The Cutprice Guignol

The Burning Girls is so great, guys.

Pitched as a gothic small-town horror starring Samantha Morton as a priest moving to a small town with her daughter Flo (Ruby Stokes), it was a show that grew in stature the more I watched it. Adapted from the book of the same name by CJ Tudor, It starts out as this appropriately eerie supernatural thriller, unfolding several of the small town mysteries that have plagued this place along the way, and then takes a turn into a seriously impressive crime climax that had my head reeling for about three days. I’m a huge fan of Samantha Morton (and if you’re not, you’re wrong about it), and she was typically excellent, but the rest of the cast turned in exceptional performances too – Beth Cordingly, Rupert Graves, and David Dawson put in some career-best turns here, filling out the small town with life and history.

But what I think The Burning Girls does so well – and what ultimately elevates it to excellence – is the running theme of how axes of privilege serve to protect people who do terrible things. There are plenty of examples of this in the show – from an abusive priest using his power in the community to sexually abuse teenage girls, to an influential landowner whose status protects him from criticism, to a teenage girl whose obvious violent impulses are excused on account of her gender and class – but, for me, the most impressive comes in the form of Lucas (Conrad Kahn) and his storyline over the course of the season.

Right at the start of the show, in episode two, we’re told that Lucas came to the small town where The Burning Girls takes place because he tried to burn down his school – with a girl who rejected his romantic advances locked inside. It’s an abjectly horrible story, and one that the show goes out of it’s way to place right there upfront at the start of his storyline. Up until this point, he’s been presented as a love interest for Flo, and, though she’s obviously disturbed by this revelation, the rest of the characters in the show go out of their way to excuse him: he’s had a hard upbringing, he’s a good kid, just troubled.

To the point that you’re lulled, as a viewer, into seeing him through that same lens. His privilege as a young white man, and the excuses people are willing to make for him along with the chances he’s granted to redeem himself, sort of cloak him within the narrative. His dangerous, misogynistic behaviour isn’t disguised or hidden from us, but the way the show presents him through the eyes of other characters allow us to put it aside, as this kind of behaviour is put aside for so many young men like Lucas.

And then, of course, it turns out he’s been an antagonist all along. It’s a twist in some ways, but more a mirror held up to the audience to show us the red flags we’ve ignored, along with most of the cast, in this boy who’s done awful things. It’s a really clever bit of writing and execution, a reminder of how easy it is for people to leverage their privilege to excuse their actions and how willing we are to forgive people who fall under the “right” umbrellas (and how unwilling we are to forgive people who don’t). I love the way Conrad Kahn plays Lucas here, balancing the obvious threat he poses with the apparently redeeming qualities that draw Flo to him.

It’s a really fascinating storyline, one of many in The Burning Girls, and one that I think is especially prescient now, with so much misogyny going dismissed or downplayed based on the perceived potential and privilege of the people committing it. Have you seen The Burning Girls? Let’s talk about it in the comments!

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(header image via The Telegraph)