Critic’s Rating: 3.5 / 5.0
3.5
If any show could take on the neuropsychiatry behind psychopathy, it’s The Irrational.
“Psychopath” is one of those buzzwords that’s lost all meaning in most of the TV world, and most shows that include it use it to reinforce stereotypes about mental illness and violence.
The Irrational Season 2 Episode 15 helped dismantle some of those stereotypes, but the story was so strange that I’m not sure it did the topic justice.
The Irrational Season 2 Episode 15 Started Out With An Interesting Case
The beginning of this episode suggested a lot of potential.
Kylie was convinced that foul play was behind the deaths of several people who passed away while doing extreme sports with Ben’s company, and everyone thought she was seeing things that weren’t there.
And once Marisa began investigating anyway, a guy who worked with Ben threatened that bad things would happen if she didn’t drop the case.
This was an intriguing set-up, but somehow, things went off the rails.
Instead of tying the case back to the neuroscientific principles Alec was teaching, The Irrational Season 2 Episode 15 went off on a tangent about psychopathy.
Alec’s students began assessing Ben to see if he fit the criteria rather than anyone focusing on solving the case at hand.
Ben offered an intriguing twist when he admitted he was a psychopath and asked Alec to help find the killer ruining his reputation — though why Alec believed that is beyond my understanding.
At First, The Irrational Season 26 Episode 15 Helped Dismantle Stereotypes
It was neat to have Ben admit he had the disorder to the group. Writing this story this way allowed The Irrational to show psychopathy in a different light than most shows.
Television doesn’t generally get this mental health disorder right. Psychopaths on TV tend to be extremely violent people who go to extremes to torture others for no apparent reason.
The only show that ever came close to getting it right was New Amsterdam, which had a recurring arc about a child who was receiving treatment to make up for her lack of empathy.
The early part of the story was on track to be more accurate.
Alec saw Ben as a “pro-social psychopath.”
This is a real thing, despite a Reddit thread full of people insisting that’s a contradiction in terms.
A pro-social psychopath is someone who lacks empathy but engages in productive behavior that ultimately helps others anyway.
Such a person doesn’t do good deeds because they care about other people — they do it for external validation or because they believe it benefits themselves in some way to follow the rules of altruism.
It’s a difficult concept to explain because we’ve all had it ingrained into our minds that a psychopath is someone who is violent toward others because they have no concept of other people feeling pain.
Psychopathy is a spectrum like any other mental health issue, so The Irrational demonstrating that not all psychopaths are Ted Bundy was great… until they undid it.
Alec Should Have Realized Ben Was A Killer On The Irrational Season 2 Episode 15
Of course, the serial killer type of psychopath would have no qualms about pretending he was the safer kind. Alec should have considered this possibility before working with Ben.
I guess it made better drama that he didn’t, but in retrospect, it wasn’t entirely believable.
Alec is a world-renowned neuroscientist. He should be aware of all the manifestations of psychopathy and how to avoid falling into a dishonest person’s trap.
Of course, he’s only human. He’s proven time and again that being an expert on the human brain doesn’t mean he’s not subject to its errors in perception.
Still, this particular manifestation of brain fallacies seemed weird and overly obvious, even if I wasn’t expecting the twist either.
More importantly, it undid all the hard work the episode did to change people’s perceptions of psychopaths.
Maybe that was the point. Maybe the writers don’t believe that prosocial psychopaths exist.
Still, it felt like a letdown.
Simon’s Dilemma Was The Most Interesting Part Of The Story
Throughout “Conversation Games,” Simon worried he might be a psychopath too. Supposedly, he had some traits that suggested it.
I’ve never had much use for Simon, but this was interesting.
That said, the solution to this kind of dilemma is usually the obvious one, and this was no exception. If you’re worried that you could be a person without empathy who would hurt others to get what he wants, your fear disproves itself.
A person who has no empathy doesn’t worry that his lack of empathy could hurt someone else. So, if Simon was worried that he was capable of inflicting pain on others, that meant he had more empathy than he gave himself credit for.
Even if he were a prosocial psychopath, he wouldn’t have had true empathy for others. So there was nothing to worry about.
I was glad that The Irrational busted some myths around this, including that silly idea that the size of two of your fingers means anything.
But I’m sorry, Alec was a bit more than hypocritical, telling Simon that it was too dangerous for Simon to join him on his mission.
Didn’t Kylie tell Alec to cut out the extreme risk-seeking behavior after he stood in front of a speeding train on The Irrational Season 2 Episode 6?
It wasn’t a promise he could keep for more than a couple of episodes, so what makes him think anyone will listen to him about a case being too dangerous for them?
Simon didn’t listen anyway, and I knew he wouldn’t, but still. That had to have been the most ridiculous thing that had ever come out of Alec’s mouth.
Over to you, The Irrational fanatics.
What did you think of The Irrational Season 2 Episode 15?
Hit the comments with your thoughts.
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The Irrational airs on NBC on Tuesdays at 10/9c and streams on Peacock on Wednesdays.
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Article by:Source: Jack Ori
