“Trust no one”: Narrative Complexity and Character Opacity in Damages

Abstract

Abstract This article analyzes the first season of Damages (2007) as an early example of the representation of ‘difficult’ women on television. More specifically, I investigate the relationship between the show’s character conception and its complex narration. I argue that all the major male and female characters on the show are ‘difficult’ in the sense that the audience experiences close alignment but troubled allegiance to them. However, the two female protagonists – top-notch lawyer Patty Hewes and her young and initially idealistic associate Ellen Parsons – are also opaque characters about whose thoughts and plans the audience is largely left in the dark. This opacity is mirrored and enhanced by the narration, which constantly teases the audience by withholding information about the plot, suggests inferences that then turn out to be wrong, and generally provides far more insight into the male characters than into the female characters.