It’s a dynamic that crops up again when Clay asks Tony to help him go look for Jess’s former boyfriend, Justin. “I’m not the right kind of victim to go against Bryce.” “She was sweet and sensitive and white,” she says of Hannah. Though she doesn’t need to explain herself, there’s still something significant in what she tells Clay when he asks, once again, about the possibility of her telling the truth. She comes close to forcing the truth out of Jess, just as she had done to Courtney in the last episode, but Jess relents, keeping mum instead of speaking out. I get that it’s her job to act on behalf of the school, but the way she manipulates and pushes these kids when they take the stand is awful.
13 reasons why season 2 episode 1 123movies trial#
The one thing that could change the course of this trial would be for Jess to tell the truth of why her friendship with Hannah ended, but to do so would mean reliving her rape - which she tells Alex she already has to do every day at school. To wit, the defense doubles down on labels, calling Hannah jealous and vindictive as a result of Jess’s testimony. It’s a generalization, certainly (and broad in a way that doesn’t include different sexual and gender identities), but where Liberty High is concerned, she’s not off the mark. As Jess puts it, girls are labeled and that’s that, whereas boys are given the chance to define themselves. The crux of Jess’s testimony is the way that high school – and life – is fundamentally different for girls and boys. (The show also strikes me, to a lesser extent, as a sort of teen Handmaid’s Tale, insomuch as it sometimes seems to revel in the misery of its characters.) That said, “The Drunk Slut” hits both the highs and lows of 13 Reasons Why: It addresses topics that deserve attention, including mental health and institutional sexism, but I wonder if it’s been done in a way that’s ultimately helpful. Jess has one of the strongest arcs on the show, so it follows that the episode featuring her testimony is the best of the season so far.