'The Bold Type' Season 4 Episode 15: Kat and Ava kiss, but their 'forbidden love' is a big no-no
Spoilers for 'The Bold Type' Season 4 Episode 15 'Love'
In the latest episode of 'The Bold Type' Season 4, Kat Edison (Aisha Dee) and Ava Rose (Alex Paxton-Beesley) kiss. Their relationship is deemed "forbidden love", one of the five types of "love" that the episode explores via its protagonists. Kat, now working as a bartender at the Belle, has the chance to make a difference with a podcast. Her first guest must come with some clout for the Belle to deem it profitable. So she chooses Ava, a Republican with contrasting stands on everything.
Now, this doesn't come easy because Kat must prove to Ava that she can debate issues without making it personal. In order to do this, she goes to a Republican mixer where she faces homophobia. But after this, Ava agrees to come on board. While recording the podcast, she reveals that she is lesbian, a fact that was never mentioned even when her own father was guilty of sponsoring a conversion camp. Ava's ridiculous explanation is that her sexuality is not her identity, an excuse that comes with her white privilege.
Suddenly, Kat cannot seem to get out of her mind. But the previous episode had left fans fuming at this storyline for Kat, a queer Black woman who has always used her clout and position for the improvement of the LGBTQ+ community. "TheBoldType took a Black queer female activist and forced her into a homophobic space to prove her ability to partake in conversations and are now trying to make this a romantic relationship. I hate it here," a fan had tweeted.
That, in contrast to Ava's extremely passive "my sexuality is not my identity", is an injustice to Kat's entire character arc and it brings us to a pressing query: where is Adena (Nikohl Boosheri) since we last saw her at Sutton's wedding in the finale of the first half of Season 4 in 'Some Kind of Wonderful'? The writers of the show seem to have practically stricken her off the narrative without giving any information on her whereabouts. Zero marks for continuity to 'The Bold Type'.
When Kat returns in the second half of the season, she is seeing some other woman. Details about this romance aren't revealed including who she is or where they meet until Kat takes the wrong name during sex. If Kat is going to be the woman who teaches Ava better, that is an unwelcome romance. It puts the emotional burden on Kat at a time and age when Ava should know better. The lives of Black women from the LGBTQ+ community are always at risk, something that Kat has advocated against. Thus, for her to fall for someone who would keep mum in the face of homophobia is completely unwarranted.
'The Bold Type' airs Thursdays at 10 pm ET /PT on Freeform.
