So the Scorned Woman is the One in the Wrong

Spoilers...
Yes. I don't know if the writer thinks he's made his lead character a woman who has "won" or even comes out okay. Does the woman scorned have to be a monster?

The first few episodes were absolutely fantastic and then things kind of fell apart in her "revenge" strategy. We get to know Gemma in the beginning, and although she used some very shaky methods to find out things about her husband (you wonder why she just couldn't have hired a PI), but she was ethical in some cases where she could have compromised herself - pills for spying, not telling her husband of gf's pregnancy.

But the writing of Gemma took a turn for the worst in the last two episodes. All of a sudden, we see that she is the crazy one; that she has no friends; that her son doesn't like her; how can anyone like her because she is aloof and superior, and it's a bit much. There is nothing in the beginning episodes to ever make her out as a bad person. She was a loving wife and mother, a good doctor, a strong confidante in getting rid of a patient's abusive bf, and then the revelation - she finds out she's been lied to by her husband, as well as people close to her for two years, which is really the brilliance of this series. The part where the writer makes her "crazy" not only ruins her character but it also ruins the brilliance of the rest of the series. There are two parts: revelation and then how she handles it, and the latter really suffers. Subjecting her son to finding out about his father in the way that she orchestrated is reprehensible. The appearance of kidnapping and doing harm to him is also reprehensible. The fact she is suspicious by school authorities when she picks up her son from school is hard to accept. Why is she the bad guy? The part that is really the most difficult for me has to do with Tom - he associates the gf as being promiscuous and then says to his mom - you worked too long and dad looked for sex elsewhere because of you. That was the most hurtful. He constantly makes references that his mother is a know-it-all instaead of just being intelligent.

And in the end -- more detailed spoilers -
Are things okay for her - it looks like she has a job but she is still walking out, Tom doesn't look like he even wants to be with her, and the husband is going off to London with his very pregnant gf to start a new life. His new beginnings kind of look promising. Living in London and having a baby are expensive - can we assume Kate's parents are helping. He also showed great concern for the whereabouts of his son and his reaction was not out of the realm of how a parent would react when he or she is given the appearance of the demise of a child by the other parent. Alternatively, Gemma we are told manages to keep her house and is reimbursed the funds her husband squandered - and signs divorce papers. But no one likes her and she is staying in town. She is considered to be a monster and she is the odd one out. Really unfair.

She was in the wrong though. She did a lot of things that were unethical, immoral and savage. What truly irritates me about the response to the show, is the sense that… If this were one of those action thrillers where a man drops dozens of bodies to avenge his love ones, people tend to cheer. However there is this expectation for women when they are betrayed, they must have hysterics and collapse into sobs and have their hands patted. Don the mantle of victimhood, take up the banner of the suffering Claires. She said screw that. I am going to destroy him. And I'm going to use all the people who pretended to be my friend while betraying me, to do it.

I don't identify with the suffering Claires. I don't identify with the kind of women who get off on being the center of people's sympathy. But Foster, she's a heroine I can get behind. Did she make a mess? Sure. But if the house is already burning to the ground, what's a little more gasoline?

Simon was a complete piece of shit and everything Gemma did was brought about by his actions. She was the victim, and he deserved everything that happened to him by the end of the second series. As for the comparison between the pain of her former colleague's dead spouse and her loss of her marriage, I think it was insensitive of her to argue with the guy about it; however, what she said was right. Anyone who thinks it's just a matter of "oh well, get a divorce, move on" has never been betrayed and brutally dumped in a long-term fully committed relationship. In some ways it is worse than a death.