'The Morning Show' Finale: Hannah's outburst at Bradley paints clear picture of a victim's turmoil and processing trauma
This article contains spoilers for Episode 10
For an issue as crucial and dire as sexual misconduct in the workplace, 'The Morning Show' has managed to keep the execution of its constantly twisting plot somewhat lighthearted. With drama and network politics running rife at its core as the eponymous talk show's long-time co-host Mitch Kesler (Steve Carell) gets slammed with allegations of sexual misconduct, the account of Mitch's victims have been sprinkled quite sporadically. Precisely thrice, in the show's 10-episode long run. The finale, however, changes everything, as we find out poor Hannah Shoenfeld could never ever celebrate her promotion because of the price she had to pay through the rewards she was given.
As a network employee, Hannah opens up about the night she felt violated by Mitch, her conversation with Mitch's replacement Bradley Jackson is not only on a whole other level of serious, but borderline traumatizing even for a second-hand account. Even for the self-proclaimed tough girl Hannah, and her tragic aftermath that follows, it's not about how well she has been able to keep herself from exploding ultimately; it's about how buried trauma resurfacing can cause a victim to shatter into pieces they didn't even know they were capable of.
In the wake of Bradley diving headfirst into busting the truth abut the UBA network's complicity in silencing Mitch's victims — Bradley, Corey, and Chip — decide to discuss the upcoming ambush-interview at Mitch's home. Mitch's only witness to corroborate that network boss Fred Macklen knew about his predatory behavior is Hannah, but getting her to talk is a task Bradley gets handed with. When she first reached out to Hannah, she gets the cold shoulder. Hannah refuses to be the poster child for Bradley's agenda and she can't wait to leave her job as head booker at the titular show to join as the EP for UBA 365 in LA. But even though Hannah shuts Bradley up and storms out, their conversation is far from over.
Later in the episode, Hannah calls Bradley over when she changes her mind about giving her statement. She calls it guilt, and even though Bradley says all the right things to a victim of sexual misconduct, Hannah's imminent outburst just goes on to prove that there is no right thing to say to a victim of sexual assault. Hannah recounts how during the Vegas shootings, as a junior booker, it was a dark place for her to venture into. In those moments of turmoil, Mitch offered her a friendly comfort to lean on and that coming from someone she so respected and looked up to was beyond a big deal for the much younger Hannah.
The two walked along the beach and later, Mitch invited Hannah to watch some comedy, which she — as a relative amateur — was more than thrilled to indulge in. It was never a question of how do you turn down your boss' proposal to hang out, as Hannah comes clean about how being at Vegas brought back memories of her mother's tragic death, and how at that moment in Mitch's apartment, all she wanted was a parent to ground her; not someone to take advantage of her vulnerability and slide their hands between her legs first, and then proceed to perform oral sex on her. And no amount of Bradley's sympathetic query about how Hannah is processing all of that can put her at ease; it provokes her further to an outburst so violent in terms of self-hatred that it's difficult to look at Mitch as anything but deplorable.
But that's not the end of it; Hannah's hysterical outburst comes from the fact that Mitch completely refused to acknowledge her at all the very next day. When she reported it to Fred because she felt used and violated by someone who was on top of her, using her body without caring about her at all. It was shocking and revolting for Hannah who didn't have the faintest idea about Mitch's flair for having sex with his juniors at work, and she did what she thought was the right thing. Hannah did get rewarded for reporting the incident with a promotion, but really, the reward was more of a ruse to silence her.
Hannah might call herself tough and everybody might know for a fact that she is, but all her proclamations about people dealing with the messed up stuff that happens to them every day don't help her avoid the incessant gnawing reality check of being successful all because she couldn't say no to Mitch. In her borderline panic attack of an outburst, Hannah addresses how the whole blow-up lost people their lives and jobs, but all it did to her was make her feel dirty, like it was her fault. From refusing to open up about the incident on accounts of backstabbing to asking Bradley to go ahead with the interview to 'do what (Hannah) couldn't, the arc is heartbreaking and tragic in every way possible. When she finally ends her life after accepting the job that she thought would allow her a fresh start, it's obvious that Hannah is every victim's self of integrity lost when they aren't able to report abuse from a higher authority. And that is exactly why taking accountability needs to be taken more seriously.
The Morning Show's finale is up for streaming on Apple TV+ now.