Last night , Beauty and the Beast made a valorous seek to get by with the elephant in the room , with respect to Cat and Vincent ’s relationship . But all that accomplished was to become some uncomfortable subtext into … really uncomfortable text . Seriously not o.k. .
looter ahead . . .
This instalment . This episode is a unadulterated representative of what happens when a show knows there ’s something amiss with the implications of a special storyline , but has no idea how to conduct with it .
Because , last calendar week ended with Vincent sort of assail Cat and Cat decide that he was too unsafe and needed to be bestow in . And , to their credit , the author did recognize that what happened between Cat and Vincent had shades of domestic violence . But the way they tried to handle that . . . well , they get points for trying ?
The show starts with Cat practice makeup to hide the bruises on her neck due to Vincent . And then she recite her sister it was get by kip funny , and a bass tissue massage . Heather answer to this obvious Trygve Halvden Lie by enounce , “ multitude are going to think you have an scurrilous beau . ” Ha . Ha . Ha . To be clear : the light-hearted music layer is intended to make that seam a joke . The writers are aware of this subtext , and went with this zany funniness feel .
Or how about this ? Vincent goes to J.T. and confesses that he bruise her , and when J.T. presses , Vicent says , “ She was asking interrogative , thing that I ca n’t talk about , and I got bilk , and I got overwhelmed . I felt cornered . ” Yeah . That ’s a ) not start to change . She ’s a copper and you ’re a secret assassin with superstrength . And b ) YOU HAVE SUPERSTRENGTH , SHE ’S TINY , AND YOU FELT CORNERED ? Vincent at least tells J.T. to apologize to Cat for him , and to tell her he ’ll stay away . Ha , that ’s what he recall . This show ’s not done with badly explaining away the similarity to domestic wildness yet .
Because then Cat and Gabe have a truly fascinating exchange :
true cat : “ It ’s just that he ’s never done anything like this before . We both know someone ’s controlling him , but when I came at him with questions —
Gabe : So this is your demerit ? Blame the victim ?
Cat : No , of course not . But this is n’t on the button a domesticated violence grammatical case . Vincent is more of a victim than anyone .
It ’s enchanting in the sense that , again , the show is aware of how this all looks — but conceive that just pointing it out will make it go aside . That kind of lampshading may work on with a plot of land hole or a deus ex machina , but not maltreatment . say that they know something looks like a really sensible and complicated issue and then throwing even more of the tropes colligate with that topic on it just does n’t cure the problem . Nor does this make it attend like an intentional attempt to use the show as an allegory for the problem .
And Gabe order he wo n’t tell Tess , when Cat asks him not to , because it ’s not his home to evidence . Tess herself is toy as the friend Cat ca n’t tell because she ’ll just notice validation for her low opinion of Vincent . Which , to Tess ’s citation , is in reality fairly valid right now .
And Cat . Cat ’s added another awkward relationship thing on top . Because Cat ’s current programme to help Vincent is to pretend to be his girl while really searching for information on the people keep in line him . She flat out tells Gabe that she ’s offering to “ use our relationship to our advantage . ” Gabe describes this plan to Tess as , “ Your mate wants to go undercover , pretend to be his girl , even though she is his girl , even though he does n’t remember that . ” Is there a different writer in charge of Gabe ? Like , the one who sees all the problems with this story ?
Last workweek , I guessed we ’d get “ angsty - conflicted Cat . ” How could I have known ? And now that he ’s coded as an abuser , and she ’s explicitly using him for information , there ’s nobody to rootle for . It ’s heavily even to enjoy how she ’s still an awe-inspiring cop with horrifying plans when the show keeps alluding to misuse . Because after Cat “ learn ” how to ticktock Vincent - the - polygraph , she goes to his sauceboat to look for information . And when Vincent shows up , she says they need to speak , going with : “ You ca n’t ever do that again . You ca n’t cross that line of work . ” STOP IT . I get laid it ’s supposed to be her plan and all , but after all the public lecture about domesticated violence , this really looks like an allusion to how victim refund to their abusers . This does not make me root for them to envision this all out and get together .
I lawfully ca n’t tell if the show want us to think this emblem or if it ’s just supposed to be more evidence that whatever ’s happened to Vincent need to be reversed . It might be the latter — which would be more within this show ’s grasp — but the repeat allusions to the clichés of vilification in media make me question . Either direction , this is handled badly .
For illustration : Vincent secern Cat , “ bet , can we maybe just start again ? Because I was having such a capital time with you up until … ” Until you attacked her ? And what happen to stay on away from her ? And you tell her that she ’s break down to have to not ask questions ? This is making me physically ill .
In other awkward relationship plots , Heather finally pins Cat down long enough to tell her that she ’s known for three month that their all in father is n’t Cat ’s biological one . Then Heather ’s given a “ business in Florida ” and write out of the show .
All the while , Cat ’s biological beginner ’s still floating around , giving instructions to Vincent via interpreter - changer . The divine revelation makes Cat too fluster to lie the right way and her bio - dad place Vincent on guard for her betrayal . He manipulate a memory board he was narrate about by J.T. to trouble her from her investigating . She visualise it out , and she , Gabe , and Tess go to try out the same beast that Vincent ’s hunt down .
And then she think Vincent accuses her of doing this as revenge for him smart her . Which have this response :
I wore a scarf all day to report up what you did . Telling myself and anyone who would hear that this was n’t your fault . That if I could find out who was assure you , I could cut those string and we could be together again . I lied because I cared about you .
So all the lecture Cat had about want to do what ’s best for the populace by stopping the beasts ? Yeah , instead , it ’s angsty - conflicted - in - love Cat with a side of uncomfortable emblem .
They stop the wildcat threat of the week , Vincent salve Cat — and I ’m still so uncomfortable with their family relationship , it does n’t even count that she ’s still the worst police detective . Plus , on the face of it , Vincent ’s remember Cat now . Now he trusts her ! And gets that she ’s judge to assist ! But she ca n’t get over the lying and the hiding he ’s done . So she ends it . There ’s no way that ’ll last . None . And now when it does n’t terminate , it ’s infect by this episode ’s frightful comparability of their kinship to abuse .
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