Today marks the return of Orange is the New Black, the Netflix original series that's about to begin its second season. It also marks the start of a weekend where I will not be seeing or speaking to anyone. I'm
How could you not be? For the great uninitiated, OITNB is about life in a minimum-security federal prison for women. We're introduced to the world of Litchfield prison through Piper Chapman, a WASPy woman sentenced to 15 months for a one-time international drug trafficking charge (oh, like you didn't experiment in college, too). Piper is always there, our eyes and ears as we meet new people and experience new facets of prison life, but the real story lies in those around her: the guards and, especially, the other inmates. Each episode in the first season provided a backstory to someone new, giving us a hint at the life they led and how it brought them to Litchfield. The stories are amazing, and the cast is even better.
The first time I watched OITNB's first season was back in September and October and after watching it again so recently, I realized how much I forgot. So here's a primer on the ladies (and gents) of Litchfield and where they each left off.
THE PRISONERS
Piper Chapman
Background: Piper is a self-described WASP, descended from a long line of the same. Constantly looking for adventure and meaning in her life, she stumbles into a bar shortly after college looking for a job. She instead finds Alex, an international drug trafficker. The two hit it off and quickly fall in love. Piper isn't really a part of Alex's business (although she certainly doesn't complain about being trotted around the world like a trophy wife) but agrees to move money across national borders once, as a favor.
Flash forward 10 years and Piper is an NPR-listening, juice-cleansing, fancy-bath-soap-producing blogger engaged to Larry, a freelance writer. She's shocked out of her idyllic life by police and charges and winds up in Litchfield.
Life in Litchfield: Like learning of the wizarding world through Harry Potter's equally unfamiliar eyes, we learn the ins and outs of Litchfield through Piper. She has minor altercations with Red, Crazy Eyes, Janae, Officer Healy, Miss Claudette and others, but she begins to develop her own stories when she starts having an affair with Alex, who happens to be in prison with her. She also has a big feud with Pennsatucky, when what starts as an intense prank war turns into violence and death threats.
Where We Left Off: Rejected by both Larry and Alex and told that she's a bad person by Crazy Eyes, Piper was already having a horrible day when she was attacked and threatened by the insane Pennsatucky. She finally snapped, viciously attacking Pennsatucky. The big question for Piper is what type of punishment she'll receive for the violence? I'm guessing a pretty long stretch in the SHU (solitary).
Alex Vause
International drug trafficker and Piper's ex-girlfriend. She and Piper rekindle their relationship in prison, until Piper realizes Alex was the one who turned her into the police and Alex gets fed up with Piper's manipulation of both her and Larry. After their latest fight, she's no longer speaking to Piper and is possibly starting a relationship with Nicky.
Galina "Red" Reznikov
Originally the most powerful inmate in the prison, Red ran the kitchen, brought in contraband with her food orders and protected a cadre of young women she "adopted" on the inside. Her battle with Officer Pornstache about bringing drugs into the prison leaves her without a job. She reacted poorly to this punishment, sabotaging the kitchen and inadvertently leading to one of her girls getting severely burned in a grease fire. She's gone from most to least powerful throughout the season.
A drug addict and regular visitor to the abortion clinic landed herself in prison when she shot a nurse after the nurse made a remark about how many abortions she'd received. She was called a hero by pro-life activists and adopted their stance by becoming a born-again Christian. She's also insane and spent much of the season in a prank war with Piper and Alex that led to Alex getting locked in an industrial dryer and Pennsatucky getting admitted to the psych ward. Things escalate and Pennsatucky threatens to kill Piper, only to hit her on the wrong day and wind up getting viciously attacked herself. The biggest cliffhanger of the season: is Pennsatucky still alive after that beatdown?
Suzanne "Crazy Eyes" Warren
Crazy Eyes is an enigma that I hope will have some light shed on it. She's clearly got some mental issues - she's the only person who regularly spends time in the psych ward and returns back to the regular prison population. She stalks Piper early in the season, an act that is at times sweet (writing her poetry, calling her "Dandelion" because she's pretty and yellow, like the weed) and at times terrifying (reacting to Piper's rejection by peeing all over Piper's cell floor). Her parents are well-to-do-looking, elderly white people (Crazy Eyes is black) who call her Suzanne. She provides Piper the most in-depth look at her soul when, after Larry relays some of the terrible things Piper said about her on a radio interview, she claims that the reason they would never work in a relationship is simple: "You're mean."
Daya Diaz (and Aleida Diaz)
Litchfield is a family tradition for the Diaz women, as both Daya and her mother Aleida are both inmates. Their relationship is strained, as Daya spent much of her time raising her younger siblings while her mother hung out with her drug-cooking boyfriend and Daya responded by sleeping with said boyfriend. In Litchfield, Daya quickly falls for Officer Bennett and the two begin a cute flirtation that leads to sex that leads to Daya getting pregnant. Aleida and Red cook up a plan to have Daya "get raped" by Pornstache to both explain the pregnancy and punish Pornstache. Bennett is not happy for obvious reasons, but things end up OK with them after Daya almost gets burned in a grease fire and Bennett realizes how much he still feels for her.
Nicky Nichols
By far one of the most hilarious and entertaining characters. Nicky is a junkie who cleaned up in prison with Red's help. She spent much of the season having an affair with Lorna, who eventually broke her heart. Nicky had a moment with Alex at the end of last season that makes you wonder if they're going to become an item and my favorite television relationship.
Sophia Burset
In for credit card fraud, Sophia's struggles come from a few sources. As a trans woman, she fights with a budget-pressed prison who stop her hormones (she tries to buddy up with Sister Ingalls to get the menopausal nun to share her meds but no dice), and she struggles with a wife who wants to be supportive but also wants to be married to a man and a young son who keeps rejecting her. She's also the prison hairstylist and her buddy-cop routine with Sister Ingalls is fabulous.
Miss Claudette
A stern and serious woman, Claudette worked to bring teenage immigrants to the U.S. to make a new life for themselves. She also murdered someone who abused one of her girls. Claudette is resigned to spending her whole life at Litchfield until the man she's been in love with since she was a child decides he wants to be with her, too. When her parole is denied, however, she snaps and attacks a guard. That gets her sent to maximum security prison, a place no one returns to when they attack a guard. We may have seen the last of Miss Claudette.
Taystee Jefferson
The prison librarian and comic relief. She was paroled midway through the season but purposely got herself arrested again when she realized how little opportunity she had on the outside. Having a known bed and three guaranteed meals a day was more appealing than her freedom. Now that Miss Claudette is out of the picture, Taystee is also Piper's new bunkmate.
Big Boo
Not much is known about Big Boo except she used to date a paroled inmate named Mercy, is occasionally one of Red's girls, and has a dog named Little Boo. I can't figure out the dog, which wears what looks like a therapy vest but seems way too young and untrained to actually BE a therapy dog. I love that there's a dog...I just have no idea how it got there. Anyway, Boo is hilarious, and her best scene is when she has Pennsatucky "heal" her of her lesbian tendencies. Her test to see whether it worked is picturing the U.S. women's soccer team. Boo's the best.
Poussey Washington
It's pronounced poo-SAY! She's best friends with Taystee and is pretty funny (her and Taystee's impersonation of white women is one of my favorite scenes from the season).
Lorna Morello
Forever planning a wedding to a man who hasn't visited her in years, Lorna breaks off her affair with Nicky out of loyalty to her beloved "Christopher." She's one of Red's gang.
Gloria Mendoza
Gloria took over Red's kitchen after she fell on the wrong side of Pornstache and gave jobs to all of her gang. While nobody was able to prove Red sabotaged the kitchen, Gloria knew and instituted a freeze-out of Red's food supply.
Yoga Jones
The yoga instructor of the group, Yoga Jones is as hippy-dippy as you'd expect someone who used to farm marijuana to be. Of course, she has her demons, which come to light when she has a confrontation with Janae. She admits that, while drunk, she shot and killed what she thought was a deer eating her crops but was instead a young child. She and Janae bonded over purposely shocking themselves with a fork and an outlet.
Norma Romano
Red's right-hand woman...until Red burns Gina. Completely mute throughout the season, Norma finally opens up to sing at the end of the Christmas pageant, a la Scrooged.
Janae Watson
Once a track star destined to escape her bad neighborhood with a scholarship, Janae ruined her shot by hanging out with a bad influence - the only boy who ever gave her any attention. Now she's got an attitude about everything and everyone, something that wasn't helped when she spent 10 days in solitary for something Piper did (Piper repaid her by fighting to reopen the prison track). She eventually feuds and then bonds with Yoga Jones.
Sister Ingalls
A nun who is serving for chaining herself to a nuclear power plant as a protest, she is both a moral compass for some characters (Sophia) and someone who's not afraid to go against the norm.
THE GUARDS
Officer Bennett
Considering he is a combat veteran, Officer Bennett is pretty fresh-faced and naive. And, as always, OITNB tests our preconceived notions by having his prosthetic leg be the result of an infection wrought by a dirty hot tub rather than an IED. Bennett develops feelings for Daya, the two have an affair, and Daya becomes pregnant. He's not happy when her solution to the problem is to have sex with Pornstache so she can claim rape and neither will get in trouble, but she still matters to him and she's still carrying his baby.
Pornstache
About as wholesome as his nickname would indicate, Pornstache likes to use his position to gain sexual favors from the inmates. He's also selling drugs on the side, a business that becomes more difficult when they start searching guards. This sparks his battle with Red and leads to Tricia's overdose. Eventually, Red gets to him by convincing Daya to have an affair with him to get him fired. He doesn't lose his job but he does get suspended without pay, and he gets Red to lose her job in the kitchen. He's also decided he's in love with Daya.
Officer Healy
Officer Healy is an inmate counselor, and is assigned to Piper. At first, Piper is one of her favorites; he sees her as a "normal" person, not like the career criminals, low-lifes, and lesbians that otherwise populate the prison. He helps her out until she starts having an affair with Alex and then turns on her. His hatred of lesbian activity is borderline obsessive, a strange thing considering how nontraditional his own marriage is (he has a mail-order wife from Ukraine who hates him). Things come to such a head between him and Piper that he knowingly leaves her alone with a vengeful Pennsatucky, thinking Piper was going to be severely hurt or even murdered.
Officer Caputo
The head of the corrections officers, he's just a little bit sketchy, but definitely not on Pornstache's level. He has kind of an adorable crush on Officer Fischer, and looks heartbroken when she introduces him to her boyfriend in the finale.
Officer Fischer
A midseason addition, Officer Fischer is a sweet woman who catches the eye of Officer Caputo. She also catches the eye of Miss Claudette, who strangles her after losing her parole hearing.
Natalie "Fig" Figueroa
The administrator at Litchfield, who serves as a liaison between the prison's corrections staff and the warden. Fig is mostly concerned with the bottom line and the public image of the prison, even at the expense of safety (when a guard is caught having sex with an inmate, she scoffs when someone refers to it as rape since the prisoner wasn't screaming or crying). She's also stealing money by cutting prison services even though the budget was increased.
Officer Wanda Bell
A harsh-looking female guard having an affair with Officer O'Neill. A good source of comic relief.
THE OUTSIDE
Larry Bloom
Piper's fiance. At first, he seems to enjoy Piper's adventure, which automatically makes his life more interesting. He uses it to get a piece published in the New York Times and get featured on an NPR story about long-distances relationships. But when he learns that Piper is having an affair with Alex, he breaks it off.
Polly Harper
Piper's best friend and business partner. Polly gives birth to a son while Piper is inside. She and her husband Pete are also friends of Larry's and support him as much as they can, as well.
Cal Chapman
Piper's brother and Larry's best friend, Cal lives in the woods, is engaged to a woman who works on an oil rig, and provides advice to Larry, both practical and insane.
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