S06.E03: American Bitch

[pbutler111]

  6 hours ago, scrb said:

It might in the end be that both are right.  He's a serial predator and women approach him or throw themselves at him to have some experience to write about.

Will Hannah write about this encounter?  Even if she really believed he was exploiting the women, she was still somewhat starstruck, in agreeing to visit him and letting him slither his way into making her let her guard down.

I'm pretty sure the series is going to end with Hannah getting a book deal of some kind so she will probably write about this encounter.

I guess it was an okay episode but I agree not the best ever. I'm one of the few who loved the Marnie bottle episode and thought that was a great episode. 

Amd I get it, it's a decent episode but I just feel like the final season needs us to be moving stories forward. I very much doubt we're going to come back to this incidient in anyway. We never do with the bottle episodes, the exception being Marnies only because  she broke off her marriage with Desi. But with Hannah, her bottle episodes never get thought about again, we never heard about anything that happened the weekend she went to see her parents, never heard about Patrick Wilson, or her grandmother again. I doubt we will hear about Matthew Rhys.

Hannah's meteoric rise as a writer bugs the living shit out of me. I've watched the show faithfully and, unless she's been writing and publishing like a demon off-script, the woman's hardly produced anything. I was perplexed when she got into the Iowa Writer's Workshop based, apparently, on nothing but a well filled application, as I don't think she'd actually written anything at that point. She certainly didn't produce anything in the short while her attention span allowed her to stay there. Then she does the NPR thing which springboards her onto the pages of the New York Times, and suddenly she's a famous/serious writer? WTF? Granted, I've got some sour grapes going on as it took me 6 years (and 87 rejections) to get my first book deal. But couldn't they have at least made a small effort to make it seem as though Hannah has been producing and publishing stuff that would justify her sudden success?

That said, I was infuriated by Hannah in this episode, and totally on the side of creepy dick-boy. People who treat accusations as proven facts and run with them, without making even a small effort to get the full story, need to be horsewhipped.

Also, I would've taken the Roth book with me. Just saying.

[WhosThatGirl]

11 minutes ago, pbutler111 said:

Hannah's meteoric rise as a writer bugs the living shit out of me. I've watched the show faithfully and, unless she's been writing and publishing like a demon off-script, the woman's hardly produced anything. I was perplexed when she got into the Iowa Writer's Workshop based, apparently, on nothing but a well filled application, as I don't think she'd actually written anything at that point. She certainly didn't produce anything in the short while her attention span allowed her to stay there. Then she does the NPR thing which springboards her onto the pages of the New York Times, and suddenly she's a famous/serious writer? WTF? Granted, I've got some sour grapes going on as it took me 6 years (and 87 rejections) to get my first book deal. But couldn't they have at least made a small effort to make it seem as though Hannah has been producing and publishing stuff that would justify her sudden success?

That said, I was infuriated by Hannah in this episode, and totally on the side of creepy dick-boy. People who treat accusations as proven facts and run with them, without making even a small effort to get the full story, need to be horsewhipped.

Also, I would've taken the Roth book with me. Just saying.

Yeah I never understood what's so good about her writing? Everyone always talked about her essay for her book of essays that she had written. Marnie and Jessa read it but she never finished it and then she wrote a bunch for her Ebook deal in season 2 but when David died she lost all those stories as she was told that company owns her stories now for a number of years and then she went to Iowa and said she doesn't even like writing anymore and she for the most part got negative feedback. I'm pretty sure we are supposed to think she's just too good to be taught writing.

I firmly believe we are meant to believe she's a wonder kin of some kind. She does keep getting opportunities for her writing a lot, she has never really struggled really. She's going to be a best selling writer when this series ends and I'm going to hate it.

Edited February 28, 2017 by WhosThatGirl

[pbutler111]

  On 2/26/2017 at 1:14 PM, Sdh1545 said:

Didn't love it.  And I've really enjoyed all the other standalone ones, even the Hannah ones. But this one wasn't good or deserving enough-it didn't move the story forward, or show us anything about Hannah we didn't already know. I was just annoyed that with a finite amount of episodes left, they wasted one on this-I'd rather have seen more of the others.

This is how I feel. We are in the final season and this episode randomly happens? Oookay. There's no reason. I very much doubt we're going to even circle back to this. Eh. We've had three episodes in the final season and I've only liked 1 of them. 

Ditto here. I want this whole season to be in service of wrapping up everyone's story in a satisfactory way and nothing else.

[stagmania]

26 minutes ago, SlackerInc said:

She is a good writer, but she has a history of understanding episodes very differently from how the writers intended. I'm specifically thinking of two late episodes of Breaking Bad. 

ETA: What teen boy did Hannah have sex with?

In this case, most of the people who saw the episode appear to have understood it very differently than the writers intended. 

The details are eluding me, but wasn't there an early season out of town trip where she hooked up with some random teen?

[chocolatine]

5 minutes ago, stagmania said:

The details are eluding me, but wasn't there an early season out of town trip where she hooked up with some random teen?

Wasn't that when she and Jessa went to Jessa's dad's house? And the boy was the father's girlfriend's son, or something? My memory of it is fuzzy, and I'm too lazy to look up the details.

[WhosThatGirl]

20 minutes ago, chocolatine said:

Wasn't that when she and Jessa went to Jessa's dad's house? And the boy was the father's girlfriend's son, or something? My memory of it is fuzzy, and I'm too lazy to look up the details.

Yes. She had sex with a 19 year old and it was Jessas dads wife's son. 

[Otherkate]

Re: the photo in the New Yorker review -- how on earth did I not realize that he was wearing those slippers? Super hot, dude.

[Lemons]

13 hours ago, Tara said:

 

And I agree with MR when he asked, how do you force someone to give you a blowjob?  By threatening physical injury, perhaps; in that case, why go to his apartment alone? 

It's easy to force someone.  In an enclosed car, an empty parking lot, anywhere a man is stronger than a women and it happens all the time. 

I bet Hannah grabbed onto his dick because it was an automatic response. You're on a bed with a guy, he pulls it out, you reach for it. They've shown enough of their sex scenes to know how it goes. 

[sugarbaker design]

13 hours ago, pbutler111 said:

Then she does the NPR thing which springboards her onto the pages of the New York Times, and suddenly she's a famous/serious writer?

I don't think writing an entry in the Modern Love series in the NYT qualifies as a huge success.  Many first-time and only-time writers have achieved this dubious distinction.  Chuck Palmer didn't like Hannah's blog.  Everybody and their mother has a blog.  I don't think the show is portraying Hannah as a famous/serious writer, or even a good writer.  She's a young woman living in New York with a degree, a little talent and time to write.

[terrymct]

I don't understand why she went to his house. Is Hannah that stupid? Multiple women are saying a man is creep at best, a sexual predator of a sort at worst....so you go to meet him alone at his home. Why not a coffee shop? Profoundly stupid. The best part of this episode is the gradual change in him, from sad and someone you might give the benefit of the doubt to full blown manipulator.

[SlackerInc]

Andy Greenwald interviewed Lena Dunham recently, and the 18 minutes specifically dedicated to this episode was put up as its own podcast episode, which I highly recommend listening to.  There's too much there to summarize, but a couple points I want to mention:

(1) It would seem the "I'm so sick of grey areas" line was something she thought Hannah might say, not a reflection of Dunham's own view.  To the contrary, Dunham expressed frustration that viewers or "people on Twitter" don't allow her any grey areas (referring to the stuff with her younger sister when they were little, among other things).  She said she has been flat out raped, but has also been involved in encounters with men she came out of feeling bad about, but (although she was careful to say she doesn't want to blame victims) that she also recognized her own role in.

(2) She said it was "very important" to her to close with the Rihanna song, because she says if you "read the lyrics really carefully, it's the story of two people who ride off into the sunset together, not out of love but because they are both getting something out of the equation."

[Giesela]

I think Dunham has written about the "accusation"? that all her writing is her life.  Not much different than the Khardashians if slightly more disguised and written.  Tiny Houses and Girls...seems valid.  I thought this was a bigger deeper discussion of that in many ways.  The writer talked about writers having to have experiences to write about; so if Hanna writes about this will she be guilty?  

Then the groupie discussion, there was a lot of thought provoking stuff there, all gray, can go either way from different people's perspectives.  

I agreed that the ATE comments were a huge surprise.  I got the impression that the writer in the episode show both half believed what he was saying and half understood that it was all just rationalizing bad behavior and he was purposefully confusing her for fun.  I felt like it was a bit of a con from the get go then i thought maybe just a con at the end.  But it most certainly was not his desire to connect except in a lascivious way.   I wasn't that surprised that she laid down and grabbed his dick.  She is a pleaser, women want to please, it will jump out of the shadows and sabatoge us when we least expect it.  She had just been oiled up by all his praise.  It gives her something to write about..........(evil I know)

 I did find the staying to watch the daughter play flute was bizarre.  Girls is bizarre enough to watch sometimes but the ATE comments really made me feel like I'm watching people from a different planet called generational artistic New Yorkers.  

I thought it was a smart episode, smarter than me.  I just edited after reading the New Yorker article.  It was good.  Doesn't explain why Dunham, Apatow and that other women seem to be on a different plane of interpretation. 

Edited March 1, 2017 by Giesela

[Sdh1545]

23 hours ago, pbutler111 said:

Ditto here. I want this whole season to be in service of wrapping up everyone's story in a satisfactory way and nothing else.

By the way, I just saw a great piece today on that episode, which expresses another good reason not to like its inclusion. http://uproxx.com/sepinwall/girls-american-bitch-recap-review/

[27bored]

Ugh, OK...

First of all, for all the talk about how this was an atonal, "different" type of episode of Girls, it was very similar in one big way: once again, the male character has to turn out to be crazy or an asshole in order for a female character to seem sane. Successful writer with a gorgeous home and, you know, "options", is reduced to being a class-5 creep after meeting Hannah. Same with Desi, especially last week. When we met Desi, he was an actor/singer-songwriter who was kinda crunchy, but seemed soulful and sweet. Now after getting a few hits of Marnie's cooch, he's basically a vagrant. Yeah, okay.

As for the episode itself, I was initially intrigued by the back-and-forth between Hannah and Chuck. I thought he was written very well and thought he would've checked Hannah more than he did, especially after her story about her fifth-grade teacher who rubbed her shoulders and made her feel better about being a writer. I wished he would've been mildly disgusted by that obvious display of narcissism not unlike Joshua was in the "One Man's Trash" episode when she said she realizes she wanted to be happy.

I have a slightly different take that I think Chuck's intentions changed after Hannah's little kitchen spiel. I think he really wanted to just talk to her at first, but he decided to put the moves on her, in his own way, once he realized how self-righteous she was being. I think he wanted to prove a point and then wash her face in it once his daughter arrived.

I...have a lot of thoughts on this episode, but I don't know if they'll all come out as succinctly as I want them to, so I'll forego expressing most of them for now. I will say I think this episode touched on one issue that might've been accidental given the ATE comments. I think there's some half-genuine, half-calculated intentions with tales of non-consent and feeling taken advantage of and yes, even some cries of rape made publicly. In the case of this episode, apparently there were a handful of young women who publicly accused Chuck of forcing them to do something against their will, or they felt taken advantage of. I think very often women in those situations don't want to be taken literally as much as they want to be taken seriously. Hannah said something to the effect of, "how is a girl going to say no?" and I thought was a very honest question, but it has a literal answer and a figurative one. The literal answer is, "she says no".

The thing that I think happens is, young women who are desperate to be taken seriously insist on speaking literally because they're afraid if they don't, they won't be taken seriously. That's the calculated part. I get it -- incidences like what happened with Chuck and Hannah are an example of boundaries being crossed and represent a violation of sorts. I don't know if that has to be everybody's business and everybody's problem, but I get the impulse.

On the flip side, that's where you get weird exchanges like when Chuck asked, "how does one give a forced blowjob?" followed by Hannah's clumsy description of it. And the other thing, the thing that kind of bothers me about this discussion, is this: you can't go through life expecting men to see the insecure little girl underneath the veneer of a full-grown adult woman. It's unfair, unrealistic, and most importantly, it's dangerous. Because some predatory men know to worm their way in by building you up by stroking your ego and massaging any sore spots in your psyche.

Edited March 1, 2017 by 27bored

[Giesela]

11 hours ago, 27bored said:

And the other thing, the thing that kind of bothers me about this discussion, is this: you can't go through life expecting men to see the insecure little girl underneath the veneer of a full-grown adult woman. It's unfair, unrealistic, and most importantly, it's dangerous. Because some predatory men know to worm their way in by building you up by stroking your ego and massaging any sore spots in your psyche.

Neither should women go through life constantly trying to figure out,  understand explain, rationalize or justify men's behavior.  Nor look to men for protection It is dangerous.  

Edited March 1, 2017 by Giesela

[hoodooznoodooz]

On 2/27/2017 at 7:40 PM, SlackerInc said:

She is a good writer, but she has a history of understanding episodes very differently from how the writers intended. I'm specifically thinking of two late episodes of Breaking Bad. 

ETA: What teen boy did Hannah have sex with?

I am Ray, because I found a typo in Nussbaum's review, and tsk, tsk-ed.

[sugarbaker design]

2 minutes ago, hoodooznoodooz said:

I am Ray, because I found a typo in Nussbaum's review, and tsk, tsk-ed.

Did you break out the red sharpie?  :)

[DianeDobbler]

Matthew Rhys says he believes his character planned the whole thing. I thought he absolutely NAILED a certain type of "off duty" celebrity. Seemingly candid (often a little inappropriately so in that "instant intimacy" way many celebrities are accustomed to being around strangers) but all the while with the most "reasonable" demeanor in the room.  Constantly validating Hannah while also challenging her a little (mostly with his vulnerability) so she felt like an equal. Boy is this a common routine.

I also agree it didn't feel like "Girls", but as one review said, something from the Girls production team with Lena Dunham as the lead. I am completely on Hannah's side as to her conclusions that the girls were telling the truth (no, four girls are not hearsay) and that you can have a forced b.j. - these things don't start from scratch, it starts when someone is uncertain, or feels uncomfortable, wants to back out, doesn't feel right, etc.  Hannah was doomed simply by accepting the invitation and visiting him at home. That decision was her ego. Also her ego was her struggle with the fact that she'd loved him as a writer, therefore she needed and wanted an explanation for his behaviour. That always kills me. "This person's work was important to ME, therefore I am looking for something to rationalize the harm he did to others cause I don't want my experience tainted." Lady, that is life. Things co-exist. Shitty people can be talented in multiple ways.

And buying into everything he said, including that reading what she'd written had tormented him, kept him up at night, put him back in therapy. Uh huh. Another flag was his ex-wife's call just as he and Hannah were beginning their conversation - ten to one he'd told his ex-wife this was the only time he was available to discuss his daughter's visit/summer custody, and then Hannah got to hear his whole devoted dad pacifying unreasonable ex schtick. The third was him telling Hannah his wife was a "deeply disturbed woman" and his daughter suffering from depression. He doesn't know Hannah and both those pieces of information were inappropriate and manipulative (and probably lies as to his ex-wife). Everything about this guy was controlling.

[Wouldofshouldof]

I completely agree with Emily Nussbaum's take on the episode.  In addition, I felt it was very self-serving to Dunham: Oh, look at the celebrated author praising Hannah.  Again, and again, and again. 

[hoodooznoodooz]

4 hours ago, sugarbaker design said:

Did you break out the red sharpie?  :)

If I had been reading the magazine in print, I would have circled it with a ball-point pen, as, unfortunately, I do not have access to a red sharpie. :)

[SlackerInc]

11 hours ago, DianeDobbler said:

Matthew Rhys says he believes his character planned the whole thing.

I can definitely see him thinking that.  Things like his grin at the end certainly muddy the waters.  So when the writers have one idea, but then Rhys has another, and the director is not one of the writers, it all gets pretty murky.  But maybe that's desirable, for a murky subject.

I would note though that I don't like Rhys's scenario, leaving the sexual politics aside, because I'm not a fan of elaborate plans that rely on so much supposition about things going down a certain exact way.  This isn't as extreme as the Breaking Bad plot with

Spoiler

Brock and the berries

, but that almost ruined that show and I'm just leery of all such Rube Goldberg plot machinery.

[DianeDobbler]

I don't think Rhys' scenario, as imagined, is all that elaborate. His character was a predator. As someone said upthread, it was likely a numbers game for him. He's done this a LOT, he's had conversations with smart, challenging, YOUNG women that end up as a set up. But any woman young enough or immature enough to think that a conversation with her can alter this guy, or that he'd be having that conversation in reasonable good faith, and that it's about what she thinks it's about (sharing perspectives, making his case for himself) is also a perfect target for this guy. I don't believe he singled out Hannah and found her niche article because he's so consumed with being misunderstood and misrepresented. I think he probably contacted/invited a number of girls, and, as mentioned above, the ones that accepted his invitation to come and talk it over are the ones deluded enough to be perfect targets. This is really garden variety manipulation with a recognizable type, not some elaborate scheme. This is his con. In a different way, Bill Cosby had his routine. While I think many women went out to dinner, stayed over (thinking they were staying as a guest, not a sex partner), came over, bought into whatever lie he may have told, there may have been a few who read the situation correctly and got out of there before the pill was in their drink. But the odds were on Cosby's side. Of course, though, he tended to pick the right targets - women who didn't want to turn down the opportunity to network with him because show business is so damn hard and this might be an important contact. Likewise with Hannah, she's a young, poor writer being asked to come and listen to an older, famous, rich writer explain himself to her in his home. There had to be a subtext running under there as well, that this was also a contact, no matter how impure that thought might have been. Proving that she could hold her own against this guy, impress him, change him. He KNOWS all this. People aren't that original. He knows her before he met her.

IOW, Rhys's idea wasn't an elaborate or over elaborate plot - it's real life. He's an actor. He's been in show business a long time. He knows it as well as anybody else - a certain type of celebrity can be very manipulative, all about power. IOW, he had a plan, and it was going to work or not. So much of it was obvious manipulation, that I think we've seen before from plenty of people - things done for our benefit. In his case I think the timing of the call from the ex was part of it, his revealing inappropriately "personal" (or made up) details of his family relationships was also part of it, the stuff about being tormented by what she wrote was bullshit, and I wouldn't be surprised if the OCD about the shoes (don't touch the suede) was just affect for her benefit, working a persona. Hell, she's OCD.

If she saw that he wasn't really focused on the subject they were supposedly discussing, if she recognized all the bait, she would have called the meeting short and gotten out of there, and his plan wouldn't work. Given her age, her ego, the fact that she was a fan of his, his status, the reflected status on her if she could prevail in this conversation, chances are it would. IOW, I think it was a pretty straightforward plan for a practiced predator, not a stretch at all. 

Edited March 2, 2017 by DianeDobbler

[hoodooznoodooz]

So what exactly was Chuck's objective? Just a slightly more intriguing game of cat and mouse?

I was surprised that Hannah got water from the faucet and didn't ask for bottled water or lemonade. 

I think Lena writes good, amusing dialogue, but the phone conversation Chuck had with his ex-wife is one of my pet peeves. "No, I don't have her gymnastics bag."  If you're on the phone, you just say, "No" or "No, it's not here." You don't restate the whole question so that we know both sides of the conversation.  

[CofCinci]

On 2/28/2017 at 9:52 AM, terrymct said:

I don't understand why she went to his house. Is Hannah that stupid? Multiple women are saying a man is creep at best, a sexual predator of a sort at worst....so you go to meet him alone at his home. Why not a coffee shop? Profoundly stupid. The best part of this episode is the gradual change in him, from sad and someone you might give the benefit of the doubt to full blown manipulator.

She went because she wanted to believe he wasn't the man she wrote about. Hannah wanted to find some sort of evidence that one of her heroe didn't do something. 

[Giesela]

Just found this as I watched Manchester by the Sea last night and wanted to read others opinions. 

Totally a surprise to me and topical to the subject of the episode.  

http://www.elle.com/culture/movies-tv/a43408/casey-affleck-oscar-win/

[luna1122]

I've known about this for awhile. It's troubling, and I've got completely mixed emotions about it. I also thought about it while watching this episode. I love Affleck, think this performance, and many others of his, was brilliant and completely deserving of the win. I don't want to believe these things, because, like Hannah, I've long admired his work. I am still twisted about it. I staunchly boycott Mel Gibson and Roman Polanski and Woody Allen now, even tho I admire the latter two's work. I haven't made the decision yet to boycott Affleck's further work. And I don't know why, or how to reconcile that. Ugh.

[sugarbaker design]

10 hours ago, hoodooznoodooz said:

I think Lena writes good, amusing dialogue, but the phone conversation Chuck had with his ex-wife is one of my pet peeves. "No, I don't have her gymnastics bag."

But didn't Chuck do that on purpose, within earshot of Hannah, to create a "I'm a dad, I couldn't do this" schtick?

Edited March 2, 2017 by sugarbaker design

[DianeDobbler]

I know quite a bit about Woody Allen that supports what his former daughter, Dylan, said he did to her, not all of it in print. People try to figure out Allen - I think Allen is a narcissist who breaches boundaries. That's what gets him off. Not pedophilia as pedophilia, but violating fundamental norms and getting away with it. He dated a fifteen year old (Dalton student) - why fifteen, why not eighteen - what's the difference physically? I think the difference was that fifteen was forbidden. Why Soon Yi? ...forbidden (I remember Mia's late daughter Daisy saying Allen had tried to get closer to her as well.) To get to Dylan there is likely more to it than "just" the forbidden, but I think that's a lot of it, and I definitely believe Dylan.

I remember being so frustrated with someone who refused to believe it simply because she enjoyed Allen's work. (Literally no other reason.) That's such a bad reason, it's so solipsistic. It's not about "you" - "well, reality or potential reality is unpleasant to me, so I'll decide reality what is most convenient to me." She drove me crazy, this woman. A blogger even did a version of this exercise: "I love Woody Allen but I don't want to be a bad feminist, so how about if BOTH are true? He truly believes he didn't do it and she truly believes he did!" Right, lady, so everything wraps up conveniently for YOU. That's not how reality works (not talking to a particular poster, just my issue with "I'm a fan, therefore it would be painful to believe certain things, therefore I won't believe it.")

I definitely believe Chuck arranged for his ex-wife to call when Hannah was there. It was a conversation he was going to have to have anyhow, so he set it up to happen so Hannah could witness it. Look how well he came off in that conversation. Clearly frustrated (by the ex-wife, of course) enough to be human, but patient, oh so willing to be reasonable, although btw, he's the better parent (his daughter will have to get fresh air at HIS house, not just sit on the computer all day!) Look how tolerant, endlessly patient, reassuring he was while speaking to someone who was no doubt irrational, insecure, and difficult (or "deeply disturbed" as he later told Hannah). You could tell it was such a challenge for Chuck to keep that conversation on track! He is certainly beset!

In my experience, fans (which Hannah definitely was) can be relied upon to behave to type, no matter how smart they are.  He wasn't complimenting her writing because Girls wants us to think Hannah is a great writer. He complimented Hannah to soothe her ego. Her writing is so effective he was tormented by what this bright, observant woman had to say! What if other people believed her - it could damage his life (so IOW, he's telling Hannah her is writing influential). The wrong tactic would have been to treat her as she seemed to expect to be treated at first - as a nobody. Instead, he treated her as she wanted to be seen. A baseline move for a man like Chuck.

I read the accounts of the two women who accused Affleck. I believe them.

One of the things I remember reading/hearing about the Allen case was an explanation as to why so many actors continue to work with him (I know one who won't even audition for him, but she's not famous.). It's because while Allen's issues are public, there is so much exploitation and vileness in the industry, so much shady, revolting behavior by people in power (actors, producers, directors), an actress could easily be standing adjacent to someone just as bad, every day that she's on set. Allen is just public.

Edited March 2, 2017 by DianeDobbler

[SlackerInc]

I don't believe Dylan for a second.  Her own brother doesn't believe it, and he was in the house at the time.

20 hours ago, hoodooznoodooz said:

I think Lena writes good, amusing dialogue, but the phone conversation Chuck had with his ex-wife is one of my pet peeves. "No, I don't have her gymnastics bag."  If you're on the phone, you just say, "No" or "No, it's not here." You don't restate the whole question so that we know both sides of the conversation.  

I forgive that, just because virtually no TV phone conversation has ever been realistic.

10 hours ago, Giesela said:

Just found this as I watched Manchester by the Sea last night and wanted to read others opinions. 

Totally a surprise to me and topical to the subject of the episode.  

http://www.elle.com/culture/movies-tv/a43408/casey-affleck-oscar-win/

Is that spoiler free?  I have not seen the movie yet but intend to as soon as it comes to Amazon Prime.

10 hours ago, luna1122 said:

I've known about this for awhile. It's troubling, and I've got completely mixed emotions about it. I also thought about it while watching this episode. I love Affleck, think this performance, and many others of his, was brilliant and completely deserving of the win. I don't want to believe these things, because, like Hannah, I've long admired his work. I am still twisted about it. I staunchly boycott Mel Gibson and Roman Polanski and Woody Allen now, even tho I admire the latter two's work. I haven't made the decision yet to boycott Affleck's further work. And I don't know why, or how to reconcile that. Ugh.

My standard is simple.  If the film or show is highly acclaimed, I will not boycott it regardless of how bad I may think some of the people who created it are.  But if it's something I might have just watched for the heck of it otherwise, I will skip it if it's got someone like Mel Gibson behind it.

[Pallas]

2 hours ago, SlackerInc said:

I don't believe Dylan for a second.  Her own brother doesn't believe it, and he was in the house at the time.

A child is molested in one room while family life goes on in the rest of the house. The father takes this one child hostage to his despair. It's their secret. It's how he loves her. It's what they have in common. It's an old story, and as Dylan told it, it rings piercingly true.

If Chuck's daughter had been in the house at the time, she wouldn't have believed his much lesser transgression with Hannah, either. 

[Brian Cronin]

On 2/27/2017 at 7:46 PM, pbutler111 said:

Hannah's meteoric rise as a writer bugs the living shit out of me. I've watched the show faithfully and, unless she's been writing and publishing like a demon off-script, the woman's hardly produced anything. I was perplexed when she got into the Iowa Writer's Workshop based, apparently, on nothing but a well filled application, as I don't think she'd actually written anything at that point. She certainly didn't produce anything in the short while her attention span allowed her to stay there. Then she does the NPR thing which springboards her onto the pages of the New York Times, and suddenly she's a famous/serious writer? WTF?

She's not a famous/serious writer. She's writing for a small feminist blog, who hired her based on the New York Times piece. She's likely barely making any money, but the blog is JUST famous enough that it would show up on Chuck's radar. 

Is Hannah very lucky to get even her small amount of success as a writer? Of course, but the show has put the work in to set up how it's happened. The NPR thing got her the New York Times piece (they often publish little-known writers in that section, so that worked) and the Times got her this small regular gig on a niche blog. That all tracks. It's not like she has a book deal or anything like that.

[chocolatine]

7 minutes ago, Brian Cronin said:

She's not a famous/serious writer. She's writing for a small feminist blog, who hired her based on the New York Times piece. She's likely barely making any money, but the blog is JUST famous enough that it would show up on Chuck's radar.

Chuck seems like the kind of guy who would have a Google alert set up for his own name so that he's notified whenever *anyone* says anything about him online.

[wendyg]

Lots of writers and artists do that, not just for egotistical reasons but practical ones: someone reviews your book, you may want to thank them (so they'll review the next one), etc. It's all part of the business of making a living as an artist, even a famous one.

We have no reason to think that ol' Chuck didn't invite other women writing about him other than that he *said* so to Hannah. The montage of women entering his building at the end suggests otherwise.

I have no idea whether Woody Allen is innocent or guilty, but it's noteworthy that *since* that whole mess he has stayed quietly married to Soon-Yi. I don't think his work is nearly as interesting since then, either, but AIUI (from one of William Goldman's books) within the film industry he is known as quaintly old-fashioned with respect to honoring budgets and deadlines, so that's one reason he's able to keep turning out a steady stream of films, many of which are not particularly hits.

The reality is, though, that the power dynamics of the entertainment industry and the eagerness of young wannabes to be taken seriously by their heroes and get work provide the perfect ecosystem for Chuck's type of abuse. I'd note that when Hannah laid down beside him (btw, shouldn't a NY novelist of his caliber know that it's "lie down" and not "lay down"?) she chose a position fairly close to him. It was a big bed, and he was close to one edge. She could easily have picked the *other* side of the bed.

[WhosThatGirl]

7 hours ago, Brian Cronin said:

She's not a famous/serious writer. She's writing for a small feminist blog, who hired her based on the New York Times piece. She's likely barely making any money, but the blog is JUST famous enough that it would show up on Chuck's radar. 

Is Hannah very lucky to get even her small amount of success as a writer? Of course, but the show has put the work in to set up how it's happened. The NPR thing got her the New York Times piece (they often publish little-known writers in that section, so that worked) and the Times got her this small regular gig on a niche blog. That all tracks. It's not like she has a book deal or anything like that.

But she has had plently of opportunitys and she's had a book deal previously. And I still stand by my speculation that when the series ends she's going to be a best selling author and it will be ridiculous. Hannah has had a lot of writing opportunities. I get that some of them have been delayed and caused an issue but she somehow got into a  purse tedious pretentious writing program and then went "nope" because she can't take criticism. 

[pbutler111]

14 hours ago, Brian Cronin said:

She's not a famous/serious writer. She's writing for a small feminist blog, who hired her based on the New York Times piece. She's likely barely making any money, but the blog is JUST famous enough that it would show up on Chuck's radar. 

Is Hannah very lucky to get even her small amount of success as a writer? Of course, but the show has put the work in to set up how it's happened. The NPR thing got her the New York Times piece (they often publish little-known writers in that section, so that worked) and the Times got her this small regular gig on a niche blog. That all tracks. It's not like she has a book deal or anything like that.

She DID get a book deal, remember?  She botched it, but she got it.

[WhosThatGirl]

20 minutes ago, pbutler111 said:

She DID get a book deal, remember?  She botched it, but she got it.

To be fair, as I said right before your post she didn't botch it. The editor died and so did all of his current projects. And then somehow else was going to sign her but she couldn't take any of her essays she wrote for the other publisher for a number of years. But the writing program which she could have benefited from is what she botched. 

[SlackerInc]

22 hours ago, Pallas said:

A child is molested in one room while family life goes on in the rest of the house. The father takes this one child hostage to his despair. It's their secret. It's how he loves her. It's what they have in common. It's an old story, and as Dylan told it, it rings piercingly true.

If Chuck's daughter had been in the house at the time, she wouldn't have believed his much lesser transgression with Hannah, either. 

The huge difference being that Hannah is a stranger and Dylan is Moses's sister, yet he still doesn't believe her.

12 hours ago, WhosThatGirl said:

But she has had plently of opportunitys and she's had a book deal previously. And I still stand by my speculation that when the series ends she's going to be a best selling author and it will be ridiculous. Hannah has had a lot of writing opportunities. I get that some of them have been delayed and caused an issue but she somehow got into a  purse tedious pretentious writing program and then went "nope" because she can't take criticism. 

Using the same criteria, wouldn't you consider Lena Dunham's real life ascent even more unlikely?

[hoodooznoodooz]

13 hours ago, wendyg said:

I'd note that when Hannah laid down beside him (btw, shouldn't a NY novelist of his caliber know that it's "lie down" and not "lay down"?) she chose a position fairly close to him. It was a big bed, and he was close to one edge. She could easily have picked the *other* side of the bed.

Yes!  I agree, he should know it's "lie down"!!

When Hannah lay on the bed so close to Chuck, I was really disappointed in her choice. 

[WhosThatGirl]

1 hour ago, SlackerInc said:

The huge difference being that Hannah is a stranger and Dylan is Moses's sister, yet he still doesn't believe her.

Using the same criteria, wouldn't you consider Lena Dunham's real life ascent even more unlikely?

Yeah I guess you have a point. But I feel like I can see that Lena herself has worked for her career. Like she does work. With Hannah I don't really see a real work effort in anything. She does the bare minimum for a lot. And I still can't get over how she acted in the Iowa writing program and to all the other students. And also before that when she had the magazine job, she insulted everyone there and quit. I get that the job made her feel stifled and blocked her creativity or whatever but still. I never understood why the show thought her insulting groups of people was telling us she was too creative and so great and these people weren't.

I think maybe Hannah season 1 and a little of season 2 was closer to the person who maybe could get a book deal or a writing column of her own. I feel like the job she sort of has now where she writes little stand alone pieces for a small blog should have been put in the show in an earlier season and then the show could have built upon that to lead success. 

I don't know. I fully expect this series to end with a montage of all of the girls fulfilling their dreams and I know I'll be disappointed. 

[Brian Cronin]

Hannah's behavior in the Iowa program WAS bad, of course. And if she just got this current gig following that program, then yeah, that wouldn't have worked. And the show realized that, so I presume that that's why they did the bit about how she had to have a lot of luck to get a chance to perform at the NPR gig and then had the luck to have a Times piece based off of that and obviously, once she was in the Times, you easily could see a niche blog giving her a shot. 

[MyPeopleAreNordic]

On March 3, 2017 at 9:24 PM, SlackerInc said:

The huge difference being that Hannah is a stranger and Dylan is Moses's sister, yet he still doesn't believe her.

Using the same criteria, wouldn't you consider Lena Dunham's real life ascent even more unlikely?

But if we're using that as how we judge whether or not someone is telling the truth - it's only one sibling of Dylan's 12 siblings (not counting Soon-Yi) that has publicly said he didn't believe her. There are 11 other siblings who stood by her and her story. The only people who know the truth are Woody and Dylan. One sibling claiming it didn't happen means nothing, especially when many more siblings have stood by the victim and her story.

 

i have to agree about the same criteria and Lena's real-life ascent....except also, Lena comes from a family of wealthy, well-known artists, so that probably didn't hurt (but I do think she's talented).

This prosthetic penis thing is BS. Many actresses do nude scenes without any kind of prosthesis for their breasts and bums...and the first episode of the season we saw Lena's labia and it wasn't a prosthesis. Come on guys. Grow a pair and show all of who you really are like the ladies. 

/rant over 

[guilfoyleatpp]

Ok, hold the presses...I just had Mr. Guilfoyle watch American Bitch with me (he's a semi regular viewer of the show).

I wanted his manspective.

We finished it and I said "Ok, what WAS that?"

"That was the devil."

"The guy? The writer? You think that was the devil?"

"THAT.  THAT. That whatever you call it, that was the devil. That was a demon spreading his wings over all he surveys, looking at his little playthings running around, and saying 'That one. I pick that one today.' He is the thing she has been running into over the course of this entire show."

"So do you think that he planned that, or is he an opportunist?"

"That was the devil. He knows exactly what to say and do to seduce anyone. He knew they weren't going to have sex, but he was still going to seduce her. He is every guy she is attracted to. He is who she will leave a good man for. He's like a professor, but he's cool. He has a daughter who is black. That makes him even cooler to her. He's the devil."

 

That blew my mind.  I'm still trying to work out the ways in which this devil theory applies. It sort of explains all the women walking into the building at the end. 

[chocolatine]

46 minutes ago, MyPeopleAreNordic said:

This prosthetic penis thing is BS. Many actresses do nude scenes without any kind of prosthesis for their breasts and bums...and the first episode of the season we saw Lena's labia and it wasn't a prosthesis. Come on guys. Grow a pair and show all of who you really are like the ladies. 

I agree with this, but at the same time, I wouldn't want this show to only limit itself to actors who are willing to show their real genitalia. Matthew Rhys is obviously not in that camp, since he also doesn't expose himself in his many sex scenes on The Americans. And I'd rather Matthew Rhys with a prosthetic penis than no Matthew Rhys at all, if that makes sense.

[SlackerInc]

1 hour ago, MyPeopleAreNordic said:

But if we're using that as how we judge whether or not someone is telling the truth - it's only one sibling of Dylan's 12 siblings (not counting Soon-Yi) that has publicly said he didn't believe her. There are 11 other siblings who stood by her and her story. The only people who know the truth are Woody and Dylan. One sibling claiming it didn't happen means nothing, especially when many more siblings have stood by the victim and her story.

i have to agree about the same criteria and Lena's real-life ascent....except also, Lena comes from a family of wealthy, well-known artists, so that probably didn't hurt (but I do think she's talented).

This prosthetic penis thing is BS. Many actresses do nude scenes without any kind of prosthesis for their breasts and bums...and the first episode of the season we saw Lena's labia and it wasn't a prosthesis. Come on guys. Grow a pair and show all of who you really are like the ladies. 

/rant over 

I agree with you about the prostheses.  I can only assume the real deal is that he wanted something bigger and/or aesthetically more pleasing than he naturally packs.  Otherwise, what would be the point of insisting on a prosthesis that looks indistinguishable from his real member?  Whether he uses the real thing or a prosthetic, the same number of viewers will assume it's one or the other.

"One sibling claiming it didn't happen means nothing, especially when many more siblings have stood by the victim and her story."

I don't agree with this logic at all.  The difference between one sibling disbelieving and zero disbelieving is huge.  The difference between one and two or three is far less vast.  It's the same theory as behind one juror (a la "Twelve Angry Men") being able to prevent a conviction.  And even before Moses broke with the family, the Yale-New Haven team assigned to investigate determined that Dylan's story was unreliable and inconsistent.

Tying this back in with the show, if we just decide that without corroborating evidence we are going to believe every accuser (like the women Hannah cited in her article for the feminist blog), we get travesties like the UVA gang rape allegations reported in Rolling Stone and sourced to one uncorroborated liar with the pseudonym "Jackie"; the McMartin preschool trial (and other less famous but similar cases); and the false rape allegation against my best friend in college that ruined his life (I'm sure you're wondering if I just believe the allegation is false--but the "victim" said it happened on a Saturday night, when my friend spent the whole weekend with me in a city 200 miles away).

It is guilt, not innocence, that requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt.  This does not technically hold in the court of public opinion, but I sure wish it did.

Edited March 6, 2017 by SlackerInc
When you change "identical" to "indistinguishable", you also have to change "to" to "from".

[pbutler111]

On 3/3/2017 at 3:36 PM, WhosThatGirl said:

To be fair, as I said right before your post she didn't botch it. The editor died and so did all of his current projects. And then somehow else was going to sign her but she couldn't take any of her essays she wrote for the other publisher for a number of years. But the writing program which she could have benefited from is what she botched. 

It doesn't actually matter.  The fact that she was offered the book deal at all -- or any of these other opportunities, frankly --  is what I'm saying is completely unrealistic.

[DianeDobbler]

For the record, Moses Farrow originally believed Dylan (when he was fifteen). He is one of the three children for whom Woody Allen is his legal father. It was only when he grew up and benefitted from being on Allen's side that he changed his tune. Either way, he wasn't there in the crawl space.

IMO the primary benefit Lena Dunham received from having the parents she has were money and connections. Money sent her to an elite school in NYC, that's where many connections were made. The other aspect is she had a secure base in NYC from an early age, and finding and maintaining that is a principal challenge for any aspiring artist who doesn't have a financially sustainable home base in NYC, one that gives them a lot of free time to pursue what they really want. That said, and as Dunham has said, she didn't get an HBO deal because her parents were "art community famous." There are many young women like Dunham all around the city, plenty doing their artistic thing. Tiny Furniture got her her deal at HBO, and Tiny Furniture got her a lot of positive attention. Like many people she was privileged, and that privilege freed her to do her writing. She knew how to navigate that world as well. There are plenty of young people with all of her privilege who don't get anywhere, let alone a deal w/HBO, because their work isn't viable commercially. She may also down rate herself as an actress, but I think she's pretty funny. She was funny in Tiny Furniture too.

 

Hoodoo, I completely believed the line of dialogue "No, I don't have her gymnastics bag." I can't quite define the conversational tactic that repeating what someone has asked you is, but it can be condescending and reflect exaggerated tolerance.  Repeating it back can make the other person feel as if they've said something annoying, and is getting on your nerves. "No, I have not seen your organic oatmeal." That's how the entire conversation with the ex played, right down to him suggesting that the bag may be in a couple of obvious places the ex-wife probably should have considered or checked before asking him, but she didn't - as USUAL - so he had to point it out to her.

I know a girl (a woman now) who did a little sitcom television when she was a tween, then didn't do anything, then got back into it in her very early twenties. She had a great singing voice and a good "B'way ingénue" look. More like a character ingénue than the romantic lead. She was a step ahead of her peers who were on the audition circuit because her dad was an eye doctor with a Manhattan practice and a Manhattan apartment, so while she was expected to work (temping), she could take off whenever she needed to audition, and her parents were extremely supportive. Having a support team is a big help.

About prosthetic penises; while I do recognize that often women are asked to show the real deal while guys are allowed to use a prosthetic, it's a fact that there are women who also use prosthetics (I hate the word "merkin" too, but that's what we're talking about). Kim Cattrell used one in SATC. We also have to consider the challenges of filming something. A penis has a mind of its own.  A real one might decline to show up in a way that makes it simple to get the shot. A prosthetic one - bam, will land on the thigh every time. I think Dunham said they also used one for Adam when he was supposed to be beating off. It made it easier for the actor to have something to grab, even though the prosthetic wasn't in the shot. I think we'll all agree that it would be even more wrong for the actor to be expected to actually grab his own thing.

 

Slacker, not to divert, but the Yale-New Haven team was a joke.  http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/28/nyregion/yale-study-about-allen-flawed-expert-testifies.html I wonder if you have read the testimony as well as the judges' report. We're not going to agree, obviously, but I don't want to leave Yale-New Haven as credible support.

Edited March 7, 2017 by DianeDobbler

[Lily247]

Hannah keeps trying to drive the point home that she is someone who has been traumatized by some kind of sexual harrassment and/or assault. Lena Dunham has also accused someone from college of sexually assaulting her. I just get the feeling that by her constantly reminding us that she has been sexually harassed, it somehow makes her seem like she is an attractive woman in some way. Also, all of the men that she has had sex or or rleationships with on the show have been "conventionally" attractive, far more than her. SSomething about that just makes me scratch my head

[SlackerInc]

Oh jeez.

[Eucrid]

18 hours ago, Matias130 said:

Hannah keeps trying to drive the point home that she is someone who has been traumatized by some kind of sexual harrassment and/or assault. Lena Dunham has also accused someone from college of sexually assaulting her. I just get the feeling that by her constantly reminding us that she has been sexually harassed, it somehow makes her seem like she is an attractive woman in some way. Also, all of the men that she has had sex or or rleationships with on the show have been "conventionally" attractive, far more than her. SSomething about that just makes me scratch my head

Really?

For starters the idea that Lena Dunham is some sort of hideous demon that could never get a good looking man to fuck her is ridiculous. Hannah as a character is like Lena, funny, smart, cute, slightly annoying at times and brave when it comes to her sexuality. Lena Dunhams boyfriends a rock star FFS. If she played the hollywood games females are supposed to play she could make her self look more palatable to all the sexist creeps but she doesn't because she doesn't have to because she is smart and super talented.

[Lily247]

  20 hours ago, Matias130 said:

Hannah keeps trying to drive the point home that she is someone who has been traumatized by some kind of sexual harrassment and/or assault. Lena Dunham has also accused someone from college of sexually assaulting her. I just get the feeling that by her constantly reminding us that she has been sexually harassed, it somehow makes her seem like she is an attractive woman in some way. Also, all of the men that she has had sex or or rleationships with on the show have been "conventionally" attractive, far more than her. SSomething about that just makes me scratch my head

Really?

For starters the idea that Lena Dunham is some sort of hideous demon that could never get a good looking man to fuck her is ridiculous. Hannah as a character is like Lena, funny, smart, cute, slightly annoying at times and brave when it comes to her sexuality. Lena Dunhams boyfriends a rock star FFS. If she played the hollywood games females are supposed to play she could make her self look more palatable to all the sexist creeps but she doesn't because she doesn't have to because she is smart and super talented.

To each their own, I guess. Every guy I have watched this show with shared the same opinion of her as well (negative). It's not about good looking men having sex with her, it's about good looking men pursuing relationships with her hat makes us scratch our heads. Hannah comes off as very self-absorbed to a ridiculous level, and is also extremely uncouth and displays a lack of self-awareness that makes me wonder if she has serious mental problems - such as flashing her vagina to her boss, stripping naked in front of strangers, necking with her gay ex BF in front of her current BF just to perhaps his buttons a little or show that she can.

She goes after men who are accused of using their power to have sex with vulnerable girls, YET she forces a blowjob on a man while he is driving a vehicle, totally blindsiding him and without asking his consent - this is very hypocritical. By the way, I am not talking about the actress Lena Dunham, as I do not know her I am referring to the character Hannah. By the way, what was wrong with Fran ? She screamed at him to get away from her after he mentioned that he is glad he doesnt have to try to be friends with Elijah for the summer - who is the gay ex BF necking with Hannah in front of him. I never saw a side of Fran that wasn't respectful. In fact, he seemed pretty darn great, his only fault being that he took so much from Hannah without setting his foot down enough. Even when she acted like a bratty child on the road trip he still tried to drive her back home like a gentleman.