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inmyarmswrappedin · 4 years

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So, because Fatou’s season ends today and, as far as we know, Druck hasn’t been renewed yet, I want to go over the things I feel the team did well in this season and the things I hope they take with them when they sit down to write the next season (which I’m manifesting will be Ava’s).

I think that s5 and, perhaps to a bigger extent, s6, were the team’s attempt to address fan feedback for and criticisms of s3 and s4. So I have hopes that, after possibly the most scrutinized season of any Skams, they are still willing to read even more feedback and sit down once again to craft a couple more seasons (possibly even 3 or 4 more seasons!).

So, without further ado, things that were done well! (Do I have to add “in my opinion”? Do I??)

I liked that for both s5 and s6, the thorough-line for the season wasn’t made obvious or shared in a press release, but rather it was up to fans to connect the story threads for themselves.

I loved that the team sought to address one of the biggest criticisms of s3, that is, that Matteo was given so many symptoms of a mental illness, but it ultimately went unaddressed in the narrative. They did this by giving Nora a dissociative disorder, and Fatou dyscalculia. (Matteo has been headcanoned as being mentally ill and having a disability.) It allowed the teams to develop both fan theories into full-blown seasons and give each of them the importance they deserved.

I have said this already, but I really appreciate that the team chose misunderstood, misrepresented and underrepresented mental illnesses and disabilities. I feel like s5 and s6 will be referents for many years, because they really took the time to portray a dissociative disorder and dyscalculia in a down-to-earth, unhurried way that isn’t meant to shock and awe, but simply allow us to understand why and when Nora and Fatou will struggle. Druck got the viewers to anticipate when Nora and Fatou would struggle, and that’s the first step in being able to anticipate and accommodate the needs of the Noras and Fatous of the world. I really can’t overstate how important this is and what a difference it makes in a real, tangible way. These seasons aren’t meant to be enjoyed for voyeuristic reasons, but they will legitimately help people.

One of the biggest criticisms of s4 was that Amira and Sam didn’t connect as women of color. In fact, it seemed like in s4 Sam was treated as another white friend, when in s2 both she and Amira were the victims of Kiki’s racism. The team addressed this by giving us Ava and Fatou’s friendship, which I want to say might be the first friendship between main characters of color where their race is a substantial reason for their bond. (There are the Sanas with their Jamillas, but the Jamillas aren’t main characters, and then there are friendships like Jo and Megan and Zoya, or Imaan and Liv, or Luca and Yasmina, but iirc in every case their bond as women of color isn’t made explicit.)

Another criticism of s4 was the way Kiki turned into the world’s most understanding white friend offscreen. The team addressed this with the Ava and Mailin storyline, which I think was wonderfully and subtly set up in s5, then built on with the biology test leaked answers.

On the topic of race, I think a major criticism of s3 was that David’s ethnicity wasn’t acknowledged (to the point where a white actress was cast to play his sister gvhvhv). The team has made up for this with Josh (more in the s6 sm than in s5, but I still count it) and with Kieu My. Fatou and Kieu My bonded over being first/second gen children of immigrants, and in doing so, they acknowledged that these characters aren’t white and have different experiences than white Germans.

The first 6 episodes of this season were some of the finest writing in the Skams. The storylines all connected and built on each other. The motifs were just so good and beautiful and fitting. The themes were all clearly defined and easy to follow.

The tortoise plot was one of the most fun and imaginative storylines in any Skams, it connected Fatou and Ismail in a believable way. And not to rave about a fucking tortoise, but animals can be really uncooperative and that tortoise delivered every fucking clip. Druck has a reputation for being one of the most depressive versions of Skam, but the Maike/Burger plot was just plain fun.

I feel like some of the old gen’s instas were a bit self-indulgent. I’m thinking specifically of Matteo’s memes and how they they weren’t necessarily the kind of memes a gay dude born in 2001 would pick, but someone a decade older. I think this is much better done with new gen. Fatou’s memes reflect her age and her sexuality, and not just that, but Ava, Mailin, Kieu My, Josh, etc. all pick memes and even focus on different aspects of recent news, based on their gender, race, personalities, interests, etc.

I appreciate that the team found a way to fit a sex scene between Fatou and Kieu My to add to the small catalogue of wlw sex scenes on Skams (I’m including the scene in lovleg or we’d only have two lol). While I understood the reasons eskam opted not to include one, I thought there were ways to feature a sex scene that didn’t sexualize the actresses and didn’t require nudity. Cases in point: the lovleg scene, and this scene in Druck.

And it also needs to be said. This is the first original season with a main of color, and the third season overall (after Liv and Imane) where 10 episodes are given to a character of color and no one else. Of the three, it’s certainly the season that loved and respected its main the most. The bar is so low it’s in hell, but Druck did clear that bar!

With all that said, let’s talk about the things I would really want the team to address in following seasons:

The thing I most want them to fix might be small or unimportant for a lot of people, but I think it’s at the core of why the season has been unenjoyable or certain plot points haven’t come across the way the team wanted, for many people. I am talking about the overly expositional nature of the writing. It appears as if the team approached the writing of the clips with the intention of hitting each beat as noted in their agreed upon outline, and absolutely nothing else was to be added. This is an issue both in s5 and s6. It’s just less noticeable in s5, because s5 is setting up stuff for Fatou’s season, and possibly even seasons that haven’t been written yet. The fact that absolutely every second counts makes for a stressful watching experience for me, because the narrative tension is always heightened. Whereas with Skam, the narrative tension would build throughout the clip. Take the Pride scene in Skam, for instance. The clip allows for Isak and Eskild to get increasingly more agitated as they butt heads. I feel like if this Druck team had done the Pride scene in s5 or s6, the clip would’ve started with both Isak and Eskild already on edge, and cut much of the dialogue that got them there.

On the topic of naturalistic dialogue, this season doesn’t have it. Here is an example from ep 10 clip 2, Wieder vereint/Reunited 11:37.

Fatou: I’ll get a certificate too and bring it over to you. And I checked it, I only have to change one course and my schedule will work.

Teacher: Miss Jallow, you are not the first one to come to me with an epiphany. We could fill entire school weeks with the lessons you missed. In addition, Doctor Steinberg told me about your, well… activities. You don’t have a lot of arguments on your side.

Fatou: But I’ve spoken to all of the teachers and they said they are okay with it.

Teacher: You seem to have friends among the teaching staff. Mrs Pavlovic put in a word for you. Okay then, do it and go before I change my mind. [translated by @kieu-tou! Thank you!]

Like. This is the bare bones version of a dialogue. This should be the first draft, not the final version. The coordinator goes from absolute no to yes, with just one line from Fatou. The coordinator gives reasons that would necessitate more than one sentence of counterargument, like Fatou’s absences and the Biology test leaked answers. The coordinator even says Fatou doesn’t have a lot of arguments on her side, and yet it takes Fatou one line to change her mind!

And of course we viewers don’t want or need a lot of time with the coordinator. And particularly at this point in the season, no one would enjoy a naturalistic dialogue with the coordinator of all people. But my point is that this is an issue with the dialogue all this season (and last season as well, but this season has been more scrutinized), the reason I picked this example is because of how easy it is to see here.

Which brings us to the pacing of the clips, and specifically the Friday clips. Because the script goes straight to the information the team wants to convey to the viewers, skipping the build up to it, many Friday clips have fallen flat, felt abrupt, and have been, tbh, unsatisfying. Again, I had this issue in s5, but as that season went on, I felt like the team had a better grip on Friday clips. But then they did it again in the first Friday clip this season, and so I think this is something the writers really should work on. The first Friday clip in Isak’s season closes on Isak being sandwiched by Emma and Even on a bench, visually setting up the love triangle, or more accurately, the personifications of who Isak should want to hook up with and who he really wants. But in order to get there, we’re shown a good amount of info, from the way Vilde, Eva and Sana are handling Noora’s absence, to Chris and Kasper, Even hovering around Isak, Emma trying to impress Isak, Isak escaping and, like, draping himself on the walls because he’s so over it all. Isak playing a game on the bathroom to stall for time. The paper towel maneuver to immediately give us a sense of what a weirdo Even is. A conversation between Isak and Even that gives us some clues about Even’s shame, as well as establish interests in common (like weed), and this is all before Emma even joins them! Just think of all the stuff we learn about who Isak, Even, Emma, Eva, Vilde or Sana are as people, before we get to the point of the clip! Fatou’s season simply didn’t have that. Compare it with the first Friday clip of Fatou’s season where the cashqueens quickly talk about the leaked answers, one of the major storylines this season that only gets a couple lines, before Fatou says she doesn’t want to talk about school (Fatou’s struggles with school, another major storyline), and then we’re onto the point of the clip, which is that Kieu My likes girls too. AND FADE TO BLACK. When people say they want longer clips, what they mean isn’t artificially inflate the clip length or add more plot stuff. Just let us watch the characters interact with each other so that we get a feel for how they relate to each other. I know I wish we’d have gotten more of Ava and Fatou interacting with each other before things turned to shit, and Ava with the other girls, so that I know why they all like and value Ava so much. I wish we’d have gotten more of Kieu My talking to the cashqueens about, like, why she didn’t make use of the biology test answers, instead of getting it on a chat. Or food combos they don’t like. So it makes more sense that later on Kieu My actually thinks she and Fatou are friends. And every line doesn’t have to count. In Skam España, the characters are constantly talking and not everything they ever talked about ended up being relevant. When one of the characters lied about her house undergoing renovations to hide the fact that she was poor, the characters joked about Italian marble and put on bad Italian accents and made that Italian hand gesture. None of this was important to the plot because those renovations weren’t real to begin with, but they made viewers feel like these were real friends joking around, instead of characters needing to hit every storyline beat in a clip.

I have this joke with my friends about Druck always going 🤪🤪 in the last third of every season, in which a season that was very tightly written and cohesive suddenly pulls something inexplicable and pretty much impossible to resolve in 1-3 episodes. Hanna’s season suddenly switching to Mia, Björn creeping on Mia in episode 9! of a total 10, David getting outed in episode 8 and then disappearing for a whole week, Amira’s season pivoting to Mia and Hanna. It has happened in every season except Nora’s, so I thought the team had learned its lesson, but then the forgotten date with Ava happened. To be clear. It really makes no sense that Nora would have hung out with Ava several times since Tuesday, and the topic of the cashqueens being officially introduced to Kieu My wouldn’t have come up. it’s just not realistic.gif I feel like at that point the writing for the rest of the reason became super contrived to keep Fatou miserable and apart from Kieu My and Ava to artificially delay the reunions until episode 9 and 10. Why add a cheating insinuation and the main checking her partner’s messages in episode 8 if you know you won’t be able to properly resolve it? Why make Kieu My mock Fatou’s “uhm” if it’s not going to be addressed in their reunion clip? Kieu My had taken the initiative for a lot of the relationship, so it’s okay for Fatou to take the initiative when it comes to making up. You don’t have to add things that can only be resolved through an expositional info dump. (Please no more exposition than it’s necessary! I think we’ve established that at this point lol.) In the case of Fatou’s season, this is even sadder because I feel like Kieu My’s intimacy issues could’ve been the reason to drive them apart for two weeks, rather than the Maya/uhm stuff. This could’ve also been resolved through Fatou and Kieu My explicitly negotiating their boundaries and how they want to be comforted and how they want to comfort each other, which I thought was the issue with Fatou rejecting Kieu My’s attempts to help while wanting physical touch, while Kieu My didn’t want to be touched but rather seen.

There are going to be many thinkpieces on why a myriad of stuff didn’t work for people, so I’m going to keep this simple and address one last thing. I think that choosing to focus on Nora’s mental illness and Fatou’s disability is a great choice that doesn’t complicate the themes too much, but Druck (and all the Skams, but I’m invested only in Druck succeeding at this point) still struggles with being intersectional. This is the major reason why the Ava/Mailin storyline ended not with a bang, but a whimper. There just wasn’t enough work done to connect Fatou’s struggles not just to her disability, but also to her race (and even her sexuality). I think that if people really want (and lbr, it’ll be mostly poc who will put in that effort and work), they can see how Fatou’s race affected the way other people and especially adults reacted to her, but this wasn’t made explicit. If Ava and Mailin are going to argue about racism all season, why not connect that with Karin firing Fatou from Aquarius? As it stands, Karin fired Fatou because of a disability neither of them knew Fatou has, and that was the resolution to that storyline. Why not make it explicit that the Physics teacher had preconceived ideas about Fatou because Fatou is black? Why wasn’t Fatou’s disability addressed in the meeting with the coordinator? Why didn’t Fatou express to Mailin that Fatou, too, had issues with how Mailin was acting wrt racism? It felt like, with the way the season was putting so much emphasis on racism, all these threads were going to be connected. In the end though, it almost felt as if only Ava is affected by racism (aside from Mailin mentioning Fatou in the last episode). It’s not like talking about how racism affects Fatou is going to make the topic redundant for Ava’s or Ismail’s season. As a light-skinned black lesbian with a disability, Fatou’s life is going to be impacted by racism in a different way than Ava’s will, as a dark-skinned black fat straight cis girl, or Ismail’s, as a Turkish-German possibly Muslim possibly non binary person. All these experiences are specific enough, and different enough, that they can be touched upon in different seasons without becoming redundant. The fact that Fatou’s season almost seemed to forget at times that she is a black lesbian, doesn’t bode well for Ava’s and Ismail’s season to acknowledge all their struggles.

The bottom line is that this season really was great and did a lot of good, and I feel like the writing just needs to be tweaked a bit for further seasons to be even better and more enjoyable overall. I am very pleasantly surprised by how the team took s1-s4 fan feedback to heart and worked to implement suggestions, and so I really trust them and hope they keep working on the show. It’d be a shame if Druck wasn’t renewed, with this team at the helm.

#druck #this post is 3K+ words in word I'm so sorry #but I really hope it makes its way to the writers and is helpful

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stretchemersonarchive · 6 years

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Not Just a Trope: How Mental Illness is Battling the Media

By: Hailey Norton

To mainstream medias like film, television and video games, mental illness has become a money making algorithm. In this algorithm, however, there is little truth to be found. There is usually a dramatic twist, or if you’re Hollywood film director, M. Night Shyamalan, a badass super villain known as “The Horde” brewing under the devastating illness known as dissociative identity disorder (DID). Or if you’re a video game developer like Red Limb Studio, your main protagonist actually turns out to be your antagonist who has killed their entire family in a psychotic episode. Or if you’re anyone working on 13 Reasons Why, from the hit Netflix original TV show, mental illness and suicide is a tool to be used for revenge on those that caused verbal or physical abuse.

All of these cases of popular media have a couple things in common. First, they’re problematic. They do not fully or accurately address mental illness in an educational light. By this, I mean, the lack of appropriate and complete depictions of mental health has caused many negative stigmas to build in our society surrounding violence, alienating those that suffer from mental illness. Second, they are aimed at teens and young adults.

The idea that mental illness is something to be capitalized on is not a new or shocking concept. Many things that are culturally sensitive are used as attention-grabbing tools to garner the most amount of money as possible with little or no regard for the implications it could have on an impressionable audience. In an article from the Journal of Community Psychology, it was stated that “Children, whose opportunities to encounter and learn about mental illness from other sources (higher education, job experience, etc.) are far more limited than adults, may be even more reliant than adults on mass media, and thus more susceptible to their influence” (Wahl).

In an article written for the Psychiatric Rehabilitation Journal, Naomi Kondo gave a very honest opinion about the inaccuracies found in film in particular and how they can be damaging for society as a whole. She brings up the point that those that have no connection to mental illness other than in films and other forms of media, may believe that depiction to be true (Kondo 250). She states, specifically, “The greatest fallacy of mental illness purported by the film industry is that there is a direct link between mental illness and violence” (Kondo 250). As someone who lives with schizophrenia and has never had violent urges, Kondo feels alienated by these depictions. One of her most compelling statements was “Sometimes these films even make me wonder about myself, if on some level I have a secret evil side, a side tied to my illness” (Kondo 251). This shows how those that are in the audience watching these films that also identify with the disorder being depicted can be negatively impacted by stigmas even though they know them to not be true.

I, too, have been personally affected by the carelessness of these mainstream media depictions of mental health. As someone who suffers from depression and has attempted suicide in the past, the show 13 Reasons Why seriously unnerved me. Hannah Baker, the protagonist of the show, truly went through some very troubling situations from bullying to sexual assault and rape. Suicidal ideation and intent are very hot topics among today’s youth and so many teens are suffering from depression and anxiety. According to the National Institute for Mental Health, “Young adults aged 18-25 years had the highest prevalence of [mental illness] (22.1%) compared to adults aged 26-49 years (21.1%) and aged 50 and older (14.5%)” (“Mental…”). In fact, suicide is the second leading cause of deaths among the age group 10-34 (Center for Disease Control).

I can understand the appeal of wanting to open a conversation with teens about this big issue and raise awareness. However, I cannot stand for and will not sit silently while a TV show graphically depicts how to kill yourself even though the book the show is based on does not. The suicide scene with Hannah Baker was damaging, triggering and completely unnecessary. It, in essence, showed every viewer, no matter how old, how to commit suicide. On top of just the idea of showing a suicide, they depicted one of the most successful ways to commit suicide by cutting in an upwards motion up the forearm. This can sever an artery which, without immediate medical attention, is completely irreversible. I am not claiming that this show has or will take lives, but it can validate the thoughts someone has when they are already battling with suicidal ideation (ie. “no one would care if I died”) (Henick). Before watching the scene where Hannah cuts her forearm in the bathtub, I had several friends warn me about how graphic it was. I mentally prepared myself in every way that I could before watching the scene. While watching, though, I was still incredibly triggered by how absolutely horrific the scene was. For this reason, I do not advise that those that have attempted or have had experience with suicidal ideation watch this show, or at least skip this scene.

What I am asking for is not to stop talking about these subjects. In fact, I would love for there to be bountiful information and plenty of conversation. I am not writing to end the discussion. I demand, however, that there be more honesty and truth in these conversations that take place, especially in mainstream medias. It is the responsibility of these creators to accurately depict mental illness and the right of the audience to get truthful information. Platforms like Netflix, where 13 Reasons Why aired, and Steam, an online video game distributor that sells games like Rise of Insanity (2018), need to be held accountable for the false information they are distributing to the world and are making money off of.

The movie I mentioned earlier but not by name, Split, directed by M. Night Shyamalan, is a major culprit of demonizing mental illness. Like many other movies depicting mental health in a violent and unreasonable way, only the rarest and most extreme cases make it to Hollywood. Shyamalan depicts Kevin, a man struggling with dissociative identity disorder, as an immediately violent and unstable person. While instability is, in fact, a characteristic of some mental illnesses it does not define the subject as depicted in the movie. Instability in conjunction with violence, in this case, creates an idea that both come hand in hand, one cannot exist without the other.

This reminds me of what Naomi Kondo was saying about starting to question one’s own personality based on a film portrayal. Schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder are two very different illnesses to live with, but the sentiment remains. The way we portray mental illness not only affects those watching that have no further knowledge about mental illness but also those that do know and live with it every day. Kevin turns out to be a super villain added to a universe M. Night Shyamalan created in his movie Unbreakable. For fans of Unbreakable, this may be an exciting addition to a long anticipated sequel, but for those who suffer from dissociative identity disorder, this can be very damaging. In a CNN article written by Michael Nedelman, an interaction between a patient with DID and their psychiatrist is discussed (Nedelman). This patient wrote an email referring to Shyamalan’s Split asking “Do I ever scare you?” (Nedelman). With nearly 1% of the population living with this disorder (Nedelman) it is hard not to think about the long lasting impacts this could have on those currently suffering.

James McAvoy, the actor who played Kevin, did not speak with anyone suffering from the illness because he could not find anyone that was willing to speak with him (Nedelman). Perhaps getting a firsthand account from someone that suffers from DID would have influenced the way the lead actor would have felt about portraying such a disorder as inherently violent. Nedelman also mentions in his article that Shyamalan was in contact with a clinical psychologist who aired concern over the hostile portrayal of the disorder to Shyamalan himself and nothing was done (Nedelman). Shyamalan even went as far as to say that no one that had seen the finished film gave any form of backlash (Nedelman). As someone who has seen the film, and was compelled enough to write this essay, I would like to prove him wrong. I had several issues with the film that begin with my already mentioned dislike of the irresponsible portrayal of violence that is directly linked to Kevin’s illness. My next issue came when Kevin’s psychiatrist, in the movie, went as far to say that those that suffer from DID are actually superior to the rest of the human race. That they, somehow, have found a way to surpass a normal state of being. Many recognize this moment as Shyamalan’s attempt to reconcile his harsh portrayal of the disorder, but this is also problematic. Instead of villainizing Kevin’s illness like the rest of the film does, it glorifies it. It gives an equally false and damaging image of how we should view those with DID. Glorifying DID and other mental illnesses does not accurately portray the struggle these people live with every day. They cannot climb on walls and do not have super-human strength like the protagonist in the movie. It is not easy to live with a mental illness and describing it as a tool to transcend a natural state of being is ridiculous and minimizes how hard it can be on a day to day basis for those living with it.

John Squires, in an article for Bloody Disgusting, a website where opinion pieces, editorials and reviews for popular forms of media, finds no issue in the way DID is portrayed in Split. Squires does, very early, acknowledge his lack of authority based on the fact that he does not suffer from any form of mental illness and that his article is, in fact, opinion. Squires, similar to Shyamalan, claims that those that take issue with Split have never seen it. He believes that the glorification by the therapist, as I mentioned earlier, is a main reason why the movie is unproblematic. He states, “Those with D.I.D. are not ‘broken,’ Shyamalan is telling us, but rather ‘more than’ the rest of us” (Squire). In fact, this is Squire’s entire argument as to why Split is not the correct “target” when discussing stigmatizing Hollywood roles. This argument, however, is based on the assumption that the glorification of this mental illness is positive which is not true. While Squire may be well-versed in horror movies, he does not use any sources to support his opinion other than another writer for the same website that wrote a similar article. There are no references to articles or journals written by medical professionals or those that suffer from DID that support his claim. It’s hard for a reader to be convinced of an argument when there are no sources in an article that states, specifically, “Here’s Why…” (Squire).

13 Reasons Why, as a TV show, is alarming and should have been a wake up call to many in the U.S. about how we glorify depression and suicide. It is clear that Hannah Baker had serious mental health issues and her pain was dismissed. This is a sad truth that many teens deal with in high school. I will not sit here and say everything portrayed in 13 Reasons Why is not factual. The atmosphere of the high school is an extreme case, but it is a possibility and should not be dismissed. The issue I have with this show is the lack of emphasis on mental illness. Hannah displays signs of depression that I can self-identify with but the show glosses over them to focus on the bullying taking place in the series. It is important to acknowledge that a focus on the bullying aspect of the show is needed, however, the show focuses on little else. Nothing is mentioned about any mental illness and her suicide is almost entirely blamed on the bullying she undergoes.

“Blame” is something this show grapples with a lot. In fact, the entire story is based on Hannah giving out tapes, thirteen to be exact, detailing how the listener added to her decision to end her life. This is possibly the most dangerous aspect of the show, next to her suicide scene as we have already discussed. Suicide, in Hannah’s context, is used as revenge. She is able to pass the blame of her own decision to commit suicide off of herself and onto those that caused her verbal and physical abuse. This evokes an idea that there is some kind of life after death and that Hannah lived on in her tapes. This emulates some kind of retribution that can be had from the grave. Mark Henick describes this perfectly in an article for CNN, “They advance the false notion that suicides are a way to teach others a lesson, and that the deceased person will finally be understood and vindicated. They won’t. They’ll still be dead.” For those already contemplating suicide, this show could cause serious problems. The path that the series takes can be very sensitive to those that have survived attempted suicide and those that have lost others to suicide (Henick). As Henick says, which I wholeheartedly agree with, the show will not “give people the idea” to commit suicide but it could add to what he calls “suicide contagion” or “copycat suicides.”

The blaming of those who were included in the tapes creates a larger conversation about who is to “blame” for a suicide. An article that comes to terms with the ideas of blame in suicide notes in the Journal of Community and Applies Sociology states, “In particular, accounts serve the strategic purpose of avoiding or assigning blame for what happened” (McClelland 227). Blaming those around Hannah for her death is one of the most damaging concepts I have ever seen enacted on television. In the end, it was no one’s decision but Hannah’s to commit suicide and no one else should be blamed. Her suicide was not the direct result of just bullying; it had a lot more to do with severe and untreated mental illness. Instead of directing attention to this fact and promoting that teens with mental illness seek help, the show passes off her suicide as a choice others made for her. Each time I heard “Welcome to your tape” I physically felt pain for those that were about to hear why she blamed them. Also stated in the article, “those reasons which are used to excuse the author for committing suicide can be seen as legitimations of an act which is normally illegitimate. Suicide notes therefore serve as evidence of socially shared beliefs as to the conditions under which suicide is seen as an acceptable act” (McClelland 228). 13 Reasons Why tries to normalize and legitimize suicides when they are “acceptable.” Is it never acceptable to commit suicide. I would not characterize the act as “cowardly,” but I also think it is very damaging to look for reasons for the audience to accept the fact that Hannah’s suicide was warranted because of the injustices done to her.

What is possibly the most shocking aspect of this show is how proud the crew is of their depiction of Hannah’s suicide scene. Nic Sheff, in an article for Vanity Fair states that he wanted and argued for a complete and graphic depiction of the suicide in episode 13. Sheff is a writer for the show and had his own experience with addiction and suicide. In his article he detailed his attempted suicide and what ultimately stopped him from going through with it (Scheff). He had swallowed a whole bottle of pills before remembering the story of another woman who had attempted suicide in which she began vomiting blood and stomach acid and shattered a glass door, injuring herself even further (Scheff). The realization that suicide is never peaceful caused Sheff to rethink his action and was able to throw up the pills he had just taken (Sheff) which is what he credits this show will be able to do as well. Sheff’s story is very powerful and should be heard, however, the young adults and teenagers watching this show do not have a similar experience to make them rethink their actions in the same way. Sheff claimed he wanted “to dispel the myth of the quiet drifting off” that is commonly associated with suicide (Sheff) but that is exactly how Brian Yorkey, the writer of the thirteenth episode, portrayed Hannah’s suicide. After the initial pain of cutting her wrists, Hannah lays calmly in the bath, relieved, which completely discredits Sheff’s argument that this scene would dispel any myths about the serenity of suicide or provide a similar experience as the horrific attempted suicide Sheff mentioned. This show does little to address those in the audience that may misinterpret the “well-meaning” actions of those working on the show.

A few weeks ago, I was watching a gamer on youtube, John Wolfe, play a game made by an independent developer called Rise of Insanity. In this game, your main protagonist is a psychiatrist that works with patients suffering from schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder. The game begins with a radio broadcast about a crazed man who murdered his entire family. John, jokingly, made an assumption that the protagonist was actually the murderer and that the family was his own (“Rise of…”). Sadly, his assumption was all too right and I shared in on his frustrations. The storyline continuously describes a patient that has become violent and has possibly killed an entire family. This is a common storyline that I have seen among independent developers, and some larger developers such as Konami, the creators of the Silent Hill franchise. The entire point of the plot relies on the fact that the main character is not only mentally ill, but also unstable and violent. The only times that the homicidal ideation of mental illness is brought up is when it is carried out. This is just not a correct representation of the norm.

On their own website, the developers, Red Limb Studio, claims that this game was “inspired by the greatest psychological horror movies” (Red Limb Studio). This was particularly alarming to me because it truly showcases my point: these depictions of mental illness bleed into other aspects of the media and into popular thought. Is it really “just a movie” if it inspires others to adapt and recreate the same storyline repeatedly? It creates a hive-mind that the only way to depict the horrors of mental illness is through violence. I do believe there are ways that mental illness can be accurately portrayed in a strictly horror-centric movie or game. Mental illness is very scary, especially for those living with it every day. It is scary to not be in control of your own emotions. There are so many video games, however, that rely on violence such as Outlast, Remothered: Tormented Fathers, Descent: Silence of Mind, Please, and many, many more.

I cannot simply say that all video games that feature mental illness are entirely problematic, though, so I will mention one that I believe did quite well. About a year ago, I played a video game called Alice: Madness Returns that follows the character of Alice from Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. This game, in particular, really struck a chord with me because of its depiction of mental illness in context of trauma and memory. While I am not very fond of the title of the game, the word “madness” being one that provokes interest for the sake of insanity, a general money-making move, I feel the developing studio, Spicy Horse, attempted with great effort to create a game that did not villainize or glorify the force of mental illness and instead depicted the trying process of piecing a fractured memory back together.

In Christina Fawcett’s “American McGee’s Alice: Madness Returns and Traumatic Memory,” the true intentions of the game are discussed. As adjunct faculty in the Department of English at the University of Winnipeg, she has been researching the psychological and emotional representation of villains and monsters in video games (Fawcett). She discusses the problem with the therapy Alice is receiving in the game in which Dr. Brumpy focuses on repressing Alice’s memory which weakens her and leaves her vulnerable. The goal of the player is to piece her memory back together by finding fractured memories. Fawcett describes that this method is meant to “[restore] dissociated memories and return a sense of wholeness to the patient” (Fawcett 496). When I first began playing the game, I criticized this process because I felt it was too easy or concise. However, the developer was able to simulate the difficulty of the task by giving Alice side-quests that distract her from her main goal. Her path to recovery is not depicted as a linear, steady path.

This representation of memory trauma is what I hope to see more of in the future with other illnesses as well. The developers of the game never questioned how real Wonderland is to Alice. There is no expectation for Alice to remove herself from “silly fantasies” or discredit her experience. It also does not glorify her trauma as the closer she gets to remembering, the darker and harder the environment becomes to traverse. Wonderland is not a place where she can escape her trauma, she lives in it no matter where she goes, which is very characteristic of mental illness. As the game progresses Alice also becomes engrossed in more combat but this is characterized as part of the game as Alice is never described as violent and it is never linked to her illness. This refreshing take on how mental illness can be depicted in video games is something that is rare and highly valuable as a lesson to other developers.

These stigmas manifest themselves from our television and computer screens into our everyday lives. These stigmas as described by writers for the Graduate Institute of Professional Psychology, “are acquired gradually over a lifetime and that their roots are established in childhood” (Wahl). A very specific instance of this stigma infesting how we view those with mental illness is crime, specifically gun violence. According to a database article written for the Salem Press Encyclopedia, about 64% (1.2 million) of those in jail suffer from a mental illness (Saral). Whether or not their illness was related to the crime they were sentenced for was not included. According to the National Institute for Mental Health, 44.7 million Americans suffer from mental health issues (“Mental Illness…”). This means, that less than one percent (.02%) of those living with mental illness are serving a sentence in an American prison. Saral also states, “among crimes committed by those suffering from mental illness, only 7.5 percent could be associated directly with the symptoms of the illness as a causative factor” (Saral). This information came from a study conducted by the American Psychological Association. Despite these facts, “According to the University of Washington School of Social Work, public perception of mental illness as connected to violent and dangerous behavior has steadily increased, spurred by depictions in news media and entertainment sources” (Saral). This is an interesting assumption for Americans to make since only about 4% of the violent crimes committed in America are done by those diagnosed with a mental illness (Metzl).

There are and should be restrictions on gun ownership based on mental health. That is a necessary way to protect not just the community, but especially the mentally ill person. It is unfounded and truly damaging to claim, however, that gun violence is an issue of mental illness because, “growing evidence suggests that mass shootings represent statistical aberrations that reveal more about particularly horrible instances than they do about population-level events...basing gun crime---prevention efforts on the mental health histories of mass shooters risks building “common evidence” from “uncommon things” (Metzl). The general idea that mental illness causes gun violence and jumping to connections without finding clear evidence ignores contributors like substance abuse, domestic violence, availability of firearms, suicidality, social networks, economic stress, and other factors (Metzl). Mental illness is not a pathway to violence. In fact, according to an article written for the American Journal of Public Health, “nearly 1 in 10 adults has access to firearms and also has a problem with anger and impulsive aggressive behavior” (Metzl). This does not state that the 10% included in this statistic has a mental illness. As this article states, there is plenty of talk of the small population that commits acts of violence but little about the victimhood the mentally ill can face daily and, “blaming persons with mental disorders for gun crime overlooks the threats posed to society by a much larger population—the sane.” (Metzl). Based on my reading of Metzl’s article, there is a much higher chance of a mentally ill person being a victim than they are of being the perpetrator. So, to assume that gun violence is an issue of mental illness, is ignorant and not factual.

I ask that we stop having the gun violence debate as if it is centered solely around mental illness, and talk more about the causes within small communities that could attribute to this larger problem. The issue of gun violence is an ever growing and hot topic currently in the United States but is clouded by the use of false claims and financial gain. It is time to pay more attention to how we give back to our small communities to create a larger change for the safety of all Americans.

Acknowledgement

I have always been very passionate about how the mentally ill are depicted in movies and TV and this was an essay I have been wanting to write since the release of 13 Reasons Why. I want to acknowledge everyone working to break down stigmas about mental illness in their lives that inspire me to do the same. I would like to recognize the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation for their amazing work with connecting researchers to funding. I would also like to thank myself for having the ability and courage to recognize when the media gets it wrong even when their ratings are good.

Works Cited

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