Law and Order: SVU- Burton Lowe, Olivia Benson, and the Unintended Failure of Nuance

I posted a Tweet yesterday that surprisingly received quite a bit of traction. Here’s the link that jump-started my thoughts about the most recent episode of Law and Order: SVU. After spending time today combing through responses from all sides of the fandom, I decided I wasn’t finished yet.

Note: this is based upon episode 23.21- “Confess Your Sins to Be Free”

Olivia Benson as a victim is significantly different from Olivia Benson as an SVU captain. It’s a dichotomy we’ve seen before (especially with the William Lewis arc), but we’ve never seen her suffer from this type of victimization — she was genuinely in love with her groomer, obviously still harbors feelings and a sense of responsibility towards this man, and we are witnessing the fallout.

After twenty-three years, we expect so many things from our dear Olivia Benson. For many of us, she’s our hero- her character has literally saved lives of people in this fandom. She’s our moral compass. Our safety net from the absolute horrors that have become remarkably mainstreamed in our society. Our defender of what’s right, good, honorable, and true. She’s our mother, sister, badass best friend. The police officer we all wish we could have on speed dial.

But now, she’s struggling. Our hero faces a charismatic demon who has somehow charmed his way back into her mind and heart. He rattled her, unnerved her, and destroyed her. We are helplessly watching her navigate this impossibly difficult scenario: she’s a woman in a place of tremendous power to advocate for victims, but now she is the victim, and lines are blurring alarmingly fast. She is doing a horrible job advocating for herself.

I would wager a guess that many of us in the fandom have been victimized at some point in our lives, and those vignettes have shaped and sculpted us. We have striking moments of self-awareness and then crushing moments of self-doubt and vulnerability. We walk a tightrope of traumas, our physiological and psychological responses ranging from confused to steadfast. I wouldn’t expect Liv’s reactions to be any different.

However, in Thursday’s episode, choices were made that we are still attempting to dissect.

Some comments have spoken to the idea that Olivia was reclaiming her power, that this was her path towards healing. If that was the intent, unfortunately, I think the triggers outweighed the nuance, and that’s where the writers failed. It’s very difficult to honor this complex and paradoxical portrayal of Liv (which honestly could be a brilliant direction heading into Season 24) when the lesson taken from this episode was that (white) men win, again. Even if that wasn’t the writers’ purpose, the message came across that groomers are the ones struggling in the aftermath of their deliberate actions. Their excuses are validated, and they should receive the grace to take things “one step at a time” with the implied and potentially expected support of their victims. Older, attractive, white men of means get plea deals and reinvent themselves under the guises of alcoholism and recovery. They get redemption arcs. The same tired story played out in America daily.

It was a confusing butchery of a delicate narrative, and Olivia’s character was eviscerated as a dire result.

I’m not sure if this is fair, but I understand. When you build a Law and Order empire spanning decades, with the main character one that we have grown to love as an extension of our own families, you have a responsibility to the audience that has kept you on the map. And when the title of your show has the initials SVU, you have an added responsibility to be mindful of the Special Victims and the stories you are telling. In this case, Liv is a Special Victim, and her story is getting crushed under layers and subtleties.

Our collective hearts shattered as we watched Liv uncover and relive her past traumas in the 500th episode. Our anxieties matched hers as she rummaged through that box, frantically searching for that tape. We cried as she fell apart, crumpled against the wall in her hallway, red wine her only solace as the music played and she desperately, desolately came to terms with her past. We cheered when she confronted Lowe, and we cried again when she tossed that tape over the bridge. Goodbye and good riddance. It was excruciating then, but we thought it was over.

It wasn’t over.

Instead, we got an almost triumphant return of the scariest kind of serial groomer. Lifelong fans of the show were left grappling with a myriad of emotions: puzzled, disturbed, disgusted, baffled, feeling so much hurt and pain. Survivors of trauma and abuse questioned the motives of the writers and show-runners, and even questioned Mariska’s integrity for allowing Olivia’s character assassination to happen in the first place. Ouch.

Again, I can only assume, perhaps naïvely, that this was never the intent. Correlation does not imply causation. However, in a 44-minute episode, writers have a responsibility to viewers to explore the ramifications of those between-the-lines moments. Nuance is a tremendous writing technique, but it fails horrendously when the message gets lost.

I have a suspicion that scenes were cut that potentially would have redeemed this episode. Lines that would have further reminded us of Liv’s struggle and pain that she’s harbored for decades. Something that would have supported the idea that sometimes a person spends years overcoming what has defined their past, only for one moment to bring back that buried fear, vulnerability, and lack of identity. How even though he’s a predator, he represents a portion of her life that she desperately tried to control, only for harsh truths to leave her spiraling. Perhaps a few choice words were left on the cutting room floor.

These words are the ghosts we crave.

In the meantime, I’m cautiously withholding judgment. Liv was not a captain last night, she was a victim, and I am focusing on the psychology behind what she is going through as a person. I am truly grappling with the plan here: the reason for bringing Burton Lowe back again in the first place. I’m desperate to see where this leads (if anywhere), and I’m curious to see if this breaks ground for a future unraveling. Will Liv fall from grace in Season 24? Will she have no choice but to be honest with her therapist and get to the bottom of these unresolved issues? Will this lead to growth in her real friendships (making amends with Barba; learning to trust Stabler again)? If that’s where this is headed, I’ll bite.

But, a cautionary tale to the writers: your fanbase won’t nibble for long.