The Equalizer Season 5 Episode 10 Review: Dirty Sexy Money

During the first part of The Equalizer Season 5, Mel’s mental health and her PTSD diagnosis played a huge part. She took time off work to focus on herself and heal the wounds she didn’t know she was carrying.

However, once she returned to equalizing alongside her husband and Robyn, the topic of her PTSD fell through the cracks, and it wasn’t mentioned as much. The Equalizer Season 5 Episode 10, “Dirty Sexy Money,” changes that as we see her in therapy again.

As a show that focuses on empowering women, it is important to showcase that it’s okay to ask for help when you’re struggling and don’t know what to do. Seeing Mel in therapy again is the kind of representation viewers need. It is a reminder that it’s never too late to ask for help and take care of your mental health.

Liza Lapira does an amazing job at portraying a Mel who is nervous to talk to her parents about PTSD. Mel mentions something that many children of immigrants know to be true, and that is that those parents don’t believe in mental health. If it’s not something that can be seen and physically healed, it doesn’t exist.

It’s important to emphasize that the show is talking about the daughter of immigrants because her parents’ (particularly her father’s) past is what dictates how they behave toward these kinds of issues. It’s not that Mel’s father doesn’t care about her or her emotions, but that he feels he failed to protect her.

When her father finally opens up, he confesses to having been dealing with PTSD his entire life. And when Mel mentions she feels he is ashamed of her, he makes it clear he feels ashamed of himself. He fought so hard and carried similar scars because he didn’t want Mel to fight the way he had to.

Even though the show has strongly stood by its core value of uplifting women and sharing their different stories, The Equalizer Season 5 Episode 10, “Dirty Sexy Money,” voices the fact that men are brought up to hide their mental health and struggles. Mel’s father says it perfectly, the men in her family don’t talk about those things.

While women are encouraged to go to therapy, it is more taboo when it comes to men. By showcasing both sides of the story, the show continues to stand by the fact that they’re creating representation for all sorts of viewers.

While Mel’s moment is a hit, Aunt Vi’s date and the repercussions are a slight miss.

For a show that has focused so strongly on prioritizing the storylines of people often forgotten by the police, the idea that Robyn might try to defend Curtis’s position seems completely out of character. She can’t judge what happened because she wasn’t there, but the Robyn we know would never come up with an excuse to defend an angry cop.

Aunt Vi’s reaction is more realistic. We know it won’t sit well with Vi when Curtis steps out of the patrol car and starts being authoritarian with the suspect. Lo and behold, she steps out of the car and walks away without turning back.

It’s important to remember that Aunt Vi has had her fair share of encounters with the police and has experienced firsthand how people of color are treated. So, of course, seeing Curtis take on that role will leave her speechless and confused.

What is more shocking to the audience is that Robyn tried to reason why Curtis might have behaved the way he did. Yes, she sees it daily with Dante, but that doesn’t mean the behavior is excusable.

Hopefully, the show will address this situation without brushing Curtis’s behavior under the rug and actually validating Aunt Vi’s feelings.

The Equalizer Season 5 is going down the right path. Particularly for Dante and Robyn shippers who will be happy to know the cat is out of the bag, and Robyn has told Dee that they are “Instagram official.”

It’ll be interesting to see how this relationship develops once Dante’s assignment with the FBI ends. Will he go back to the NYPD?

Or will he join the trio and officially become an equalizer?

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The Equalizer airs Sundays at 10/9c on CBS.

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