#sharp objects meta

[randomishnickname]

Thinking about Amma Crellin and her actions as reflections of the social hierarchy she grew up in. (spoilers under the cut)

Amma is pretty much Windgap royalty. Not only is her family extremely wealthy, her mother holds power over the livelihoods of big parts of the population. Her family history is deeply tied to that of Windgap. The sheriff and other officials are at Adora's beck and call. Everyone knows Adora and deferes to her, and this status transfers to Amma:

She plays the star part in the school play as a matter of course. She can get away with everything, from shoplifting to breaking curfew, from taking drugs to insulting and taunting a police officer. She's hot shit and very good at being a hot girl to boot, on the way to being prom queen like Camille once was. Her friends do everything she wants. Boys, she feels, are hers to control. Others are her playthings. At home, she's at the mercy of her mother. In the rest of Windgap, she's invicible.

Then, Ann and Natalie. Both outsiders who moved to Windgap only recently, their family without social capital worth speaking of. Both freaks, misfits - tomboys and late bloomers, still running through the woods instead of following the norms of girlhood and femininity. Still lacking self-control, prone to tantrums and biting. In the social hierarchy both of the school and the town, they're near the bottom - it's interesting Amma was friends with them once at all, but then this keen sense for social status often becomes more prominent once puberty hits. I think it's a safe bet they were bullied. They were not cool girls. And so Amma, who never faces consequences for everything, who's royalty, who has friends entirely devoted to her - she's safe killing them, in her good right almost, they're nobodies, and Windgap, that she knows so well, proves her right by not even once suspecting her. Had not an other outsider and freak, Camille, disturbed the status-quo, she would have gotten away with everything swimmingly. Her friends laugh about it too - Ann and Natalie's lives don't seem to have had much worth to them.

[I do believe her choice of killing Natalie wasn't entirely out of convenience either - I have the suspicion that Amma had a childhood crush on Natalie's older brother John that got rejected, and that killing his beloved little sister was a form of punishment for this unheard of outrage. Amma telling Camille John fancies her (despite him treating her like a venomous snake in the pool scene) could be a sort of wish fullfilment. Would explain how viciously she latches onto the 'baby killer' narrative.]

And then, Mae. To me it's VERY MUCH not a random choice to have Mae be a black kid. The only people of color Amma has probably ever met in the conferedate nostalgia enclave of Windgape are domestic workers that obeyed her, or workers at her mother's pig farm who defered to her, all of them incredibly lower on the social hierarchy than the litte Windgap princess. And now she meets this black city kid, who lives in a rented apartment, maybe with a single mom. That's not someone Amma would respect, or consider on her level, but instead I think she'd have this deep belief that Mae was her inferior and should obey her, defer to her. Did she plan on killing her when Camille granted Mae attention? Or did Mae refuse her somehow, got sick of being bossed around, in this fight they supposedly had?

And I love how all of this is both implicit and subtle yet crystal clear, in everything we learn about Ann and Natalie, the way their peers describe them (in contrast to the adults who are more proficient liars), in every interaction we see between the white upper class of Windgap and POCs.

[jilyandbambi]

Adora Crellin is only able to feel even a facsimile of love for her daughters when she's actively killing them, and that...that........I just......

[hearthouses]

sharp objects and the art of pov

Forgive me, but I need to get a little lit analysis 101 here for a minute because I am seeing a lot of obtuse and willfully dense posts about the narrative voice in Sharp Objects and the authorial intent of Gillian Flynn. There is this persistent idea that Flynn hates her protagonist, Camille Preaker, and wrote her with a lack of respect, and did not present her as someone to empathized with, but rather scorned or pitied. This idea largely, I think, comes from the language used in the novel to describe Camille and her state of mind, as well as the reader’s own perspective of Camille herself and their inability to empathize with her. While I could understand this argument if the book was written in third person omniscient with the narrator (aka the author) controlling how Camille is presented, however—the novel is not written in third person omniscient, but first person point-of-view.

We are in Camille’s perspective throughout the entirety of the book, so her observations and thoughts about herself are meant to reflect how she thinks of herself, not what Flynn thinks of her. Of course, you can argue that Flynn chose to write her that way, but that argument is disingenuous and a misdirection to the point that the idea that Flynn hates her own protagonist because… she wrote her as having low self esteem and self-isolating behaviors after years of abuse, self-harm, and trauma from rape. You cannot argue that the way Camille is written is a reflection of how Flynn feels about her because Camille acts as an unreliable narrator, her perspective is not meant to be “the truth” of who Camille is, but rather her own distorted perception.

Negative self-perception and self-worth aren’t uncommon in people who have survived the things Camille has, and it’s not disrespectful to her to depict that with truthfully and with sharp accuracy. Camille’s point-of-view of herself is ugly and discomforting, but it’s meant to be. The novel is an examination of the mindset of someone who doesn’t see herself as worth much, but persists anyway; Camille survives despite everything, which is the beauty of the novel, which is the strength of Camille. She is not her to self empower herself and teach the audience to love themselves, Camille is the nitty gritty ugliness of what survival looks like and the process of getting through day to day life when you carry every negative thing in your life around with you, unable to unpack it and unable to heal the right way.

To that call that “disrespecting” Camille, is a massive misunderstanding of what the novel is about and I feel the reader needs to take a step back and examine why they see Camille as a figure to be reviled or pitied, why they are projecting those ideas on Camille, and then laying the blame on the author, who clearly loves Camille Preaker, as she has stated, more than once: 

To me, she's a fucking hero. To me, someone who's been in that much psychological pain and still keeps her head above water, still manages to move through her day and be kind to people — you never see Camille save the cat, or run into a burning building, but you do see Camille be consistently kind to everyone. You see in Camille a consistent decency. For someone who has been through as much as she has, to do that and to be still alive, to me is heroic. I think it's important for people to see what has happened to her, and what she's been through. So for me it was a privilege to be able to be in the writer's room and flush out that episode and be part of that. - Gillian Flynn,  JULY 22, 2018, for Hollywood Reporter

[lovethatcoat]

Cluster B Parenting in Sharp Objects Part 2

I was thinking about how Amma turned out and what was different when she grew up compared to Camille’s situation.

First, let’s look at the more minor influences. It seems like Amma doesn’t have the close connection to Jackie that Camille has. Jackie clearly was a positive, loving influence for Camille. Research has shown there are factors like the continued support of a trusted adult, which bolster an individual’s resilience and counteract the negative outcomes of having had multiple adverse childhood experiences. Of course, Camille still does exhibit multiple harming behaviours to herself and others (it can be argued she’s being retraumatised in multiple ways throughout the story, so there’s likely an element of regression as well), but in contrast to Amma she’s kept a more intact moral compass and empathy.

Jackie was still more whole when Camille grew up and able to be a positive influence. However, the death of Marian and her inability to prevent it or stop Adora from continueing causes her to retreat and drown her guilt in alcohol, making her a less effective influence for Amma.

The same might have happened with Alan whose grief over Marian’s death might cause him to engage more in numbing himself with music and alcohol than he did before (not that he wasn’t bloody useless before - letting Adora kill his daughter under his very nose).

Furthermore, despite her mother’s meddling Camille had a close, loving relationship with her sister Marian. Her ultimate death was of course a big blow, but before that it was a positive influence Amma didn’t have.

The biggest influence on Amma is of course Adora. After Marian had died and Camille escaped her clutches, Adora turned her attentions to her youngest child. I already wrote about Camille and Marian playing the scapegoat and golden child roles in Adora’s game and at first glance it seems like Amma has replaced Marian as golden child. She’s Adora’s perfect baby girl and lets her poison her.

So now, who is the scapegoat? Adora appears to still invoke Camille as a warning to Amma not to be “incorrigible”. However, I only just noticed, Adora is doing the same with the golden child role and Marian. We hear it from Amma’s mouth, but the idea likely was put there by Adora: Marian was perfect and Amma can only hope to approach that. So basically Adora triangulates Amma between the scapegoat archetype Camille and the golden child archetype Marian. Amma is very aware of having to play a role and she does it quite well, which is then rewarded by her mother.

Amma doesn’t have a stable role, she lives on unstable ground, being subjected to the poisonous “love” of her mother as golden child and constantly in danger of being demoted to scapegoat if her performance is deemed lacking (or her mother’s unstable mood demands it lbr). It’s basically the push-pull dynamic romantic partners of personality disordered people have to deal with. It might explain why Amma feels like she has to fight for her mother’s attention by eliminating the competition.

Another thought: Camille’s arrival likely solidifies Amma in the golden child role by taking over the scapegoat role, so this is the behaviour we see from Adora while Amma’s words still echo previous treatment from the time before Camille was there.

[jilyandbambi]

sybilius replied to your post “I just spent 2 hours reading all of Sharp Objects from cover to cover...”

i never read the book but their relationship in the show is absolutely perfect

In the book, Amma comes off as more sociopathic (I say, as someone without a background in psychology). Her and Amma’s first meeting and first official introduction is much frostier than in the miniseries, and overall her character comes off as a lot more cold-hearted and malicious. Yes, even given the reveal. Even her interactions with Camille read, to me, as less “damaged child with a warped sense of boundaries attempting to forge a bond with the big sister she’s always been curious about,” and more “Genderswapped, Southern-Gothic Ramsay Bolton who’s found a new toy.” It’s less needling Camille in an attempt to get to know her because she’s actually curious and more teasing Camille purely out of maliciousness and jealousy. 

Even Amma’s attempt to make amends with Camille following the scene at the dress shop plays out differently in the show vs. the book, emphasizing why I (a non-psychologist) would say book!Amma as someone exhibiting signs of Antisocial Personality Disorder. In the book, Amma makes peace with Camille by offering her a joint (drugs, something Amma enjoys + takes comfort in), whereas in the miniseries, Amma makes up for the shopping trip by giving Camille a long-sleeved dress (apology rooted in something that will make Camille happy + feel comfortable). 

I point to the differences in these two scenes to say that show!Amma, from the moment of her and Camille’s proper introduction, exhibits a keen desire to know Camille, the person, to forge a bond with her, to become important to her, to be saved by her (”Take me to St. Louis with you”//”Please stay”//”You could practice on me.”//running away during the Calhoun Day play so that Camille--and Camille, specifically, will come and find her//) 

(Side note, it’s my strong opinion, as--and I cannot stress this enough--a non-psychologist that show!Amma isn’t actually a psychopath or a sociopath or has any shades of whatever Adora’s illness is; rather, I think Amma is suffering from a severe case of C-PTSD, as is Camille, and Amma’s crimes (like Camille’s cutting) are a way of reliving/playing out the years-long trauma inflicted on her by Adora--NOT THAT THIS IS AN EXCUSE OR ME WOOBIFYING HER, just character analysis-->but this is another post. Anywho, I bring this up because looking for a “rescuer”-->someone to take you away from the abuse (Amma) or save you from the pain/trauma of reliving it (Camille) is one of the key symptoms of C-PTSD. I think Amma definitely does this with Camille and I think Camille does this again and again, with Jackie (which is part of the reason she’s so betrayed at Jackie’s revelation), with Curry, with Alice (who reminds Camille of the sister who was her ‘anchor’ during the time of the abuse), and finally, with Amma. It’s complicated, and I don’t want this side note to become a post unto itself. Moving on!) 

All this is why I hands down prefer Amma’s characterization and her and Camille’s relationship by extension in the miniseries as opposed to the way it’s presented in the novel. The changes to the character and to the development of the relationship enriches both, taking Camille and Amma from two irreparably  people trying to use the other to, at times, fill a void (Camille) and take apart and discard (Amma) the way the do in the books; to two abuse victims who grow to love one another quite deeply and see in one another the chance to heal and find the safety and unconditional love they’ve always sought. 

The latter, in my opinion, makes the ending of Amma and Camille’s story that much more of a gut-punch. However flawed and unhealthily, show!Amma genuinely loved Camille, wanted to know her, wanted to be a family with her, and Camille wanted the same, just as ardently, which is why it hurts so mcfricken badly when their happy ending gets snatched away from both of them once the truth is revealed. It’s also why, I don’t think, we needed the novel’s epilogue included in the miniseries. 

In the novel, Amma never asks for Camille to take her in (unless I’m missing some scenes). It happens, eventually, but it kind of goes sour from the start. Amma isn’t happy with Camille and Camille takes Amma out of obligation and is just as miserable. There’s no sense of closure, of catharsis, of YES, this is what they deserve that then gets ripped away when the truth comes out. In the book, Camille and Amma aren’t each other’s happy endings, Camille’s happy ending is going to live with the family of choice she’s found with Curry and Eileen. I think they cut this part out of the miniseries because the journey we went on with these characters in this retelling is different. Being together with Amma in St. Louis was what show!Camille wanted and now that she’s lost it, the horror sets in not just because of the twist, but also because the viewer knows there won’t be any coming back from this for Camille (Amma, I think, knows this, too, which is why her “Don’t tell Mama” at the end, to me, sounds regretful, for what both she and Camille are going to lose. In the book, she’s described as smug). 

Paradoxically, though, the changes the miniseries made leave me hopeful for Amma, pre-reveal, I mean. If she, after 13 years of abuse and gaslighting was still able to desire and form any semblance of a genuine connection and emotional attachment suggests to me that show!Amma, at least, wasn’t always a lost cause and could have been saved from herself had Jackie stayed on the wagon or Camille come home sooner. Book!Amma, on the other hand, reads as having always been a little mini-Adora, which makes this iteration much less interesting to me, tbh. 

[jilyandbambi]

elegantvamp replied to your post “Adora Crellin is only able to feel even a facsimile of love for her...”

Munchausen's by Proxy. Shes a narcissist who wants to feel needed so she poisons her children so they'll rely on her to be a caretaker.

Oh yeah, this I know. Even so, from what I’ve read, it’s rare for MBP to result in the child’s death. I think something like less than 10% actually result in death. But Adora’s case seems to be especially severe. Marian was an accident, if we go by the diary entry, but (in my opinion) something about having crossed the line with Marian must have let a few screws loose. She fed Amma enough poison so as to have the girl be immune by age 13. The first time she is able to connect with Camille on anything resembling an emotional level is when she’s purposefully giving Camille enough rat poison, horse tranqs, ipecac, and antibiotics to kill her. 

When I wrote this post I was also thinking about Camille’s lines in the book re: pain as intimacy. Reading the scenes between Camille and Adora in the book, and watching the scenes between Camille and Adora, and Adora and Amma in the miniseries, to me it comes off as getting off on being needed but also getting off on her daughters being in physical agony that she both caused and has the power to take away. Sort of like how some budding serial killers get off on hurting small animals so that they can nurse them back to health. It’s not just a compulsive need to feel needed but a need to exercise full control over other people as well as a need to have something tangible onto which she can exorcise all hurt, anger, guilt, shame, horror of her own traumatic upbringing. The thing about narcissists and relationships is that for all intents and purposes, other people are toys to them. Considering that, one could compare Adora’s abuse of her children to that of a traumatized child reenacting the scenes of their abuse using their Barbies or baby dolls. 

Or, to put it another way: Camille cuts herself. Amma commits murder. And Adora has her daughter-dolls. 

[lovethatcoat]

Cluster B parenting in Sharp Objects

The family dynamics in Sharp Objects are eerily familiar to me, which is unusual because you barely ever see horrible mothers and if you do it’s not such an on point depiction of cluster B personality disordered (mostly BPD with a bit of narcissistic tendencies) parenting.

It’s interesting what sticks out to me depending on which topic is most current for me in my personal healing journey. Back when I read the book - apart from general holy mackerel, this is my life! - I was realizing a lot of things about the different treatment I (scapegoat) and my brother (golden child) used to receive. Like Camille I used to be quite jealous of the preferential and loving treatment my brother would receive compared to the rejection, putting down and abuse I got. I was also conflicted about feeling this way, because I knew you aren’t supposed to be jealous of your sibling.

However, just like Camille, I was slowly realizing how being the golden child sucks as well, just in a different way. They’re getting more love, but it is quite literally toxic. It’s suffocating and enmeshing. The golden children are being parentified and trained to take care of the parent’s emotional needs. They’re kept dependent, small and weak, so that they can never abandon the parent. The parent only sees and loves on the parts they want to see to the point of neglect. They ignore any misbehaviour because their black and white thinking doesn’t allow them to conceive of their GOOD child to ever do any wrong (Amma out in the town doing drugs with a murderer on the loose and the parents just letting her, anyone?). They’re being taught a ridiculous sense of entitlement. Finally, the child learns to be a horrible, abusive person by imitating the parent and joins in the abuse of the scapegoat child.

It took till my early twenties for me to come out of the protective ignorance my brain had imposed on me and realize there’s something very wrong with my mother even with the very clear physical abuse. No wonder my brother hasn’t caught on yet, when the abuse is so much more subtle and you’re being clung on instead of kicked away.

~*~

Now, while watching the series a couple years later, in the meantime I have woken up to my father’s role in all this. My lovely, gentle, kind father, my hero whose coming home meant a bit more safety, who actually saw me and not just whatever she projected at me. Doesn’t Alan seem like a nice and caring guy? He even made an effort with the cake for Camille’s birthday. And yet, what a useless, willfully blind coward! Camille, please leave, you’re making your mother sick.

You’re making your mother sick.

ENABLER

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[rollingscone]

thanks utena for having me analyze one too many unhealthy sibling relationships and having that carry over into sharp objects lmao

basically, the controversial Rollin Roulette scene will make a lot more sense by the end and if you keep in mind Amma’s reference to what ‘love’ looks like to her ever since she was born to Adora Crellin.

Sex or sexual intimacy is a currency to her, regardless of the target. To be liked or feared by someone is her strongest tool in her tool chest. It’s a power move to get Camille to like her by helping her feel some sort of chemical happiness, continue leading the boys along through sexual manipulation (goddamnit girl you’re only 14 stOP), and attempt to make the girls jealous of her favor with Camille (speculation on my part, but it seems she hasn’t figured the last part out completely WHICH IS A PLOT POINT KINDA). 

And as the next episode hints, Amma relishes in being cared for after a bender. It’s the easiest way to gain the motherly care and affection one could want from a mother like Adora Crellin. 

And we’ve seen Camille’s inverse of this; the main one being seeking physical affection after being told she was never loved by Adora. 

Amma and Camille are two sides of a very fucked up coin and I love the amount of detail both Gillian Flynn and HBO put into making it as believable as possible. Someone please help these girls sort out the difference btwn emotional, physical, familial, and romantic love pls and tHANK YOU.