What I’m Watching: Divorce

Divorce: Season 1, Episode 6 “Christmas” (B+)

After Frances got that awful call from Robert’s new lawyer, I had expected a tempestuous and angry episode with the couple at each other’s throats. Instead, we got this relatively time but still highly entertaining installment centered on Robert’s insistence that everyone should be together on Christmas. Robert has an interesting outlook on life, one that venerates family traditions even when he’s doing what he can to pull apart his family. Frances is actually the one who deserves more criticism for her actions in this episode, putting off telling her parents and then announcing their impending divorce in front of all the party guests when Robert wasn’t even going to say anything. Letting Robert take the fall for her with her parents wasn’t exactly noble, but it does seem that they love him and are pretty much willing to forgive anything. Frances’ mom asking her if she’s going to forgive Robert before asking if she’s going to be okay says something, and Robert Forster’s father certainly expressed support for his son-in-law. Robert’s decision to spare her parents didn’t work out so well since he saved some of his more blunt language for their son who had his headphones on but hadn’t plugged them in to anything. One of my favorite parts of the episode was the brief snapshot we got of a very definitely not French Julian eating Christmas dinner with his parents, only to be interrupted by someone sent by another man’s husband to punch him in the gut for sleeping with his wife.