wawamouse | Oz Rewatch 3: S1E08: A Game of Checkers

Originally posted to tumblr

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Heads up I'm wine drunk right now so I'll skip the polished article with the screencaps LOL. Rudimentary/live watch notes:

Sister: [Schillinger] didn’t say “a better man”, he said “a different man”
Tim: "I have an eyewitness…”
Sister: it was me!
Tim: Me!
Random thought: If Diane had quit in McManus's office, Schillinger probably would’ve had no choices to get Beecher killed, probably would’ve gotten paroled, and probably half of the Beecher/Schillinger plots would’ve been avoided
Nowakowski said Oz is off route 7a… which means Oz might be somewhere along NY-7 which starts in Pennsylvania goes north to Binghamton, and northeast passing north over Albany and then up into Vermont
Guy who starts the riot is wearing the same shirt as Jaime Velez?
One of the Muslims totally pushed someone off the control area when the riot started?? lol
Hill putting the towel on Dobbs like it’s a little blanket…. apply pressure, dude!!
Eddie: (saying some bullshit to Miguel)
Sister: Shut up, Eddie!
Diane: Shut up, Eddie.
Why does Devlin seemingly have nothing else to do but fuck with Oz?
Adebisi stole two sandwiches before the food went out to everyone else lol
Said is so full of shit… with the “wake up the nation” shit like if his goal is prison abolition, he’s better off using McManus because his idea of prison reform might be impotent but at least he has connections (to a Senator, for example) that Said could benefit from. McManus’s execution of ideas suck major ass; if Said is supposed to be (presumably) a community organiser, then surely he could work with McManus to create programs in Em City that would actually benefit prisoners. After those actually succeed, then more could be done in terms of making steps toward taking power away from the very act of incarceration/dealing with issues that lead to imprisonment. The very presence of Devlin in the show suggests that Said’s method of a spectacular destruction wouldn’t ultimately lead to change. Devlin got elected by the public on a stance of being harsh on crime. And given the amount of shit he gets away going forward in the show, I feel like there wouldn’t have been that much outrage from the public there was another Attica situation, because I am almost certain Devlin would’ve found a way to spin it. Ultimately, every time I watch the scene between McManus and Said, I’m reminded of how ineffective Said is as an activist in the show. He doesn’t actually really have many particular beliefs in the show when all is said and done; he’s a celebrity, first and foremost. The things he does are performative in many ways, such as when he refused the pardon for Ramadan. Yes, he would’ve been used a political point for Devlin, but his criticism of the administration would’ve been far more powerful if he had been on the outside, helping prisoners through his connections as a public figure. I mean for fuck’s sake, even Beecher did more for the inmates in Oz just by going back to do pro bono legal consulting with them after he was released! I suppose a lot of it can be chalked up to the fact that the writer(s) of the show probably don’t have a great wealth of knowledge of the tradition of thought that Said seems like he’s supposed to subscribe to, but I always get the sense that there is a huge gap between Said’s actions and the things he supposedly stands for. It's just sort of disappointing how little he ultimately accomplishes/how little the show ultimately allows him to accomplish. Maybe the secret of the show is that Said is a dumbass. I means maybe that's no secret, though, either. He starts the show incredibly arrogant and SORT of grows. But I guess he had more issues than he thought going in or maybe it's a comment on his core personality that he was in prison in the first place (for blowing up a warehouse or whatever). Petty shit. Maybe that was the hint that he ,was never going to do great things or think long term enough to accomplish lasting change. Possibly the only thing he ended up doing that really mattered (and maybe I'm forgetting things, so feel free to remind me if so) was helping to inspire Omar to get his shit together, even if Omar eventually got killed anyway.
All in all, Sister found the season finale underwhelming…
Sister hoped someone would die (Adebisi)
How did Adebisi go into withdrawal so quickly??