Joshua Jackson – Zosha Millman

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Where to start with this finale.

As finales go, I would say this one isn’t going down in the hall of fame, but still managed to be a fairly entertaining (and jam packed!) hour of television. The show has definitely evolved in its ten episodes; taking a turn away from the subtlety of, say, “Mad Men” for the full-on soapy-nature “Nashville” somewhere in there. Which all culminates, sort of, in this finale. Guns are brandished about, passionate love-making sessions fly by (save some montage for the rest of us, Noah), and no one is happy about most things in their life.

When I was taking notes for this post, I found a lot more of my notes were abrupt things that would normally be jotted down in the “additional thoughts” bullet points following an article that discussed a bigger aspect of the episode. Which is probably where this finale fails to feel like a finale: it’s got way too much plot and very little answers to back it up. Sometimes that makes the questions fun—now that Noah is arrested and we’ve seen that look between him and Allison before she answers the door for the police, I’m a lot more interested in learning what’s happening in the time between these plot lines. But in other ways that variation in tone can make for a scatterbrained episode of TV, and when that episode happens to be your finale it can create some problems.

This episode feels like the capper to a whole different breed of season, which until now has seemed to only casually dabbled into the frenetic pacing of primetime soaps. An earlier episode might’ve taken the time to explore or at least observe Allison in her new sense of serenity that she’s found at her mother’s hippie camp. It would splash around in the fact that she’s now on great terms with Athena, but by the time she’s back to Cole she brushes off her mother as “the same.”

Easily one of the way the show has changed most in how it handles its perspective-shifting tool, which in the scenes at the ranch is the most jarring it’s ever been in this episode. The explanations I’ve read from the creator haven’t fully satisfied my craving for justification. I’m all for exploring how a tense and stressful situation could lead to unreliable memories, but here I’m prone to think there’s a bigger, longer con being played on us as an audience, because there’s no way you straight up disagree of the cause, location, players, etc. that much. But at this point in time I have no idea what they would be covering up with a trick like that.

It’s a shame too, because Joshua Jackson was really acting his ass off in his monologue. Cole’s been an interesting slow-boil this season; easily the member of a couple we know and see the least about. He also seems to be one of the only people in the entire universe of “The Affair” who still believe in loving, happy marriages. From Noah’s agent to Noah to Helen to Helen’s parents, there’s so much pessimism of people who seemed to make calculated choices with their marriage, but Jackson really sells that Cole and Allison were very happily in love and married for that reason.

And where will he be next season? Where will anyone be next season, really? I guess we’ll now be dealing with flash forwards where Noah is undergoing some sort of legal processing (court? prolonged stint in jail?), and as interested as I am in that plot line I do wonder whether the show will try to return to its roots—here being the way Allison and Noah’s relationship has created a ripple effect across the lives of so many people—now that its ironed out the first season. That plot line would fit into Allison’s explanation to Detective Jefferies that whatever wedding they were at was because it’s a tight community, despite whatever animosity they may have.

I guess we’ll find out if “The Affair” is more “Parks and Rec,” figuring out their footing and running from there; or “30 Rock,” moving from a smart, tightly crafted show to a more goofy (though mostly just as smart) and looser show model.

I don’t know why it makes me so excited now that we know Allison is on whatever Noah is hiding but it does. She’s been so good this whole season, I’m intrigued to see how they justify this.
Please don’t let it be a “we’re so hopelessly in love I’d do anything for you baby” reason.
Are all the men in this world scumbags, or just the one Noah attracts? I feel like one way “The Affair” writers can grow in season 2 is by making the conversation between men not so heavy-handed about their marital strife.
Maura Tierney, bringing it as per uzghe this week. Here she’s in a confusingly believable scene where Noah is shocked Helen is even considering divorce proceedings (four months after he moved out because he told her he was in love with someone else) and yet still lets her beg him to return to their house.
I’d be interested to see more from Noah and Helen’s oldest son, who clearly has a solid grasp on the emotions running rampant through his household, even if his parents don’t.
Whitney is consistently the perfect 17-year-old who honestly can’t see that a 30-year-old sleeping with her is a red flag, and then takes it out on those around her.
In Noah’s version of events both Helen and Allison are in white, with Allison wearing a high neckline and Whitney wearing a lower cut. But in Allison’s her and Helen are in more muddy colors, and Whitney is practically dressed like a catholic school girl.
Well guys, we did it! I hope these have been as much fun for you as they have for me. I’ll be back with more when season 2 hits, and hopefully a show or two in between now and then.

I’ve touched on this point in the past, but let’s take a time out from Noah and Allison to talk about how great their spouses are. Specifically the actors. It’s not easy to play someone through someone else’s eyes and to make that character convincing. But Maura Tierney and Joshua Jackson do just that.

There’s a certain subversive element to Tierney’s performance. Her character could easily have been a shrew stock-type, nagging Noah and ultimately driving him away. But Tierney’s performance elevates the character exponentially, giving Helen a real life feel that could’ve so easily been swept under the rug.

This week, as she confronts Noah about his affair, it’s so interesting to watch the way Tierney handles the dialogue–particularly interesting given that it’s all being filtered through Noah to us. We’re able to see the things that he perceives she values, and it’s sort of remarkable the way Tierney is able to balance his intake with her emphasis. When she calls Allison “just a waitress” you can see how that line stands out to him (this show often mingles with the idea of class, and we know that his and Helen’s relationship is at an awkward crux around it), but Tierney give it its own spin. She’s a wife trying to grasp how her husband could so monumentally fuck up for an appeal she can’t understand.

She’s been through this with her own father and mother, and it’s Tierney who really drives that point home in the scene. This is a woman who in some way steeled herself for this for years. She wants him to give her the standard reasons we can assume her father did–she was 22, she was a model–anything other than that he threw away his entire life, her life, her kids’ lives, for “just a waitress.”

Jackson’s portrayal of Cole in this episode is such a gentle example of what a constipation their communication has become. Their differences are stark: how they feel about the city, how they feel about the porch, how they feel about change in their lives; and Allison senses this. We know she does; we see it week after week when Cole makes an offhand comment to her and she grimaces.

This scene made me feel a lot of feelings.

Which is why his monologue is so heartbreaking. Until now we haven’t really spent enough time with just Cole (and Allison, I suppose), so it’s an abrupt shift when Allison sits alone with him and finally sees how much pain he’s in. She’s always seen his passion; even when it’s bad, she can see how much he cares for her and his family.

But, in some of the best acting and writing I think this show has to offer, Allison is never aware when Cole turns that love towards her. She’s shocked when the real reason he came to the city isn’t to hunt down the man who might’ve stolen their coke but to figure out why she did it.

It occurred to me that until now no one on the show has touched on how Cole handled Gabriel’s death. It’s possible in her blind grief Allison wasn’t even aware he woke up every night in tears. So it’s left to Jackson (who really knocks it out of the park here) to communicate all that pain and grief that he’s locked up inside of him, and the result is heart-wrenching.

In most circumstances it’d be easy to brush off some simple psychology like his anecdote about his father’s death, but here it slips in nicely with how Cole and Allison have been so out of sync. In his experience previously he found a way to return to normal. And while he can’t fathom why that can’t happen now, she knows that this change has to see itself through, and she knows she can’t do it in Montauk. But now that she’s remembered that the alpha male can step out of his shell, she might be starting to think that she can do it with Cole.

Stray thoughts:

I really find myself rooting for the married couples. Or at least Cole and Allison. In the end it didn’t seem to me like she was saying goodbye to Noah as she looked as the skyline, so much as she was finally getting the change she needed from her own relationship.
I feel like they could blow their entire affair just based on how many times they pretend to be introduced to each other. I mean, good god.
The Detective story here seemed almost slipped in for necessity but not in a bad way. I’m just so intrigued by it I’m always left wanting more.

Tag: Joshua Jackson

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