'Black Monday' Season 2 Episode 8: Congressman Harris' suicide makes fans plead 'don't kill gay men for plot'
Spoilers for ‘Black Monday’ Season 2 Episode 8 ‘Lucky Shoes’
Fans of the Showtime Wall Street comedy series ‘Black Monday’ are not happy. Why would they be? In Season 2 Episode 8 ‘Lucky Shoes’, something terrible happens.
It was election night, and Blair (Andrew Rannells), of course, wanted to be with his secret lover Congressman Roger Harris (Tuc Watkins), to provide moral support. But obviously, things were uncomfortable. Neither man was openly gay and to act cozy in front of others would not have gone down well, especially for the Congressman. So, he kept his distance from Blair.
The Congressman ultimately won. But things took a turn for the worse. When Blair asked him how soon he would bail the banks out, he said that it would have to wait at least a term. He wanted to get settled in the office first. Also, it would look terrible if the first thing he did in office was helping his financier. An obviously angry Blair threatened to leak a video of them having sex if he did not comply with his promise. The video in question was recorded by CCTV cameras during the Halloween party. Harris left, asking Blair to let things cool down for a bit. But Blair was in no mood to give in.
When the Congressman left, Blair showed the tape to the Congressman’s notoriously homophobic father-in-law, the televangelist Pastor Newell (Michael Hitchcock). Blair told him to make sure that the Congressman complied, else they would both risk losing their reputations. He handed a copy of the tape over to the pastor. But things did not go the way he thought they would. The Pastor, unbeknownst to Blair, leaked the tape to the press. When Blair found out on the news, he ran to the Congressman’s home. There he found him hanging from the ceiling. And that is where the episode ended. Obviously, fans were sad.
Several claimed that this episode broke them. “Yo, the recent episode of ‘Black Monday’ is quite triggering especially at the end so if anyone still wants to watch the episode but doesn’t want to be potentially triggered then uh I guess I can always tell you? in a (hopefully) less triggering way, sorry if this is phrased weirdly,” wrote a fan on Twitter, warning people about the ending without spoilers.
Similarly, another fan wrote on Twitter, “BLACK MONDAY VIEWERS THE END OF EP 8 IS VERY VERY TRIGGERING PLEASE BE VERY CAREFUL AND USE DISCRETION.”
For its part, even the official Twitter handle for ‘Black Monday’ tweeted: “For more information on suicide and finding confidential support, visit the below link or contact: 1-800-273-8255 suicidepreventionlifeline.org.”
“#blackmonday was harrowing last night. no idea what to expect for the rest of the season, but I’m more scared than I already was,” wrote another fan, adding, “They killed a gay man for no reason, he did NOT have to die. He shouldn’t have had to for plot progression.”
Others expressed similar sentiments. One fan wrote, “Gay men shouldn’t have to die to advance your plot, and that’s partially why I’m so frustrated besides the Blair torture porn. please think about that before you celebrate plot progression in this show.”
One fan wrote, “I know it's just a show but it fills me with so much sorrow to think that somebody could be so full of internalized homophobia that they commit suicide at the thought of people knowing they're gay. I'm really genuinely sad right now.”
That did not, of course, mean that fans did not like the episode. One wrote on Twitter, “Andrew Rannells’ acting was absolutely phenomenal in this week’s episode. Such a heavy topic and he handled it with the heartbreaking severity necessary to pull off such a gut-wrenching moment at the end of the episode.”
New episodes of ‘Black Monday’ arrive every Sunday at 8 pm EST/PST only on Showtime.