Need to get caught up? Check out my review of episode one, First Period.
Episode two of Carrie caused a lot of big emotions. I mean, really just one big emotion. That emotion being rage.
Let’s discuss it.
We start out the episode with the fallout from the shower scene. Everyone’s got thoughts about it. Most of the girls in class feel like they didn’t do anything wrong. Especially Chris. Because nothing is ever her fault.
Sue feels bad, though. Even though she didn’t really participate in the tampon and pad throwing event, she feels bad.
Good for her. As her boyfriend Tommy points out, the fact that she feels bad is how we know she’s not an asshole.
At least, not a total one.
Carrie’s teachers are worried about her. For good reason. Her gym teacher, Miss Desjardin, makes the other girls run laps. The counselor, Mr. Mortin, talks to her about books. He takes her to the school library, and this opens her world up.
It’s good that Carrie has these good adults around, trying to protect her. Because her mom is sure as hell not.
Margaret White is struggling at her job. Not because being a cashier is soul-crushing. I mean, it’s a job. Thousands of people do it every day. Most of them don’t feel the need to tell grown-ass adults not to buy sugary cereal or condoms.
Frustrated, she takes this anger out on her daughter when she finds out that she was given age-appropriate sex education at school. After you know, she had her period and thought she was dying.
Carrie, understandably, is angry. So is Chris. Surely, this is going to end really well.
Let’s talk about why this episode was so great. First of all, and I’m embarrassed I didn’t realize this before now, one of the head writers is Justina Ireland. And Ireland is a fucking queen.
She wrote such amazing books as Dread Nation and Deathless Divide. If you enjoy zombies and alternative fiction, those are the books to read. She’s also done a lot of great work with Star Wars. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that this show has been so good so far.
Now, let’s talk about Chris. Because she’s a fantastic character.
Not to say that she’s a good or likable person. She’s a complex person. Chris’s dad is struggling and blaming her mom for the whole thing. When we meet her mom, it’s pretty clear that she doesn’t have any idea of what’s going on.
So far, her mom has been described as ‘abandoning her family’. But if you watch carefully, we’ll see that her mom has been doing everything she can to spend time with her daughter. It’s just her former husband that she doesn’t want to be around. Chris can’t see this. She can only complain that her mom had a Peloton in her room. Clearly her dad’s done a number on her.
Chris is in pain. She’s angry. But she’s angry at the wrong people. Her stepsister. Her mom and stepdad. And Carrie. This doesn’t make her exactly relatable. But it does make her complex and interesting.
Margaret White, on the other hand, is not complex or interesting. She’s self-centered. She’s a bad parent. She believes entirely that she is right about everything. Anyone who doesn’t agree with her is brainwashed, ignorant, or insidious. Probably a mixture of the three. She feels victimized after harassing people just trying to live their lives. And then, when her manager tries to support her while still telling her to knock her shit off, she feels like a victim again.
Let’s spare a thought for her manager, by the way. She looks like a punk rocker, but handles this situation so responsibly, with such care for a woman who is struggling. And she is met with nothing but dismissal. Good on her.
Finally, I have to talk about the library scene. When Carrie sees the school library, her whole life opens. She grabs literally half of my favorite banned books, including I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and The Handmaid’s Tale. She’s happy for maybe the first time in a long while.
I think a lot of us were the weird kid in school. I was, and I found a lot of solace in the school library. It felt like Utopia. I almost cried with joy watching this scene.
Honestly, I loved this episode. I love how they’re slowly ramping up the secret telekinesis group that I assume we’ll eventually get to see more of. Overall, I was furious in the best way possible. I’m excited to see what happens next.
My book, Station 86 Volume One, is available now on Amazon! It’s got two dark sci-fi stories about murder and mayhem on the station of First Contact.
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