She dated one guy who raped her, one guy who beat her up, and two guys with addiction issues (Dory and Nick).
That’s only four out of however many men she dated, so I don’t think that’s most of the men she dated.
And, a lot of people, including Chris herself, have addiction issues, so I don’t see that (necessarily) being a problem.
That was four men that we knew of…but I get the feeling that Chris went through a lot more than merely four dysfunctional men.
In her professional life and around close friends like Mary Beth, she was fairly confident and felt secure, but when it came to guys and even just people she didn’t know well, most of her self-confidence seemed to evaporate.
Chris had her bout with alcoholism partially due to her self-confidence issues, but she sought help and nipped it in the bud before it ruined her life…unlike some of the men she dated, whose addiction issues were much more chronic.
Sure, lots of people have addiction issues…but what is the deciding thing with addiction is…does the person work to overcome it? Or does it become a chronic issue with them?
Chris belongs in the first category; she was strong enough to overcome her alcoholism and not allow it to destroy her life and become a chronic pattern.
Many of the boyfriends…the latter category…many of them would only temporarily stop drinking/doing drugs etcetera…then go back on it with lame excuses a while later.
Thank Heaven Chris does break away from these dysfunctional boyfriends much to her credit…I know too many women that unfortunately remain with dysfunctional boyfriends.
Nick seemed like a good influence and seemed to agree with Chris that they didn’t want the relationship to grow too serious, and Dory (when clean) seemed like a good guy who really cared about her.
I guess…but Dory was only “clean” at times, then would slip back into his old patterns…again, a chronic issue.
The ones with Nick, I still have to re-watch…I don’t remember Nick too well. Did he overcome his addiction or was his addiction a chronic pattern…..?
I think David was pretty nice and normal too, and he loved Chris. Those seem to be the major three that I can think of, and they were all fundamentally good men, IMO.
True, David was good for her…and she was good for him.
We’ll have to agree to disagree re how she relates to men versus women. I think she’s much more comfortable with men - she plays pool and poker and softball and loves watching baseball and basketball.
I’m not saying women can’t do/like those things, just that some seem to be traditional “male” hobbies.
I don’t think it was that she preferred male company…I think it was the activities she liked…she liked pool and sports and all, but true that it was male-dominated, so back in the 1980s, when females were mostly shooed away from these activities, Chris saw no other option but to play with those who were there…which by default…were mostly men.
If it had been a group of women playing poker or pool, Chris would have been just as comfortable. I actually think she sometimes wished more women would join these activities; I suspect she figured that if she joined, other women would see and also be encouraged to join in.
Too many girls who had interests in traditionally “male” dominated areas like sports, mechanics, engineering, police work, science, and math faced this dreadful dilemma…they were pressured to either give up these interests/talents or to be the lone female among a horde of males…a painfully uncomfortable catch twenty-two so to speak.
I think she likes to show off how good she is and that she can beat the guys.
True…she rather fears most men, so I think she is afraid of the men overwhelming her and making her appear “weak” hence her mask of bravado.
Chris is truly tougher than a street thug, but deep inside, has lots of fears and since she has had bad experiences with men in her personal life, she is very wary of being trampled on by men, especially at her work.
She grew up around Charlie and his police buddies, and was distant from her mom.
Partially true…but I do think she loved her mum…her mum had her own issues and I think Chris felt bad for her. Notice that Chris usually speaks of her mum with sadness, not hostility.
I think she would be lost in a world of women friends and their wedding plans and baby showers and sick kids and such. She wouldn’t know how to relate.
But she wasn’t “lost” with women…she was a good listener with Mary Beth when Mary Beth talked about her kids and her happy marriage with Harvey and never seemed uncomfortable with it.
In the later seasons, when Verna Dee joined them, Chris related very well to her. Chris often joined the Laceys at their family gatherings and seemed completely at ease.
And women friends, as most of us know, do talk about much more than weddings and baby showers.
In addition, Chris went to an all-girls parochial school and in college, was in an all-female dorm (and I am sure these girls and young women talked about much more than boyfriends or weddings or fashion) and she speaks fondly of those years…something she would NOT have done if she felt “lost” among other females.
And in the episode where Mary Beth has her breakdown, Chris actually mentions that at one time as a teenager, she fancied becoming a nun…and nuns live in all-female communities.
I actually think she feels a bit lost and overwhelmed among a horde of men, although she does a heroic job of hiding her nervousness with them.
Streetwise, tough Chris had plenty of practice in developing that tenacity to rival the roughest street thug growing up in a tough area of Brooklyn…thank HEAVEN they mostly scrapped the farcical storyline of having Chris grow up pampered in some posh, wealthy county club town way out in the boondocks of Westchester County.
I’m not sure I agree with the idea that she was wary of partnering with Mary Beth b/c MB talks about her family and that that would compromise them.
Possibly…but I think once she got to know Mary Beth, she was glad to have Mary Beth as her partner.
I notice that in the re-union films in the 1990s, both women are much more relaxed because sexism has begun to erode and they are no longer the lone females in their workplace.
Compare those films to the 1980s series and see how much more pressure they are under…and they felt the pressure and were more uptight…not as free…they both were more wary.
I think there just was sexism, that talking about family wasn’t going to hurt them anymore than they were already hurt by sexism inherent in the department/job.
True…and Chris and Mary Beth realized it and fought sexism together.
I’m also not sure I agree with Chris and Mary Beth being friends. They’re partners and I firmly believe they love each other and care about each other and their families, but if they didn’t work together and just happened to meet then they would never be friends, IMO. If anything, they're friends by circumstance and they make the relationship work, I think.
No, I think they’re more than merely friends “by circumstance.” Initially, it began that way, but I think their friendship grew to more than being merely professional partners; by mid-season, they went far beyond the call of duty in work friendship.
They became like sisters by the show’s end; in fact, little Alice often called Chris Aunt Christine…something she wouldn’t have done if Chris had been this mere work acquaintance without much of a bond.
Chris was like an older sister to Mary Beth as well as an aunt figure to Mary Beth’s kids…even as early as the first season, Mary Beth and Chris exchange holiday gifts at Christmas and Mary Beth’s kids and Harvey pitch in to buy Chris something; Harvey Junior gave Chris that red scarf and Chris proudly wore it as any loving aunt would.
I can’t think of any example to suggest she was close to her mom. Brian said something about the mom didn’t know how to reach Chris, that none of them did, and she said Charlie did.
Brian was an arrogant idiot to me who pretended to “know” everything, but in fact knew squat about his own family, including their parents.
He was just SUPPOSING that Chris was this unreachable being to their mum…but there are hints that Brian was really not that close to either parent and was merely using their mum’s premature death to attempt to make Chris feel guilty for not seeing things “his” way.
The only person who really “couldn’t reach” Chris was Brian himself…because once Chris grew up and was no longer a frightened child, he could no longer bully her or try to overcontrol her…so he alone declared her “unreachable” and made her out to be the “troublemaker.”
I wouldn’t have put it past Brian to have badmouthed Chris to his wife and daughters…thankfully, Bridget and Anne were smart enough not to be brainwashed and were willing to embrace Chris.
Chris actually seems a bit sad when she talks about her mum, not hostile or cold…so I do think at one point, Chris had been close to her mum and despite what Brian tried to claim, Chris did love their mum very much.
I think the mom may have suffered from depression. Charlie and Chris both seemed to allude to that at times.
True…and none of them knew how to deal with it…Brian, however, chose to disassociate himself from the family; he, not Chris, was the one who moved all the way out to Cali; Brian, not Chris, was the one who was disdainful toward New York City and toward Charlie Cagney.
Brian, not Chris, was the one who went chasing the big fortune and the good life full of luxury, mansions, and material goods.
Chris was ambitious also, but she used her ambition for the good of humanity. With her college degree, she could have gone fortune-hunting on Wall Street or some huge corporation, but she did not.
She chose to become a policewoman for the city of New York…partially it was to carry on her family tradition of the line of police officers in her Irish family, but also because unlike Brian, Chris was not self-centered; she never had the mentality of making a fast buck and the public-be-damned.
I suspect that’s a large part of what ripped Brian and Chris apart…it hurt Chris to see Brian become so shallow, self-absorbed, and so disdainful of the Cagney/Donovan Irish heritage and values they’d both been raised with.
I also tend to ignore the husband b/c I think it was just a plot device to give her a private life in the movie. I think they should have just given her another random boyfriend.
That would have worked also…that husband was cheating cad…I was so glad to see Chris split from him…that husband was just another in a long line of guys Chris ended up being hurt by…poor Chris.
I think Dory was clean after rehab, and I got the impression that he would stay clean. No one can predict the future though, he could have been clean ten years and then slipped, but I thought he was serious about staying clean.
True, no one can tell…I’m glad Chris didn’t wait around indefinitely for Dory to finally get his act together…she deserved better.
A bit off topic, but question re Dory - in the episode where his friend/sponsor is arrested for possession and then the evidence is mysteriously lost so the charge dismissed - do you think Dory did it?
He said he didn’t, but I do think he stole that evidence to help out his friend. It seemed like too much of a coincidence to me.
I wondered about that one also…Dory did have that history of lying to hide his addiction…I wonder if he ever received psychological counseling to help him really get rid of his drug habit?
Chris said that all she ever wanted was for Brian to like her. I think he thought of her as the annoying little sister (which is probably normal for siblings), then the parents divorced and he gravitated to the mom and she gravitated to the dad, and then they were both in college (and him law school) and the mom died and Chris cut off communication, so I think Chris and Brian never really knew each other as kids and certainly not as adults. They’re connected by DNA and not much else.
I think it was more than that…I actually used to think that Chris was the older of the two…Brian always seemed so shallow and selfish to me.
I suspect Brian, as they grew older, bullied Chris quite a bit, which is where part of her self-esteem problems and her selecting dysfunctional boyfriends stemmed from.
I actually think Brian cut off communication from not only Chris, but their parents as well. I think he only used their mum to try to guilt Chris into his shallow way of seeing things.
I think the mum’s depression, possibly alcoholism, and other issues hurt Chris deeply…Chris loved her mum, but didn’t know how to help her.
Brian saw this, so when the mum died (I really don’t buy the one storyline claiming that the mum simply dropped dead on some golf course of a heart attack; I think there was more to it than that specious claim that Brian told Chris), Brian used that as a weapon against his sister.
I have the feeling that Brian really wasn’t that close to their mum as he claimed either; otherwise, he would not have been so eager to ditch the rest of the Cagneys/Donovans and purge their New York Irish Catholic heritage so soon after their mum died.
When Chris visits her brother in LA, Brian seems determined to raise his daughters in “upper-class” WASP, suburban white-bread world; he seems rather unsettled by Bridget wanting to get to know Chris better and later by Bridget embracing their Irish Catholic heritage that Chris is so proud of.
I don’t like Brigit because I don’t understand her storyline. She constantly says she wants to be a free spirit like her aunt, but first, I don’t think people can become free spirits, I think they either are or they’re not.
Second, I don’t think Chris is a free spirit. She doesn’t want marriage or kids, which tends to go against the norm, but otherwise she’s pretty much done what she's “supposed” to do in life.
She graduated from college and then started a career where she likely stayed until she retired. She studied abroad while in college, and she likes to travel on her weekends and/or vacations, but she seems pretty stable and responsible to me.
She doesn’t just take off and ignore her responsibilities and she’s not flighty (except with men, IMO).
I don’t think Chris is, which is why the episodes with the niece baffle me. Brigit mentions Paris a few times, but she doesn’t seem to understand that Chris was in school at the time she was in Paris, not just traveling or running off for an adventure. And Chris never points that out to her, and it frustrates me a bit.
I like Bridgit, but yeah, that storyline was a tad confusing because I agree with you that Chris wasn’t any “free spirit” or flighty…even with men.
I suspect it was Brian running his mouth…he tried to make his own sister out to be this “irresponsible” playgirl with “no” responsibilities.
I wouldn’t put it past Brian to make up the tale of Chris allegedly being on “holiday” in France while their mum was on her death bed just to make Chris look bad to her nieces instead of telling the truth that Chris was working hard for her college degree.
I also wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Brian tried to deny that they were Irish and made up the tale of himself and Chris allegedly being from some millionaire family and being born rich and then accusing Chris of being this unappreciative “brat” as well.
I never did buy into that storyline that attempted to depict Chris as a pampered femme fatale from this rich, country-club-style family from the boondocks of Westchester county anyway, so I tend to just chalk it to more of Brian’s BS-ing.
I still think it was that Chris, with her self-esteem issues, selected men mostly who just weren’t good for her…it could have stemmed from a mix of her dad’s and possibly mum’s chronic alcoholism and her snobbish brother’s poor treatment of her.
I say Chris did the right thing by walking away from most of these men; she did not just dump them on a whim.
She loved each of these men…despite her streetwise manner and toughness, she had a huge heart, a lot like Mary Beth…she never ended any romance too lightly or too easily.
I think the woman that Mary Beth met on the beach when Mary Beth was having a nervous breakdown was a free spirit.
Definitely…I also suspect that Maggie had a slight crush on Mary Beth. Mary Beth is also a fascinating character because she’s so extroverted, more so than Chris, yet is a highly sensitive person.
Remember how Mary Beth cried so easily? I suspect both women carried the special trait of high sensitivity; however Mary Beth was extremely sensitive, yet was a bubbly extrovert and not at all shy while Chris was more introverted and moderately sensitive.
Below are websites about this trait that approximately twenty percent of the human population has:
http://hsperson.com/test/highly-sensitive-test/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/10-traits-highly-sensitive-person_55dc86e6e4b08cd3359d514d
http://www.wsj.com/articles/do-you-cry-easily-you-may-be-a-highly-sensitive-person-1431971154
http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2015/02/08/what-makes-a-highly-sensitive-person/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/wellbeing/health-advice/highly-sensitive-people/
http://thoughtcatalog.com/sophia-borghese/2015/02/21-ways-to-take-care-of-a-highly-sensitive-person/
I think both Mary Beth and Christine could benefit from these websites, if they haven’t already…it sure would help Chris’s self-esteem, although in the films, her self-esteem seemed to be growing stronger.
Their high sensitivity made them both deeply compassionate, highly perceptive especially to the unspoken, and extremely observant and that was a very good thing in their work as detectives.
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