SERIES - ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK - Laura FOURCHAUD

Hello Mister Cox,

I chose the season 2 of the series Orange Is the New Black. This series tells the story of Piper Chapman. She is sentenced to 15 months in prison for have transporting, ten years earlier and in favour of his ex-girlfriend, drug money.

For resume the season 1 :
Piper Chapman, engaged to Larry Bloom, is taken to Litchfield Prison. She quickly finds herself confronted with the hell of the female prison milieu: intimidation of the prisoners, violence, but also the "hole"(a confined cell)...  After insulting Red's food, the “head” of the kitchen, Piper is starved out by the kitchen staff during one week. She also notices that Alex Vause, his ex-girlfriend, is in the same prison, which will make her furious. She decides to inquire with her father-in-law, lawyer, whether Alex denounced it. Anxious about the morale of his fiancée, Larry prefers to tell him that his ex-girlfriend did not denounce it. As episodes continue, Piper and Alex become friends again and fall back in love. So, Piper separates from Larry. The end of season 1 closes with a fight between Piper and a female inmate, Tiffany Doggett "Pennsatucky". Piper hit him to death in the face in the several times.

The main characters (of the season 1) are :
Piper Chapman
Alex Vause : Piper's ex-girlfriend
Larry Bloom : Piper's fiance
Sam Healy : The prison advisor
Galina Reznicov “Red” : The chef of the kitchen
Miss Claudette Pelage : She shares Chapman's cell
Suwanne Warren “Crazy Eyes” : It's a somewhat unbalanced inmate who is obsessed with Piper
Tiffany Doggett "Pennsatucky" : she’s bossy and ignorant. This old drug addict, very believing, doesn't get along well with Piper.

Episode one of the season 2 :
After beating “Pennsatucky” to death, Piper is taken to the security ward and transferred to a mixed prison in Chicago. She is confronted with other inmates who are going to make her live a nightmare. Piper doesn't know what she's doing in that prison and how long it will stay there. But during an exit, she discovers that Alex was also transferred. Piper learns that they're there to testify during the trial of the drug trafficker for whom Alex worked. In more, Piper is relieved when she learns that she didn't kill "Pennsatucky".
Alex asks Piper to lie through the trial. While Larry and her father try to persuade her to tell the truth. Piper chose to lie, she swear not to know the trafficker. However, Piper learns that Alex, for its part, told the truth in his testimony. So, Piper thinks that she wanted to trap her.

The main characters of the season 2 are :
Piper Chapman
Alex Vause
Larry Bloom
Sam Healy
Galina Reznicov “Red”
Suwanne Warren “Crazy Eyes”
Tiffany Doggett "Pennsatucky"
Tasha Jefferson «Taystee » : She's funny, intelligent and frequent the group of "blacks"
Nicolette Nichols « Nicky » : She's funny, she has a sarcastic humor and sometimes a bit salacious

At each episode, there're flashbacks on the past of each of the inmates. This helps to understand their character and behavior within the prison.

Episode 2 :
The inmates at Litchfield Prison are preparing for the "employment workshop" competition, which involves passing false job interviews. Taystee won the contest, but she is disappointed when she learns that this competition will not allow her to be hired when she leaves prison. We learn that Taystee used to work with her adoptive mother (drug dealer) and that she already had a unique talent for mental calculation and a strong ambition.
Pennsatucky returns to the prison. She is called by Councilor Healy. The latter asked him not to say that he was present during the aggression. In exchange, he offered him dental surgery.
For his part, Larry has had no news of Pipper since they separated. Thus, he inquires about the situation of Pipper by questioning his father and the best friend of Pipper.

Episode 3 :
Pipper return to the prison under the astonishment of the other prisoners. She's happy to find her former cellmates.
New inmates arrive at Livingston Prison. One of the inmates named Brook Soso is in Pipper's cell. She's sad, her family and her best friend miss her. On the first night, Pipper hears Brook crying and decides to confide in her on her debut at the prison and reassure her. But Brook quickly becomes annoying and invasive. Pipper makes her understand that they will never be friends and that it's better that she stay away from her if she doesn't want to get problems.
The group of afroamericans plays to a game of "questions - answers" and don't would like to make participate Suzanne. The flashbacks trace the life of Suzanne: her beginnings of dementia, crisis, the mockery of others and the difficulty for her adoptive parents to try to integrate her socially despite her difference.
Daya, an inmates and John, a guard of prison, fell in love. she's pregnant with him of several months and they want to keep the baby. Daya asks John to provide him with prenatal vitamins and to worry more about his future child.
Taystee is angry because her adoptive mother, Vee, is in the same prison. She's angry with her for having abandoned her when she entered prison. We learn that Red and Vee are old acquaintances. Red doesn't want to appear weak in front of Vee, which is why she decides to go to the prison hairdresser to recuperate a beauty.
Vee tries to regain control of the prison (as was the case during her first incarceration) and manipulates Suzanne. Vee manages to reconcile with Taystee. She asks him for forgiveness and promises that she will never let her down.

Episode 4 :
Pipper is assigned to another box, she now shares her dorm with Red. The cohabitation is tense. In addition, Pipper is angry, she realizing that during his absence, some inmates stole her personal affairs. Pipper and Red decide to put aside their rancour and share their despair and loneliness. Red realizes that she has grown old and that she should find an activity of her own age. For this, she asks the director of the prison to create a vegetable garden. This one is not against this idea.
Taystee and one of her friends of the African American group, Poussey, embrace. But Taytee denies being homosexual. Vee notices the closeness between the two friends and advises to Taytee to stay away from Poussey.
Lorna, the assigned driver of the prison van, leads Rosa, a inmate who suffering from a cancer, to the hospital for her chemotherapy. She takes advantage of her time to go to her ex-boyfriend's house. She discovers that he is about to marry, which deeply sadden her. Indeed, Lorna is persuaded that she would marry with him when she came out of the prison. The flashbacks tell the story of Lorna. She lived in a large family, rather poor. She dreamed of a life like a fairy tale and of prince charming. We also learn how she met Christopher, her ex-boyfriend, and why she is imprisoned. Indeed, Lorna was convicted for harassing and threatening to kill Christopher and his new girlfriend.

Episode 5 :
The bathroom of the "Latinas" has plumbing problems. They are forced to shower in the bathroom of Afro-Americans. Since they are responsible for cooking, they want to take their shower in priority. But, the group of Afro-Americans don't agree. Thus began a clan war between the gang of Gloria (the "mother of Latinas") and the group of Vee (head of the Afro-Americans).
Many flashbacks tell the story of Gloria. She runs a grocery store and doesn't earn much money. We also learn that she's a battered woman and that, despite the help of her aunt, she can't separate from her violent companion. She's denounced by one of her clients for fraud, which is why she is incarcerated.

Pipper receives the visit of his mother and brother. She's disappointed because her father didn't come to see her. In addition, his brother tells him that his grandmother is about to die. She decides to apply for furlough from the prison advisor, who agrees to transmit her request.

On his side, Red begins to clean the greenhouse to do his gardening workshop but also in order to make again of traffic

Episode 6 :
Valentine's Day is approaching in Litchfield Prison. Each prisoner must decide on the question "what is love for you?”. Each has different answers: feeling accepted, being well, suffering, making love ... Each one tells anecdotes about Valentine's Day. Latinas make cupcakes in the shape of a heart for the occasion. Caputo (assistant to the director of the prison), invites Fisher (one of the prison guards) to come and celebrate Valentine's Day with him. But he discovers that she invited the other girls colleagues from the prison.

Taystee steps away from Poussey, she follows Vee's advice. Poussey learns that she will no longer be able to work with Taystee at the library because Taystee has been transferred. She decides to settle its accounts with Vee.

The flashbacks tell the story of Poussey. Her father was a military so she traveled a lot around the world. She lived some time in Germany and had an intimate relationship with a superior's daughter. One day, this one surprises Poussey and his daughter. The superior is furious and decides to send back Poussey and his family to the United States. Poussey will then try to threaten the superior with a weapon but she will be retained by her father.

Larry visits Pipper. He tells her that he has been contacted by a journalist to write an article about the prison, and he asks Pipper to help him find information and denounce the prison faults. Despite some reticence at first, Pipper decides to investigate.

Red is gradually resuming his business. She manages to bring merchandise through the sewers. Meanwhile, Vee is making false deliveries of household products to hide tobacco smuggling.

Episode 7 :
Vee continues her cigarette smuggling with the help of the Afro-American group. She exchanges cigarettes against any kind of goods. Vee is intolerant to the one who doesn’t respect her business like for example Cindy who keeps the merchandise for her.
Red is also continuing his business.

Caputo gathered the prison guards and demanded them to be more vigilant, and firmer with the inmates. They execute his orders immediately. One of the guards listens to the telephone discussions of the inmates, she learns the pregnancy of Dana.

We learn thanks to flashbacks that Cindy, one of the Afro-Americans, worked as a customs agent at an airport. She took advantage of it to steal in the baggage of the passengers. Cindy was irresponsible. She abandoned her daughter and confided her to her mother, who raised her as her own daughter, making her believe that Cindy was her sister.

Pipper receives a visit from the journalist who contacted Larry. She describes what is not working in the prison system: the guards' behaviour, the abuse of the isolation cells. She wants the outside population to know their condition of life. The journalist wants only information about the prison's electricity grid. He wants to know more about frauds in the prison environment.

Episode 8 :
The prison counsellor is forced to tell Rosa, a inmate who suffering from a cancer, that she can't be operated on. We learn that formerly she made a series of robberies with a group of boy. She was usually in a couple with one of the boys of the group but at every hold-up her boyfriend of the moment would die. For her it's a curse. During her chemotherapy, Rosa decides to make a final blow with the help of a young boy, also afflicted with cancer and that Rosa appreciates. They steal the wallet of one of the nurses. While she crosses the corridors of the hospital, she views the young boy crying beside her mother. Rosa thinks that her curse has again struck and that he will die. But she learns that these are tears of joy and relief because it's healed.

Pipper got his exit permission to visit his dying grandmother. So, the inmates are jealous and decides to harass Pipper. She became the enemy number one in the prison. Helpless, she decides to ask Healy (the prison counselor) to cancel her permission. The latter refuses and makes her realize that she has an unheard-of luck and that she should benefit from it instead of listening to others. Following Healy's advice she decides to announce the good news to her mother. But she tells him that her grandmother died yesterday. This news deeply saddened him.

Caputo has doubts about Red's garden. He decides to search all the pots of plants and destroy the work of the group of Red. Not finding anything illegal, he decides to redeem himself by offering them new plants. Fisher finds the new rules unfair and decides to report them to Caputo. Exhausted by Fisher's remark, Caputo immediately dismissed her. The chief of the prison takes advantage to recruit someone else without informing Caputo. The Fisher substitute is not going to be appreciated by everyone. Indeed, it's Mendez, a former guard. Corrupt, perverted and slightly psychopathic, the latter often abuses his power.