else instead, namely Artie Abrams.

From her relationship with Artie, Brittany learns the importance of being at liberty to discuss one’s feelings with one’s partner (“But when Artie and I are together we talk about stuff like feelings”). She also experiences the joys of having a formalized relationship. Artie, despite not fully understanding Brittany and oftentimes underestimating her intelligence, is generally an attentive and positive partner. Brittany’s time with him tends to be happy.

However, for as much as she flourishes in her relationship with Artie, she also finds herself unwilling to completely break off her relationship with Santana, with whom she is still deeply in love. Unlike Artie, Santana does fully understand her, and the feelings between them run so deep and so strong. 

This unwillingness on her part to forsake her relationship with Santana eventually leads to cheating between her and Santana while she’s still dating Artie, and the cheating eventually leads to the implosion of the Bartie relationship.

In the meantime, Santana’s experience with suddenly being Brittany’s “side dish” as opposed to her primary partner proves to Santana something that for years she has attempted to deny: that she is deeply in love with Brittany, craves intimacy with her, and can’t stand to be without her.

So cue first the Hurt Locker scene and then the Back Six of S2, where Santana finally allows herself to name her love for Brittany aloud and to acknowledge to Brittany that she wants them to be together, and, shortly afterward, Brittany suddenly becomes “available” again.

From there, Brittana’s is not an all-at-once transformation, where the girls go from being emotionally impeded to emotionally intimate in every way, but rather a step here and a step there over the course of the Back Six, with Santana learning (with much help from Brittany) to “embrace all the awesomeness” that she is and accept her own sexuality, becoming increasingly emotionally transparent in the process, and with Brittany learning to assert herself and be her own person, refusing to swallow her own feelings to preserve Santana’s ego. 

At the same time that Santana is gathering the courage to put on her  “LEBANESE” shirt and wear it proudly (see 2x18), Brittany is gathering the courage to stand up to the next person who calls her an idiot (see 2x19) and to tell Santana that she deserves to be treated well in their relationship and have her feelings acknowledged (see 2x18). It is a period of individual growth for both girls, and that individual growth paves the way for them to come into themselves as a couple. 

They suffer a few setbacks along the way—such as when Santana stands Brittany up on Fondue for Two (see episode 2x19)—but, gradually, by the end of S2, they reach a place where they can be honest with each other about what their actions toward each other mean and how they feel about each other and their relationship (see the Heart Locker scene in episode 2x22).

This progress continues into S3, when they officially start dating and take the first steps toward negotiating their emotional intimacy in public. Here, we see Brittany being wonderfully mindful of Santana’s comfort levels in terms of their coming out process as a couple (see episode 3x04) and Santana opening herself to Brittany in ways she never has before.

Santana becomes willing to cop to her feelings for Brittany not only when they are alone together but also before others, even in Brittany’s absence, and even to hostile audiences, like Principal Figgins or her abuela.

Unfortunately, Brittana—and especially Brittany—don’t get a lot of dialogue as the season progresses, but it’s still easy enough to see that they’re closer than they’ve ever been before. 

Hence why it so strains credulity when the Glee writers make it so that, somehow, Santana has no idea that Brittany’s not going to graduate, though that’s a rant for another day.

Of course, if we were charting Brittana’s emotional intimacy on a line chart, the “up curve” they’d experienced between S1 and S3 would take a sudden downturn come S4, when their breakup—precipitated by distance—suddenly reintroduces uncertainty into their dynamic, the likes of which they haven’t experienced since before Santana could bring herself to say the words “I love you.” 

Again, as before, the problem isn’t in the feelings. 

It’s in the inability to express them.

As discussed here, Santana and Brittany are still very much—truly, madly, deeply—in love when they break up, but because the entire object of said breakup (as Santana conceives of it) is to permit them both the freedom to pursue other happinesses while they can’t for the moment be together, they have to try to move on from each other, which means giving up the trappings of their former formal relationship. If they’re going to do the “find your bliss elsewhere” thing, then they have to do it right, and that means that they can’t function like a couple. There have got to be some boundaries.

The difficulty comes in deciding where those boundaries lie and then somehow enforcing them.

Throughout their entire “broken up” period between S4 and early S5, neither one of them is certain how to interact with the other now that they’re uncoupled. They still crave each other’s company (see, for example, 4x06 and 4x13), but they’re not sure how much they can do or say or even where to draw the line when it comes to physical touch. How much disclosure is too much? At what point are they crossing a line? 

Santana, in particular, is so afraid of getting her wires crossed that she finds it difficult to maintain regular contact with Brittany, especially once Brittany starts dating Sam.

Remember: Even in the primordial days of S1, when the girls were still pretending that they were “just” best friends, there was always a romantic element to their relationship. They’ve never known how to maintain a strictly platonic dynamic. 

This uncertainty creates some notable awkwardness during S4. Though at various points, the girls vow to each other that they’ll always be best friends and remain close, even when they’re dating other people (see, for example, in 4x06 and 4x13), their communication—at least as far as we’re shown it in canon—appears both sporadic and far less open than it once was. They’re careful around each other in a way they haven’t been since S2.

It takes Brittany’s misery at MIT and Santana’s misery in New York to reopen their channels of communication (see episodes 5x12 and 5x13). Because their concern for each other’s well-being is always paramount even when they’re not officially “together,” when each one learns how unhappy the other one is in her current living situation, they each attempt to counsel and support each other, despite their previous awkwardness, and those attempts eventually lead to them talking about their relationship. 

Brittany bravely admits that she wants her and Santana to be together again, and her act of emotional disclosure causes Santana to realize that she wants the same thing, too. 

They talk about first their fears and then their hopes in getting back together. They make plans. They tie up loose ends. 

From there, their emotional intimacy only increases and deepens.

The Brittana we see in S6, fresh off of their months-long vacation to Lesbos and concert tour as Mercedes’s background singers, have seemingly only grown closer in the time they’ve spent together since S5. 

They are extremely communicative, talking together about their feelings both negative and positive. They also help each other problem-solve and build each other up in times of stress and duress. They’re incredibly attentive to each other’s wants and needs and united in the front they present to the world.

And most importantly?

Their words and deeds align exactly. 

They tell each other how much they love each other with handholding, nose-nuzzling, kisses, hugs, and lovemaking, but they also say it in words—with “I will love you until infinity,” “I choose you over everyone,” and “I do”—and mean every one through and through, from the very depths of their hearts. 

There’s no more discrepancy between what’s actually going on with them and what they say is going on with them. 

They’re on the same page, 100%.

Brittany has metamorphosed from the yes-woman who went along just to get along. She no longer allows anyone to step on her, and she doesn’t sacrifice her own emotional truth to placate other people. She expresses her feelings clearly and is active in making decisions regarding her and Santana’s relationship. Gone is the girl who looked on, brokenhearted, while everyone told her who she was and how she should feel. Now she knows how to advocate for herself, for Santana, and for their love even—and even especially—when the stakes are high (see, for example, her speech to Santana’s grandmother in 6x06).

Santana, too, has undergone a remarkable, seasons-long change. No longer is she the girl who is too afraid to admit, even just to herself, that she’s in love with her best friend. Now she’s the woman who almost can’t help but tell the whole world how much she loves her wife at every opportunity, and she’s willing to prioritize her relationship with Brittany, even when doing so isn’t easy or without personal cost to her. While she once imposed ridiculous rules on herself and Brittany to try to keep their love a secret, now she breaks all the rules so that they can be together. She allows herself to be vulnerable and to show her innate sweetness. She allows herself to be honest about what she feels. 

—and, ultimately, that growth and honesty for both girls allows Brittana to enjoy a high degree of emotional intimacy during their engagement and marriage.

Their scenes together in episode 6x06 are some of the most emotionally intimate in the whole show—and I’m not just talking about them standing side by side to take on Alma at the end of the episode, but about Santana confronting Brittany in the hallway and about their ensuing conversation about Santana’s boundaries and how they’ll work together from now on to achieve common goals. That communication is so healthy and expressive. It’s so adult and straightforward. It’s something they never would have been able to do early on. It really shows their growth.

Looking forward, one can only imagine that as married women, they continue to learn each other better and to make use of their well-honed communication skills. Their “I love yous” undoubtedly continue to be frequent, their acknowledgment of who they are and how they feel absolutely their norm.

In any case, I’m rambling now, but TL;DR? Brittana’s biggest obstacle regarding emotional intimacy is the issue of being able to acknowledge their feelings for what they are. Once they learn to do that—together—they cohere in a remarkable way, emerging as the most cohesive, communicative, emotionally intimate couple on the show.

“With acknowledging feelings, it’s better.”