Loving The Complexity Of Madeline Ushers Character: A Woman Who Declares She Doesnt Want To Be Limited

Loving the complexity of Madeline Ushers character: a woman who declares she doesn’t want to be limited by men, who’s life is defined at every turn by the decisions and actions of her brother.

……

Madeline Usher is doomed by her attachment to her brother, and it is the root of all her eventual pain.

When Verna offers them the deal, it’s Roderick who ‘charges forward, straight at it’ and accepts the terms despite the fact that the only ‘next generation’ they current have are his kids. Madeline agrees afterwards but only once Rodrick makes it know he is already in. I don’t think she’d have gone for it if he had objected, she’s always had a very ‘both of us or neither’ kind of attitude.

And then she is as much these kids parent (from what we have seen) as Roderick is. Granted we see next to nothing of the kids biological mothers so we have to assume they weren’t very involved (either by their choice or other circumstance) with their kids after Rodrick got his claws into them.

That first scene when we meet Perry Madeline and Roderick are equally dismissive of him, but she is the one asking questions and prompts: you’ve had a year to come up with an idea, is this it or is there more? How are you going to make this successful? Why will your pitch be different? She even asks Roderick to jump in ‘anytime now’ to help her handle this train wreck. And Rodrick has just received the news he’s dying but I think it’s telling that Perry is looking at both of them for validation, for support. They are equally intimidating but equally supporting him.

With Camille we don’t get 1-2-1 interactions between her and her father (despite her own obsession with winning his approval) but we do get a scene with Madeline. After Perry’s death Camille lobbies to be given the power to lead the family’s PR response, and Madeline takes her seriously and asks what she would do. When Camille lays out her plan it’s Madeline who gives a proud nod of approval and okays her actions.

Leo unfortunately gets no parental interactions from either senior Usher. Victorine only gets it right at the end just before her monstrous actions are revealed. Otherwise all she gets from Roderick is pressure and the interactions of an investor, not a father.

Tammy gets the most parental interaction from Madeline, which is tragic as she’s trying to show her father that she can be the heir to his empire. But her aunt is the one who shows up to her presentation, who gives her the pep talk, consoles Tammy (in her own way) about the failure of her marriage, who believes Tammy when she is terrified by someone in the crowd.

Frederik is always focused on his father so Madeline doesn’t get many moments with him, but again Roderick is more of a CEO or boss than a father: focused on how to protect the company, how to secure the future. Little to no concern or support to his son as he mourns his wife’s injuries, as he deals with his siblings deaths, as he takes on more pressure from the world and the family. Roderick only mourns his son (as opposed to his heir) after Fredrick is dead.

Added to this: the security on all the kids? Madeline arranges it. When more kids die? We see Madeline demand it be doubled. She’s the only one still fighting for them, fighting fate itself.

With Lenore we see more interactions with her and Roderick but her interactions with Madeline are just as sweet and show a close, loving relationship. Lenore even calls her Granny Madeline. And Madeline is the one planning to preserve Lenore via AI: this must have been the main reason she begged Roderick to kill himself. Not to save her to but to spare Lenore. What’s the bet that she started working on the AI project in earnest when Morelle announced she was pregnant?

Madeline tracks down the supernatural entity they made a deal with and tries to negotiate a new deal: again (now we know the original terms) this is likely for Lenore’s benefit, not hers. She faces down a power far beyond herself and tries to save or protect what’s left of her family. Not Roderick.

Madeline took steps to preserve and protect her nieces and nephews, and grand niece while her brother did next to nothing. Once you know the nature of their deal with Verna, Roderick’s attitude to his remaining children after they remember who Verna is is just baffling.

Madeline even makes reference to birth control that she took on the off chance the deal was real. She says to Tammy that she didn’t want children with her first husband and hasn’t since, but she has been a mother to Rodericks kids. This lack of biological motherhood hasn’t spared her for the heartbreak of loosing a child. Or a grandchild.

And it’s even the decision of a man (again her brother) which is going to end her family’s legacy in another way. His marriage to Juno, his treatment of her, his denial of her fight to get clean and his horrible reference to himself as Victor Frankenstein and Juno as his monster - this is what pushes her to sign away the company when she inherits it. Madeline speaks about the board choosing her and moving the company away from pharmaceuticals, into the fields of AI and tech. Sure Madeline then died but a lot of the groundwork was likely there, and it could have been a possible path for the company. If Juno didn’t inherit it all and break it apart. Because of Roderick, and the way he treated her. Once again Madeleine’s legacy is destroyed by her brothers actions.

The irony of 1970’s Madeline declaring she doesn’t want to be limited by men’s choices or by a man, taking steps to protect her self and her heart, focussing her work on things outside of medical drugs in the hope that one day that can be what they become known for… then being doomed to more heartbreak and failure by every one of her brothers careless actions is so sadly tragic.

What I’ve learned about how my brain works:

About 2 weeks ago I finalised plans with my father to help me put a new fence post in my garden. The old one had rotted at the bottom, it was leaning, he said it would be the work of an afternoon to dig out the base, secure and concrete a new one and attach it to the existing fence. Date and plans confirmed, I ordered all the supplies to be collected on the day of the build.

This little bit of ‘DIY prep’ clearly activated an area of my brain which had been dormant through the winter.

That night I decided I would also like more green in my dining room: I’d seen and saved something on Pinterest several months before, so now was clearly the perfect time to make it. I ordered plastic hedge panels, cut them to size, wove them together using spare twine, wired the whole thing with spare string lights, and used green zip ties to attach fake succulents all over. I then drilled 5 large bolt holes in my wall to hang this art, ordered enough 2x4 wood to make a frame, measured and cut to size, stained it, attached corner brackets and TaDa…. 5ftx5ft wall art where 3 days before there was nothing.

So main DIY day comes and we do the thing, the new fence post is up and it’s all secure and great. Job jobed. My father leaves.

Once again my brain wakes up and goes ‘we like this accomplished feeling, more please’.

In the 5 days since the fence post was fixed I have:

Bought 2 more bags of white gravel (my front garden has needed this for almost 5 months), Put weed killer down on the existing gravel, in a garden shop sale I’ve bought 4 more large terracotta plant pots, bought 9 new summer/autumn heathers to go in them, sourced enough wood mulch, peat moss, and ericious soil to fill them all, reorganised and styled these new pots alongside my existing plant pots filled with winter/spring heathers, and weeded the rest of my front garden; ordered gravel boards to support and provide a level base for my small area of decking, sealed them and secured them to one another; researched and chosen the rose bush I will be planting in the spring; chosen and ordered enough fence paint to cover my garden (and ordered fence paint brushes), decided on the colour of my kitchen tile paint and bought foam rollers so I can start next weekend.

What I HAVE NOT DONE in the last 5 days, or the 5 before that when I first felt this dormant DIY urge:

Called my local plumber/handyman to fix the crack in my bathroom sink, which has been there since September, and means I can’t properly use said sink and have had to have a plastic bowl placed inside so I can wash my hands and/or face.

This weekend I plan to do more DIY and probably mine-sweep my local store for cheap plants to take home and ‘rescue’. Despite my best internal efforts, I will likely not call the plumber.

I don’t know why I’m like this.

It’s almost like the Usher children *knew* they weren’t going to live long and so they intentially left no marks upon the world.

Camille’s speech about how none of the kids actually makes or does anything is so startling: here is a group of people given all the opportunities and access money can buy, all of whom have had this their entire adult life, and they haven’t used it to create or build anything.

You can almost sense Roderiks disappointment in them, in his speech to Perry. He has this hyper focus on what his ‘investment’ money will fund, and says that ‘Ushers change the world’. But outside of himself and Madeline, not one of them has.

Frederick took the money, if he ever got any, and probably funnelled it back into his house or the company. By the looks of it he doesn’t have anything other than his family and his job, so there’s nothing for Roderick to invest in.

Tammy funnelled the money into a lifestyle brand, but one that wouldn’t have her at the front and centre. She scathingly reveals to Bill that she selected him to be her husband based upon his brand and marketability, showing she was ready to create this new empire but with her pulling strings in the shadows. From the outside it probably looks like she hasn’t created anything at all and that it’s all Bill, using his wife’s money. On top of this, the running gag of her storyline is that her brand and ideas aren’t even original, but are ripped off of Goop. So she hasn’t made anything new, and if Goldbug has any impact at all it will be no different to another more successful, more well know product. Hardly ‘changing the world’.

Victorine has some medial training but she looks to be a supporting role to her partner within their clinic, in which Al is the talented surgeon who people come to see and Victorine is a kind of silent partner. So she decided to go into medical devices or smart medical tech, but she relies upon the ideas and skills of others. As Camille said ‘the mesh is the surgeons, that’s why she’s fucking the surgeon’. And her medical knowledge seems to be limited if she thinks just her word and some money will move their experiments into human trials. So she also hasn’t ‘changed the world’ she’s just found someone else who was trying to and co-op-ed their ideas. You could even argue she poisoned those ideas, as Al mentions that the pain medication Victorine has been supplying looks like street drugs and wouldn’t stand up in any medical paper or research study.

Camille is, like she said, spinning furiously and going nowhere. She looks skilled in her field (from the analysis scenes we get, and Madeleine’s signing off on her PR analysis post Perry’s death) but she works from the shadows and hasn’t ‘created’ anything that wasn’t there before. There have been PR spin doctors before and there will be more to come; Camille offers nothing new ans hasn’t ‘changed the world’ in any measurable way. From what little we see of her work she hasn’t recreated a PR agency, hasn’t trained up other spin doctors under her, hasn’t created a brand or company which will outlast her. She leaves nothing behind to show what her skills or talents were.

Leo is shot down quickly when he claims he makes games: he doesn’t, he gives money to people who do. So he too will leave little to nothing behind when he’s gone. His references to past boyfriends show no long lasting relationships in his life and he has no other hobbies or pursuits we know of. Like Camille he hasn’t created a company to help with game design, hasn’t trained up others within this field he claims as his own. Even with the gaming ‘world’ it sounds like he changed very little. Fredrick’s throw away comments about Leo’s flat reveal that Leo hadn’t even had input in the decoration or style of his own home: he just latches onto the styles, ideas, aesthetic of his current boyfriend and goes with their ideas and plans. It’s such a small tiny thing but he truly has no original ideas in any aspect of his life.

And finally Perry, who’s desperate for that start up money but clearly has no plans or ideas on how to use it. He’s had a year and his main idea is an exclusive whisky bar. Even this idea, for all its crude intentions, shows his lack of vision: he doesn’t understand that to get the reputation he claims his bars would have will take time. You don’t just ‘create’ a consequent free bar celebrating decadence and privilege overnight. Reputations take time and as Madeline asks ‘what will be different about this one’ to draw people in to begin with? Studio 54 (which he compares his club to). only operated for 3 years before closing: not the smartest inclusion in an investment pitch.

To be fair to Perry though, looking at what the other siblings did or didn’t do with their loan money it seems a bit unfair that his ‘Blow job whiskey bar’ was shot down so decisively and cruelty. Assuredly Leo’s ‘video game studio for just myself’, Camille’s ‘PR agency just for me with my two assistants’, Victorines ‘medical training and clinic where I help out other surgeons’, Tammys ‘subscription lifestyle brand ripped off from a celebrity’ and Fredrick’s ‘I’d just like to work with you Dad’ were all clearly given the green light. But Perry apparently wasn’t good enough. Maybe this was a reaction to Roderick getting the news he was dying as so he wanted Perrys investment at least to actually change something, but still. He might as well give him the money either way at that point.

And I think it’s probably intended as a commentary on the ultra wealthy. Like of course people with more money than most counties have no plans to leave anything for the next generation. They have achieved their high levels of success by being solely focused upon themselves and so are honestly incapable of considering others. They are solely interested in enjoying the life they are currently living and why strain themselves to fight and build something when they don’t have to?

But it also works so well as a supernatural legacy and ironic conclusion to Roderick’s deal: he agreed that none of his bloodline would outlive him, and so none of them built anything that would.

The 13th Doctor

I’m just so happy. For a fantastic show, with all the lore, back story and potential that Dr Who has, that the new regeneration will be a woman is brilliant. And hats off to the creators, I think they did it right. When the idea first came up a couple of years ago I was sceptical in a caught off guard way. I’d never thought about the doctor being ABLE to be a woman, let alone if it was something I’d be happy with. But the writers made Missy her own character and made us love her for her own evilness and snark, for her wit and sheer force of personality. And only then did they reveal she was as once The Master. And she only got better and more complex this season. The arc with her and the previous regeneration perfectly encapsulates how a character can develop over time (now fighting alongside the Doctor instead of against him) while showing that the character can retain the same presence, gravitas and diabolical nature regardless of their gender. The scenes with those two were a delight to watch.

And now that we’ve seen that this can work and that a female Time Lord can be a powerful character I really can’t wait to see what they do with Jodie’s Doctor. What will her take on the character be (Tennant was brooding but bouncy, Smiths was a bit manic and yet dark, Capaldi's I found slightly more beaten down and world weary)? How will she interpret this change? Who knows but I can’t wait to see! Well done to the BBC for doing this and making a bold choice for the character and the show. Let’s breathe some new life into the fandom!

Ok first real post here so go easy on me.

If anyone’s been watching the Kdrama Reborn Rich, I have so many thoughts and predictions that I’m sure are going to turn out to be hilariously wrong but I just had to vent *somewhere* so forgive me my crazy ramblings. plus it’ll be fun to look back later and see how shockingly wrong I was.

But also potential spoiler warning in case I’m right about anything, plus I’ll be referencing events in the show up to episode 11.

SPOILERS

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So.

THE WORLD/ TIME TRAVEL/THE RULES

I think the world Yoon Hyun-woo has been reborn into, where he is now Jin Do-Jun has elements of self fulfilling prophecy and timeline correction. My evidence? Yoon Hyun-woo’s mum and the story Yoon Hyun-woo reads in the chairman’s autobiography that he shared with him as Jin Do-jun.

Jin Do-Jun is working off of the knowledge that he has from the previous OG timeline, and as such he can only make decisions based upon this. As Yoon Hyun-woo he didn’t know that his mum had bought stock: either the family never found out after she died or his Dad didn’t tell him.

So though he went to great lengths in the ‘new’ timeline to remove the reason why his mother died in the OG timeline (trying to save his fathers job, trying to ensure his father still got worker protections, finally trading and bartering leverage so that his father wouldn’t be on the picket line protesting and being beaten up on television) in an effort to save her life, he didn’t take any steps to stop his mother buying that stock or to protect its value. He also wasn’t aware how bad her mental or emotional state was in the OG timeline, and so couldn’t have predicted she would take her own life once that stock failed. And so in the ‘new’ timeline he’s blind sighted by her suicide.

So his future knowledge is limited to things he knew, and he might not know all the information about something. In those grey areas Hyun-woo knew nothing about, things can happen or could have happened to affect change. Plus in some ways the timeline will try and correct itself: In both the OG and new timeline the mother died. Some events are inevitable.

Secondly, when the chairman goes missing Do-Jun thinks he knows exactly where he will be, due to a story in the chairman’s autobiography that he read in the OG timeline as Hyun-woo. However this turns out to be wrong: the chairman is luckily nearby but not where Do-jun expects him to be and not for the reasons he thinks the chairman would be there. When Do-Jun shares the reasoning/story he knew from his life as Hyun-woo the chairman laughs, and then states it’s a good sounding story and he will use that from now on.

So Do-Jun’s knowledge from the OG timeline can be compromised or incorrect. Plus the chairman’s statement, that he will use this PR worthy story/reasoning going forward, could explain why this was the version in his autobiography that Hyun-woo read in the OG timeline. Self fulfilling prophecy, plus Do-Jun might not necessarily have the right information.

My read on this? While Do-Jun can make small changes, the larger events will still happen as the timeline corrects itself. The changes he can make are dependant on what he knows, and even that can be incorrect. And he may even *cause* some events to happen.

EPISODE 10/11 AND THE ACCIDENT

We’re made to think that in the OG timeline this crash happened and the OG chairman and Do-Jun were killed. Due to the changes Hyun-woo/Do-Jun has made as 4-2 (befriending the driver) this didn’t happen in the ‘new’ timeline. Wether this is true or not in the OG timeline I’m not sure. But if so the ‘new’ timeline will work to self correct and events will play out as if they had died.

We’ve seen the chairman is loosing mental capacity, likely a combination of the stress of the crash compounding his chronic condition. I think (once it comes to light) the siblings will use this to question his decisions regarding Do-Jun and the succession, and act to remove him as chairman. It will be as if the grandfather *had* died, but likely much more messy and dramatic within the family (due in no small part to Do-Jun’s actions in the series so far to ruin them all). Within this messy transfer of power I think Do-jun will loose much of his power and influence in company: the siblings taking the opportunity to get revenge on him for his actions in episodes 2-10. So in regards to the *succession* it will be as if Do-Jim *had* died in that crash.

But wait! In the OG timeline Do-Jun died in that first ‘accident’. And we can guess this lead to much of the tension we see between 4 and 4 Alpha and the rest of the family in the OG timeline in episode one. And why 4 Alpha wanted to ‘know the truth about the accident’. Surely this will be changed in this new timeline due to Do-jun’s survival?

No.

I think the timeline will move to correct itself.

I think there will be a second attempt on Do-Jun’s life, by the same person as the first (at this time we don’t know if this is his cousin Jin Seong-jun or Seong-Jin’s father/ Do-Jun’s uncle Jin Young-Kim: all that has been confirmed is that it’s not Seong-Juns wife, Mo Hyun-min). In this second ‘accident’ Do-jun will survive but, realising that this family member won’t stop trying to kill him and not wanting to put other friends and family at risk, he’ll decide to allow the family to think he is dead, and continue to work from the shadows to take the Jin family down. Do-Jim will realise that with his grandfather/the chairman having been removed he has lost much of his protection within the company and family, and he might not survive a further attempt on his life.

Do-jun will go into hiding, I think only telling his CEO friend Mason Oh that he’s alive and working to take Soonyang down. And once the ‘new’ timeline’s Hyun-woo turns up at Soonyang, Do-jun can use this resemblance to move around the place practically unnoticed: why would you think it’s Do-jun who’s been famously dead for 15 years? Much more likely to be a minor employee wandering where he shouldn’t be.

In essence I think the ‘new’ timeline we are in will eventual become the OG timeline, with some small changes. Think Harry Potter time turner rules: small things can change, but the overall narrative remains.

This second ‘accident’ will take the place of the first from the OG timeline: in this ‘new’ timeline Do-Jun’s mother 4-alpha will be suspicious of foul play as she overheard Do-jun and his father confirming the first accident was an assassination attempt. This will lead to the family breaking ties with the Jin’s until 2022, when 4-alpha once again returns for answers, offering her shares in the company as a bribe for the one who knows the truth.

The second ‘accident’ and Do-jun’s supposed death will cause Seo Min-young ( the prosecutor) to shut herself off enough to become the cold and focused person we saw in the OG timeline, and explains why she has a target on the Soonyang company: in this ‘new’ timeline she also knows the first ‘accident’ was planned and so will believe that her boyfriend has been killed by his family.

And my final out there prediction….

THE KILLERS IDENTITY

The whole series the main background mystery has been ‘which family member killed Hyun-woo in the OG timeline?’.

I think… Do-jun killed himself/hyun-woo in the OG timeline, and will order the hit on the Hyun-woo in this ‘new’ timeline.

Firstly and mainly, he will realise the self fulfilling prophecy and cyclical aspect of this life. In order to go back and effect these changes, Hyun-woo has to die and in that way (violently betrayed) so that he is motivated to destroy Soonyang once he becomes Do-jun.

Secondly Hyun-woo has to die in the course of brining Soonyang’s corruption to light, so that afterwards Do-jun can reveal himself, come back into the light and revel in the groups destruction. Do-jun can’t reveal himself if Hyun-woo is still alive: they’re in essence twins. Questions will be asked and mainly by Hyun-woo himself as to why they are identical. But no one is going to suspect foul play if there is clearly Hyun-woo’s body, in the centre of an international corruption scandal, with a well documented life working for Soonyang, who can’t speak for himself anymore to contradict Do-Jun’s and explanations.

Plus as time passes from Hyun-woos death people will forget *exactly* what he liked like and only remember that he resembled the prodigal son who has just returned, Do-jun.

So yeah, I think Do-Jun will have to spend the next ~20yrs working from the sidelines and background to make small issues and problems for Soonyang and the Jin family, kind of like how he did before he was revealed as the main investor in Miracle. Lots of sneaky work and near misses, kind of a death by a thousand cuts plan. And he will set up/add to/make worse the things he knows the family will do between now and present day, so that they will be caught by prosecutors in 2022. And when that time comes the whole group and family will be taken down in one go.

Anyway, that’s my thoughts on the world, we’ll have to wait and see if it’s correct! I haven’t read the web comic the who is based on so I have no idea what’s coming down the line.

Anyone agree? Or really disagree with these thoughts?

*One Day Netflix Spoilers*

You can interpret it however works for you, and I don’t know how it played out in the book, but I loved the scene where Em and Dex got together.

Because Emma *chose* Dexter. When she didn’t have to, when she had other options, knowing all of his baggage, and knowing that they would probably be able to stay friends if she didn’t. And she still chose to start something romantic with him.

Emma was at the highest point of her success: a published author, signed for a second book, sent to live abroad in an exciting new city. And she’d started seeing someone who (from the little we see) is kind, charming, and cares for her. Emma is winning in every sense!

And she initially rejects Dexter. Her reasons make sense; she doesn’t feel he truly *wants* to be with her, just that she’s there and he’s lonely. She is sure of herself and her place in the world, and turns down the man she used to crush on because she wants it to be real. When given this opportunity were not shown a knee jerk, desperate, ‘oh my god, finally, yes!’ moment when he says he wants to be with her. She was NOT waiting on this, and she’s not PINING for him. It actually shows huge strength that when the man she used to like finally wants to be with her, she has the inner strength to say no and stick to what she deserves; a proper relationship with someone who truly wants her, not a placeholder.

Dexter lays his heart on the line, leaves himself competent venerable, and Em says no.

You could interpret Em coming back as unsatisfactory: a woman in her prime, going back to the man she’s been pining over most of her adult life. But it can also be seen as an empowering moment.

Emma knows all of Dexters issues and chooses him anyway. Dexter has literally just laid out his current headspace and issues, and it’s clear she was supporting him as the divorce was announced and agreed upon. And previous episodes show they’ve been close throughout Dexters marriage and fatherhood, with Em stopping in at his job and answering his late night calls. She’s been his best friend again for several years and knows his struggles, so she is going in to any romantic relationship with her eyes open.

Reducing Emma’s choice to being a silly or naive one I think misses huge parts of who she is, things which are key to her characterisation. Throughout the series she’s shown as intelligent, savvy, switched on and determined. Even when she’s unhappy or trying different things, she is sure in her conviction to do *something*. When she’s unhappy at the restaurant and Dex suggests teaching she makes a career change and trains. When she’s at her lowest (post headteacher affair and loosing Dex) she turns rock bottom into a spring board and tries once again to write her novel.

Emma is the embodiment of conviction. Whether it’s knowing what she wants or just knowing what she doesn’t, she is decisive and commits to her path. She’s the perfect foil for Dex who’s lesson across the series is to stop running from difficult feelings, and learn to process unpleasant emotions.

So she didn’t choose Dexter on a whim, and I love that they showed that. Em leaves Dex, turns him down, and goes to dinner with her lover in the city she’s loving living in, while doing the job she always wanted.

And she could have left it like that and they would have likely remaking friends. They did after that kiss at Tilly’s wedding, and after they slept together. So she has nothing to loose by rejecting him.

But Emma *chooses* Dex. She knows herself and what she wants, she knows who she is and what she is now capable of. What she wants, if it’s on the table, is to be with Dexter. So she commits to it.

They could have made her jump at the option to be with Dex. The writer could have had them get together when Dex was at the height of his fame or Em at the lowest point of her life. And either of those could have easily had a sense of fear on Em’s part: to be equal to Dex, to be good enough for him (in her head), to finally make it. But doing it this way gives her all the power, all the agency. And I *love* that.

From comments later it’s clear their relationship was good, they do work well together and they make one another happy. We’ll never know how Emma’s life could have gone if she stayed with Jean-Pierre. But the life she chose with Dex *was* happy. As Ian said ‘[Dex] made her so so happy’: wether you think she could have done better or deserved more, a life with someone who makes you happy… isn’t an insignificant thing.

We’ll never know if it was *the right* choice to be with Dex. But seeing how happy she was it’s clear it was a *good* choice. And that’s all we can ever hope for.