Galavant Rewatch 2.1, "A New Season, aka Suck It, Cancellation Bear"

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As the second season of Galavant begins, narrative focus begins to shift meaningfully--but not always admirably.

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2.1, "A New Season, aka Suck It, Cancellation Bear"

Written by Dan Fogelman, Luan Thomas, Julia Grob, and Joe Piarulli
Directed by John Fortenberry

Synopsis

He's right, though. There are only so many times you can hear the song...
Image taken from the episode, used for commentary.

Galavant and Richard continue to sail along their way, with Galavant trying to explicate and Richard complaining. The pirates conducting them--Peter Pillager and his crew--chastise them for an attempt to return to the dominant musical theme of the first season, offering another as they do so. The other major characters also join the new song, cementing it as the dominant musical strain and explaining current circumstances.

Isabella's situation receives particular attention; she is shown making multiple attempts to escape the pink prison in which she is held. Madalena, Gareth, and Sid (whose repeated silencing is lampshaded) also receive attention amid references to several contemporary-to-the-episode (it aired 3 January 2016, per IMDB) media productions. Galavant, Richard, and the pirates run aground on land familiar to Richard.

Unlike some things in a previous episode, this did not work well.
Image taken from the episode, used for commentary.

In Valencia, Gareth begins to mutter discontentedly about his position in the overthrown court; Madalena remains queen, but his own status is ambiguous. The two sit in judgment over minor matters. Sid also asks about his status, highlighting Gareth's own ambiguity of position.

In Hortencia, Isabella's parents press her about the intended wedding with Harry. She argues against the whole affair, but her arguments are rejected by her parents out of hand. They leave her in holding, and she continues to pine for the absent Galavant.

It does seem hard to top him.
Image taken from the episode, used for commentary.

Galavant and Richard proceed through a tangled wood, and Richard realizes they are in an enchanted forest from which some do not return--only to find that the Enchanted Forest is a bar in the woods. In the event, it is a gay bar, and Galavant is conscripted into working it by a disco-singing queen.

In Valencia, Gareth seeks Sid's help to clarify his own position in the kingdom. And in Hortencia, Isabella confronts Steve about his contentment before seeking aid in escape from Vincenzo and Gwynne. Vincenzo offers to help, covertly.

There is some clear influence.
Image taken from the episode, used for commentary.

Richard helps Galavant serve in the Enchanted Forest; the latter is caught amid an escape attempt, and Galavant rails against Richard. After, Richard encounters a long-lost avuncular figure who asserts that Richard's own father was gay and offers to assist Richard's escape.

Gareth confronts Madalena about his status. She condescendingly accedes to his demand.

Richard retrieves Galavant with some difficulty and effects their escape through the women's restroom. Galavant grudgingly acknowledges Richard's assistance and apologizes; Richard admits his incapacity, and Galavant commends him, encouraging his development.

Discussion

Early on, the episode makes reference to Game of Thrones (and you should read Shiloh's now-complete series on the series!), engaging directly with the ultimately more commercially successful and culturally-influential series. A later mention of "the White Walkers" functions similarly. The engagement, though, reads as a way to note what Galavant is not, which makes it less a re-grounding in current ("gritty," "grim," and "realistic") medievalisms and more a reaffirmation of the satirical--and decidedly medieval in echoing the fabliau, as noted--underpinnings of the series. It was a welcome note, and one that is sounded again in the continuing season as in the previous.

Far less welcome is the episode's treatment of women and gay men. Early in the episode, for example, Isabella is used to make a caricature of feminist discourse; she self-reports as a feminist before acting in such a way as to belie the report. The flattening of her character from earlier episodes continues, therefore, in a way that undermines some of the other work at inclusion the series had done even in her own character, as well as reducing her from a previously strong character to one conforming more neatly to misogynistic, patriarchal expectations of an often misunderstood medieval period and its descendants.

Similarly, the depiction of the gay men in the Enchanted Forest rings of stereotypes of flamboyance and hypersexuality, both of which have been used repeatedly and across decades to justify violence against gay men. That Richard is assumed to be gay because of his mannerisms and sexual inexperience with women does not help, either. And while it is the case that such examples as Chaucer's Pardoner might be taken as antecedents, and while it is the case that a camp aesthetic is decidedly present in many gay communities, that the depictions presented are a seeming first recourse does not argue in the episode's favor.

I had hoped to see better.