here are my Eddie Diaz specific wishes for the beginning of season 8 because the only way out is through and if I think too hard about where this season as a whole ended up and that bizarre lackluster finale I’ll have an out of body experience:
have this Eddie and Chris storyline actually mean something. if you’re gonna do this drastic traumatic thing in such a rushed way you have to do something with it. Could some time apart be good? sure! maybe! but don’t just have Chris gone and offscreen not speaking to his dad and never seen at all until they arbitrarily decide Eddie has done enough penance that he can be narratively rewarded by having his son back.
as good of a dad as Eddie is and as much as he wants to give Chris the space there’s still a big difference between not breaking down the door of a bedroom and a distance of 1000+ miles for months. let him go to Texas as the PARENT. bring Chris into the narrative. he’s older and more aware now, so have his decisions matter. have him face the reality of living with the Diaz parents who historically are probably not going to give him the freedom and respect he’s used to and let it become clear how different Eddie has always been in his approach to him… show us some flashbacks of Eddie’s own childhood, let Chris come to a deeper understanding of his father! let them actually talk about Shannon and what happened with Kim in a real way… let him fully realize his dad isn’t perfect but he tries so hard and let Chris recognize him as human and the value of what Eddie gives through that. if it’s about Gavin’s availability something like this can still be achieved in an arc of a few episodes if it’s given actual time and focus
let Eddie have a real confrontation with his parents about all of this. They flew from Texas to California in the middle of the night without a word to their own adult son and acted like it was their right to let a 13 year old make the call about his own parenting while Eddie was vulnerable and panicking. Without prior knowledge of the situation, without letting anything cool down. Let him tell them that was THE WRONG THING TO DO! Don’t have him get interrupted, don’t let them talk over him about how they know better, don’t let one of them drop dead while he’s letting his emotions out. Eddie always feels like he’s being punished when he does something for himself because, well, the narrative punishes him. DON’T PUNISH HIM.
let him tell Helena how deeply it hurt him when she said he was dragging Christopher down with him all those years ago and how this felt like a second instance of that, let him feel betrayed by the way Ramon handled this situation regarding HIS fatherhood and HIS son after all the time they’ve spent working on their own relationship, let him tell them they DON’T know better than him because he makes mistakes because they did too! let him tell them he’s a good father! let him feel like a good father! he is one!
if you want to explore who Eddie is when he doesn’t have Chris and only has himself to look after then actually do it. let him look after himself. For himself. don’t have him only be miserable and still feeling like a failure months later, don’t let him keep circling the drain just idealizing what he and Shannon had. Devin is great but my god… we need to let Shannon rest. As nuts as it was I tried to roll with the doppleganger storyline because I thought well, at least this will lead somewhere and ultimately be a catharsis even if it’s wild. but like then even that wasn’t fully formed and was twisted into a punishment and fresh trauma so?? whether he finally goes to some sort of grief group or gets to heal his inner child or whatever else, let him actually get something out of also making himself a priority in his own life and quit repeatedly destroying the ground under his feet and blaming himself with no end in sight
does Eddie deserve to get to a more mentally healthy place (especially after whatever the fuck all that was)? yeah! is healing linear? absolutely not, and I do love that this show doesn’t shy away from that with everyone’s respective trauma. but mental health is also not a game of punishments and rewards where keeping his own son around is what he gets for whatever passes for model behavior as decided by his parents and an emotional teenager. nobody has to earn the right to love or happiness or to keep raising their own child by sanding down all of their jagged edges and they’re usually very good about showing that so give him that same grace
okay this isn’t Eddie but literally fucking stop… repeatedly torturing Hen and Karen and their children. Stop it. stop. Right now. Stop.
kill Gerrard in a sharknado
