"Orange is the New Black" Season 4 Review

by: James Southworth
Rating: 4/5 Stars

America's social climate is very tense right now, especially with events such as the elections, Orlando shooting, Black Lives Matter, and LGBT movements happening. All of these things have created a lot of anger and divide that was only inevitable. With that being said, "Orange is the New Black"s fourth season couldn't have come any sooner. Always a very socially relevant show, this show addresses a lot of issues within its prison setting that very closely parallel our society. Darker, better, and more concise than ever, OITNB tackles complex themes such as injustice, racism, rape, mental illness, the complexities of good vs. evil, relationships, and different responses to tragedy. In addition to this, the show boasts some of its best and most dynamic ensemble performances so far, while giving sympathy towards characters I never thought would it would look towards.
I'll admit, unlike pretty much every other season of this Netflix original, I was not immediately hooked. The first episode did not take itself seriously at all, making out like a poor attempt at dark comedy (and that's sad since OITNB usually excels at this element). A lot of the episode revolves around taking care of the hit man that was attempting to kill Vause. Lolly ends up saving her life, but later that night, Alex finds that the man is still alive, and she ends up being the one who actually kills him. Lolly is treated more like a punch line for the first part of the show, and while a lot of the jokes hit, it still got a little annoying to see it time and time again in both episode 1 and 2. On the upside, Alex is transformed into one of the more interesting characters of this season with her trying to figure out how to live with what she's done. She changes from one of the less likeable characters to one of the more likeable ones.

You'll see that's a pretty common trend with all of the characters. It seemed for a while like Piper might be one of the main antagonists of season 4 with her continually bitter attitude to everyone around her, but by the end of the season I found myself rooting for her as she became more like the person she was in season 1. I was most surprise, however, to see Sam Healy shown in a whole new light. We are suddenly able to see why Healy might be the misogynistic, homophobic person he is, as well as why he's just not good at his job. He gets an incredibly tragic backstory of losing his mentally ill mother at a young age, and ever since, he's been trying to find someone else who can replace her, and this person ends up being Lolly. And speaking of Lolly, she also gets a heart-wrenching backstory of how she became homeless because of her mental illness (schizophrenia) and was eventually arrested because of a misunderstanding. Joe Caputo becomes a lot more likeable as he tries to figure out how to be warden and deal with GCC, the corrupt organization who really pulls the strings in his prison.

Those are just a few of the characters that become more interesting; more will be discussed later. First of all, I want to address the array of incredibly relevant themes in this show. The first is racism. This has always been a part of the show, but never has it been shown in a more extreme way than in this season. It first sparks when the new batch of prisoners arrive and one of the prisoners of Hispanic origin talks to Maria about the possibility of the Spanish being able to have control over the prison. Maria, whose past includes having a father involved in a Dominican gang, agrees to this, and a prison gang of sorts is born. Out of this comes a group of white women created by Piper who were originally made to try to stop gang activities. While Piper may have had good intentions, this group gets out of control and turn into dangerous white power radicals. A lot of anger is festered between these the Spanish and whites, and even the African Americans get involved by the end. It makes things dangerous. But the show also addresses how no group is necessarily in the wrong. All of them have some anger built up, and all of their emotions are valid. But being violent against each other or making verbal attacks won't solve anything. At the end of the day, OITNB definitely shows that unity is more powerful and effective than attacking one another, as is proven in one of the more inspirational parts of the show when everyone stands in peaceful protest of the corrupt cops over the prison.

Rape is also an issue addressed here in powerful ways, mostly through the character of Pennsatucky, who is trying to live in prison as a rape victim (a cop raped her and never got caught). The love and caring Boo shows her is incredible, as she tries to show Pennsatuky rape is a real crime, which Pennsatucky doesn't understand since she's been sexually abused her whole life and only thought this abuse was natural (which is such a tragic part of her character, and probably many others like her in real life). Her response to this tragic event is incredible, as she becomes a stronger character than before and actually embodies the Christian values that she was an unreasonable extremist on in the past. She goes so far as to forgive her rapist, perhaps one of the most beautiful moments of light and humanity in a season filled with a lot of darkness, despair, and anger. It's been truly great to see Pennsatucky changed from a redneck Christian punchline to a multi-dimensional character, quite possibly my favorite one of all of the ensemble.

Injustice has become more relevant in the U.S. in the midst of the Brock Turner case and Orlando shooting, and this theme is shown multiple times throughout season 4. Previous seasons of the show have had their share of good and bad cops. But at the end of the day, the incompetent warden and corporation still managed to keep the good cops on the force, while kicking the bad ones out. There's a whole new slew of cops in this season. Piscatella and his crew at first seem a lot more competent than the forces at work in the past seasons. However, we soon discover this group is corrupt, sexist, and unpredictable. Piscatella himself disobeys Caputo constantly in favor of his own acts which take away prisoners' basic human rights by invading them in every way possible. Humphreys is easily the worst, being a total sadist and playing some horrifying "games" with the prisoners. He instigates a fight between Suzanne (who he horrifically calls "the black retard") and her ex-girlfriend, leaving Suzanne more mentally scarred than before. The only good cop is Baxter, a young man who can't really do much about the other cops. And even he has a tragic ending, accidentally killing an inmate while trying to break up a fight, which takes place after the cops attempt to take Suzanne down from a table when she joins the peaceful protest (Suzanne goes off even worse than she normally would) near the end of episode 12. All of this adds up to all the prisoners feeling a rightful sense  of injustice.

The inmate in question who Baxter kills is, very tragically, Poussey. I had a feeling with the darker tone of this season a character might get killed off, but I never expected it to be Poussey, who seems to be considered by many fans the best character on the show. She's definitely the most pure of all the characters in prison. She's loving to everyone, was arrested for simply distributing drugs, and has the most potential of thriving in the outside world (and, not only that, she's probably the character most enthusiastic about leaving prison). And while I do think killing her off was unneeded (even if her death was certainly meant to parallel the real-world injustice of cops killing mainly black people for unjust reasons), the way this show has its characters respond to her death really works in creating the show's powerful theme of how all responses to tragedy have a certain validity to him. I teared up when Taystee had a raw and visceral reaction to Poussey's death,  going into the fetal position beside her body and crying endlessly over it- that was the way episode 12 ended; on a decidedly dark and somber tone. The final episode continues to show people's reactions to the tragedy, with all of the African American characters having a righteous anger, Suzanne tragically trying to feel the way Poussey felt by attempting to crush herself under a pile of books, and many other characters simply talking about the memories they had with Poussey. Red attempts to keep her prison "family" busy because she believes that will keep them from doing anything dangerous.

Red ends up being right, as Taystee (who isn't "busy" according to Red's definition) discovers Caputo won't get any cop in trouble for Poussey's death, which means her death was essentially pointless. So the season ends on a dark note with all the prisoners in a huge riot and surrounding all the cops, with Daya holding a gun up to Humphreys, but we never see if she pulls the trigger. The episode ends beautifully with Poussey breaking the fourth wall and giving a genuine smile to the audience who has loved her. This seems to be the show telling us to move on from this death knowing Poussey has had a happy life. It's certainly bittersweet, but I couldn't think of a better way to handle a character death with the  weight of a large audience appreciation attached.

There's a lot of great acting that went on this season. Taylor Schilling continues to shine as Piper, giving what started as a pretty typical protagonist quite a bit of depth to the point where I could hate her one moment and sympathize with her the next. Michael Harney had some really great moments as Healy, giving the character more complexity than I could've predicted. He showed just how much humanity was in this flawed person, and his moments with Lolly (played by Lori Petty)- who, by the way, also had a lot of great moments this season- were nothing short of touching. Samira Wiley as Poussey gave a standout performance, making her character's passing all the more heartbreaking and bittersweet. Uzo Aduba still consistently balanced the comedy and tragedy of Suzanne, making her much more sympathetic this season and decreasing her as a punchline. But the best performance for me was Taryn Manning as Pennsatucky. This season felt like it belonged to her with a huge story about her trying to move past her rape. She embodied the subtleties of her character perfectly, and really gave a refreshing outlook on a flawed Christian that can still be likeable. There were, unfortunately, some ensemble performances I didn't care  for quite as much. Natasha Lyonne was surprisingly bland as Nichols, but maybe it was because the writers were trying to rehash her drug recovery story yet again. I know that drug addiction is not something easily overcome, but I do think it does an injustice to Nichols' character to make her somehow unable to resist her addiction. And the recovery story wasn't nearly as compelling this time as it was the first. Nick Sandow as Caputo started the season interesting but became a bit cliched in his warden role, feeling like the typical nice but incompetent boss. His dark comedic elements disappeared this season, as well,which was disappointing. Laura Gomez as Flores didn't do much for me, and she's probably the only character in the show I wish didn't have quite as big of a role. But still, even in the midst, of the slightly weaker ensemble roles, there are plenty of others to love, and the cast will always be the major reason why I watch this show.

It can't be denied that "Orange Is the New Black" is more built around its characters' moments and chemistry than a solid story line. That is still a problem season 4 suffered with. A lot of stories simply disappeared off the map, only to be randomly brought up again later. Some didn't make a whole lot of sense. But the central story lines are still seriously compelling, and more importantly, consistent in their respective messages: how racism created a hostile environment, the hardships of moving on from a traumatic event such as rape, and how righteous anger can arise out of an unjust situation. And the moments that this show are ultimately built around are really memorable moments. So, even if the show is flawed, there is still a lot to be loved here. You can't help but get invested in so many of the characters, and I definitely want to continue to follow their story lines for many years to come. So here's to OITNB's best season so far. I can't wait for the next!