Bates Motel 3.10.
May. 13th, 2015 10:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakIn which several characters take a big step forward. This show being this show, this is not something beneficial to the continued survival of part of the population.
To bet the complaint out of the way first, because by and large I thought this was a good finale to a good season: Bradley. Was a hated character for much of what BM fandom exists, and when a hated character is killed, it always smacks of the worst type of fanservice. (See: Callie on BSG.) So when the scene where Bradley robbed her mother and smashed her old room without Norman anywhere in sight - proving Bradley was reallly in White Pines Bay and not another Norman hallucination - came up, I sighed, because I knew what would happen. Never mind the fan reaction, though, the larger problem with Bradley is that the character hasn't been written consistently and sense making since the end of season 1. Bradley in s1 wasn''t the most interesting of characters, but I found her entirely plausible and refreshingly anti cliché in several ways - she had the popular girl status in high school but wasn't mean about it (as Emma said to Norma, one of the most frustrating things about Bradley was that she couldn't even hate her), she was distressed about her father's death (considering the guy burned to death in front of her, that was all too understandable) and in that state made the mistake of having hurt/comfort sex with Norman before realising it meant far more too him and ending the relationship since she didn't feel the same way. That was that. In s2, however, partly probably due to losing Nicola Peltz to Transformers, Bradley was written out and replaced by Cody. This meant she went from being entirely normal in the s1 finale at the high school prom to almost committing suicide in the s2 opener (taking place the same night), then going on a revenge path complete with killing her father's killer, then faking her death and getting out of town. All of which came out of nowhere as far as Bradley's s1 character was concerned and mostly seemed to exist to generate both tension and cooperation between Norman and Dylan (and of course to explain her departure). Her return in this season, not as a hallucination, as I had orginally assumed, but in reality, similarly didn't follow much character logic; fine, Bradley, who'd grown up as a rich girl, finding life on her own without money hard and returning for that reason would make sense by itself, despite the fact for all she knew the drug lords whose vengeance she'd been fearing - which had caused the faking-death-ploy to begin with - were still around. However, given that when Bradley left town, the brother she'd actually been closer to had been Dylan, not Norman, and Dylan was also the one with a) money and b) knowledge of the drug lords, since he was working for them, it would have been logical for her to try and contact him for help. That she doesn't is entirely for Doylist reasons - she was only brought back to be killed by Norman, and reminding viewers of Dylan/Bradley just when he's started his relationship with Emma isn't wanted, either. Basically: Bradley in early s2 and in the last two episodes of s3 wasn't a character, she was a plot device. And then she was fridged.
(Sidenote: Bradley's anger at her mother, otoh, I buy. Yes, it's massively unfair to her mother, who thought her daughter was dead. But it's the kind of emotional illogic people display. Especially teenagers.)
All this being said: Given Norman's overall development, it makes symbolic sense for his second murder (not counting Sam Bates, as that was manslaughter in defense of his mother), the first one we actually watch him commit (sort of, more about that in a minute) to be Bradley, i.e. the first girl he had feelings for, crushed upon, and who was his symbol of hope and acceptance when he originally arrived in White Pines Bay. Bradley, who called him the kindest person she knew in her farewell note. He's losing more and more of his Norman personality in the creation of the Mother personality, and killing Bradley meant killing the innocent teenager he used to be, too. Every season finale had Norman get a step closer to his serial killer self. He committed his first murder in the s1 finale but blocked it out entirely. He remembered doing it again in the s2 finale but by that time Mother was developed enought to tell him she did it, not he, and so could absolve himself. Now, in the s3 finale, the Norman personality becomes complicit with Mother, watching her commit the murder and then, after the iconic Psycho line - "Mother, what have you done?" and the identical cover up (with the car in the lake; and of course Bradley stealing is another homage to Marion Crane) embracing the murderous Mother who promises never to leave him.
One of the greatest ironies, of course, is this: Norman's actual mother at this point couldn't act more differently. Norma's been bombarded through the season with mounting evidence that Norman's mental problems far exceed anything you can "handle" by all the ways she attempted to. And in the finale, she finally takes the step I thought the show wouldn't allow her to take until the final season, to wit, start to look for outside help for Norman, genuine treatment, not a hastily drafted therapist/one night stand. This is huge and major. It's also coming after the third time another character tells her about something disturbing Norman has done: first Dylan told her Norman hallucinated being her, then James Finnegan the lousy therapist yelled at her that Norman needed help after Norman nearly strangled him, and then, last episode, Caleb told her about Norman-as-Norma attacking him with a knife. It's both ironic and fitting, given Norma's own damage, that it's the third statement by Caleb that shatters what increasingly thin threads of denial she still clung to. And then Norma does something which is arguably the most selfless thing she's ever done for her second and too much loved son. Now one thing I've always loved the show for is that it changed the Norma is the sole source of Norman's psychosis/it's all her fault premise from Psycho into something far more complicated. Norma did contribute her (large) share to who Norman is becoming - because of the co-dependency, the control issues, the guilt tripping back in early s1 when things didn't go her way - , but she didn't do so maliciously, and she herself grew up so damaged, then as an adult was in an abusive relationship, that she had no "normal" role model to form herself after. Still, you could always argue that her actions to protect Norman were also about protecting herself, since she couldn't live without him, and the idea that Norman would be taken away from her by the state if his blackouts and at least one, possibly two violent actions that she knew of were discovered was the root of her fear, not the concern of what would happen to Norman in such a case. But not anymore. Here, Norma definitely puts what's good for Norman first, before her own need of him, and that would be getting professional treatment enabling him to live without her (which he will have to one day anyway). Because Norma's life is one big post modern Greek tragedy, it's this very action, the point where she's unquestioningly facing all that she tried to deny or prettify or make look harmless/temporary, the point where she's ready to face that "what's good for Norman?" isn't "staying with me, I'll look after him" and act on it for Norman's, not her own benefit, that convinces her son that she's given up on him and seek refuge with the Mother in his mind who kills people rather than let them come between them.
(Sidenote: it's the best kind of retcon because after all, the Mother in Psycho the movie is Norman's creation. She might originally have been modelled on Norma Bates but she's then been shaped by his needs, fears and desires.)
Not that Norman seeing Norma's action as the betrayal of betrayals is the only obstacle to the "get Norman professional help"plan. I was wondering how, having taken Norma so far when it's not yet time for her death, the show would justify her then pulling back and NOT act on this for about a minute, and then the answer came by way of American healthcare. I.e. Norma asks the blunt and obvious question of how much all of this would cost and after the mental institution person avoids answering for a while, she finally comes through with a horrifying number, even counting insurances. (Incidentally, I apprecate that the home Norma visits actually does look like a friendly, good place, instead of a horror trope.) I'm assuming part of the next season's plot will be Norma trying to find the money somehow, which will probably take us right back to the city's main source of income, i.e. drugs, either via Alex or Dylan or both. And it will be as good an explanation as any why Norman won't actually end up in an institution where he could receive help that would prevent him killing any more people before Norma's own demise.
Speaking of which: now that Dylan and Emma are officially an item, I've seen speculation they at least will get a happy ending and he'll take her far away from White PInes Bay after Norma's death and realising Norman is gone beyond repair now. Somehow I doubt that. Firstly, given what Dylan knows about Norman's state of mind, there's no way he'd buy a "mother doesn't want to talk to you, she's only talking to me now"; he'd want to hear it directly from Norma. And once he finds out Norma is dead (and a corpse Norman has mummified), I can't see him leaving Norman behind in that state, both because of Norman and because of future victims. So unless Dylan and Emma leave White Pines Bay while Norma is still alive, I don't rate Dylan's survival prospects high once the show wraps up.
As for Emma: you know, I'm happy for her, but the finale drove home to me that she hasn't had a single scene with Norma all season. I mean, a scene where she and Norma actually talked, not a scene where they are both in the same room. Never mind Dylan or Norman, I miss that relationship of Emma's, show, bring it back next season, pretty please.
And finally: as espected, Bob the Creep doesn't make it out of the season alive, and as three quarters expected, it's Alex Romero who kills him. What makes this different than our good sheriff's previous killings, which were motivated by his own welfare and career (the alternate sheriff candidate) or a drug lord getting too much out of control (see also: s1 finale) is that in this case, he does it point blank because he's in love with Norma. And Bob either arrested or living on to menace another day from abroad would be petty enough to spill on the Norman front. Bob further justifies his thematic existence by pointing out the pattern of turning into our parents when our parents are what we most hate being. There's a lot of that going around on this show, and not just the obvious (i.e. Norman and the Mother in his mind). Norma and Caleb, with their respectively physically abusive and crazy parents, are other cases in point; Norma isn't clinically insane, but she certainly has isssues galore and needs (actual, real) therapy herself, and she's not abusive in the physically violent sense, but her controlling and manipulative ways earlier on with Norman, no matter her intentions, certainly spilled over in emotional abuse, while with Dylan because of how he came to be she was too distant and the relationship at the start of the show was toxic as well, just in a different way. (Anyone remember Dylan frequently calling Norma a whore while also asking her for money? That they're in a far better place now isn't just due to Norma but also Dylan changing their behavior.) As for Caleb, yes, he loved Norma and evidently still does, and they were all each other had once upon a time, "raising each other" i.e. not only siblings but each other's real parent figures. Didn't stop him from abusing her sexually eventually and needing years to realise that was what he'd done. That contrary to my expectations he makes it out of the season alive but without saying goodbye to Dylan after having gone to greath lengths to win Dylan's affectoin is of course just what he complained Norma did when she ran from home at age 17. Following bad patterns is an ongoing curse, though you can also, see Dylan and Norma, break out of them eventually. (It's also what Norma tried with Norman this episode, but alas we know she won't succeed.)
While his feelings for Norma certainly drove Alex to murder in this episode, their relationship in other ways is actually pattern breaking for one or both of them. (We don't know anything about Alex' previous relationships with women to tell on his part for sure.) Their reconciliation scene in this episode - importantly set before, not after Bob's death, with Norma unaware of what Alex would do, yet acknowledging that his handing over the flash drive to the FBI had been the right thing to do, which is the opposite from her initial self related "how could you do this to me?" reaction from last episode - managed to be both tender and melancholic, with her little smile when she ruefully said "we're all doomed" summing up the charm and tragedy of Norma Bates. They are doomed; at this point, the show really has committed itself into making Alex the man who'll die with Norma once Norman kills her, and nothing will tell me otherwise. But I'm so rooting for them to get some happiness before that happens, morally ambiguous couple in waiting that they are.
Lastly: Vera Farmigia's outstanding performance throughout goes without saying, but Freddy Highmore has been so excellent this entire season that it's infinitely frustrating to me he doesn't get the same kind of critical and fannish plaudits Mads Mikelsen gets for Hannibal. Like Mikelsen, Highmore took on an iconic pop culture character very much defined by one particular actor (despite already having been played by some other actors as well) and made him entirely his own. He is Norman Bates for me now, sells both the pity and the horror of it, and in a show that is full of dark humor and unafraid of camp still makes the scenes potentially campy - Norman-as-Norma - feel utterly riveting dark. I'm in two minds about the show's choice of staging the actual murder of Bradley by cutting from Highmore as Norma/n to Vera Farmigia as Norma/n. On the one hand, I get why they did it. Not only are we entirely in Norman's mind at this point, and this is how he feels it happening, but there's the same Doylist reason why Buffy the Vampire Slayer in its second season had Angel(us) kill Jenny Calendar in game face, as a vampire, despite the fact he broke her neck, he didn't drink her blood, so there was no "technical" reason for it. It's a device to enable the audience to maintain sympathy with the killer later when he's in his right mind, so to speak, presenting him as a different being when he's committing the murder. But. Freddy Highmore has been so very good throughout that I think he'd have carried it off: showing us Norman at his most murderous and then later again trying to be better. (Also, alas Bradley was not given the chance to be a Jenny Calendar, i.e. a character the audience deeply cared for and didn't want dead, see above.)
Trivia: at the start I had my doubts about Norma's third season hair but by now I've come around to it. She looked stunning in the finale.
In conclusion: bring on season 4!
To bet the complaint out of the way first, because by and large I thought this was a good finale to a good season: Bradley. Was a hated character for much of what BM fandom exists, and when a hated character is killed, it always smacks of the worst type of fanservice. (See: Callie on BSG.) So when the scene where Bradley robbed her mother and smashed her old room without Norman anywhere in sight - proving Bradley was reallly in White Pines Bay and not another Norman hallucination - came up, I sighed, because I knew what would happen. Never mind the fan reaction, though, the larger problem with Bradley is that the character hasn't been written consistently and sense making since the end of season 1. Bradley in s1 wasn''t the most interesting of characters, but I found her entirely plausible and refreshingly anti cliché in several ways - she had the popular girl status in high school but wasn't mean about it (as Emma said to Norma, one of the most frustrating things about Bradley was that she couldn't even hate her), she was distressed about her father's death (considering the guy burned to death in front of her, that was all too understandable) and in that state made the mistake of having hurt/comfort sex with Norman before realising it meant far more too him and ending the relationship since she didn't feel the same way. That was that. In s2, however, partly probably due to losing Nicola Peltz to Transformers, Bradley was written out and replaced by Cody. This meant she went from being entirely normal in the s1 finale at the high school prom to almost committing suicide in the s2 opener (taking place the same night), then going on a revenge path complete with killing her father's killer, then faking her death and getting out of town. All of which came out of nowhere as far as Bradley's s1 character was concerned and mostly seemed to exist to generate both tension and cooperation between Norman and Dylan (and of course to explain her departure). Her return in this season, not as a hallucination, as I had orginally assumed, but in reality, similarly didn't follow much character logic; fine, Bradley, who'd grown up as a rich girl, finding life on her own without money hard and returning for that reason would make sense by itself, despite the fact for all she knew the drug lords whose vengeance she'd been fearing - which had caused the faking-death-ploy to begin with - were still around. However, given that when Bradley left town, the brother she'd actually been closer to had been Dylan, not Norman, and Dylan was also the one with a) money and b) knowledge of the drug lords, since he was working for them, it would have been logical for her to try and contact him for help. That she doesn't is entirely for Doylist reasons - she was only brought back to be killed by Norman, and reminding viewers of Dylan/Bradley just when he's started his relationship with Emma isn't wanted, either. Basically: Bradley in early s2 and in the last two episodes of s3 wasn't a character, she was a plot device. And then she was fridged.
(Sidenote: Bradley's anger at her mother, otoh, I buy. Yes, it's massively unfair to her mother, who thought her daughter was dead. But it's the kind of emotional illogic people display. Especially teenagers.)
All this being said: Given Norman's overall development, it makes symbolic sense for his second murder (not counting Sam Bates, as that was manslaughter in defense of his mother), the first one we actually watch him commit (sort of, more about that in a minute) to be Bradley, i.e. the first girl he had feelings for, crushed upon, and who was his symbol of hope and acceptance when he originally arrived in White Pines Bay. Bradley, who called him the kindest person she knew in her farewell note. He's losing more and more of his Norman personality in the creation of the Mother personality, and killing Bradley meant killing the innocent teenager he used to be, too. Every season finale had Norman get a step closer to his serial killer self. He committed his first murder in the s1 finale but blocked it out entirely. He remembered doing it again in the s2 finale but by that time Mother was developed enought to tell him she did it, not he, and so could absolve himself. Now, in the s3 finale, the Norman personality becomes complicit with Mother, watching her commit the murder and then, after the iconic Psycho line - "Mother, what have you done?" and the identical cover up (with the car in the lake; and of course Bradley stealing is another homage to Marion Crane) embracing the murderous Mother who promises never to leave him.
One of the greatest ironies, of course, is this: Norman's actual mother at this point couldn't act more differently. Norma's been bombarded through the season with mounting evidence that Norman's mental problems far exceed anything you can "handle" by all the ways she attempted to. And in the finale, she finally takes the step I thought the show wouldn't allow her to take until the final season, to wit, start to look for outside help for Norman, genuine treatment, not a hastily drafted therapist/one night stand. This is huge and major. It's also coming after the third time another character tells her about something disturbing Norman has done: first Dylan told her Norman hallucinated being her, then James Finnegan the lousy therapist yelled at her that Norman needed help after Norman nearly strangled him, and then, last episode, Caleb told her about Norman-as-Norma attacking him with a knife. It's both ironic and fitting, given Norma's own damage, that it's the third statement by Caleb that shatters what increasingly thin threads of denial she still clung to. And then Norma does something which is arguably the most selfless thing she's ever done for her second and too much loved son. Now one thing I've always loved the show for is that it changed the Norma is the sole source of Norman's psychosis/it's all her fault premise from Psycho into something far more complicated. Norma did contribute her (large) share to who Norman is becoming - because of the co-dependency, the control issues, the guilt tripping back in early s1 when things didn't go her way - , but she didn't do so maliciously, and she herself grew up so damaged, then as an adult was in an abusive relationship, that she had no "normal" role model to form herself after. Still, you could always argue that her actions to protect Norman were also about protecting herself, since she couldn't live without him, and the idea that Norman would be taken away from her by the state if his blackouts and at least one, possibly two violent actions that she knew of were discovered was the root of her fear, not the concern of what would happen to Norman in such a case. But not anymore. Here, Norma definitely puts what's good for Norman first, before her own need of him, and that would be getting professional treatment enabling him to live without her (which he will have to one day anyway). Because Norma's life is one big post modern Greek tragedy, it's this very action, the point where she's unquestioningly facing all that she tried to deny or prettify or make look harmless/temporary, the point where she's ready to face that "what's good for Norman?" isn't "staying with me, I'll look after him" and act on it for Norman's, not her own benefit, that convinces her son that she's given up on him and seek refuge with the Mother in his mind who kills people rather than let them come between them.
(Sidenote: it's the best kind of retcon because after all, the Mother in Psycho the movie is Norman's creation. She might originally have been modelled on Norma Bates but she's then been shaped by his needs, fears and desires.)
Not that Norman seeing Norma's action as the betrayal of betrayals is the only obstacle to the "get Norman professional help"plan. I was wondering how, having taken Norma so far when it's not yet time for her death, the show would justify her then pulling back and NOT act on this for about a minute, and then the answer came by way of American healthcare. I.e. Norma asks the blunt and obvious question of how much all of this would cost and after the mental institution person avoids answering for a while, she finally comes through with a horrifying number, even counting insurances. (Incidentally, I apprecate that the home Norma visits actually does look like a friendly, good place, instead of a horror trope.) I'm assuming part of the next season's plot will be Norma trying to find the money somehow, which will probably take us right back to the city's main source of income, i.e. drugs, either via Alex or Dylan or both. And it will be as good an explanation as any why Norman won't actually end up in an institution where he could receive help that would prevent him killing any more people before Norma's own demise.
Speaking of which: now that Dylan and Emma are officially an item, I've seen speculation they at least will get a happy ending and he'll take her far away from White PInes Bay after Norma's death and realising Norman is gone beyond repair now. Somehow I doubt that. Firstly, given what Dylan knows about Norman's state of mind, there's no way he'd buy a "mother doesn't want to talk to you, she's only talking to me now"; he'd want to hear it directly from Norma. And once he finds out Norma is dead (and a corpse Norman has mummified), I can't see him leaving Norman behind in that state, both because of Norman and because of future victims. So unless Dylan and Emma leave White Pines Bay while Norma is still alive, I don't rate Dylan's survival prospects high once the show wraps up.
As for Emma: you know, I'm happy for her, but the finale drove home to me that she hasn't had a single scene with Norma all season. I mean, a scene where she and Norma actually talked, not a scene where they are both in the same room. Never mind Dylan or Norman, I miss that relationship of Emma's, show, bring it back next season, pretty please.
And finally: as espected, Bob the Creep doesn't make it out of the season alive, and as three quarters expected, it's Alex Romero who kills him. What makes this different than our good sheriff's previous killings, which were motivated by his own welfare and career (the alternate sheriff candidate) or a drug lord getting too much out of control (see also: s1 finale) is that in this case, he does it point blank because he's in love with Norma. And Bob either arrested or living on to menace another day from abroad would be petty enough to spill on the Norman front. Bob further justifies his thematic existence by pointing out the pattern of turning into our parents when our parents are what we most hate being. There's a lot of that going around on this show, and not just the obvious (i.e. Norman and the Mother in his mind). Norma and Caleb, with their respectively physically abusive and crazy parents, are other cases in point; Norma isn't clinically insane, but she certainly has isssues galore and needs (actual, real) therapy herself, and she's not abusive in the physically violent sense, but her controlling and manipulative ways earlier on with Norman, no matter her intentions, certainly spilled over in emotional abuse, while with Dylan because of how he came to be she was too distant and the relationship at the start of the show was toxic as well, just in a different way. (Anyone remember Dylan frequently calling Norma a whore while also asking her for money? That they're in a far better place now isn't just due to Norma but also Dylan changing their behavior.) As for Caleb, yes, he loved Norma and evidently still does, and they were all each other had once upon a time, "raising each other" i.e. not only siblings but each other's real parent figures. Didn't stop him from abusing her sexually eventually and needing years to realise that was what he'd done. That contrary to my expectations he makes it out of the season alive but without saying goodbye to Dylan after having gone to greath lengths to win Dylan's affectoin is of course just what he complained Norma did when she ran from home at age 17. Following bad patterns is an ongoing curse, though you can also, see Dylan and Norma, break out of them eventually. (It's also what Norma tried with Norman this episode, but alas we know she won't succeed.)
While his feelings for Norma certainly drove Alex to murder in this episode, their relationship in other ways is actually pattern breaking for one or both of them. (We don't know anything about Alex' previous relationships with women to tell on his part for sure.) Their reconciliation scene in this episode - importantly set before, not after Bob's death, with Norma unaware of what Alex would do, yet acknowledging that his handing over the flash drive to the FBI had been the right thing to do, which is the opposite from her initial self related "how could you do this to me?" reaction from last episode - managed to be both tender and melancholic, with her little smile when she ruefully said "we're all doomed" summing up the charm and tragedy of Norma Bates. They are doomed; at this point, the show really has committed itself into making Alex the man who'll die with Norma once Norman kills her, and nothing will tell me otherwise. But I'm so rooting for them to get some happiness before that happens, morally ambiguous couple in waiting that they are.
Lastly: Vera Farmigia's outstanding performance throughout goes without saying, but Freddy Highmore has been so excellent this entire season that it's infinitely frustrating to me he doesn't get the same kind of critical and fannish plaudits Mads Mikelsen gets for Hannibal. Like Mikelsen, Highmore took on an iconic pop culture character very much defined by one particular actor (despite already having been played by some other actors as well) and made him entirely his own. He is Norman Bates for me now, sells both the pity and the horror of it, and in a show that is full of dark humor and unafraid of camp still makes the scenes potentially campy - Norman-as-Norma - feel utterly riveting dark. I'm in two minds about the show's choice of staging the actual murder of Bradley by cutting from Highmore as Norma/n to Vera Farmigia as Norma/n. On the one hand, I get why they did it. Not only are we entirely in Norman's mind at this point, and this is how he feels it happening, but there's the same Doylist reason why Buffy the Vampire Slayer in its second season had Angel(us) kill Jenny Calendar in game face, as a vampire, despite the fact he broke her neck, he didn't drink her blood, so there was no "technical" reason for it. It's a device to enable the audience to maintain sympathy with the killer later when he's in his right mind, so to speak, presenting him as a different being when he's committing the murder. But. Freddy Highmore has been so very good throughout that I think he'd have carried it off: showing us Norman at his most murderous and then later again trying to be better. (Also, alas Bradley was not given the chance to be a Jenny Calendar, i.e. a character the audience deeply cared for and didn't want dead, see above.)
Trivia: at the start I had my doubts about Norma's third season hair but by now I've come around to it. She looked stunning in the finale.
In conclusion: bring on season 4!
