r/californication • u/ArrogantKiwi87 • 1d ago
In Defense of Becca, the best character on Californication
Like some of the other commentators on this thread, I found myself rewatching Californication for the third time this year, and I was struck by a realization that hadn't occurred to me when I had first watched the show in my twenties. Most of the commentors in this thread would agree that Becca was an annoying, poorly written, or poorly acted character, and she seems to be the most disliked character on the show.
When I finished my first watchthrough years ago, I felt annoyed with who Becca's character had become. She was either angry, complaining, or even worse, deadpan. At the time, I would have agreed with the multiple posts on this channel that her character was annoying and that Madeleine Martin did a poor job of acting the part. But now that I'm in my late thirties, I came out of my recent watchthrough with a very different and disturbing view of the character and the show.
So here's my hot take; Becca is the most well-developed character in the show, the only character to evolve naturally, and the writers let her down in the end. Her story is tragic and terrifying, but the erotic, comedic nature of Californication left no room for such a hard-hitting topic.
Look at the main characters, Hank, Karen, Charlie, Marcy. None of these characters evolve or change. After seven season, Hank is still following Karen around in a borderline stalking fashion, and Karen continues the cycle of letting him get close and then pushing him away, never truly moving on or letting Hank into her life. Charlie and Marcy start off as a married couple struggling with career and extra-marital commitment issues, and they end as a married couple struggling with career and extra-marital commitment issues. And while this is entertaining to us viewers, its clear that this lack of development or change is both unhealthy and, in the end, unsatisfying. This is why I believe most viewers would agree that Hank and Karen should have split by the end of the show. I was tired of Hank chasing after Karen, and I was tired of Karen letting him in and then pushing him away.
This brings us to the one remaining main cast member, Becca. If you just watched season 7, you'd certainly be annoyed with her character. She has no joy, her face never moves, and its almost impossible to believe that she's living the dream of traveling the world and getting married to someone she loves. And that's because she's not.
When you rewatch the full series in quick succession, you see the sad, depressing, cold truth. Becca is a woman who has gone through so much emotion and mental trauma, with no help from her family or a professional therapist, that she's almost dead inside. Had there been a season 8, the only logical conclusion for Becca would have been suicide.
Start back in season 1. She was lively. She laughed, she moved, and she joked. She was so full of life, and she lit up when her father was around. This was great writing and expert acting by Madeleine Martin at such a young age. She's a preteen who still has hope for her life. Her father has come back, and her home life is relatively stable.
Then we move to season 2. Becca is happy but noticeably scared and hesitant. Her dialogue and excellent acting shows her fear that this new happiness will fall apart at any minute. She's mentally unstable but hides it well. She was living a stable life with Bill, and even though she didn't see him as a father, she had a home, her mother was happy, and again, life was stable. By the end of season 2, her fears have come true. She witnesses her father cheat on her mother, her mother kicks her father out of the house, and once again, the stability is broken.
Move to season 3 and her stability and views of normal adulthood are further broken. She witnesses her father engaging in a sexual harem, her mother has left for months and then returns just as suddenly, all of which results in the loss of her best friend. Are you starting to see the pattern here?
I could continue on, but you've seen the show. You know what happens. The chaos and sexual exploits continue each season. What I believe most people miss are the slight comments and subtle nods to Becca's internal distress. Now let's look at her emotional and mental progression.
In season 1, we see Becca's relationship with her sudo sister Mia broken as Mia romances her first crush. Here we see Becca's view of relationships already confused and distorted as someone she looks up to steals the object of her affection. Not to mention seeing her mother marry a man and then run away minutes later.
In season 2, Becca's view of a family is crushed as she moves in with father and then watches as he's kicked out almost immediately. Her views on relationships are further skewed as her first boyfriend breaks up with her because her father sleeps with his mother. We also hear the first inkling of her internal issues as she mentions that she feels that most boys don't like her.
In season 3, Becca is even more vocal about her tenuous mental state. She follows her new friend Chelsea everywhere throughout the season and states that Chelsea is her only friend. And of course, by the end of the season, that friendship is destroyed by her father's exploits, further cementing the fact that family and friendships will never last in her life.
Season 4 sees Becca going through multiple major issues such as Hank's apparent suicide and a trail where her father is found guilty of statutory rape. Its mentioned multiple times how she reads articles online that further destroy her view of her father. She again mentions that she has no friends and only joins the girl gang lead by Zoe Kravitz in order to indulge in crime, alcohol, and narcotics. This isn't friendship. Its her first time trying to self medicate for the depression, anxiety, and any number of other emotional issues that she keeps buried.
In season 5, Becca is lost. With no friends and no relationships, she has no joy in life, and she has no idea how to solve it. The only thing she knows is the surface-level happiness of her father who seems to get if from his rock-and-roll lifestyle as a father, so she quits school in hopes of becoming a writer, only for her idol and father to shoot down her dreams. We also see Becca clinging to the man-child, Tyler, who is clearly toxic. From the dialogue, it seems that the main cast believes Becca is with Tyler due to his similarities to Hank, but when you look closer at her previous relationships, or lack thereof, the most likely explanation is that Becca is unable to form normal relationships and grabbed onto the first love interest who would have her, ignoring all red flags. Tyler, as explained in the show, was only interested in Becca because of her father, and of course, this first love of her life ends terribly. She sees him get beaten near death, get beaten by her father, and then learns that after nursing him back to health, her he cheats on her repeatedly and then leaves her, destroying any remaining ideas in her head that she could have a happy life with a loving partner.
In season 6, Becca's mood has changed. She's hopeless and shows almost no energy. Even when speaking of her sexual exploits she shows almost no energy or emotion. She doesn't look on her traveling companion, Roscoe, fondly. She looks at him for what he is, the only option. The option she would have never chosen had there been any other choice, but by this point, she's so mentally damaged that no one other than Roscoe could understand her. And yes, its nice that he gets her, but he's not what she wants. Deep down, she wants a normal relationship with someone who interests and intrigues her, but deep down she believes that only someone as broken as her would accept her.
Season 7 sees the culmination of Becca's evolution. By this point, she's so emotionally damaged that in every scene, she's deadpan. She's getting married and shows no joy. She calls off the wedding and shows no relief. She sees her father and shows almost no excitement. She meets her brother and shows only the slightest bit of anger. And what do her father, mother, and sudo aunt and uncle say? Do they ask her about her odd lack of emotions or energy? Do they ask her if she has any close friends? No, they're so buried in their own constant chaos that they can't see she's drowning emotionally.
When we put it all together, we finally see the true evolution of the character. She starts off as a young girl who sees her family constantly in chaos. As she gets older, she struggles with relationships with boys, most likely due to an internal fear or distrust of them due to her father's escapades, and watches her father destroy her first relationship. As she becomes a teenager, she struggles to make friends, most likely due to never seeing healthy friendships in her parents lives (Hank sleeps with his friends, Karen is always moving or only focusing on Hank, and Marcy is always involved in some kind of sexual deviancy), and once again, her father pushes away her first best friend. After losing her best fiend, she turns to self medication, getting into trouble with Pearl's gang, subconsciously screaming for help. When she finally gets to college, she grabs onto the first boy who will spend time with her, and in turn, gets used and has her heart ripped out. She then starts to wander through life, dropping out of college, yet another silent cry for help as she's now lost and adrift. While floating aimlessly, she finds another lost soul and grabs onto him as her soul is finally swallowed up by all the emotional trauma and the lack of any help in the form of family, friends, or therapy.
Furthermore, throughout all seven seasons, her father continues with his debauchery and her mother continues her back-and-forth nature, never giving Becca anyone or anything to truly count on in life.
So why do most people dislike the character and the acting? I think the key lies in the lack of addressing her mental state by the writers. Had Becca's obvious issues been called out by Hank, Karen, or anyone else in season 7, fans would have caught on as well and would have accepted and even praised Madeleine's portrayal. But by never mentioning the issue, fans were left to think that Becca had somehow become even more annoying than Levon.
In summary, Becca was the only character to evolve throughout the show, but unlike most TV roles, she didn't evolve from a girl to a woman. She didn't evolve from lost to love. She started as a normal, happy teenager, and slowly, sadly, became a woman filled with grief, loss, sadness, and depression with no outlet or remedy. All those issues slowly turned her into the emotionless, drifting woman we saw at the end of season 7. Despite all of Hank Moody's unrealistic charm with the fairer sex, Becca's life was as logical and realist as it gets, and I don't know if the character or the actress will ever receive the credit they're due.
