To follow up on your recent ask -- do you think Rio's forgiven Beth for shooting him? Do you think he's ready to move on from that? Truth be told -- I'm not ready so I feel so ambivalent about them getting more romantic without any confrontation. And I'm a huge brio shipper. I know, I know... We may never get that confrontation/even a little hashing out around it, it just is so important! I don't know how they could have something *real* [like stable and honest -- I do think what they have is real] without it. Not that I think the show would give us a happy stable brio but... Still. [I know I went off on my own thoughts in this ask]
Do I think he’s forgiven her? No, not particularly—not for the shooting or, frankly, for anything else she’s done to him. Nor do I think Beth has forgiven him for kidnapping her or setting her up and betraying her when she trusted him. I think they’ve just pushed forward, so each new hurt cuts the wound a little deeper at the same time that it piles another mine on top of a pile of mines that are precariously stacked to the point that setting off one of them may cause a total chain reaction.
But I think Rio’s confronted her on the shooting several times and punished her for it several times over—doing everything he can short of physically hurting her or the people she cares about most—so I guess I don’t really think it’s something that’s a barrier for him recognizing and acting on his real feelings for her. In some ways, I think he’s resigned to them.
It really seems like with the shift in how Rio is approaching handling Beth—and the tests he has given her with guns specifically—that he’s sussed out where her lines are and knows that she doesn’t actually desire to take him out, meaning he may have reckoned with why she actually pulled the trigger in that moment.
I wanted a confrontation for my own catharsis, not only because I think it’s important for Beth to take accountability to Rio’s face, but because I wanted Beth to get the space to talk about how she felt in that moment too (I know what she did to Rio was worse, but it didn’t come out of nowhere—it was a reaction to a particularly intense moment after discovering a particularly gutwrenching betrayal in the middle of a specifically designed and high stakes punishment—and I find that Beth’s feelings about how Rio’s treated her really, really get lost in this conversation generally).
I don’t know. I’m not sure Beth uttering the words “I’m sorry” will actually do anything for Rio at this point? What are those words to actions? Rio seems to be trying to make her prove her loyalty through what she does, not what she says. He really does want to build some sort of future with her in all senses of the word.
I think a lot of people are in your boat and I understand feeling that way. I think it’s the wrong choice to make for the characters and the story not to let them address it, personally, but I’ve never thought Beth and Rio were going to have something stable or honest and I also find it frustrating generally how there seems to be a deep desire to see Beth punished at the same time that many people ignore the ways that she’s actually already been punished? I find that they very much are back into a pattern of back-and-forth in terms of how they are treating each other, meaning when one person strikes, the other strikes back—and when one person softens, the other person softens.
I think somehow they’ve rebalanced to be fairly close to equal, and I actually think we’re going to see the flip side with Rio (I assume) turning in Annie, which is about the deepest wound that Rio could inflict on Beth without crossing an uncrossable line, as well.
Still, I’d like her to acknowledge it instead of shutting down or deflecting when it comes up. I think it should’ve happened before what was supposed to be the end of season 3 and now I’m not really sure that it will happen at all. If it never does, I’ll be disappointed, but personally I’m still going to watch and enjoy and ship because to me, their dynamic is intriguing, complex, and interesting enough that I still find it enjoyable—I just lean in to the fucked up nature of it, personally, but I know that’s not for everybody.
