Orange Is The New Black - A Review

Orange Is The New Black provides a powerful look inside prison, even if through the eyes of embellishing TV writers, producers and directors.  Since most commentators rarely stay in prison overnight, this view of prison life is invaluable in portraying the seedy, violent, hateful and depraved aspects of incarceration.  Many of the scenes and scenarios depicted really happened in a U.S. prison, normal Hollywood exaggeration excepted.  The series compresses those events into installments, making it tough to tell how prevalent and representative each special disaster and characteristic is.  Prison conditions obviously vary from prison to prison, but we on the outside cannot very well tell how much.  We need shows like this one. 


Orange Is The New Black tends towards the awful and hopeless aspects of prison life, which is fitting for an institution that has rarely succeeded in achieving its original goals of repentance, renewal and rehabilitation.  The dark humor of the series makes in easier to watch as we realize the utter sinfulness and wickedness of many people.  The most interesting aspects adding depth to the series are flashbacks to the criminal lives of the inmates, who are shown to deserve their incarceration, generally, even as they may not deserve the unfair compounded conditions they have to deal with in prison. 


 Many viewers will dislike the overemphasis on lesbian activities and homosexuality, the near-absence of successful relationships, the overplayed corruption of correctional officers and wardens, and the subtle and not-so-subtle disparagement of religion.  These are the prices we have to pay for an entertaining look, however slanted, into the underworld of prison.  Like the slave narratives published by abolitionists, Orange Is The New Black shows the worst aspects of prison.  We look forward to former prisoners commenting on this series. 
Once we as a society realize the futility, waste, violence and hopelessness of incarceration on the scale we now have, an American state can then take the first step towards meaningful reform by legalizing judicial corporal punishment of adults in lieu of incarceration.  Then, the continual misery we watch on Orange Is The New Black can be cut in half. 

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