On Becoming a God in Central Florida Review: Flint Glass (Season 1 Episode 7)
In the opening scene of On Becoming a God in Central Florida Season 1 Episode 7, “Flint Glass,” Krystal sells her engagement diamond and replaces it with a fake. The new rock, which has enough shine and sparkle to mimic the real thing, is the perfect symbol for an episode that’s all about deception.
As a business, FAM is as phony as Krystal’s ring. It’s a scam passing itself off as legitimate while hiding behind the glitz and glamor of rallies, events, and bizarre cultic rituals. It’s a chip of flint glass that has managed, rather successfully, to market itself as a diamond.
Taking down FAM will likewise require a bit of deception, but Krystal proves in this episode that she’s more than up for the task.
The fact that Kystal is an accomplished liar herself is part of what makes her such a fascinating protagonist.
It’s rare to feel like, as an audience, we’re allowed to be impressed rather than appalled by a woman’s capacity for deception.
Dishonesty is a quality more commonly cheered for in stories about men, where it makes them seem more clever, more adaptive, more stealthy — whereas women who lie are decried as unfaithful, deceitful, and treacherous. These are all synonyms for the same behavior, but they somehow only take on a negative connotation when applied to women.
On Becoming a God in Central Florida breaks that mold beautifully, employing a bait-and-switch that sets Krystal up as the wet blanket to her husband’s ambition, but only to sweep Travis aside and let Krystal become the antihero.
In pursuing her exposé of Obie in “Flint Glass,” Krystal is bold and unapologetic.
She embodies a whole host of qualities — unscrupulousness, cunning, dominance — that are common with male protagonists, but rarely celebrated in women. She’s willing to employ every tool in her arsenal in order to get what she wants.
Krystal certainly isn’t the only liar in this episode, but Cody and Ernie are primarily lying to themselves rather than to other people.
Both men are desperate to believe that they are the heroes of this story, and that desperation — along with an aggressive, all-encompassing sense of purpose — leaves them blind to the damage they’re causing, not just to strangers but also to the people they love.
And then there are people who want to be lied to because the truth is too crushing to face.
When Krystal proposes an investigation into FAM, Mirta is initially quick to shoot down her idea:
Mirta: Devil’s advocate here: isn’t this how business works? Only a few people make it. No audience is going to care.
Mirta thinks no one will be interested in the story, and not just because it isn’t juicy enough, but because believing it won’t make them feel any better.
After all, what’s the alternative? FAM is just a distillation of American capitalism as a whole — a few people win, and everyone else loses. The lie that anyone can become one of the successful few is what keeps people going — it’s self-deception as a means of survival.
“Flint Glass” does a great job of exploring the reasons that people lie, both to themselves and to others, in order to try and stay ahead of the competition.
It’s a much slower episode than On Becoming a God in Central Florida Season 1 Episode 6, “American Merchandise,” but it does provide a deeper understanding of each character’s motivations while laying the groundwork for some big conflicts on the horizon.
What did you think of this episode of On Becoming a God in Central Florida? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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On Becoming a God in Central Florida airs Sunday at 10/9c on Showtime.
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Ariel Udel
Ariel fell in love with storytelling on the night Flight 815 crashed on a mysterious island, and has been blogging about television ever since. She has an affinity for messy female anti-heroes and an enduring love of Battlestar Galactica, Xena: Warrior Princess, Lost, and Halt and Catch Fire.