Okay. Either Bitten is a very subtle look at how fascists
justify their oppression of others, or the show just has no clue that
having its secondary protagonist castrating a man to death for choosing love
over the law is supremely, supremely fucked.
Quick recap: Jeremy is poisoned, Elena searches for Zachary
Cain’s human galpal, gets caught in another super-obvious trap, where Marsten
actually just asks her to stay out of the upcoming battle; after breaking
Killwolf’s arm and discovering the poison he dosed Jeremy with, Elena leaves
unharmed. Clay tortures Zachary Cain for a while, and it ends very badly (see
below). Nick goes off to erase his father’s death and have meaningless sex
while the Pack is still in incredible danger and its leader lays dying. And last
and most certainly least Dullfriend sees Elena’s clothes in the Wolf Vodka
video, which he believes means she was cavorting naked in the woods somewhere.
All this is crap. There are two massively important points
in “Prisoner”: 1) Elena talk with Cain’s gal pal, who reveals she not only knows
about werewolves, but that Cain refused to bite her because he loved her too
much to risk losing her. Note this is EXACTLY opposite of what ostensible hero
Clay did when he bit Elena immediately upon Jeremy telling Clay she simply had
to leave when he first brought her home.
And on the subject of Clay perhaps not being a hero: 2)
After Elena confronts Clay with the news that Zachary Cain loves his shitty
Helena Bonham Carter knock-off more than Clay apparently ever loved Elena —
that he trusted her enough to be honest with her about himself, but also loved
her so much he couldn’t bite her despite how much she begged — Clay confronts
Cain. And Cain confirms it all; he does love HBC, and the only reason he joined
this Mutt uprising is because Pack law says that if she knows about werewolves
she has to die, but he also didn’t want to lie to her. He practically has to
overthrow the Pack if he wanted to be honest with the woman he loves and continue
to live with her. Oh, and then Clay
castrates Zachary Cain to death.
What the fuck? And
that’s just for the reveal that Zachary Cain is nobler, romance-wise, than
Clay. What the fucking fuck is my
reaction to Clay castrating a character.
I’d mentioned before my confusion about Bitten’s werewolf society, and someone mentioned that Mutts were
just inherently less in control than Pack wolves. But how is that all mitigated
by harassing every Mutt to prevent them settling down roots? How can they
possibly be serene when the only true relationships the Pack allows are those
within the Pack?
Sure, Cain and the Mutts have murdered people — Pete,
Antonio, several innocents, and I’m not excusing that — but the Packs of the
world apparently can kill Mutts for disobeying laws that
they did not make, and cannot argue against. The Mutts here have killed a bunch
of people, but have they killed more than Clay did in his job as enforcer?! And
the enforcer before him, this Jimmy Koenig guy (who has been hired by the
Mutts) was apparently much more violent than Clay. This sounds like fascism,
plain and simple. “We’re morally the best people in town, but we forbid you to
love. Oh, and unless you follow all of our rules, we’ll cast you out and
prevent you from ever settling down, and if we see anybody breaking these rules
we’re going to kill you, and it’ll be okay because we’re in charge.” Seriously,
this is completely fucked up.
Even if you disagree about Pack vs. Mutt society, think
about this: Zachary Cain, the ostensible bad guy, loved a woman so much that he
was willing to die for her. Clay, the ostensible hero, loved a woman so much he
was willing to kill her. Also, only one group is ripping people’s dicks off. Honestly, of the two sides, I know
which one I’d rather be on.
