Switched At Birth is
constantly juggling a ton of plot. In this season alone, the show has
introduced five new recurring characters just to service the plot, giving most
members of the main cast new avenues to explore and populating those worlds
accordingly. This is a storytelling strategy the show has employed since very
early on in its run, and for the most part it has worked. The writers
almost always know where to find the grounded character moments within all of
the swirling plot, giving the show’s stories a gravity that could be lacking
otherwise. For the most part, it seemed as if this season was following that
same path of balancing plot and character moments, until “The Scream” revealed
a few glaring weaknesses.
It’s not that this episode featured plots or character
moments that were bad, per se, but everything felt a bit underdeveloped in a
way it hasn’t so far this season. Moments like Bay’s disappointment in Tank and
John and Kathryn’s big blowout are things five episodes in the making, and
should have brought the big emotional guns. Instead they felt a bit underdone—almost
too low-key—and the overall impact of the episode suffered for it.
Let’s start with Bay and Tank, because their story took a
few turns for the bizarre here. Although Bay let Tank down easy in the last episode,
his kindness when she injured her hand has her seeing him in a different light.
Except now, everything is awkward; she doesn’t know how to flip the switch from
telling him she wanted to be friends to letting him she’s now in fact
interested in a more-than-friends way. The awkwardness is wrapped around what turns into a somewhat
strange story about a fraternity party Mary Beth gets invited to, a party Tank
refuses to invite Bay to, no matter how many hints she drops. Suddenly, it’s not a
story about Bay and Tank so much as it is a story about Tank and how his fraternity
is having a “Dog Fight,” which is basically a party designed to make fun of
women the fraternity brothers deem less than attractive. With Mary Beth as one
of the potential targets, Tank finds a way to get the party canceled—but despite Bay’s insistence he depledge, he
refuses to abandon his brothers.
This left turn for Tank’s story does a few interesting
things for his character, in that it reinforces his status as a “good guy” for
Bay while putting a few chinks in that good-guy armor so he doesn’t appear too
perfect or boring. But something about the story feels a bit hollow; a plot
designed for plot’s sake and masquerading as a plot designed for character’s
sake. Admittedly, much of my reservation might be due to the fact that Bay and
Tank as a potential couple is far less interesting to me than Bay and Tank as
friends. But a lot of it is in the somewhat inelegant way their pairing was
introduced in this episode, with Bay making such a quick and swift sea change
from only wanting to be friends to luring Tank to her bedroom and planting a
kiss on him. Bay and Tank certainly are lovely together, and Vanessa Marano and
Max Adler have wonderful repartee, but it just feels like there are still a few
missing pieces here that still need to be filled in for the story to fully
work.
The biggest story this week, and the one I was most
anticipating, is what happens with John and Kathryn after John’s kiss with
Jennice last week. The moment John and Jennice agreed to keep the kiss a secret, it
was obviously only a matter of time before Kathryn found out. What makes the
story all the more complicated is Kathryn’s reluctance to tell John about the
subject matter of her upcoming book. I wrote last week about John and Kathryn
being out of sync, and their respective stories here were examples of that to
the extreme; they’re now so out of sync that they can’t even talk to each other
about the most important things in their lives, for fear their marriage is so fragile that these things will break them apart. John and Kathryn’s secrets
surface at the most awkward time and in the most awkward way: right in the
middle of a party Renzo is throwing in honor of Kathryn’s big book deal. It’s
awkward and horrible, yes, but something about it also feels downright strange
in a way I can’t quite put my finger on; like I was watching the show from afar
through a fuzzy lens.
John and Kathryn’s inevitable blowout—where John tries to
explain exactly what happens and Kathryn kicks him out of the house—simultaneously
feels like a long time coming and like it wasn’t developed enough at all, which
is a strange place for this story to sit. A lot of this has to do with Switched At Birth’s plot-heavy
mentality: John and Kathryn have barely spent any time together this season
(which yes, in itself is part of the point), but it doesn’t feel like they’ve
spent significantly less time together than they have in the past. The quality of that time is different, sure,
but in order to truly sell a story of this marriage going off the rails, it
needs more. More time, more talks, more weight.
If any story is indicative of the imbalance of plot vs.
character this season, it’s Daphne’s developing love triangle with Jorge and
Campbell. When Daphne’s time at the clinic began, it seemed like this was truly going
to be a story about Daphne and her regaining her trust in herself after her
rollercoaster of a summer with Jace. Instead, though, it’s turned into a
somewhat odd mixture of underdeveloped love triangle and public service
announcement about extreme sports and brain injuries, and somewhere in there it
feels as if Daphne got lost. The thing is, I respect Switched At Birth’s commitment to telling stories about issues like
brain trauma. I respect that the show constantly strives to do things just
slightly outside of the norm. But when it takes away from telling richer
stories about the core cast, it’s automatically less interesting. What is
Daphne’s story here? What does her relationship with Campbell or her relationship with Jorge do for her? That’s what is still difficult to see.
I suppose in the end what I’m missing this season, which
didn’t stick out as too much of a problem until “The Scream,” is the family
interaction. New characters and plots can be wonderful and rewarding, but at
this moment it feels as if those are coming in expense of the Kennish/Vasquez
moments and stories that are the backbone of the show. It could easily be that
this episode is simply a transitional period in these stories, a necessary step
in order to get to a richer, more character-driven place for the main
characters. But that’s just one of the things that come along with analyzing television
on an episodic basis; it can be difficult to see the forest for the trees. And
this episode was full of trees.
Stray observations:
- Carrie Wikis Some Art: The
Scream, Edvard Munch, 1893, oil, tempera, and pastel on cardboard. - This whole “Bay can’t paint or sign” thing is not making me
happy. Regina already can’t sign! Leave poor Bay alone! - Who’s picking Mary Beth for a “Dog Fight” party, besides
jerks? She’s gorgeous! (I guess I answered my own question with the whole “jerks”
thing.) - The murder mystery started out as a lot of fun (those
accents!) but quickly felt like an afterthought, which was a shame. It felt
like there was more to be mined there. - The title of Kathryn’s book is Batter Up. Indeed, Kathryn.