Episode 2 opens with Hannah
speaking to the listener. She conjectures
why they could be on the tapes. Were
they cruel, a contributor, or just a bystander.
She goes on to tell the listener she believes they know exactly what
part they played, and she is still dead.
The eerie thought ends in a
silence that captures the curiosity of the audience. As Clay goes on with this new day, Hannah
continues with a warning, the listener is not alone. There are others. As the community attempts to promote suicide
awareness, Clay’s parents, especially his mother, come up with ways to shield
him from the backlash of all that has transpired. Still, Clay, as well as the rest of the
audience, is anticipating the name of the subject of this tape. Who is it?
Is it Clay? No, the star of the
show is Jessica Davis, Hannah’s former best friend.
Jessica
Davis is introduced looking and acting like a hot mess as she bursts through a
classroom asking questions about Justin, ending with, “What you listening to
Clay?” Another flashback takes the
audience to the day Hannah and Jessica meet.
The, then, school counselor introduces them to assign them as friends
since they are both new to the school.
Although the situation is less than desirable, the girls make the best
of it and hit it off immediately. The
image Jessica has when she and Hannah first meet and the present-day Jessica
seem like two different people. The
contrast is devastating. Typical of the
scheme of the show, they bounce from past to present and so forth as Hannah
discusses she and Jessica’s friendship, and Jessica freaks out in the
present. In the past, Hannah and Jess
meet regularly at Monet’s, a popular coffee shop, where they meet Alex Standall. The duo becomes the trio. The trio remedy the chaos in their lives with
two hot chocolates and, “whatever the hell Alex is drinking.” Then, Alex trades up, Jessica falls off, and
they all go their separate ways, or did they?
Instead, the trio becomes a duo again when Jess and Alex fall in love, leaving
Hannah behind.
Amid
the story of Hannah, Jess, and Alex, the show reveals a side of Hannah that
explains the difference between her and other victims of trauma. Outside of the movie theater they both work
at, Hannah and Clay have a conversation where she asks him if he thinks she
will ever be as pretty as Jessica. Clay
seems astounded since he believes she is beautiful. He stumbles over his words until all he can
get out is that Hannah is special.
Although Clay is just nervous and confused, Hannah is offended,
revealing her lack of resilience. It is
scenes like this one that show the reality of who Hannah is, and prove that the
show is not glorifying her or what she has done in any way. Also, in the very next scene, the show
depicts the glorification of the jock star, and the absurdity of it all.
As the
show goes on, Hannah reveals the next traumatizing incident in her life, the
list. As Jess misinterprets what is
going on due to circumstances not yet revealed, she blames Hannah for something
that she is a victim of, calls her a slut, slaps her, and walks away. Is Hannah lying? The present, and wrecked, Jess tries to
convince Clay that he cannot believe everything he hears. Then, revealing the disarray that Justin has
become as well, Justin’s friends, Bryce Walker, Zach Dempsey, and Marcus Cole
tell Justin that Jess is looking for him and that she looks like a mess, to
which Justin replies, “Yeah, she has for a while now.” Eventually, Jess finds Justin at Bryce’s
house, and freaks out on him. In the
midst of the argument, Jess accuses Justin of not telling her something, a
foreshadow of the reason for her demise.
As the
episode comes to a close, Tony’s relationship with Hannah’s parents is revealed
as her mother reaches out to him after finding the list. Clay is confounded as he witnesses Tony being
embraced by the tearful mother of Hannah Baker.
End scene, credits roll.
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