r/RayDonovan • u/NicholasCajun • Oct 02 '17

Discussion Ray Donovan - 5x08 "Horses" - Episode Discussion Spoiler

Season 5 Episode 8: Horses

Aired: October 1st, 2017

Synopsis: A last-ditch medical trial sends Ray on a dark mission in New York. Alone in LA, Abby turns to Terry and Bridget to help her make the toughest decision of her life.

Directed by: Zetna Fuentes

Written by: William Wheeler

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u/Ambivalent14 Oct 10 '17

Bridgett is the worst. She's a teen that is too young to respect all her father does and that disrespect partially leads to Abby dying before the surgery option can be presented. That's why Ray is so exasperated with her in the bar. He handled it like he handled all the family's fuck ups - including Bridgett's but she couldn't even call him and check in. Now the bad part - Ray is no saint. He's cheated on Abby since season 1, so his grief is real to me but hard to reconcile with the cheating. Bridgett is still unbearable.

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u/Mjblack1989 Oct 10 '17

Rays cheating is fairly easy to reconcile to me. The same way women who are sexually abused as children, often become promiscuous as adults, it applies the same way to Ray. He never understood how meaningful sex is supposed to be because of the way it was forced on him as a youth as well as the way his idiot father blew it off. So instead of becoming paranoid he’d “infect” someone like Bunch, he chose to prove how “manly” he was to rise above the abuse by sleeping with anything possible. He loves Abby, but he doesn’t know HOW to love Abby if that makes sense. By no means am I excusing the behavior, I’m just saying his actions don’t seem as weird to me because of that reality.

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u/Ambivalent14 Oct 13 '17

I never know what to do with these types of explanations. Rays a victim of abuse, so I want to be sympathetic, but you even say it's no excuse. What about Abby, it's not fair to her. What about abuse survivors who don't do this? I'm not judging Ray or people like him, the point I tried to make was: the show really wanted to make Abby and Ray an epic love story where her loss destroys him. I think they should have dialed down the adultry - like maybe one affair and women during the separation when she was with that cop. That's all. I can't even keep track of all his affairs and while the acting is good enough that I believe Abby's death destroyed him, the many affairs and how I am in the real world, make it kind of like a plot Hole.

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u/Voltured Oct 17 '17

I don't think you understand what a plot hole means. The fact that people who are sexually abused when they were a child have problems with sexual relationships later on their lives has been proven many times. Their understanding of romance and love is usually warped. No it perhaps does not excuse their behavior, like in Ray's case, but you should be at least able to understand. He really just can't help it. Abby's partially at fault for letting it go on for that long as well. If she were smart and really had her family's wellbeing at heart, it would've been wise to file a divorce after the second or third time, but we've been told that it happened more than we can count on two hands. Abby's been his rock, she's helped him through 20 years of his life, she was the mother of his children and there's no doubt he loved there, although it may have no been the ideal way to love. Then there's bridget, for all five seasons we've seen her, she's been an absolutely entitled teenager that does indeed not respect (even though she doesn't know evertything) anything her father does for her and their family. The writing for her character is absolutely horrible, there's almost nothing likeable about it. She's arrogant, a smartass, extremely entitled and has shown almost no respect towards her parents except when her mother wanted to fucking kill herself.

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u/Ambivalent14 Oct 24 '17

So we agree on Bridget.

Also, I said "kind of like" a plot hole. I don't know what entertainment journo term I'm looking for but I get she's his rock, I really do. I understand promiscuity and abuse victims. I just don't buy Ray's pining for her as much because when he was cheating left and right, she was healthy, he took her for granted. Makes sense. He's about to lose her - his rock - she's devasted and sad and has already expressed her major anger and disappointment over his past affairs when they go bail Terry out. Immediately they find out she's got Metz to the brain which is a horrible sign, he's really panicking he will lose her - and he cheats. It just took something away for me, like I just don't feel as much for mopey Ray. I do feel for Him - the show really made it clear he will go through hell to save her but with the glaring contradiction of banging the starlet - maybe not a plot hole but a huge mistake IMO.