I was always gonna be mad if they redeemed Donna as an abusive parent in a show based in depicting the consequences of abuse. But I’m specially mad that they redeemed her in a show where David Field exist. What transpired between the confrontation between Carmen and Fields was super important to me cause that’s the reality of people that have been abused; the victim has to find healing on their own regardless if the abuser is ever gonna acknowledge or comprehend the effect of their actions. Carmy, as many victims, justified the abuse he went through with excuses provided by the abuser himself: ‘I made you the best’ ‘you were a worthless piece of shit and you needed me’
Carmy wouldn’t have accepted that treatment from Fields (or he wouldn’t have processed it and justified it the way he did) if he hadn’t been abused by Donna first, which on its own would have made for a more cathartic final if Carmen had decided to cut ties with Donna, at least for a while. To showcase his capacity to cut ties with the systems that oppressed him from the beginning, to acknowledge the core of the wound inside of him. Instead, getting an apology from Donna was apparently enough for Carmen to open himself up to enjoying life again. It really didn’t; Syd made that happen for him even before he got to talk to Donna.
And the show tries to give you the idea that Donna understands she did bad things, that she acknowledged it the way Fields never did. And I think what they implied here is that Donna deserves a chance at redemption cause she knows what she did was wrong. Or that she is more likely to change cause she understands what she did.
Full stop, no. Nobody “deserves” anything; you are either given grace or not. That depends solely on the people you hurt. Carmen and Nat had the total right to cut Donna just while they recover from the things she put them through; they don’t have a responsibility to care for or heal her just cause she is their mom. That’s literally the opposite of reality; they don’t own her shit. Even if she tries to do right by them now, even if she loves them, cause she loved them plenty while she was abusing them too. Why is there a sad pause while discussing that Mickey was Donna’s favorite? As if not worrying enough that the one kid who got the attention and adoration from Donna is also the one who felt the most trapped in life? Donna not only abused her children, but she also neglected them emotionally enough for them to carry into very unhealthy dynamics and coping mechanisms. For Carmen it was Fields and cooking, for Michael it was drugs and failed projects.
It would have made a bigger impact on me and my belief in Donna’s capacity for change if she had ever allowed her kids to distance themselves from her, because she mainly used her kids as sources of emotional security throughout her life. Her understanding that she did bad things doesn’t mean she understands why she did them. It doesn’t imply that she now has the emotional maturity or coping mechanisms to avoid falling back into old habits and behaviors. Donna’s behavior in s5 seemed somewhat childish, as if they were trying to portray her as a bear with no teeth left, as if she dropped all her vicious behavior the moment she decided to. That doesn’t work like that.
Carmen has his own arc to overcome his trauma about being in the safe zone. His first and main safe zone is Sydney, then Richie, and his team. He doesn’t feel the ghost of Fields hunting him anymore cause what he did to him was proven wrong- that, no matter how much he failed, he would always be worthy of love. That’s what happened when he dropped the dish, and Syd and Richie calmed him down.
I just don’t think his ending with Donna is justified; it's like they wanted to sell an ending about believing in people, but they didn’t connect that with the reality of abuse and trauma enough for it actually to feel honest. Like Storer tried to showcase the ‘best scenario’, how he wishes his parents had acted with him, but in doing that, I think he betrayed the actual wisdom that could had helped people like him and Carmen; healing trauma is not about redemption or reconciliation, is about breaking loyalty to abusive systems, and victims have a right to do it regardless of that implies reconciliation or not. Most of the time, reconciliation is gonna be out of the question cause you cannot heal from something you are still justifying. You cannot be in a relationship with someone who only sees your happiness as a means to their own, and that’s the vibe Donna still gives me, cause she never got truly confronted, and I don’t know what she would do if she ever did. I don’t have a reason to believe the old Donna is gone, just that it's gonna be a ‘responsibility’ for Carm and Nat to ‘help her’ and take care of her regardless, and I honestly hate that. Cause it implies that they are willing to take bad behavior from her just cause she is 'trying.’ That her victims are supposed to be the ones to do therapy and healing to deal with her, and have to live with the consequences of what she did. Still, we don’t have a clear definition of how she plans to make it easier for them; she doesn’t sacrifice anything, not even a little time, distance or loneliness of her own, to prove that what she cares for most is the well-being of her children.
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