Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
On at least one occasion, I’ve woken up at 3 a.m. on a Friday to binge new episodes of Jenji Kohan’s prison dramedy. As Twitter showed me, I was never alone. That’s how important Orange Is the New Black used to be to the pop culture conversation. It was a show many would happily lose sleep over to ensure spoilers would remain intact, but over the years, the series has lost a bit of its punch. With the exception of one deeply depressing inmate death, Seasons 3 and 4 felt a bit meandering, more like a shell of the sharp and deeply empathetic series than a continuation of it. However, as Season 5 proves, it is possible to self-correct. Welcome to the Litchfield riot. You’ll be happy you tuned in.
Whereas past seasons of the show have taken place over the course of weeks or months, Season 5 takes place over just three days. A lot of this season’s strength comes from this tight structure and the reason for it. Because of its ever-growing cast and all of the drama that accompanies each new character, it’s easy for Orange Is the New Black to feel a bit rambling. There’s just so much going on at every moment, and most of it isn’t connected. Season 5 changes this, presenting a Litchfield connected around the death of the beloved Poussey Washington (Samira Wiley), but it’s more than that. This season presents a cast that is finally unified in their intense anger, both over the unnecessary death of a fellow inmate and the cruel way they’ve been abused treated by guards.
While the idea of a prison riot may seem scandalous on paper, watching it unfold makes it feel inevitable in the way only good TV can sell insanity. As the inmates led by Taystee (Danielle Brooks) and Daya’s gun (Dascha Polanco) make their demands to management, this season stands as a blistering critique of the for-profit prison system. However, this season never loses its humanity while taking its soapbox stances.
Because the central plot of this season is so interesting, Orange Is the New Black rarely takes the time to delve into characters’ backstories, which is a choice that works for this season. There’s a sense of speeding without training wheels to these episodes, the show trusting you know and remember enough about these characters that you won’t be lost. That being said, this season also takes the time to explore new characters. Ouija (Rosal Colon), Pidge (Miriam Morales), and Zirconia (Daniella De Jesús), three Dominican inmates who were part of Maria’s (Jessica Pimentel) gang in Season 4, get a lot more screen time, and they’re a lot of fun to watch. Likewise, the overtly racist white supremacist inmates, Brandy (Asia Kate Dillon), Skinhead Helen (Francesca Curran), and Kasey (Kelly Karbacz), weirdly deliver some of this season’s funniest moments. However, it was the tonal shifts of this season that were the most engaging to me.
Season 5 of Orange Is the New Black wears many hats. At times, it proudly stands as a testament to activism before delving into a heartfelt reflection on loss and grief. There are moments in this new season that are so overtly funny, they’re basically a comedy routine, and there are sequences so chilling, it’s clear the writers intentionally borrowed horror movie tropes. But despite all of these shifts, Season 5 feels cohesive.
Orange Is the New Black has always been a show about people, specifically the intimate, vulnerable, and relatable moments even the most monstrous person experiences. With Season 5, the series broadens its scope to examine something more powerful — community. Sure, it’s a community that doesn’t know how to be a community, but it’s made up of people who are furious, in pain, and feel the overwhelming need to do something about it. This season of uprisings and pushed limits is sure to leave you gasping. However, it’ll also leave you wildly cheering.
