Your New Obsession: Orphan Black

Black is back! In thick eye liner, or dreads, or yoga pants, or that terrible bleached wig. My personal fave is the wig.

To be honest, this show isn't really back for me, so much as continuing. I just started watching it, I think literally last week, and characteristically mainlined the whole season and a half. Hallelujah for Google Chromecast (and a comcast login).

My main fascination with this show is actually something that I heard discussed on the podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour before I even watched the show: it pretty much ignores genres. It started as a case of stolen identity, basically a heist show. Then it was a cop serial. Then it was sci fi when we discovered the clones. There was a bit of Desperate Housewives with the soccer mom. Then it was the L word. Then it was a Children of Men dystopia/fantasy/drama. Now it's treading into Breaking Bad territory (because Cal is totally a meth cook, and now he has a kid). This week we got a little Jesus Camp and Queer as Folk in the same episode. I was so confused by the extended gay make out scene. Which is weird, because I love gay make out scenes, but I wasn't expecting it. It was a moment of total indulgence and spectacle in an otherwise overtly plot driven show. It was just there because the writers enjoy Felix and wanted to make us watch a gay romance. This was the type of scene we get all the time with heterosexual couples, but I don't know if I've ever seen a scene like this, filmed like this, in a TV show, let alone a show that's main premise is not about homosexual relationships. It was a moment of fun, excess, a little cultural shock (reaching for the lube? that doesn't even happen in Looking), and total bubblegum - right before the cops broke in and Paul held a gun to Felix's head. It's that kind of quick gear shift that makes this show addicting. Because even though it pulls from so many inspirations, it is completely unpredictable precisely because of the pastiche it's created. You never know when there's going to be a joke, or when there's going to be gun shots. It's the kind of show you cannot multi-task, it's completely absorbing, because it forces you to constantly think. You can't settle into the groove of crime show, or soap opera, or comedy. In a content-saturated television landscape, it's fresh and exciting.

And because of this, it has legs. I've been having an argument with my boyfriend about whether to trust this show or not--he's still hurting from LOST, another mystery show that built layer upon layer of plot only to reveal it wasn't built on a solid foundation. He sunk hours of his time into that show, not only watching it, but thinking about it, debating it, analyzing it, trying to figure it out. Say what you will about the finale--I actually don't hate it, and I think it's an interesting point to make with a finale--it was inarguably not a good pay off. The show built itself up as a concrete, solvable mystery. It revealed itself to be an existential piece of philosophy, with no satisfying answers. (Which really is a whole 'nother discussion--LOST as metaphor for life?)

With every new layer of plot, the BF gets more invested, and more anxious about commitment. He think there's no way this show will be able to pull off a pay off. But I think it's secret weapon is it's non-allegiance to genre. It's an anti-genre show. And consequently, it can do whatever it wants. LOST was beholden to a certain style, a certain blueprint or script. Orphan Black is beholden only to itself, to it's characters and it's story, wherever that story needs to go. It's not peeling back layers and dropping hints to keep viewers tuning in and talking about it - it's doing that because that is the true story of it's characters.

Because this show is all about character. It has to be--that's the central hook. Sarah, Cosima, Allison, Helena, Rachel, all played by the same actress. The show necessarily needed to be built on strong, fully-realized characters, or it would have been impossible to tell them apart, and the show would have felt cheap and failed. Instead, each character is completely their own, to the point that I forget it's the same person. The excellent work done by Tatiana Maslany allows me to relax into my suspension of disbelief, rather than just being fascinated by the technical prowess, by how they pulled it off. I no longer think about locked-off shots and layered takes when I watch her interact with herself--because I'm completely invested in these distinct and individual characters. I buy it all. I'm sold. I'm in.

I think this is also the key to why it can pull off any genre so stylishly. It's like this is actually 5 different shows in one, with each clone getting their own storyline that is appropriate to their life and character. Put Clone Club together and they're each better for it; braid the genres of this show together, and it's stronger for it. This show recognizes that conflicting elements are a strength, not a weakness. Conflicting elements provide endless opportunity for story.

So my answer to this argument--should we commit or not?--is jump in. I trust this show. It's revealed itself to be built on a solid foundation. Most shows stumble when the world they've established gets bigger. This show is built on that expansion. We started from the bottom, now we're here. Sarah got off a train, in who knows what city, and knew nothing. From the moment she saw Elizabeth, her world started to get bigger, and it's still getting bigger. The premise of the show is conflict & change, so we can't get comfortable and resent a new element, because we're always hungry and eager for that shift. It's really the ideal way to write a television show, and it's the main reason this show is becoming such a phenomenon.

TL;DR Felix