Yearning Love
A couple of months ago, I participated in the following Twitter exchange:
Now that I have more than 140 characters to get into it, I can give a fuller explanation of what I meant. Though it was a little more dubious back in February, the eventual reunion of Fitz (Tony Goldwyn) and Olivia (Kerry Washington) seemed inevitable to me; even if that reunion didn't happen until the series finale, they are -- to borrow the language of 'shippers -- Scandal's OTP.
When the series started last spring, the fact that Olivia and Fitz were destined for one another was clear to viewers because Fitz was a handsome world leader who was a model of moral rectitude apart from the thing where he was cheating on his wife, and Olivia was an equally upright crisis manager who served only unjustly accused clients because she and her team were the "White Hats." And the more we were exposed to First Lady Mellie (Bellamy Young), the more we would have wanted her husband -- a basically good person (apart from the adultery) -- to ditch her. "He deserves better than to be yoked to someone so nakedly scheming!" we might have even yelled at our TVs. "And Olivia is so beautiful, and so sad!"
In the intervening year or so, we've learned a little more about everyone involved in this love triangle that complicates the question of whose relationship we should be rooting for. Yes, Mellie saved Fitz's approval rating by inventing a pregnancy -- but he went on to get her pregnant for real, which makes him just as bad. Yes, Mellie and Olivia (and several others) conspired to steal the election for Fitz without his knowledge -- but when he learned of the conspiracy, and that a member of the cabal (Debra Mooney's Supreme Court Justice Verna Thornton) was planning to clear her conscience with a deathbed confession, he killed her before she could do so. As my esteemed former colleague Linda Holmes tweeted back in February, everyone involved in this situation -- and pretty much everyone on the show -- is a scumbag, and I especially shouldn't have any investment in the possible reconciliation of Olivia and Fitz. Dicks don't deserve love, not even from other dicks! But last night's episode forced me to face facts: I still want Olivia and Fitz to end up together.
I KNOW. I'M SORRY. I know it's indefensible. But here's my self-defense.
1. I was an English major. This means I have studied a lot of novels and plays whose plots are based almost entirely on the travails of couples whose love cannot be due to obstacles that either seem insurmountable until they're not (those would be the comedies -- your Pride & Prejudice, your Twelfth Night), or that remain insurmountable (tragedies from Romeo & Juliet to Anna Karenina). Having read and written about dozens of texts like this, contemporary stories that follow the same theme of unfulfilled, unfulfillable yearning -- even ones on TV, even ones that are pretty trashy -- really work on me in a big way.
2. Goldwyn and Washington are hot. Sorry, forgive the typo. That should be "hottttttttttttttt." In the love triangle post I linked above, I cited the Season 1 episode (the sixth, titled "The Trail") in which we see Liv and Fitz initially consummating their smoldering, forbidden attraction. If you haven't seen it, go buy it on iTunes, and prepare to be shocked (and, um...titillated) by the sexiest sex scene I have ever seen on non-pay TV. Now, as Liv and Fitz have reason to keep pushing away from one another but still can't cool down their hot, hot pants, every scene between them keeps the viewer on edge, tensely waiting for them to give in to their throbbing biological urges. And it can be even hotter when they don't! The yearning!
3. The worse Mellie gets, the better she gets. The sick genius of Scandal is the way it manipulates the viewer into being on all three sides of the triangle. Because when Fitz finally made it back to the White House after keeping a vigil at Liv's hospital bed (and, not incidentally, getting her to make out with him), Mellie greeted him by announcing that she was moving across the street to Blair House. The two buildings are connected by tunnels, so no one outside their immediate circle need know that they're living apart, but that doesn't mean she's given up:
You should stop fighting me and consider using this time to think. See, I'm keeping it quiet for now, but there's a clock on that. You need a little time to figure out what you want to do, you need a little time to figure out if you can behave, but I have had enough. You want to shack up with Olivia Pope -- fine, have at her. But the clock is ticking. And when the alarm rings, I will be standing on the front lawn of Blair House holding a press conference discussing my philandering husband who can't keep his pants zipped, and the whore who has him on a leash. I'm done. Life as you know it is over. I hope you make the right decision, Fitz. I do. I hope you choose family. Because good luck getting re-elected once I start talking.
Fuuuuuuuck. You have to give it up for Mellie: she did try being nice. But now that Mellie's powers have been turned decisively against the desire of Fitz's heart (or parts beyond), the primary obstacle preventing Liv and Fitz's happiness just got bigger and scarier, meaning their anguished yearning can only get more intense. And even though I know I shouldn't, I love it.