I was very pleased with this depiction of life for an ex con for the first two episodes for several reasons - it was very realistic in that some people are ready to offer Ruth Slater a second chance, feeling that she's paid the price and suffered enough, while others are determined to continue to make Ruth pay forever. Obviously some people waver and change their minds but all in all it's a fairly accurate portrayal of the situation. When someone says to Ruth, "... she would take one look at you and not know what to say to you. She's never met anyone like you," it shows just how people think about certain people, how they dehumanise them. In Britain it seems to be a lot worse than other places, but still, even everywhere else, there is that prejudice that is always present, always there. There is, in reality, no real way to 'pay the price', to 'serve the time' - as Ruth says, she 'served her time and paid her pound of flesh'. But honestly no one will really ever let her forget it for the rest of her life. And I think that would have been enough; it would have made compelling viewing. Switching between thinking she's a bad person who deserves her fate and she was a messed up kid with a messed up life who deserves some kind of redemption - it would make for good viewing. And this is the problem I have with the third episode, where we find out that Ruth is actually a Saint. I was disappointed, to say the least... It gives the viewers a nice sense of closure, sure; hey, this woman who we spent two episodes watching being treated like trash because we thought she deserved it suddenly turns out deserving of a medal. I don't know, I felt tricked. It's like, even in 'serious' fiction, as someone who broke the law and paid the price, you just can't get any representation. Ruth was innocent after all, and therefore totally deserving of a three episode melodrama. It's so neat, so tidy. Imagine, though, if it hadn't been the case - if she'd been guilty after all - the drama still would have held up, right? So was it really necessary to reveal her 'innocence' after all? I don't think so.
Review of Unforgiven
