#tw;csa

Welcome, Dr. Max Cristie! AKA, to many, Dennis Rickman from EastEnders. Lol. I think I’m gonna be calling this guy by his full name, surname, or “Dr. Cristie” a lot, because it’s already inconvenient enough having to differentiate between Max Walker and Max McGerry without adding a third Max into the mix (I think there have been more, but I’ve only watched these three). Honestly, they’re getting almost as overloaded as the Sams at this point.

Anyway, Max (who gets called by his first name for his first review post) is... interesting so far. He feels a bit generic and bland, to be perfectly honest, but his connection with Dylan keeps me intrigued. Some part of me is still convinced they’re exes after seeing this first episode, especially as the history between them still hasn’t been explained yet. It wouldn’t be the first time a long-running Holbyverse male character has been established as bi through the introduction of a male lover from med school - Henrik and Gaskell, anyone?? Though obviously I hope Max doesn’t turn out anything like Gaskell. The closest to Gaskell that Casualty should ever go is Stevie.

They really went out of their way to establish Max as very protective over children, first with the little girl he brought in (whose hair he was awkwardly stroking??) and then the teenager being groomed by her football coach. I’m almost certain Max will have a backstory where either he had a child who died, or he suffered some sort of trauma in his childhood (possibly abuse-related as it would add further complication between him and Dylan due to their similar trauma, and the useage of this SA storyline in his first episode, and how angry he was at the football coach, and also he reminds me of Greg Douglas, but it could be something else) that’s made him protective towards kids. It’s one of those Holbyverse cliches - if a character is protective of children, you know they have some sort of trauma.

Anyway, it’s not this guy’s fault so I’m trying not to hold it against him, but the introduction of a new character named Max really, really worries me because the most obvious option for who they could declare as CEO now that Henrik’s left is Max McGerry. But they wouldn’t want a new character and a CEO with the same name, as that could get confusing. So this makes me think it’s more likely that Casualty will retcon Henrik leaving, and we’ll have to be burdened with the knowledge that he’s still stuck in the job that he is utterly incompetent at and literally hates, rather than away from Holby with the man he loves. Sigh.

Robyn may or may not be leaving, Paul almost definitely is. Meh. I don’t really have strong feelings about Robyn, but I despise Paul. I’ll accept Robyn leaving if it means we don’t have to put up with Paul anymore. It would be a shame for the show to lose Amanda Henderson, as she is a very good actress when they actually give her worthwhile material, but Robyn as a character has hardly had any decent storylines or development since the excellent Glen story.

I don’t know why Robyn would want to marry Paul. He’s so annoying and irritating and bland. But if he makes her happy, then, er, good for her I guess??

I am really, really angry that the show had Faith turn out to be right about the football coach grooming the teenaged patient. Portraying a character who is literally an attempted rapist as some kind of hero to a rape victim is absolutely disgusting. I was hoping that this would be a story where Faith got it all wrong and ended up with egg on her face, so to speak, but evidently not. If anything, it feels like they’re saying “see, Faith’s not an abuser, look at all these men, that’s what a real abuser is!”. And as disgusted as I was with the football coach tonight, or the man hurting his daughter in that storyline a few months ago, I am equally disgusted with Faith and find it disturbing that the show wants to paint her as a hero to abuse victims.

Not only is this deeply frustrating, it feels like an utter letdown coming from Jon Sen, who did one of the best female-on-male sexual abuse stories I’ve ever seen on TV during his time at EastEnders (Mick’s storyline about being groomed by his foster worker). I know he can tell stories about female abusers better than this. So why is the show still romanticising and glorifying Faith? As a queer person whose abuser was a woman, I hate that the show doesn’t seem to care about people like me or Lev.

I know the storyline was more to provide an establishing moment for Max when he confronted the coach in the hall (and I was totally cheering him on when he did!) than it was anything for Faith, but in that case, why include Faith at all? Why not use a character who wasn’t an attempted rapist - someone like Marty, perhaps - to recognise the grooming situation? Or it even could’ve been Jacob! That would tie into all the Tina aftermath lately as well.

On the subject of domestic abusers in Casualty, Marcus is becoming more of a disgusting monster by the episode. Poor, poor Stevie. It was so upsetting tonight, seeing Stevie in one of the most vulnerable moments she’s ever had, and Marcus using it against her to isolate her. This storyline is so hard to watch, although I suppose that’s a good thing with a topic like this, but it’s still distressing. Stevie deserves so much better. <3

Oh, absolutely. (Also, Dylan's canon autistic. S26E10 "Sanctuary" confirms it, plus several writers and actors have liked tweets referring to him as autistic, as with Henrik - which you pointed out already though.) I think this attitude comes pretty much entirely from ableism (also some misogyny towards Connie, Jac, and Stevie, and homophobia as well, as you point out).

I see it happen more with Henrik and Dylan than the others, but I think I've seen it happen with Jac on occasion and I would not be surprised people do it with Connie and Stevie. (...I feel like I've also seen it happen with John in anti-Johnrik arguments, but I may be mixing it up with the fervent "Henrik would never ever ever want a romantic relationship!!" crowd.)

With Henrik and Dylan, at least (again, they're the ones I've seen it most with so I can judge where the takes are coming from better), it always seems to come from a place of "Oh, they're so cold and logical and unfeeling, they couldn't want a relationship!". And... yeah, the ableism in that is obvious.

Henrik and Jac have both admitted they want relationships (Henrik in "Hanssen/Hemingway" - written by his literal creator Justin Young, Jac in "Locked Away" among other episodes) but don't know how to handle them or commit to them. Dylan was literally married, and left the show in 2012 because he was still in love with Sam and couldn't bear seeing her move on. But that doesn't stop the fandom from being like "Nooo, they don't want relationships, they can't have relationships, they can't!".

@dylan-keogh1 may be able to discuss how people do this with Dylan better than I could. My main area of expertise in Holbyverse fandom's responses to characters is Henrik, obviously.

And Henrik gets hit very hard with this attitude. There's this awful trifecta that leads to people really pushing the "he doesn't want relationships or have feelings for anyone!!" stuff with him: ableism and homophobia and viewing him badly for being an abuse survivor.

They view him as too "logical" and "unfeeling" to have romantic or sexual interests, because he's autistic, and they view it as impossible for anyone to truly love him because he's mentally ill. They get grossed out by the thought of him being with a man and would rather he just be sexless. And they think it would be gross for him to have sex because he's "dirty" (it also says a lot that this attitude only came about after the noncanon Reyhan storyline; no one cared when his only sexual assaulter had been Birdie Thompson). (There is very much this attitude that Henrik was "forced into gay sex" and it made him dirty. I've seen it from SO many people. They don't think Henrik's abuse was wrong because it was abuse, they think it was wrong because it was "a gay man forcing his perverted desires on an innocent straight boy and ruining him". This is why they got so angry about Henrik being bi, too - they felt like they'd been "tricked into feeling sympathy for him", only for it to turn out "he was a dirty whore who wanted it all along". Quotation marks to emphasise that this is a disturbing, deeply homophobic view and I do not endorse it under any circumstances, obviously.)

The combination of these things is how we ended up with the absolutely disgusting attitude many fans displayed throughout Henruss, where they accused Russ of "grooming" or "manipulating" or "taking advantage of" Henrik. They saw Henrik as a "fragile, vulnerable" (ableism + him being an abuse survivor) "heterosexual man being forced into gayness all over again" (homophobia), and refused to accept that he was a grown bisexual man with the agency to make his own decisions and pursue who he wanted. Many people had a disturbing excitement when they thought Henrik was going to be raped again, and were disappointed when it turned out to be a normal, healthy, consensual relationship. People can only seem to imagine Henrik having sexual experiences (particularly with men) if they’re non-consensual, and... well, that’s a common enough way for developmentally disabled people to be thought of that I’ve read whole articles pointing it out before. I can’t imagine they’d have this attitude if he wasn’t autistic (and if he wasn’t bi).

The whole idea of "oh, Henrik would never want romance or sex, it's out of character for him to want that" is just so blatantly stereotyping him for being autistic. I mean, during the Russ storyline I saw people saying stuff like "Henrik's never had any interest in pursuing relationships, he's always avoided it before, why would he start now?!".

In actual canon, like, onscreen, not-subtle canon, Henrik has always been interested in pursuing romantic relationships, and though they never came to fruition (apart from Maja and, obviously, Russ), the reasons for that were hardly ever "he didn't want a relationship". The only love interest of his you could apply that reasoning to at all is Maja, and even then, he's outright stated he loved her but was too scared to commit. Everyone else? He kept pursuing Sahira despite knowing she wasn't interested and was also literally married. Roxanna died before they could get together. He was just starting a relationship with John when John got exposed as a serial killer and also died. I guess you could sort of use him backing off from Carole as proof of him avoiding relationships, but that still feels like a stretch - he was going to ask her out, then found out her dance teacher was also interested and she was considering going out with the dance teacher, so Henrik backed off and they stayed just friends. He could've tried asking her out anyway, sure, but it's certainly not proof of him "not wanting relationships" that he decided to let her pursue someone else she was interested in.

I was going to bring up his crush on Elle and point out that we don't know what happened between them in their backstory and they could have been together at some point for all we know (Elle denies to Jacob that she and Henrik were ever a couple, but she's also being playful/jokey when she does so), but then I realised I don't even need to think that deep about it because the fact that Casualty, the show Henrik's not even a regular character on, gave him a romance subplot is proof enough that "Henrik doesn't want relationships" is nonsense.

Sorry, I'm rambling now. I get really mad about the "Henrik has never wanted romance or sex!!" discourse. But yeah, TL;DR: you're absolutely right about where this discourse comes from, and I think in Henrik and Jac's cases, there's also a bizarre perception that because they were abused in the past they shouldn't have consensual sex ever either.

Best Case Scenario Option: Henrik admits he loved Gaskell and that he was going to come out for him, but John’s betrayal shoved him back into the closet and made him once again scared to accept his feelings for men. Also, the word “bisexual” actually gets used somewhere.

Middle Case Scenario: Henrik’s feelings for John aren’t addressed directly, but the show also makes it clear he has always known he’s bi deep down and has simply stayed in deep repression/denial because of his trauma from the abuse. Also because he grew up in a very homophobic era, and trained as a doctor during the AIDS crisis (although I wasn’t expecting either of these things to be directly mentioned, and indeed they weren’t, but they don’t really need to be - they’re kind of obvious factors in Henrik having stayed closeted).

Worst Case Scenario: They pulled some “I’ve never felt like this for another man” bullshit.

I hoped for Best Case Scenario, and we got Middle Case Scenario. That’s good enough for me - I was seriously worried they’d try to retcon Henrik’s existing awareness of his bisexuality just to make the parallels with him and Serena stronger. Of course my Johnrik heart still craves some acknowledgement of Gaskell, but this is better than an “I’ve never felt like this for another man”, which would have swept Gaskell and Henrik’s feelings for him (he openly flirted with Gaskell, asked him out at least once, said things like “It’s time people saw you again, John. The real you. Us.”; he KNEW he was in love with him) completely under the rug.

I was really frustrated with the “you don’t need to label it, no one uses labels anymore!” though. Maybe Serena would feel that way. I can buy that. But Henrik wouldn’t. Henrik is absolutely the sort of person who needs to be able to put labels to things, and I’d like to think Serena would know him well enough to know that. There’s no shame in not using labels, Holby, but there’s also no shame in labelling yourself as bisexual. I mean, we’ve never had a scene of anyone telling Dom he doesn’t need a label, have we? He’s allowed to label himself gay, because that’s the sort of thing he’d do. Similarly, Henrik would be the sort of person to want a label too. But suddenly when it’s a bi character we get “you don’t need labels”? Come on, Holby.

I’ll just take that scene as meaning Serena was saying that Henrik doesn’t need to label himself for now. I can see that it would be easier for him simply to approach his relationship with Russ on its own merits first, and then he can start learning how to be comfortable with calling himself bi. There. I’ve fixed it.

And I was very very glad Holby addressed Henrik’s internalised homophobia and how the abuse trauma has led to him repressing and denying his bisexuality. Just the “fuck you” I was hoping for to the people saying this storyline is “implying abuse makes you gay”. As a lesbian myself who experienced abuse/grooming from a woman, I really appreciated how the show outright addressed that queer CSA survivors exist and our trauma isn’t any less valid, and our sexualities aren’t any less valid either. (Also, Guy Henry was brilliant in those scenes, just saying.)

The actual Henruss content was ADORABLE too omg. Russ touching Henrik’s arm at the beginning!!! That scene in the locker room!!! All the flirting!!!

And congratulations to everyone who said “how long have we got to do this dance for, do you think?” was Russ talking about his and Henrik’s relationship. I genuinely believed they’d be talking about the hospital. Nah, Russ just confronted him head on. Yay!!

When Russ said Henrik was being awkward, I was going to say “nah, Henrik’s always awkward” and then Henrik said it himself. I know people have always told me I really get Henrik but... this is on a whole other level. Anyway, Henrik admitting he’s “always awkward” is another line I can put in The “Henrik Hanssen Is Autistic” essay, whenever I get around to finishing that. Heck yeah.

Also, even if Gaskell wasn’t mentioned tonight I fully believe Henrik’s reactions to Serena subtly asking about his feelings for Russ were influenced by Gaskell’s betrayal and how it shoved him back into the closet. I mean, he reacted much better when Essie brought up his feelings for Gaskell in S20E45. Tonight he was back to the kind of denial I’ve always written him as having gone through back in his med school days (ask me sometime about how I think he definitely made out with John on several occasions and they probably slept together at some point, but I also think he would’ve had at least one big “I’m not gay wtf I’m not like you” argument with him at some point...). Ouch. :(

Bernie and Serena were back. That was a thing. I’m not big on Serena but as I say, I enjoyed her scenes with Henrik. And I do really like Bernie. The Berena pairing is pretty cute.

For more dedicated Berena shippers - I’m really happy for all of you. You more than deserved that happy ending after all the shit Holby put them through.

Jemma Redgrave was fabulous tonight, and I liked how they addressed Bernie’s trauma from Cameron. Although that scene where Nicky yelled at her broke my heart :( But it was nice seeing Bernie being in full trauma-surgeon mode again when she helped Kylie!

And that final scene on the roof was sweet. I was also happy to see that Bernie and Serena got to kiss despite social distancing restrictions - makes me very optimistic for Henruss getting to kiss soon...

Donna seemed to have left. Thank goodness, Digital Spy confirmed she hasn’t. I was actually going to start this post with a long rant about how Donna deserves better but then I saw she hasn’t actually left.

So now I’ll just say: Jaye Jacobs was AMAZING tonight. What a talented actress. Shame they wasted her so much throughout her second stint, really.

I don’t have much to say on the Nicky/Jac and Madge/Regina scenes because I was busy paying attention to everything else. I’ll have to rewatch to form proper commentary on them. Madge’s storyline is still a mystery, I see. Belinda Owusu and Rosie Marcel were fantastic. That’s about all I have to say.

Kylie is the gazillionth person to get run over in Holby’s car park. Not much to say on that, either.

Basically, I really liked this episode, even if the Kylie thing annoyed me and I wish Henrik had brought up Gaskell during his scenes with Serena.

And like... this is not the finished version of this dialogue, but...

“Don’t. Don’t say it. Don’t give me some clichéd line about me being brave or so strong or whatever. I’m not any of that. I didn’t fucking choose this. I’m not some martyr. I was a child who suffered things no child should have to, and as a result, I spent my whole life in self-resentment and couldn’t even do so much as admit that I was bi until my 60s.”

I’m pretty proud of it. At least of the sentiment. So.

There is so. fucking. much. going on in that episode. It’s like, where do you even start analysing this. It’s one of my favourite episodes now tbh, because looking back on it the writing and characterisation in that episode are brilliant (as I always say: the early episodes that imply Henrik was sexually abused in the past >>> the recent episodes that actually explicitly address it. The early stuff just handles it SO much better without even saying it.), but there is so much going on. (And this is before I even get started on Chantelle’s subplot, wherein she is very visibly autistic, to the point of talking about how she doesn’t like sarcasm because she thinks it’s just a way to be mean.)