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 Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:06 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
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MORE GREAT LISTS
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10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:06 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
Share
Tweet
WhatsApp
Pin
Share
Email
MORE GREAT LISTS
HISTORY
10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:06 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
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10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:06 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
Share
Tweet
WhatsApp
Pin
Share
Email
MORE GREAT LISTS
HISTORY
10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:07 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
Share
Tweet
WhatsApp
Pin
Share
Email
MORE GREAT LISTS
HISTORY
10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:07 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
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10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2021 2:07 pm
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STORY | DECEMBER 13, 2018
10 Of Human History’s Most Atrocious Plagues
by Joe Duncan
fact checked by Jamie Frater
The entire span of human history has been an arms race of survival adaptations against diseases which seem to be out to completely destroy us, both as individual organisms and as a collective species. Every time we come up with a new technique to combat various communicable diseases, the pathogens responsible change and mutate, becoming better-adapted to our weapons against them. Such is the way of all of life. Theorists are even now drawing comparisons to this dynamic to describe crime, wherein criminals adopt new methods of lawbreaking, only to again be outdone by advances in law enforcement.[1]Life is constantly striving to outdo and overcome itself. With this in mind, there have been some pretty brutal plagues which have threatened entire civilizations on many occasions. The term “plague” is used generally here to mean any sort of pathogen which devastated a large portion of a human population, though many of the following entries, in fact, involve the plague you’re thinking of. Here are ten of the most atrocious plagues in human history, what they were, and what happened.
10
Prehistoric Plague
A great plague was believed to have happened around 100,000 years ago, during the Paleolithic period, and is thought to have reduced the numbers of humans drastically, specifically killing the very young. It’s believed that this epidemic dropped the human population Africa to less than 10,000 people, which, in a short, brutal, prehistoric world, isn’t very many.Researchers reached this conclusion by isolating two specific genes which make apes less susceptible to some pretty brutal illnesses. In humans, one gene is gone, and the other is now nonfunctional.[2] After the end of the pandemic, Homo sapiens thrived and spread rapidly, and this genetic change may have helped by lowering their susceptibility to certain diseases.
9
Sweden
Photo credit: Karl-Goran Sjogren/University of Gothenburg
Extremely recent studies of mass grave sites in caves in Sweden have uncovered many bodies but have also unearthed something quite terrifying: the oldest-known strain of the plague—as in the actual Black Plague, Yersinia pestis, the bacteria which wiped out much of medieval Europe in several waves. It is thought to have struck long before the historical plagues we know of, and finding it on 5,000-year-old bodies in Sweden gives that idea some serious credibility.While the first known massive Y. pestis outbreak was the Justinian Plague, which brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees in AD 541 and continued to strike relentlessly for 200 more years, killing over 25 million people, we know it was around disrupting human societies long, long before that. Around 5,000 to 6,000 years ago, we know that human populations took a sharp decline for some reason.[3] Researchers are now beginning to think they have the culprit—the very first Black Plague.
The bacteria is still around today—so why isn’t it anywhere near as deadly as the one that practically wiped out the remainder of the Roman Empire, or the 14th-century plague that killed as much as 60 percent of the population of Europe? Adaptation. Humans have adapted ways to fight it off since. Right now, the discovery in Sweden is the oldest strain of Y. pestis we’ve found; there might be more out there, resting in the earth.
8
Athens
Photo credit: Michiel Sweerts
Athens was struck hard by a mysterious pathogen between the years of 430 and 427 BC. Known as the Plague of Athens, the epidemic greatly disrupted their efforts in the Peloponnesian War.[4] This plague is detailed in the famous work, the History of the Peloponnesian War, which tells of the disease wiping out more than one third of the Athenian population at the time. Thucydides, the author, described the symptoms of this brutal plague in great detail, with violent coughing, retching, and convulsions being some of the items on the list.Researchers still aren’t exactly sure what the Plague of Athens was, but scholars in the various sciences have speculated it was possibly measles, smallpox, or a few other diseases. While we may not know the exact strain of pathogen that struck, we definitely know it did a considerable, horrifying amount of damage to the Athenian population. Though it’s surrounded in ambiguity, whatever this mean bug was is thought to have contributed greatly to the downfall of classical Greece.
7
The Antonine Plague
Starting in AD 165, the Roman Empire was rocked by a viciously brutal plague that was a dark, ominous cloud, foreshadowing things to come. Many scholars believe this outbreak to have been a case of smallpox. Whatever it was, it definitely rocked the sturdy empire at its foundations and ultimately altered the course of history. The Antonine Plague was so bad that at its height, it was killing up to 2,000 people per day in the ancient empire, and anywhere from seven to ten percent of the Roman population did not survive.The outstretched Roman army, who lived in close quarters as they marched across Europe, was hit particularly hard, affecting Rome’s military might and ultimately contributing to a later scaling back of the empire. This also altered the tightness of the people, as they grew distant and apart, much like later plagues would also cause in various societies, especially medieval Europe. This epidemic paved the way for the Germanic cultures to take a foothold and ultimately would lead to the inevitable decline of the Roman Empire. In failing physical and economic health, Rome was in serious trouble, all thanks to a plague that ravaged its population.[5]
6
The Byzantine Empire
Photo credit: Medievalists.net
Remember that first surfacing of the bubonic plague we mentioned earlier that brought the Byzantine Empire to its knees? It was brutal. It was very brutal. The Byzantine Empire is actually just really another name for the Eastern Roman Empire at the time period, and the Byzantines, while they spoke Greek and were based out of Constantinople, were still very much the Roman Empire and referred to themselves as such.Often referred to as the Plague of Justinian for its taking place during the reign of Emperor Justinian I, this plague hit Constantinople, the heart of the empire, in 541 and then spread outward over the course of the next year to reach the full outskirts of the Roman Empire.[5] At this time, Justinian was really starting to rebuild the Roman Empire and was making headway in military campaigns in the West in attempts to reclaim the glory of Rome. This plague stopped those efforts dead in their tracks.In an ominous foreshadowing of what was to hit Europe centuries later, this plague, too, was brought through trade, mainly being carried and transmitted by fleas on rats. But it didn’t stop there and wasn’t limited to only the Eastern Roman Empire. The plague soon spread further to the various feudal states which had taken a foothold in Europe after the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire. This plague ravaged Europe entirely and killed at least 25 million people. That’s a powerful pathogen.One thing was for certain at this point of human history: Expanding trade routes and greater transportation technologies had their downfalls and brought with them millions upon millions of deaths. They would bring many more.
5
Medieval Europe
Photo credit: Pierart dou Tielt
Then came the Black Death, the Great Plague. This plague began in China in 1334, and like the Plague of Justinian, it spread to Europe through trade routes. This plague was out for death, and no one could stop it. The ravaging bubonic death toll would reach peak heights in 1348 in Europe, after having traveled yet again through the Byzantine Empire, up the trade routes, and into the bloodstreams of Europe. This plague was so brutal and unrelenting that it would go on to wipe out up to 60 percent of all of Europe at the time.[7]This changed the European outlook greatly. Fewer and fewer people relied on prayer and began opening their minds to other things. The culture greatly adapted, and much of our great art came from the period which followed.
4
America
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Then came the disease epidemics of the Americas. Smallpox first arrived in the colonies of Florida, Carolina, and Virginia in 1519 and devastated the native population after being brought by the colonizing Europeans.[8] It reached Massachusetts in 1633. Due to the fact that the so-called New and Old Worlds were so far removed, the Native Americans had little, if any, immune resistance to the viruses of Europe, like measles, plague, and especially smallpox.Smallpox was particularly brutal and spread to Central and South America as well, greatly infecting the Aztec Empire. In just 100 years, half the time of the Plague of Justinian, it wiped out 90 percent of the Aztec population, a drop from 17 million people to only 1.3 million. These diseases killed so many that only an estimated 530,000 Native Americans were left alive by 1900. This makes the American plagues some of the worst of recorded human history.
3
The Modern Plague
Photo credit: CDC/Larry Stauffer, Oregon State Public Health Laboratory
The so-called Modern Plague occurred in China, beginning in or around 1860, and was yet again another brutal epidemic that you don’t hear about much in history books. It hit Hong Kong in 1894. This plague would strike for still another 20 years, killing around ten million people.[9] This brutal outbreak would spread to India as well.During this latest plague, however, science isolated the cause, namely the fleas that traveled on rats, usually from ships or trade, which would bite and transfer the bacteria. It became possible to treat the disease and even prevent future outbreaks.
2
Polio
Photo credit: CDC/Charles Farmer
Polio hit, and polio hit hard, and there are still people alive today who remember the epidemic. Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus, which aggressively attacks the human nervous system, causing all sorts of horrifying results, and has killed a lot of people, especially striking children under the age of five years old.The epidemic hit its worst in the United States in 1952, as doctors sought every and any method to treat and cure the disease.[10] In 1933, there were 5,000 known cases of paralytic polio in the United States, and by 1952, that number had jumped to 59,000, well over tenfold. Polio was finally stopped by the development of two vaccines against it.
1
HIV
Photo credit: CDC/C. Goldsmith, P. Feorino, E.L. Palmer, W.R. McManus
HIV is seemingly the last massive epidemic to strike planet Earth, or it is for now, anyway. It hit hard and became widespread by the mid-1980s. As early as 1981, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States began publishing pieces and keeping an eye on a spreading virus that was taking lives.[11] This infection was opportunistic and struck the gay community particularly hard. By June 16, 1981, the stage was set as the first man with AIDS, a 35-year-old gay Caucasian, stepped into a doctor’s office for help and ended up being admitted to the Clinical Center at the National Institute of Health. This 35-year-old man would be dead by October 28. From here, the disease would spread, and by 1986, the CDC would declare that more people in 1985 were diagnosed with AIDS than all previous years combined. This was a rapidly spreading epidemic, in a digital age with radio and television as well as computers. The disease continued to ravage the world through the 1990s and 2000s.But humanity fought back against this worldwide bane and developed antiretroviral drugs and other treatments which at least managed to somewhat contain the virus, initially. Now, we have drugs that can do miraculous things. Two HIV-positive people can have an HIV-negative baby, and a positive partner can sleep with a negative partner and, through the help of drugs, not give the virus to the negative partner. Cures and vaccines are in the works, with diligent people working hard and creating medicine to combat this global epidemic on a daily basis. Billions of dollars have been donated to the cause. This gives us hope in our modern medicine, our ability to respond to an epidemic of this magnitude, spreading at this incredible rate, so uniformly and quickly, as we slowly trudge down the path to victory. It shows promise for the future of fighting pathogens which seek to take us out . . . but there will always be another one coming.I like to write about dark stuff, history, and weird things.
Read about more terrible outbreaks from history on 10 Horrors Of The Great Plague Of London and 10 Scary Facts About The Justinian Plague.
More Great Lists
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Atrocious Murders Inspired By Movies
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
Top 10 Historic Ways To Beat Plagues
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Cartoonish Deaths
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Ambitious Grimoires
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Of History's Most Evil Medical Murderers
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Strange Beauty Secrets Of History's Most Beautiful Women
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Most Hard-Core Events From Outlaw Biker History
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Of History's Most Scandalous Women
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
10 Most Genocidal Wars In Chinese History
fact checked by Jamie Frater
Share
Tweet
WhatsApp
Pin
Share
Email
MORE GREAT LISTS
HISTORY
10 Craziest Things Done By Philosophers
HISTORY
10 Truly Disgusting Facts About Ancient Greek Life
HISTORY
10 Important Prehistoric Individuals Worth Knowing
HISTORY
10 Costly Archaeological Forgeries With Unfortunate Consequences
HISTORY
Top 10 Important Events in U.S. History
HISTORY
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:30 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:30 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:30 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:30 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:30 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:30 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:31 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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Posted: Thu Oct 14, 2021 11:31 am
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Season One
"Can't Fix Crazy" - Flaca saving Gina's life and extinguishing her arm from the oven grease fire Red had caused the night before, and Norma later giving Red a silent What the Hell, Hero? by ripping her secret santa slip and throwing it at her. To top it off, Gloria's Genre Savvy enough to put the pieces together and starve Red out, just how the latter starved out Piper in the beginning.
Fig of all people gets one when she puts an end to Healy's infatuation over Piper.
"Healy, if you ever contact an inmate's family again out of your lesbian witchhunt s**t, I will destroy you. Your mail-order bride will leave you, and you'll never work again. Get some ******** therapy, man."
Later on, when Suzanne freezes up during the play on her part, Norma earns herself another CMOA by breaking her silence to save Suzanne and the show.
In "Blood Donut", When Watson antagonizes Yoga Jones about her accidentally murdering a kid, Yoga ''slaps the everloving s**t out of her!
When you find out why Claudette is in prison. She killed the man who was abusing the girl who worked as his maid.
Following her unfair stint in solitary confinement (during ********, season 1, episode 9) thanks to jealous prison guard Healy and manipulative hick Pennsatucky, a determined Piper heads straight for her ex-girlfriend Alex and leads her away into the chapel. Once there, the two finally relieve some of their obvious Unresolved Sexual Tension since reuniting at the end of the pilot episode. Also may count as a The Big Damn Kiss moment.
In the same episode, Piper chews Healy out over it from her cell.
Piper: The only sicko here is you. And under different circumstances, what? I'd be your girlfriend? Is that it? Did I make you jealous? You put me in this hellhole for no reason. Wake up, Healy! Girls like me? We don't ******** ignorant, pretentious old men with weird lesbian obsessions! We go for tall, hot girls, and we ******** love it! So, that leaves you on the outside, living your sad, sad little life. You don't get me! Ever! So, go ******** yourself!
When the prisoners meet the juvenile girls, Suzanne quotes Shakespeare at them. It's amazing and terrifying.
Piper scaring a girl straight without acting, exaggerating, or threatening her. All she does is give an honest, disturbingly calm assessment of what prison can do to your emotional well-being and sense of self-worth, and it's enough to render not just the girl she's talking to but all the other students, inmates, and staff members in the vicinity completely speechless.
Chapman: I'm like you, Deana. I'm weak too. I can't get through this without somebody to touch, without somebody to love. Is that because sex numbs the pain, or because I'm an evil ********, I don't know. But what I do know, I was somebody before I came in here. I was somebody with a life that I chose for myself. And now? Now it's just about getting through the day without crying. And I'm scared. I'm still scared. I'm scared that I'm not myself in here, and I'm scared that I am. Other people aren't the scariest part of prison, Deana. It's coming face to face with who you really are. Because once you're behind these walls, there's nowhere to run, even if you could. The truth catches up with you in here, Deana, and it's the truth that's gonna make you her b***h. (walks out)
Washington: Damn, you cold.
Chapman: Bitches got to learn.
It should be noted that Piper wasn't even supposed to be helping with Scared Straight, she just happened to be in the bathroom at the same time and is the only person to take it seriously.
Sophia not bowing to Pornstache's attempts to extort her into sex for her hormones, despite the personal hell waiting for her when she goes through withdrawal and then a complete lack of hormones.
In the season 1 finale when finally getting dumped by both Larry and Alex (her fiance and girlfriend, respectively), ostracized by almost every other prisoner, then backed into a corner by an armed Pennsatucky before eventually getting ignored and left to die by a vindictive Healy, a desperate Piper snaps on her Knight Templar nemesis, who'd been planning to kill her for the last several episodes. The resulting No-Holds-Barred Beatdown is truly an epic sight to behold.
Piper ends up sharing a cubicle with Claudette, one of the oldest convicts there who is extremely strict about the conduct of her roommates. After having a bad day, Piper finally tells her to lay off. She launches into a tirade about all of the things she's had to deal with since coming to prison, and asks her to cut her some slack. As she walks off, Claudette slowly smiles to herself.
In 'Tit Punch', even though it landed her in jail, Red punching the woman who made fun of her in her breast implant.
Piper accidentally insults Red's cooking, and Red's response is to make sure that she slowly starves, using her connections to deny Piper any food whatsoever. It's both terrifying and incredible how far Red's reach extends throughout the prison, and teaches Piper a valuable lesson about respect.
Piper figuring out how to get back on Red's good side is pretty impressive too. She creates a home-made remedy by bartering for various items around the prison, which includes cutting off strands of her hair. There's one moment where it looks as if she's crying in her bunk, and Pornsatche stops by to mock her and the situation she's found herself in, but it turns out her eyes are just watering because she's chewing jalapenos for Red's balm. The balm doesn't exactly work, but Red appreciates the hard work that Piper put into making it, and forgives her.
Season Two
The finale has a few:
Caputo finally getting one over Fig with a Bait the Dog moment, consoling her over her cheating husband, then allowing her to attempt to buy his silence about her embezzlement in exchange for oral sex, and then admitting that he had already noticed the warden.
Norma goes Beware the Quiet Ones in her attempt to avenge Red's beating by Vee, by formulating an arsenic made out of apple seeds. When Gloria points out the flaws and lack of necessities to succeed with this plan, she offers her help. Still gotta give Norma props for trying.
Sister Ingralls' "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Caputo and how their "compassionate release", referring to the system sending a still-senile Jimmy off into the world alone to fend for herself and without nearby or known relatives.
"What are you going to do about the quality of senior care in this prison? The elderly are the fastest growing population in this prison, and they have special needs. So-called "compassionate release" in lieu of care is completely unacceptable. You can't dump sick, old ladies on the streets. It's unconscionable, inhumane...and illegal. You must meet your obligations."
In Episode 8, when the black inmates (and everyone) verbally hound Piper about her receiving furlough to see her dying grandmother and other special privileges for her ethnicity, Piper snaps once again and voices that she's aware of her white privilege, but also lets the girls have it.
Piper: Yes, I am white! We have established that, and I got furlough, too. I guess white privilege wins again, and as a speaker for the entire white race, I would like to say I'm sorry you guys got the raw deal, but I love my ******** grandmother. And yeah, she may be a whitey too, but she's also a ******** person, and she needs me. So you all can shut the ******** up.
In Episode 4, When Piper is reassigned to room with Red, who denies Piper permission to move Red's belonging to her side of the room, the two have a standoff. Just as you think a fight is about to break out, Piper shatters Red with a witty low blow referring to back when Red starved her out and eventually lost her position as head chef.
Piper: What are you going to do? Not feed me?
In the same episode, Soso shows that she's more than just a flat Asian Airhead as she quickly realizes Piper is trying to sell her to Boo, and calls her "seriously ******** up."
Suzanne's adoptive mother giving an epic speech about Suzanne (age 10) being rejected from the birthday party for being four years older, and how other children are rejected for simply being different.
"You know which children suffer in this world, Melanie? The ones that are told they are different, the ones that are never given the chance to succeed alongside any other kid their age, and I'll be damned if I label my child less than so the rest of the world can put her in a box and dismiss her before she's had a chance to succeed in life."
After several occasions when a (sometimes well-meaning) Alex screwed Piper over, Piper finally gets a pretty twisted revenge: she gets a freed Alex thrown back into prison with her. On the one hand, this is very decent revenge for Alex coercing Piper into perjuring herself while Alex made a deal and was set free, and on the other hand, Piper can justify it by claiming that she was saving Alex's life by getting her out of reach from a man who wanted her dead, which is in fact true. It's deliciously messed up and should quite an interesting dynamic going forward.
Adding to the CMOA is that Piper enlists Polly and Larry into getting Alex thrown back into prison. Larry rightly guesses that part of Piper's motivation is to get Alex back in with her, and it's not quite a reconciliation between them, but Piper points out that it gives them a chance to screw over someone they don't like.
Cal and Neri's surprise wedding. The sincerity in their relationship is a clear contrast to the lack of it in any of Piper's.
Piper's verbal beatdown of Polly and Larry said what some of the audience was thinking at that moment.
On the other hand, Polly's deflection reflects an already-twisted message of the show: that we can't choose who we love and it just sort of happens (which, as we've already been shown, is true for Piper and Alex). And her v****a ''did'' bounce back.
Healy's forged paperwork that "proves" what he knows to be true: Suzanne was not responsible for Red's beating.
Morello cursing Vee to her face;
Morello: "May you never have a minute a' peace."
Taystee, Poussey, Janae and Cindy all turning on Vee, berating her and letting her know that she's now in a prison full of people out to get her, with no one to back her up.
Black Cindy: We about to recant our s**t.
The Karmic Death of Arturo, Gloria's abusive boyfriend, who's trapped in a room after he knocks over a candle and is burned to death.
Rosa's final escape, especially when she makes roadkill out of Vee.
Pornstache manages to score one, when he is escorted out of the prison for getting an inmate pregnant (well, not really, but everyone thinks so): he is completely unmoved by the fact he's getting arrested, leaves the prison with his head held high and only cares about the woman he loves and "his" unborn baby, yelling in front of the staff and inmates that he is not ashamed of Daya, he loves her and will take care of her and the baby when he returns. Even better — that was exactly what Daya wanted from Bennett, the actual father of her baby.
Mendez's reintroduction to the show starts with him pulling up in his car, squealing the tyres, dramatically slamming open the doors and power-walking through the corridor while giving out no less than three shots. An a*****e through and through, but damn if he doesn't have style.
The Golden Girls muscling everything they need out of the kitchen, simply by reminding Gloria and her crew that they're the most hardened criminals in the place.
Season Three
Finger in the Dyke, when Boo gives her father an epic "The Reason You Suck" Speech for not accepting her as she is.
From the same episode: "Suck my big, fat, DYKE, d**k, YOU ********, HATEFUL, PIECE, OF, s**t!!!!"
Boo is pretty much made of Awesome in Season 3, especially the way she stands up for Doggett after a guard rapes Pennsatucky.
Gloria’s son has come to visit with her mother. He’s a typical teenage bad boy, and Gloria’s mother is sick of his attitude. Gloria then turns threatening towards him and states the following:
“Oh you think that’s funny? You listen to me. You think you hot sh*t? You think cuz I messed up that you’re going to follow in your mother’s footsteps? Well, let me tell you something; you’re dead wrong. From now on you’re gonna come here every week. You’re gonna bring your homework. And if you don’t, I will make your life a living hell, even from in here. Try me. I’ll call my brothers from Washington Heights, and they’ll hang your a** over that bridge until you piss on yourself and it comes running down your body into your mouth.”
Norma finally asserting a degree of independence after a lifetime as a perpetual Shrinking Violet by quitting her long-held position as Red's underling.
Chang's character development. Until this season, we know her as the Lady Looks Like a Dude introverted Chinese woman who occasionally opened her mouth to make crass remarks. Well: she was a Chinese immigrant who spoke no English, was pushed around by her family too much- even to the point where her own family attempted to coerce her into an arranged marriage just for their own personal gain. She took to illegal sales with a friend of hers, and after one night of being ripped off, grew a ******** spine and made it her initiative to take no prisoners and ******** up whoever got in her way. Beware the Quiet Ones, indeed.
Red is asked by Healy to be a translator between him and his wife and ends up giving the latter a "The Reason You Suck" Speech when she hears how conceited and deliberately difficult she's being.
A rather dark example, but Piper taking revenge on Stella for stealing her money by filling her bunk with contraband. And then placing a tip in with the guards, ensuring that she gets sent to Max. It's a vicious and cold-hearted move and Piper's unemotional stare while showing her new "Trust No b***h" tattoo really sells it.
Piper: I don't ******** around. Let the people know.
The ending of "We Can Be Heroes." The veteran guards are discussing creating a union and Caputo comes to confront them at the bar. After he goes on about all the union-busting tactics that corporate is going to use, they ask him to be their union rep, to which he agrees. It ends with O'Neil starting to sing "Do you hear the people sing?," which then goes into a full-blown cast recording over the credits.
During the Season Three finale, when DEA agents arrive to bust Cesar. Not only do they take him down swiftly and smoothly, but he shows a skewed Papa Wolf sensibility in trying to protect his children.
Healey tries to take advantage of the fact Soso is still recovering from her attempted suicide by drug overdose, by getting her to testify against her counselor, Rogers. Soso's response is a deadpan "You're really bad at your job, you know that?"
Season Four
In the opener, one of last season's cliffhangers is resolved in a brutally awesome manner. Alex is being choked to death when Lolly comes in and single-handedly beats a professional hitman to death (well, almost death). Lolly's calm manner is rather disturbing, but the fact remains that she saved Alex's life.
Caputo runs into one of the guards from the prison that walked out on him last season and when you think he's going to offer an apology, he instead unleashes a pretty epic The Reason You Suck speech.
Sister Ingalls punching Gloria in the face to get sent to SHU in order to obtain proof that Sophia is there. Even Gloria praises her for it.
And when Sister Ingalls's plan fails, it's Caputo who takes a photo of Sophia and smuggles it to a journalist.
The journalist in question being Danny Pearson.
Blanca lasting several days into her Jane Eyre-esque punishment of standing on a table instead of letting herself be broken.
Not to mention that the only reason she got down off the table was because the prison was forced into full lockdown. Even with the guards' sadism, they completely failed to break her.
In "The Animals", after a series of horrible and inhumane actions inflicted upon the inmates by the guards, all of the inmates stand together in peaceful protest against the guards. Everyone.
In the finale, after hearing that Poussey's killer won't be arrested, Taystee creates a riot involving all the inmates that sweeps through the entire prison in only a couple of minutes. Then, if things couldn't get any better, all the inmates convene on Humphrey, Mc Collough, and Judy King. Humphrey attempts to pull out his hidden pistol, only to have it knocked out of his hands and land at Daya's feet. Daya then picks it up and takes control of the situation, forcing Mc Collough to the ground and pointing the gun at Humphrey's head. The camera then spins around, centered on her, letting us see the rage and blood lust of the inmates surrounding her. Epic cliffhanger.
Even better, the inmate who knocks the gun out of his hands is Maritza, who he terrorized and made eat a baby mouse.
Caputo puts Piscatella in his place after Poussey's death, and the big, scary guard takes it. At that moment, Caputo's almost like a white Sisko.
Season Five
After starting the riot by knocking Humphrey's gun away, Maritza gets a further revenge by kicking him right in the bullet wound, followed by a few others. No tears were shed.
Taystee heads straight for Caputo after the riot starts to tell him off for his announcement about Poussey's death. She ends up making clear just how south things have gone by punching him in the face.
Frieda getting herself and the Aryans out of the pantry by bluffing that she shot the guards with poison darts.
On that note, props to the guards. They managed to take down the Nazis and Frieda, all four serious badasses in their own right. They then hold the kitchen for some time until Frieda bluffs them.
Boo acting as Penn's lawyer, marching up while playing the Law & Order theme song and then catching Angie in a lie about Saved by the Bell.
The ladies burning the attempted snack bribe, including Piper finally being driven to take a stand over how little they're being taken seriously.
CO Coats may well be a rapist scumbag, but he becomes the only guard to evade the roundup and manages to get into the ceiling. He remains loose for two days, with only a handful of Twizlers, before Angie and Leanne find him. And then, with a little help from Pennsatucky, he escapes the prison
"Tied to the Tracks":
Gloria shutting down Aleida, letting her know that Daya shooting Humphrey is but the culmination of her bad parenting.
"You ******** her up for twenty three years, how was I supposed to undo all that in just a week?"
Daya realizing that following her mother's advice had done nothing but lead to trouble for her, and owns up to her actions. She turns herself in, and when Aleida sees her and tries to yell out for her, Daya simply ignores her.
Frieda's gang taking down Piscatella, while stoned off their asses. "Teamwork!"
Gina having the foresight to film Piscatella ranting and threatening Piper and the others. She gets a forehead kiss from Red and Nicky for her troubles and she looks delighted.
Flaca and Maritza doing one final vlog was heartwarming in itself, but doing it live during the SWAT raid was pretty awesome.
The Nazis and Hispanics led by Ouija joining forces for an awesome Last Stand against the incoming SWAT team. Obviously a lost cause at this point but in no way was it not cathartic to see them deliver such an impressive opposition to the armed and trained officers.
Season Six
Dixon punching out a homophobic punk that calls Coates and Penn (in disguise) faggots.
Nicky warns the guards of an assassination attempt, at great risk to herself, to save Red.
Piper resolves to "make prison suck less" and does so in grand fashion by bringing back kickball...which helps end a thirty year bloc war. By accident.
The final blow to the war sees several characters step up:
Maria, desperate to avoid war, manages to Taking a Third Option to avert the imminent brawl without snitching and convincing a nervous McCullough to go with the mixed teams, which finally brings the blocks together to cheer for teams, not blocks.
McCullough deserves props as well, overcoming her paranoia and PTSD long enough to back Maria's call.
Season Seven
Blanca wins the season (and arguably the entire series) by beating the legal system at its own game. She gets her riot conviction thrown out, keeps her green card, and avoid deportation. Then she leaves the country anyways to be with Diablo.
Figueroa's character development comes full circle as she gives up her dream of having a child via IVF to secure an abortion drug for a raped detainee.
Other
The theme by Regina Spektor.
Uzo Aduba winning back-to-back Emmys, first as Outsanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series then as Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She's the first performer since Edward Asner to win an Emmy for playing the same character in a Drama and Comedy.
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