American Crime season 3

The key to handling disappointment is managing expectations. Nobody gets it right all the time. I was so in love with the previous season of John Ridley’s Emmy-winning series that I assumed I’d be in for a real treat with season 3. But while there is some merit (it would be hard for Ridley to completely misfire), the season is kind of a mess, and not even a hot one, but rather lukewarm.

The third season takes on abuse and exploitation in its many forms. We have migrant workers on a tomato farm who have to live a dozen people to a trailer, an environment rife with peril. They don’t get paid enough to ever move on because they have to pay for their lavish accommodations, food, and “health care” (sometimes illegal drugs) out of their low wages. Oh, they’re also beaten, overworked, raped, and worse. Being a migrant worker is no picnic. Take that, Mr. President.

The tomato farm featured here has been run by an old man who is now on his death bed. It has been taken over by his oldest daughter, a mean-spirited, manipulative control freak, completely devoid of empathy. When the wife of one of the farm owners, Jeanette (perennial favorite Felicity Huffman), starts to ask questions about the welfare of the workers, she is utterly dismissed and made to feel worthless.

I mentioned drugs before.  Several characters, including Coy, played by last season’s Connor Jessup, are addicted, and this addiction is used as a means of control. (And boy, did I want to see more of Jessup in this, but he was really a more supporting actor here.)

Another form of exploitation is human trafficking and prostitution. Dedicated and caring social worker Kimara (played by Regina King, who won Emmys the last two years for her roles on American Crime) tries very hard to get young men and women out of this lifestyle before they end up dead or in jail, but for her, it’s always two steps forward, one step back. On top of that, she is having fertility treatments to have that baby she’s always wanted. This probably explains her motherly instinct. She is certainly the most likable character in the show this season.

Then there is the French Haitian nanny, Gabriella—played with heartbreaking brilliance by newcomer Mickaelle Bizet—who was brought to America by an extremely unhappy couple (Lili Taylor and Timothy Hutton) to watch their son and to be abused. Taylor’s character is very enigmatic…probably too much so…and Hutton’s character is simply monstrous.

Most of these stories are snapshots with little air time. Much is hidden in terms of what actually happens, with whom, and why. There doesn’t seem to be much reason for this. A sense of mystery? I call it a sense of confusion. The season is only 8 episodes long instead of 10 or 11, like before. Thus, there is little time for story and character development. Every story feels disjointed, in spite of the fact that there is a loose thread running through each. The story of the migrants only takes up the first 4 episodes, while the nanny’s story picks up in its absence for the second half. We get Kimara’s and Jeanette’s stories through all 8 episodes, perhaps because of the popularity of the two actresses, but only Kimara’s story is engaging to watch. Jeanette is a doormat who tries for about a second to become an independent woman, but ends up caving in the end.

Perhaps the most emotional story is that of Luis Salazar, played by Benito Martinez, a Latin American immigrant who has come to look for his missing son. When that story is resolved in what is really the most intense moment in the series during episode 4, everything that comes after is anticlimactic.

This season’s themes are overtly political. This is a contrast to what has come before in the series. Instead of telling a gripping story with amazing, relatable characters and letting the audience make up its own mind, the producers have taken it upon themselves to educate the privileged white patriarchy. In doing so, they have reduced the show from something exceptional to something common.