Review: Lovecraft Country Episode 5, “Strange Case”

Ruby (Wunmi Mosaku) takes center stage in a new episode of Lovecraft Country that has a lot to say about race, horror and privilege. It’s the show’s best yet:

“Strange Case” throws us right into the weirdness as Ruby wakes up in William’s bed…as a white woman. The actor who now plays her, Jamie Neumann, is terrific as she stumbles through the streets, confused and frightened and seeing things from a whole new perspective. As Ruby will later tell William, people — or at least, the white police — aren’t scared of her when she’s like this; they’re scared for her. And after the police take her back to William’s house, he puts down a tarp, Patrick Bateman-style, and slices her open, all while a new report about locusts shedding their skin plays on TV. It’s a bold, gruesome, off-the-wall opening to a bold, gruesome, off-the-wall episode.

William takes the time to explain exactly how he came up with the potion that turns Ruby white, but it’s boring and doesn’t really matter. What’s important is that this device gives the show an opportunity to develop Ruby’s character, explore the power of white privilege, and bring us some wonderfully sickening special effects. Ruby can only turn into Hilary Davenport for brief stretches; when the magic runs out, she literally sheds her new skin, a bloody butterfly forcing her way out of a meat cocoon. Each time we see the process in more disgusting detail. Watching Hilary’s face crack in the service elevator at Marshall Field’s is unsettling, and seeing her slough off folds of skin is the alley outside the bar damn near makes you want to vomit. It’s great.

Even better is the way the potion, which William only allows Ruby to take if she does him a favor or two, shows us a new side of Ruby, promoting her from background player to main character. We’ve seen before how badly Ruby wanted to work at Marshall Field’s, how qualified she was, and how hard she’d tried to get the job. Of course, when she interviews as Hilary, Paul the manager just gives her the assistant manager job straight away. Ruby is thrilled to have it, but it makes clear how little all her efforts before mattered when the game was rigged.

Sometimes the episode oversells this idea. For example, the second time Ruby turns into Hilary, no one makes her pay for things like ice cream and newspapers. The episode is trying to convey how white people have privileges they take for granted, which is a fair point, but that’s not a realistic way to sell it. There are also some over-written lines. “I enjoyed my entire day using the only currency I needed: whiteness.”

Much better are subtler scenes like the one in the break room at Marshall Field’s. Hilary’s white employees openly disparage the Black girl who works there, Tamara, while listening to a cover of a Little Richard song sung by a white man and complimenting Hilary for dancing like a Black girl. “Do you think you could convince her to take us to a bar on the South Side?” one asks Hilary. “It’ll be like a safari.”

These women are happen to enjoy Black culture but have nothing but contempt for Black people. They congratulate themselves for being tolerant enough not to use the n-word. It’s unthinking, dug-in, insidious prejudice of the kind that’s very hard to get rid of; in a way, it’s scarier than racist cultists who are keeping white supremacy going through literal magic, because at least they only exist on TV.

Seeing all of this convinces Ruby that hard work and a good attitude are not, in fact, going to be enough to get ahead. Towards the end of the episode, she turns over a new leaf by seducing her boss, whom she earlier witnessed sexually assaulting Tamara. She ties him up and rams the stem of a high-heel shoe up his ass over and over white shedding Hilary’s skin on top of him.

Who is Ruby uninterrupted? She’s pretty horrifying, and I can’t wait to see what she does next now that she’s a bigger part of the show.

She’s also very tied to William, who it ends up is actually Christina Braithwhite using magic to look like a man, the same way Ruby is using it to look white. The show is drawing a parallel between the two women. Christina is prevented from becoming a full member of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn because she’s a women, and Ruby is kept from doing pretty much anything she wants because she’s a Black women. But as Ruby points out, their similarities only go so far; born into fantastic wealth and power, Christina still has privileges Ruby never did. But for better or worse, Ruby is dependent on her now. My bet is that Christina will try and use Ruby to influence Leti and Tic.

This is definitely Ruby’s episode, but Tic and Leti are here, too, doing their research thing and trying to translate the Language of Adam after Montrose has killed Yahima, their translator. There’s some subtle writing and acting after they discover what Montrose did: Leti assumes Montrose simply let her leave the house, while Tic instantly knows that Montrose killed her. Jonathan Majors is terrific as Tic’s anger flashes and he beats his father to a pulp.

There’s a definitely a very dark, troubled side to Tic, which isn’t surprising giving his abusive upbringing, not to mention whatever happened to him in Korea. Majors is also terrific at selling Tic’s more vulnerable side. “Please don’t be scared of me,” he says later to Leti. Aw, Tic.

All that said, I still don’t quite buy that this moment of vulnerability turns into a passionate sex scene. And their writhing nakedness lasts a little too long, as if the show is trying to convince us that these two characters do indeed have chemistry. I’m still not 100% buying it.

I was more convinced by the sex scene between Montrose and Sammy, the bartender with whom Montrose is having a secret gay affair. Like Tic, Montrose is damaged. He’s dead quiet during the whole scene; there’s not really anything in the way of foreplay, but Sammy is obviously into him so he lets it happen. The hand-holding was almost romantic. There’s yearning here; there are some layers, whereas with Tic and Leti I kind of feel the romance is just happening because they’re two attractive TV characters in the same room.

I also felt something later when Montrose finally let go and let himself have some fun at the drag ball, and kissed Sammy; shame be gone, at least for now. I wonder if that’ll change him. And kudos to Michael K. Williams for selling a lot of character growth with very little dialogue.

Finally, in the last moment, Tic stumbles on something in his research and calls his mysterious girlfriend/friend/I dunno in Korea. “How did you know?” he asks. “You believe me now?” she replies. “What are you?” he finishes.

Well, that’s ominous.

I wish the Leti-and-Tic story was a little more compelling, and with multiple hanging threads just waiting to be tired up (Hippolyta and Diana heading to Ardham, whatever is going on with Tic and the mystery girl), it may pick up soon. But Ruby was the star of this episode, and I think her story made it the best one yet.

Episode Grade: A-

Bullet Point Country

• One plot point we didn’t talk about: in exchange for using the potion, William has Ruby work a party for the racist police chief who abused Leti a couple episodes back. The chief is part of a magic lodge, and Christina has her put some kind of charm in his drawer. We’ll see what it does later, but the scene itself is terrific: to avoid getting found out, Ruby has to hide in a closet where the chief is keeping a guy strung up, gagged and bleeding. It’s disgusting, but the scene has real Hitchcock-style tension. And what happened to the police chief? His body looks burned?
• The bit with Tamara the next day is great, too. “White folks are even more fucked up than you think they are,” Hilary says. “They have got shit you can’t even imagine!” The manic comic energy is off the charts.
• During the scene where Sammy and other drag queens are getting ready, we hear Little Richer’s version of “Tutti Frutti,” a nice counterpoint to the scene in the break room at Marshall’s:

• Speaking of that scene, RuPaul’s Drag Race fans will recognize Shangela and Monét X Change among the queens!

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