The hegemonic power of contemporary media can undoubtedly be demonstrated through television’s strategic relay of curated messages aimed at informing audience subjectivities and shaping social values and ideologies. Feasey calls attention to this power when she notes, “Fictional representations are a powerful force in shaping what we think about specific groups, individuals, roles and responsibilities” (“Good, Bad” 4), thereby suggesting that television depictions of the maternal experience can reinforce standardized expectations of ‘good’ mothering (“Good, Bad” 4). To construct a more robust audience reading of the fictional maternal role, then, a thorough analysis of the changing maternal reality and standards of mothering is necessary as a first step. Television’s common depiction of motherhood tends to prioritize a rather reductionistic narrative whereby women are defined in terms of their role as a mother. By situating her in the home both literally - in her common role as a stay at home mom and housewife - and figuratively - in her willful devotion to her home and family - television shows women consumed in their mothering role. Very little television to date has done sufficient justice to the complexities of motherhood and mothering. Like television’s monster mothers and evil stepmoms, the “aberrant” mother has been coded to suggest villainy, evil and deficiency.            

            Television prioritizes the visibility of perfect mothers and mothering, while framing the aberrant mother as the flawed counterpart of this idealized neoliberal feminist subject or normative mother figure. Created for women, by women and about women, Dead to Me (Netflix, 2019-) challenges traditional notions of mothering by emphasizing the ambiguity and dynamism in the maternal role and showing female audiences that veering from normative standards of mothering does not hinder their potential to be great mothers. Dead to Me explores transgressive portrayals of motherhood and through its complex narrative, exhibits a concerted effort to redefine the maternal role and amplify the subjective nature of motherhood. Dead to Me depicts motherhood as a deeply personalized and evolving experience whereby mothers grow into their roles as mothers and as women. Dead to Me’s protagonist, Jen Harding, is an imperfect, atypical mother who portrays motherhood with overt realism; in a way that lessens pressure associated with hard to achieve standards of normative or socially appropriated mothering. Dead to Me reinforces the reality that just like Jen - a window and single mother - and Judy - an aspiring mother troubled by multiple failed pregnancies – it is okay for women and mothers not to be okay sometimes.

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            This paper will conduct a modern contextual analysis on the representation of motherhood and modern mothering in Netflix’s Dead to Me. More specifically, this paper will unpack the concept of the “aberrant” mother with respect to Jen’s character, and rigorously challenge the traditional television mother from both a theoretical and contextual standpoint. With reference to Feldman’s Dead to Me, this paper argues that the visibility of the aberrant mother on contemporary television works to redefine standards of modern mothering by challenging conventional practices of intensive mothering and speaking more honestly to the complexities of motherhood. More broadly, however, the embodied aberrance of Dead to Me’s protagonists, Jen and Judy, exemplify the power of female resistance against patriarchal control and misogyny. First, this paper will explore the concept of the aberrant mother with respect to Jen Harding and her frequent subversion of the stereotypical mother portrayal. A wider socio-cultural lens will be taken to examine the socially appropriated nature of motherhood and ideal mothering. Discussion of how Dead to Me challenges the feminine mother construct will first define the ‘global mother’ prototype and then draw on theories surrounding neoliberal feminism and aberrance to elevate cited examples of Jen’s obvious deviance from this standard. Next, this paper will discuss the struggles of motherhood on all personal, social and emotional levels. Mention of single motherhood and nonviable pregnancies will shed specific light on the factors hindering Jen and Judy’s maternal experiences respectively. This section will draw on the concept of competitive women and the comparative pressures placed on mothers and aspiring mothers. This section will also explore the concept of body politics with respect to Judy’s failed reproductive efforts. Moreover, this paper will discuss motherhood in the face of trauma and abusive patriarchy by drawing on gendered and discursive hierarchies imbedded in Dead to Me’s portrayal of marriage and sexual relationships. Specifically, this section will speak on the stress and trauma associated with abusive relationships and emotionally toxic men and their effects on female and maternal mental health. Discussion will touch on the feminization of madness and the commercialization of the “crazy” mother as pejoratively labelled by men. Finally, this paper will unpack themes of love and female friendship with respect to Jen and Judy’s bond and investigate the power of transgressive female friendships in supporting struggling women and mothers.

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            Television prioritizes a portrayal of motherhood that reinforces the prototypical mother; more specifically, its preferred discourse surrounding the maternal experience masks patriarchal dominance and misogyny under the seemingly autonomous lives led by mothers on screen. Television negotiates an ideal of motherhood, and in doing so, pressures women to conform to standard practices of mothering (Feasey, “Good, Bad” 10). Podneiks explains that media texts work to ‘sell’ the vulnerabilities of maternal audiences by implicitly judging them based on discourse surrounding “good, good enough, and bad mothering” (qt. in Mutti-Driscoll 491), consequentially reinforcing guilt, anxiety and shame associated with not being able to achieve the ‘perfect mother’ status. Allen et al. expand on these aforementioned maternal insecurities by suggesting that television that prioritizes the ‘perfect mother’ portrayal “invites consumers of popular culture, particularly young women, to judge themselves and others against these models of successful (and abject) femininity and maternity” (920). The contemporary media environment is saturated with images of conservative, selfless and wholly satisfied ‘good’ mothers who conform to what Feasey suggests are ideologies of intensive mothering (“Good, Bad” 27). Similarly, Orgad describes the normative or ‘exemplary’ mother in the television landscape as the “balanced woman”(167): the white, middle-class, upwardly mobile woman and multitasker mother who successfully crafts “a felicitous equilibrium between work and family” (Orgad 167) and tends to the mental, physical, social and emotional wellbeing of her family without question. In Dead to Me, the normative mother is depicted through Jen’s neighbour, Karen. Feldman’s decision to use the name Karen is particularly meaningful. A “Karen” is a popular culture term that refers to a demanding, privileged, stereotypical white woman, helicopter mom or mom gossiper always wanting in on the business of others. This is demonstrated through Karen’s frequent peering over onto Jen’s life either by watching from her street cam or by interrogating her every move. The visibility of Karen’s character as the ‘exemplary’ mother model illuminates Jen’s aberrance and ‘flawed’ maternal practices. Feldman’s careful and strategic use of language (Karen) and popular culture slang (a “Karen”) reinforces the mainstream connotative association of normative mothers being boring, unadmirable, annoying or a nuisance.

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            Walters and Harrison define the aberrant mother as a counter image of the normative mother; an “unapologetically non normative” mother heroine, who resists male control and normative familialism” (qtd. in Orgad 167) and is metaphorically situated between the monster mother and normative mother. In Dead to Me, Jen exemplifies the type of aberrant mother not commonly showcased on television. Rather than possessing stereotypical maternal qualities of compassion, patience, nurturance and joyfulness, Jen’s character is openly angry. She expresses her anger, resentment and grief in front of her children and meditates by means of blaring heavy metal music while swearing and yelling. While evidently different from the social construct of the ‘good’ mother, Jen’s aberrance - displayed through the unconventional ways in which she chooses to mother – does not make her an unfit mother nor does it speak to her ability to love and nurture her children. For example, Jen’s love and excellent mothering can be seen through her devotion to protecting the safety and conscience of her sons Charlie and Henry. Jen struggles with her mental health and with coming to terms with her emotions after losing her husband and learning of his affair. Jen is seldom shown having everything together or holding back from expressing her true emotions, but she openly admits that she is trying and that “[she is] doing best [she] can” (“Oh My God”). Jen is shown crying (ugly cries), giving the finger to her children, having mental breakdowns and using profanity; this is the very realism commonly left out in television’s discussion of motherhood and female struggles. Jen does not feel bad about her not being okay (unlike the emotional repression most mothers feel obligated to do), but rather embraces her aberrance and is unapologetic about her anger: “That’s just my face. I have an upset face” (“You Know What You Did”), Jen explains. In an interview, Christina Applegate, who plays Jen, describes Dead to Me’s real take on motherhood by nurturing its ups and downs with an aberrant twist: “Like, when I call Lorna a twat, [saying] that I’m going to stab this f*cking b*tch in the twat—which was, of course, one of the ad libs out of my dark, twisted head—that couldn’t have been played. That had to be real. In this particular show, we just had to play the reality.” (qtd. in Grober). Although Jen is not always likeable, she is not evil as a mother or as a woman. Jen realizes her deviance and vulnerabilities as a struggling mother and apologizes to her sons who witness her suffering first hand: “I’m sorry that I get so angry all the time and that you saw your dad and I fight all the time”(“You Have to Go”), she notes. A newfound visibility of motherhood and mothers facing hardships allows for real, raw emotion to redefine traditional standards of mothering while simultaneously destroying the myth of the aberrant mother as the deficient mother. In veering from a reductive depiction of motherhood, Dead to Me resonates with women and mothers on a shared appreciation for and understanding of the complexities of motherhood.

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            Television to date has attributed very little recognition to the struggles faced by mothers on all personal, social and emotional levels. The one-size-fits-all interpretation of motherhood suggested by the social construct of ideal mothering in-exhaustively represents the ups and downs of the maternal experience and streamlines the complexity of the mother’s role. Being interpellated to strive for the ‘global mother’ status, female television audiences learn to understand themselves as secondary to their role as mothers. Subconscious internalization of ideologies surrounding appropriate mothering can heighten comparative pressures among women who judge themselves based on their perceived degree of success in their mothering role. Rather than supporting one another and embracing the ambiguity in ‘successful’ mothering, women reassure themselves of their adequacy as mothers by comparing to other mothers. For example, Henry’s schoolteacher points out Jen’s lack of involvement in her son’s academics compared to her husband’s: “He was such an involved father” (“Oh My God”). Likewise, Jen’s mother in law Lorna reminds her that her “off-putting attitude” makes her an in-complacent mother and difficult wife (“The Price You Pay”). While Jen tries to stay confident, bold and independent in her work and home life, she is also emotionally exhausted: “I’m not defensive, I'm tired” (“Oh My God”), she unapologetically admits. The realism that Dead to Me brings to motherhood is valuable because it reinforces the fact that mothers are human too; they don’t always know the answers and they too feel alone sometimes. Dead to Me debunks the ‘good mother’ myth by demonstrating that maternal feelings and motherly instincts are not natural, fixed, or innate for all women (Feasey, “Good, Bad” 10), but rather that the mother grows alongside the woman, her lived experiences and her present reality.

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            Dead to Me addresses themes of body politics and female infertility in its reference to Judy’s unviable pregnancies and early entrance to menopause. The narrative surrounding Judy’s failed reproductive efforts can elicit symbolic meaning: perhaps, that a deficient womb suggests maternal inadequacy. This symbolic interpretation aligns with the ‘good vs monster’ mother narrative in its implication that women who commit crimes are unfit for motherhood. Judy speaks about the stress, guilt and shame she feels carrying the burden of killing Ted and blames herself and her body for not being able to bear a child. This emphasizes the debilitating pain associated with an unclear conscience and suggests that withholding the truth can hinder one’s potential as a mother. Podneiks discusses this same kind of self-inflicted pressure placed on the female body whereby women feel they must comply with healthy self-care and pregnancy practices that adhere to the ‘good’ mother myth (qtd. in Mutti-Driscoll 492). The immense guilt Judy lives with after unintentionally killing her now best friend’s husband can draw parallel with the stress and pressure felt by mothers who believe they should repress their feelings or hide their pain in order to keep intact their ‘good’ mother image and status. Situational and generational trauma, stress, and grief hinder the normalcy of Jen and Judy’s lives and leave them struggling to make sense of their realities. From losing her husband, transitioning to single parenthood and learning about her husband’s affair, Jen’s exhaustion and confusion about the state of her life is not masked or stylized, but rather her emotional suffering is vividly reinforced. For example, frequent emotional breakdowns illustrate Jen’s conflicting feelings of resentment and grief: “I was obsessed with trying to find the person that killed him and for what? He fucking killed me…I’m glad he's dead” (“I Can’t Go Back”). Ultimately, Jen exhibits the ugly side effects of pain that results from the willful betrayal (Ted’s affair) and unplanned betrayal (Ted’s death) of a man she loved dearly.

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            In Dead to Me, the feminization of madness can be seen as influenced by toxic masculinity. Dead to Me sheds light on the effects of dysfunctional relationships on the emotional wellbeing of women and mothers. The men in Dead to Me are introduced as charismatic, charming and irresistible. However, as the season progresses, their manipulative, deceitful, disloyal and abusive sides take center stage. Judy’s ex-husband Steve, for example, is manipulative: he blames Judy for Ted’s death despite telling to drive away after hitting him. While initially Steve consoles Judy and reassures her that they're “in this together” (“Try to Stop Me”), he switches up later when his stakes grow higher, in order to protect himself and his reputation: “It’s every man for himself” (“Try to Stop Me”), he tells Judy. Likewise, Steve makes Judy feel ashamed for not being able to bear children and leaves her because she is unable to provide him the family he desires. After leaving Judy, Steve is quick to call her crazy and order restraining orders against her; this is his way of justifying his selfishness and ignoring the pain and valid suffering he puts her through. Steve further justifies his cowardly acts by telling Jen to also beware of Judy’s craziness: “Wherever Judy goes, chaos tends to follow.” (“Maybe I’m Crazy”). Steve not only reinforces Judy’s insecurities about being undeserving of maternal status, but also makes her feel unlovable and flawed. Judy’s relationship with Steve is emotionally taxing and abusive and this is illustrated by the misogynistic ways in which he addresses her in dialogue and undermines her in public. For example, when Judy lingers in shock after having just hit Ted, Steve tells her "drive the car stupid” (“You Have to Go”). Jen is also often framed as crazy, angry and pessimistic. Flashbacks from the night Jen unintentionally kills Steve, for example, shows Jen’s rage in response to Steve’s calling her a “cunt” and blaming her for driving her husband to kill himself (“You Have to Go”). Lorna places similar blame by suggesting that Jen’s toxic nature gave Ted a reason to be unhappy: “The only harder sell than a moldy house is a bitter woman. No one wants to live with that.” (“The Price You Pay”).

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            Dead to Me amplifies the important role played by mothers to nurture, guide and support their children. Jen is frequently shown molding the ideologies of her two sons, Charlie and Henry. While her parenting style is different from most normative practices of maternal discipline, Jen teaches her sons valuable life lessons about the importance of being truthful and treating women with respect. Notably, when Jen lectures her son Charlie about his reflexive use of language to label women as crazy, she recounts her own experience with her husband to suggest that masculine disloyalty is often times the cause of such feminine hysteria. Jen reasons that “men call women nuts and crazy way too often, just to undermine [them]” (“Maybe I’m Crazy”) and that women are not innately crazy, but rather are often driven crazy. Moreover, when her son Charlie gets in trouble for selling drugs at school, Jen’s aberrant approach to maternal disciplining is made clear: “A good mother would take him to therapy, but I'm going to scare the shit out of him” (“Oh My God”), she explains while proceeding to stage a police interrogation in their home. Jen teaches her son to unlearn misogyny and patriarchal ideologies (Souls) by showing them that despite being a woman, she is in charge: “I don't know where you're getting all of this patriarchal shit but I'm the woman of the house" (“Maybe I’m Crazy”).

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            The bond shared by Jen and Judy epitomize the transgression of female friendship that much of television has neglected. Both women are powerful in their own ways and their almost opposite personalities - Judy being soft, compassionate, naive and vulnerable and Jen being the tough, ‘angry woman’ character - complement each other in a way that is rarely portrayed on television (Dunn and Turner 168). Jen and Judy stick up for one another especially in the presence of hostile and abusive men who belittle them, and their bond nurtures genuine love and support. Jen and Judy’s friendship is predicated on a mutual understanding of one another and their struggles and their ability to be openly vulnerable with one another strengthens this connection. For example, when Judy feels overwhelmed by her grief, she tells Jen “I just don’t want to sit in these feelings alone” (I’ve Gotta Get Away”). Jen, without hesitation, sits with her in silence and consoles her with the power of her presence. Thus, their power, resilience and leadership is amplified through the ups and downs of their friendship and the sacrifices they make for each other. Their constructive rather than toxic friendship invites women and mothers in the audience to find this wanting (Feasey, “From Soap” 39).

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            Jen and Judy show their gratitude for their friendship by pointing out the good in one another rather than amplifying each other’s faults. For example, when Jen’s mother in law Lorna undermines Jen’s mothering abilities by telling Judy that “mothering never came natural to Jennifer” (“Maybe I’m Crazy”), Judy responds in Jen’s defense saying, “That’s not true, Jen is a wonderful mother” (“Maybe I’m Crazy”). Dead to Me demonstrates the power of supportive women to help correct flawed self-perceptions and critical self-evaluations in their roles as women, individuals, mothers and friends. For example, in an effort to help Jen see the same good in herself that Judy sees, Judy tells Jen, “I wish you would love yourself more” (“Maybe I’m Crazy”). Likewise, when Judy hits herself and expresses self-discontent, Jen tells her to “stop shaming [herself] and [her] body…” (“I’ve Gotta Get Away”). Thus, while their similar traumas don’t necessarily make them computable, they show Jen and Judy how much they need one another to be better versions of themselves - whether as mothers or as women: “I needed you today, Judy, and that’s very hard for me to admit.” (“I Can Handle It”). Perhaps the most fundamental point, then, is that the power of friendship and mutual respect can potentially be more fulfilling than that which could be provided by a man or found through marriage.

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In conclusion, television’s proliferation of highly glamorized narratives surrounding motherhood reinforces ideologically embedded myths of mothering that cast normative mothers as sane, saintly and uncontroversial figures. Mediated motherhood has been put up against a backdrop of an idealized prototype and the narrowcasting facilitated by popular culture television and the discursive and gender hierarchies they uplift make it so that all facets of the mother’s role are not equally made visible on television. A blurring of traditional boundaries between deviant and global mothering is exemplified through Dead to Me’s grounding of motherhood and mothering in ideologies of aberrance; specifically, in situating mothers as people first and entrenching aberrance into the mothering experience to assure that the unexpected struggles of mothering, single parenting and familial management are not merely glorified, but rather are more realistic and exhaustive. Dead to Me shows, with raw emotion and from a maternal perspective, the heart wrenching effects associated with the betrayal of love in all forms. While audiences may not relate to Jen, her pain and heartache can be felt by those who empathize with her and understand the power of dealing with love and loss on top of the already challenging role of being a mother. Overall, Jen communicates a powerful message to women and mothers: to embrace aberrance and to understand that there is no ‘right’ way to mother or to be a mother; that it is okay to be selfish, to do bad things, to mess up and to not always have the right answers. In essence, popular culture’s prioritization of the ‘perfect mother’ prototype significantly hinders the subjective nature of motherhood and the potential for mothers to mother in their own ways. By entrenching a narrative associated with balance and willful subjection to their family, husband, children and household, television significantly under-represents the struggles of motherhood. Transgressive portrayals of women, mothers and maternal friendships go beyond pop cultural portrayals of women in passive roles and performing invisible labour such as housework and mothering, and instead, engage with notions of aberrance. Dead to Me’s ‘struggling mother’ depiction exposes the expectations of the ‘good’ mother as a romanticized myth, thereby tempting audiences to reassess whether this is a standard they wish to emulate (Feasey, “From Soap” 27).

 

 

Works Cited

 

Allen, Mendick, et al. “Welfare Queens, Thrifty Housewives, and Do-It-All Mums.” Feminist Media Studies, vol. 15, no. 6, 2015, pp. 907-925, Taylor & Francis, DOI: 10.1080/14680777.2015.1062992. Accessed 18 Nov. 2020.

 

Dunn and Turner. “I’m your Person: Television narrates female friendships in the workplace from Cagney and Lacey to Grey’s Anatomy.” Transgressing Feminist Theory and Discourse, edited by Jennifer C. Dunn and Jimmie Manning, Taylor & Francis, 2018, pp. 165-178.

 

Feasey, Rebecca. “From Soap Opera to Reality Programming: Examining Motherhood, Motherwork and the Maternal Role on Popular Television.” Imaginations: Journal of Cross-Cultural Image Studies, vol. 2, no. 4, 2013, pp. 25-46, DOI: 10.17742/IMAGE.mother.4-2.2. Accessed 18 Nov. 2020.

 

Feasey, Rebecca. “Good, Bad or Just Good Enough: Representations of Motherhood and the Maternal Role on the Small Screen.” Studies in the Maternal, vol. 9, no. 1, 2017, pp. 1-31, DOI: 10.3138/UTQ .83.2.397. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

Feldman, Liz. Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

Grobar, Matt. “Dead to Me Stars Christina Applegate & Linda Cardellini On Dark Comedy’s Exploration Of ‘Women Holding Each Other Up.’” Deadline, 11 June. 2019, www.deadline.com/2019/06/dead-to-me-christina-applegate-linda-cardellini-liz-feldman-emmys-1202623980/. Accessed 20 Nov. 2020.

 

Mutti-Driscoll, Catherine. Review of Mediating Moms: Mothers in Popular Culture, by Elizabeth Podnieks. University of Toronto Quarterly, vol. 83, no. 2, Spring 2014, pp.491-492, Project MUSE, muse.jhu.edu/article/557174. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

Orgad, Shani. “The Cruel Optimism of The Good Wife: The Fantastic Working Mother on the Fantastical Treadmill.” Television & New Media, vol. 18, no. 2, 2017, pp.165-183, SAGE, DOI: 10.1177/1527476416652483. Accessed 18 Nov. 2020.

 

Souls, Somnolent. “An Ode to Women.” Review of Dead to Me (Season 2), by Liz Feldman. High on Films, 8 June. 2020, www.highonfilms.com/dead-to-me-season-2-netflix-review. Accessed 20 Nov. 2020.

 

Dead to Me Season 1 & 2 Episodes:

 

 “I Can Handle It.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

“I Can’t Go Back.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

 “I’ve Gotta Get Away.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

“Maybe I’m Crazy.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

“Oh My God.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

“The Price You Pay.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 8 May. 2020, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

 “Try to Stop Me.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

 “You Have to Go.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 3 May. 2019, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.

 

“You Know What You Did.” Dead to Me. Netflix Canada, 8 May. 2020, Netflix, www.netflix.com/title/80219707. Accessed 19 Nov. 2020.