What I’m Watching: Orange is the New Black

Orange is the New Black: Season 2, Episode 12 “It Was the Change” (B+)

Now this was a pretty packed episode and a fitting penultimate hour for the season (though the finale is 92 minutes, which is sure to be an experience in itself). Even if she is fated to be transferred to another prison, it’s good to see Piper get one last chance to dig into the prison and realize that things are actually awry, mainly the plumbing issue and the files she got caught redhanded with by Caputo. She may even have found her meal ticket if the files in her hands are damning enough to serve as blackmail. During the storm, it was fun to see certain characters deal with the situation, like the gullible Pennsatucky and Boo, while it was much more serious and less entertaining for others. It’s hard to feel sympathetic for Figueroa when she saw her husband kissing another man after she ignored Caputo’s many calls and treated everyone at the prison so terribly. More flashbacks to Vee’s past reveal that she was above nothing including sleeping with her son and then having him killed immediately after by her cop friend because she thought he was competing with her in business. Red not strangling her made her the better person, but then Vee had to come back after alleging a truce to wail on her. I certainly hope this isn’t the end for Red, but especially with Taystee realizing that she can’t hate Poussey, I don’t see how the tables can’t turn on Vee in what’s sure to be a very transformative and memorable finale.