Why do you think Beth’s character is always reduced down to her relationship with men? It feels like, at times, we only view her through that lens. I wish the Dean/Rio narrative was less central to the show.
Mmmm, I don't entirely agree? I think she's frequently impacted by her relationships with men, for sure, but that's because the show uses those relationships as catalysts for Beth's journey forwards (and backwards!) and as both internal and external stressors to her overall arc. Dean, Rio, Turner, Fitzpatrick and Nick have all been antagonists to Beth's protagonist at one point or another, and their role in the narrative while they are is to drive her arc through conflict, interruption, tension, backing her into corners or showing her doors she didn't even know were there.
That said, I do think Beth's arc is the most conflict-driven arc on the show, and is frequently the plot driver over Annie's and Ruby's, which often go through more introspective storylines that detour from the main narrative thrust. Ruby's had that frequently with Sara, Stan and her own moral crisis, while Annie's had it with the therapy storyline and Ben.
Those stories do often come full circle to tie into the main plot, usually as drivers in their own right – needing money for Sara's meds and Ben's transition have been huge motivators for Ruby and Annie in crime after all – but they are less about the throughline of narrative tension that keeps the story moving at the pace it moves, so it allows those arcs a bit more space.
With that weight placed on Beth though, I think we lose some of that narrative room for Beth to reconnect with why she's doing what she's doing. There have been moments of it – like her guilt over Danny's broken arm in the most recent season, or Jane going missing in 2.07, but they're both things that are ultimately weaponised against her again (Dean telling Beth Danny didn't even ask for her, Dean accusing Rio of taking Jane ergo blaming Beth when he was the one that lost her).
That sort of weaponisation is designed to spin around that domestic tension and push Beth in a way that drives plot again, and usually means we have less time to sit with Beth's feelings than we do with Annie and Ruby, who by nature of their role narratively are allowed those greater introspective arcs.
I think that can make it feel like Beth's being moved by the men in her life, and, well, that's kind of because she is a lot of the time, but I don't see that as her character being reduced to them. I think her character is frequently responding to them, but that alone is something that's close to the show's heart. It's so frequently about the situations women are forced into by the men in their lives, and Beth's arc has from the very beginning been about trying to re-claim her agency in the wake of that. It was something that was never going to be easy, but I think it's really rich as a source of conflict and I've personally loved watching Beth grapple with that over the series' run!
