When Revolution
began, I can’t say we had a particularly high hopes in terms of racial
inclusion. We hoped to be surprised, but we’ve watched and read a few
dystopians now and they don’t have a great record when it comes to the representation of POC.
Almost inevitably, these stories revolve around the great and glorious
straight, cisgender, able bodied White man and how he is going to save
us all. POC are usually in very secondary roles and they die in vastly
disproportionate numbers.
Revolution
alas, didn’t change things, even with Charlie being the main character,
we quickly lined up behind Miles Matheson, the great white hope to save
us all. And the POC?
Well, firstly we had that classic dystopian problem - death.
So much death. Of course, it’s a war, it’s a post-apocalyptic world,
people are going to die. People are going to die in large numbers and
from all demographics, people are going to have to be sacrificed and
they certainly are on Revolution
- in hefty numbers. But Black people, already making up a relatively
small number of the cast, don’t live long or develop well before they
die. The rebels had Nicholas, a preacher and a war leader, a complicated
character I hoped would be developed well until... death. Then there
was Alec, Miles’s former protegé (he seems to have a couple of random
Black protegés) who was sold to Texas for punishment for a botched
assassination. He serves Monroe faithfully despite how he was treated -
he’s willing to sacrifice his life to plant a nuclear bomb in Atlanta -
and, of course, is shot before he can.
Then
there’s the bit parts who barely warrant a name but are there fore
emotional impact - Rosie dying to emphasise the losses the rebels took,
and Beth, who has to be sacrificed so we can see what the nanites do to
stop her cancer.
That’s
a lot of death for a not very large number of characters but, again,
it’s not just about the number of deaths, it’s also about the quality of
death. None of these characters were developed sufficiently for their
deaths to be particularly traumatic or important. Those whose deaths
were presented as even slightly emotional - Beth, Nicholas, were largely
done as ways to make a point to others rather in their own right.
Contrast that to massive grieving around Danny or even Maggie - their
loss was felt, it was important, it had impact, they were people whose
deaths mattered.
The
POC who live - and who die for that matter - are so often in a
secondary role and in the shadow of a White character, serving a White
character, or controlled by a White character. Nicholas never develops
to be the leader he could have been. Grace is a prisoner in fear of her
life and has been since the very beginning of the show - a tool in
Randall’s hands. James Hudson has every reason to be furious with Miles
who failed him during his attempt to kill Monroe. Despite having risked
Hudson’s life, Miles still tracks him down and brings the militia down
on his life - costing him his home and his wife. That’s twice Miles
ruins his life - and Hudson still follows Miles.
Priscilla
is Aaron’s wife who we have seen in flashbacks of Aaron’s life and more
he recently when he ran into her in the Plains Nation. We know nothing about this woman
because she isn’t a character, she isn’t a person in her own right.
She’s a name - she’s a tool for Aaron’s development. She is part of the
man he was, weak and self-doubting and returns again to show his growth
into a greater representation of “acceptable” masculinity.
Even the two most prominent POC on the show - Neville and Nora - are cast in a shadowed, secondary fashion.
I must admit that when I saw Giancarlo Esposito appear on Revolution,
I was extremely excited. Giancarlo Esposito is an amazing actor and I
knew that if the writers gave him a powerful role, he could more than
pull it off. As Major Tom Neville, Esposito has taken on the role of a
very interesting antagonist. At first blanch, this might seem
problematic because once again we have a man of colour as the bad guy
but it is not as simple as that. Though Giancarlo Esposito is clearly a
Blatino, Major Tom Neville is not. Had his hypermasuline role been
given to him as a man of Latino heritage, it could be deemed problematic
because of the image of Latino men being filled machismo. Tom Neville
however is meant to be read strictly as Black. Hypermasculinity in
Black men is actually a rarity in television despite their continual
castings as thugs, drug dealers and pimps. Neville, in terms of hyper
masculinity, is the equal of Bass and Miles. While hyper masculinity in
and of itself is always problematic in terms of gender, in this case,
it forms a sort equality between Neville, Monroe and Miles.
Neville
as an antagonist is however still problematic. Despite the fact that
we are meant to see him as existing with no moral boundaries, he is
still second to Bass and most recently second to Miles. No matter where
Neville is placed, all he can do is follow orders or capitulate to a
stronger man for survival, thus placing limits on the power he gains
from his behaviour relative to the White men he is juxtaposed to. As an
antagonist, he is most certainly destined for defeat but unlike others
in his role, it will always be because of how he was forced to respond
to the actions of others. Neville doesn’t act independently, he always responds
to stronger forces and that is not a true antagonist. This is
why, not matter how much screen time Neville gets, he will never be more
than a side character because at the end of the day, his actions have
no real bearing on where the story is headed.
The
ultimate in side characters however, is Nora. When we were first
introduced to her, Miles made a huge deal about how necessary her skills
were to freeing Danny. Though she resisted, Nora eventually agreed to
go along and as the weeks passed she has become increasingly less
relevant. Nora does not act in her own self interest, even in cases
where it involves her family - instead of leaving with her sister to
find her father, Nora put Charlie above her own flesh and blood. The
writers could have had her leave and rejoin the group after spending
time with her sister but that would have given her too much autonomy.
From
the beginning we learned that Nora and Miles clearly had a past. It was
more than hinted at, yet the moment Rachel showed up, Nora was shunted
to the sideline as though everything she and Miles had been through was
absolutely meaningless. Nora literally risked her life and her freedom
for Miles and yet all of that was meaningless when Rachel showed up. To
make matters worse, he never confides in her, or listens to what she
has to say. Charlie who has had much less experience than Nora commands
far more of Miles attention than Nora could ever hope to. Now that
Rachel is gone, Nora and Miles have sex and it feels so much like she is
a consolation prize because he couldn’t get Rachel. Miles never ever
speaks up in Nora’s defense, let alone acts to help her the way he has
done for Charlie and while Charlie may be his niece, he has known her a
New York minute in comparison to his long term interactions with Nora.
When Nora has been in true peril, either she has saved herself, or Aaron
has saved her. She is clearly not worthy of being saved by a major
male character. At this point, Nora is little more than a convenient
weapon who is told never to question Miles’ actions and a fluffer for
when Rachel is not around. Nora may have started off as an interesting
character but now she is little more than a cardboard cutout.
I wish I could say we were surprised by how these characters developed in Revolution,
but this is the same pattern we’ve seen in dystopians over and over.
The straight White saviour narrative that is almost a requirement in
these shows pushes marginalised characters to the back; as secondary
forces, side characters or casualties. Again and again it seems the Grim Darkness of the future is extra Grim for POC.
