On feimineach: SPIN: more getting women on TV very, very wrong
I mainlined Spin series 2 on Walter Presents.
*Do not read this if you haven’t watched it.*
It’s a cut and thrust, wheel and deal, dog eat dog, keep your friends close and your enemies closer, French, political drama. There are few things that I like more than that but I had to suspend all of my feminist sensibilities to be able to watch it at all. I promised myself that I wouldn’t “do feminism” on it but here I am regardless. (Feminist analyses are just like the hiccups, really: uncomfortable, concerning, infuriating, and like the divil himself to stop.)
There were several criticisms about the representation of women in Spin series 1. For starters, all of the women there were in some way dependent on their menfolk (Valentine on Pierre*, Appoline on Simon, yer woman who was the candidate on just about everyone, really) and much too capitulating. It was a valid enough criticism but I could get over it for the odd glimmer of fight and rebellion. Juliette, the daughter, was irredeemable but she was young and selfish and we were all that once.
Series 2 took the biscuit, though.
The journalist, Appoline (different actor), was still knocking about and still capitulating to her ex-husband, Simon. She had, finally, kicked him and their “every other Tuesday night visits” to the kerb but she still relied on him as her source and green light. I get that terrorist incidents are delicate and that journalists are confined by the boundaries set down by the establishment but it was always personal for Appoline. Because she’s a woman, see. For Simon, it was always business. Appoline was even told by her (male) editor that she always had to get personal. It’s probably her hormones.
The common law wife, Rose, was vain and silly, and then used and discarded. Just like she deserved, amirite?
(Rest.)