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Throwing out a White Collar thought for y'all
I had a thought while I was chatting in PM with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
aqwt101 about last week's episode and figured I'd share it.
She asked me if I thought Peter would still consider Neal a criminal after the anklet came off. And I said no, of course not, he wouldn't be then -- he'd have paid his debt to society and he'd be a free man. (Well, assuming he doesn't pull off a major heist so Peter has to arrest him; then he'd be a criminal, obviously...)
And then I went, HMMM. I think it's quite possible that Peter and Neal are catastrophically failing to understand each other in that scene at the end of 5x01.
I don't think Peter's "You're a criminal" statement means anything like "You're in the category criminal, and you will be forever". All Peter's doing -- or all he thinks he's doing -- is reiterating what is, to him, a fairly obvious thing: that Neal is a criminal on a tracking anklet that Peter is responsible for. And Peter keeps forgetting this, and blurring the lines with "friend", and since he can't stop doing that, he's handing Neal off to another handler who won't keep forgetting that he's Neal's parole officer.
I don't think there's any reason to believe that Peter sees "criminal" as an immutable, fixed category (actually there's quite a bit of evidence to the contrary in the way he treats Neal and other criminals he's dealing with throughout the series), but I do think there's evidence that he thinks of Neal as a criminal right now, i.e. while the tracking anklet is on and Neal is still serving out the sentence he was convicted for. He pretty much has to, no matter how he feels about it personally, because it's factually true. For example, when Neal comments that he's a criminal like his dad in 4x03, Peter kinda looks away but doesn't deny it -- he can't deny it, because it's literally true: Neal was tried, convicted, and is currently serving his sentence. Ditto for the hearing in 3x16, and Peter's comment about not knowing whether Neal is a criminal or not until they take the anklet off and give him a chance to prove it with his actions.
So as far as Peter is concerned, in 5x01, all he's doing is stating the obvious. It hurt to say it, because he's spent a lot of time lately with Neal firmly in the category "my friend" and not in the category "my parolee", but he's basically just reiterating what he thinks they both know.
But I don't think that's what Neal hears. I think what Neal hears (and apparently what a lot of fandom heard *g*) is "You are a criminal and you will be one forever." And I think it's fair to say that this probably plays a role in Neal deciding he's going to go full-on bad guy in 5x04: if even Peter doesn't believe in him anymore, why not? (I also thinkaelfgyfu_mead made a really excellent point in the comments to my last White Collar entry, and I can't rephrase it better than she said it: "I think Neal really wants to believe he's a sociopath so that he can stop feeling guilt and pain." Augh, Neal. ;_;)
Anyway, so now Neal is seriously pissed off at Peter, and Peter has no idea why. I mean, Peter probably thinks it has something to do with reassigning him to a different handler, and it probably does have something to do with that, but there's a bigger issue that Peter is completely, 100% clueless about. Because what Neal heard is not actually what Peter thought he said. As far as Peter is concerned, nothing's really changed -- he said as much in their walk'n'talk in 5x02. He still thinks of Neal the same as he always has, and can't really understand why Neal is acting so different.
.... they really do need to be locked in a room until they start talking to each other. IDIOT BOYS.
aqwt101 about last week's episode and figured I'd share it.She asked me if I thought Peter would still consider Neal a criminal after the anklet came off. And I said no, of course not, he wouldn't be then -- he'd have paid his debt to society and he'd be a free man. (Well, assuming he doesn't pull off a major heist so Peter has to arrest him; then he'd be a criminal, obviously...)
And then I went, HMMM. I think it's quite possible that Peter and Neal are catastrophically failing to understand each other in that scene at the end of 5x01.
I don't think Peter's "You're a criminal" statement means anything like "You're in the category criminal, and you will be forever". All Peter's doing -- or all he thinks he's doing -- is reiterating what is, to him, a fairly obvious thing: that Neal is a criminal on a tracking anklet that Peter is responsible for. And Peter keeps forgetting this, and blurring the lines with "friend", and since he can't stop doing that, he's handing Neal off to another handler who won't keep forgetting that he's Neal's parole officer.
I don't think there's any reason to believe that Peter sees "criminal" as an immutable, fixed category (actually there's quite a bit of evidence to the contrary in the way he treats Neal and other criminals he's dealing with throughout the series), but I do think there's evidence that he thinks of Neal as a criminal right now, i.e. while the tracking anklet is on and Neal is still serving out the sentence he was convicted for. He pretty much has to, no matter how he feels about it personally, because it's factually true. For example, when Neal comments that he's a criminal like his dad in 4x03, Peter kinda looks away but doesn't deny it -- he can't deny it, because it's literally true: Neal was tried, convicted, and is currently serving his sentence. Ditto for the hearing in 3x16, and Peter's comment about not knowing whether Neal is a criminal or not until they take the anklet off and give him a chance to prove it with his actions.
So as far as Peter is concerned, in 5x01, all he's doing is stating the obvious. It hurt to say it, because he's spent a lot of time lately with Neal firmly in the category "my friend" and not in the category "my parolee", but he's basically just reiterating what he thinks they both know.
But I don't think that's what Neal hears. I think what Neal hears (and apparently what a lot of fandom heard *g*) is "You are a criminal and you will be one forever." And I think it's fair to say that this probably plays a role in Neal deciding he's going to go full-on bad guy in 5x04: if even Peter doesn't believe in him anymore, why not? (I also think
aelfgyfu_mead made a really excellent point in the comments to my last White Collar entry, and I can't rephrase it better than she said it: "I think Neal really wants to believe he's a sociopath so that he can stop feeling guilt and pain." Augh, Neal. ;_;)Anyway, so now Neal is seriously pissed off at Peter, and Peter has no idea why. I mean, Peter probably thinks it has something to do with reassigning him to a different handler, and it probably does have something to do with that, but there's a bigger issue that Peter is completely, 100% clueless about. Because what Neal heard is not actually what Peter thought he said. As far as Peter is concerned, nothing's really changed -- he said as much in their walk'n'talk in 5x02. He still thinks of Neal the same as he always has, and can't really understand why Neal is acting so different.
.... they really do need to be locked in a room until they start talking to each other. IDIOT BOYS.