OWN
“Queen Sugar” Season 5, Are Charley and Davis destined for a comeback?
This Article was updated on August 4, 2021 by julianna torres
I’m not going to lie I have been struggling with seeing Davis show up for Charley in the last two episodes while it is beautiful, magical, amazing, long-overdue and gorgeous to see this black man show up for this black woman in this way I struggle because I know their history and that’s kind of what I want to jump into. Having a conversation around them actually reconciling almost four years after their divorce that was prompted by him cheating, embarrassing her on National Television as well as fathering a child outside of their marriage that he hid for 11 years.
In the series premiere Charley West seems like she has it all she is powerful, intelligent, a mother articulate, beautiful, she seems like she just literally has the whole package and we quickly learned in the series premiere that All That Glitters Is Not Gold. While she is still amazing, intelligent, beautiful, she’s in a marriage that is not a committed one and it’s honestly how we actually learn that but I think it’s the most hurtful of the whole thing. What happens is Davis West, her husband at the time is a professional basketball player and his team or a group of people not the entire team are called out and put on blast for sleeping with women while they’re on the road specifically they get brought in on rape charges because the women involved are saying that they forced themselves on them. At first it just seems like it’s just these guys so Charley goes into overdrive as Davis’ manager, as a person who is very prominent with the team and works with them in reference to their marketing, business and PR and how they spend things. At the top of the episode we see her trying to figure out how to get ahead of the story, how to find out the truth and then how to best position Davis to take the blow if they have to get rid of all these players, rebuild the team, do they want to trade Davis and what does he want to do because he’s pursuing getting another championship ring and he doesn’t feel like he’s going to be able to do it if the team is dismantled because of this charge.
In the beginning they think that it’s this group of people but it comes out later on that Davis is also one of the guys who are caught on camera at this woman’s hotel room. So while he allows her to believe the lie that he’s not involved and that they have to handle this from the outside in he’s actually a part of it and Charley is hit with so many blows. Now not only does she try to help the team figure out what they’re going to do to be able to make it through this storm but she then gets thrown right into the eye of it because Davis is the most prominent, popular and highly paid person on the team that’s also involved in the scandal and then on top of the business we now have to deal with her learning that she has been cheated on and the infidelity.
We actually see all of this play out in a scene that will forever live rent-free in my mind and it’s the scene where Charley actually gets the news, it’s released online and everyone’s phones start to go off in this arena while they’re in the middle of a game. Then Charley like literally blacks out and walks onto the court, interrupts the game and starts going off on Davis screaming how could you, what did you do and you can just see the visceral hate, disappointment, betrayal, all of that you can just see it in her in this moment.
Now that was the initial act that sparked everything, it sent Charley to a place of depression and sent her to a place of insecurity for sure and it just so happens what was also working in the background is her father is sick, she needs to go back home she had been putting off going back home but because she’s so involved in her own life and has her own things going on she misses a lot that’s happening back in St. Joes with her father. He ultimately passes away and she misses it and that’s actually what sparks the whole entire series that’s what brings Charley to St. Joe and why we find her in Southern Louisiana in the series. Now we are five seasons in and this one act is what actually pushes her back home and she’s able to reconnect with her siblings who are Nova and Ralph Angel Bordelon and then we also get to see all of what happens in reference to them reconnecting, rekindling and rebuilding their relationship. For me it’s not just the one act of Davis cheating but we learned later on that he not only has been cheating or did this thing with this woman and why we ultimately learned that it was consensual they actually had a relationship while he was on the road. So he did not rape this woman, it’s still you cheated on your wife but she’s not the only one and he actually cheated with someone in Texas and got someone pregnant and had this kid that he was going to go visit and taking care of him and “doing right by” this whole time outside of his marriage and Charley was not the wiser and it was for 11 years old.
So again that adds insult to injury as well it’s like not only did you cheat once, it wasn’t a mistake, it wasn’t a thing that just kind of happened you got caught up in the moment like you had a system, you had a schedule, you had a plan, like you literally did this consistently for years. I think that’s what’s sitting on me when I’m seeing him in these moments be the Davis that she thought he was and wants him to be because it’s like sir you did all this other stuff, like I don’t know how much he has to do to come back from that but I don’t know if the last two episodes is enough.
Moving on we can definitely see when Charley gets into her first major relationship after Davis which is with Remy Newell I actually loved them together I really, really, really, really, really wish that would have worked out because I thought that he was just such a great compliment to Charley. He was able to get her together but also celebrate her, challenge her, support her, like he was literally everything that Davis was supposed to be and the fact that he came right after Davis I was just like come on look at God showing up and showing out for our girl. But we have moments where she was dating Remy and you can see that Davis was jealous or still interested so that has always been there like I don’t think Davis was ever not attracted to or did not want Charley.
I won’t pretend to know what’s in the minds of cheaters or people who you know commit acts of infidelity because I just cannot relate, I do not compute, I’ve not done it, I don’t plan on doing it. For whatever reason Davis stepped out on his marriage but the Davis that we’re seeing today seems like okay so it’s actually a little complicated because while I don’t feel like he’s applying pressure romantically but because he’s showing up so well as a friend and they have this history it automatically seems like it’s romantic energy, does that make sense? Like Davis is not doing anything to me romantic in the last two episodes that we have seen in season 5, he is just showing up and being a great friend, being a great family member and doing what needs to be done and because of who he is you can take it romantically. I feel like you know Charley is feeling something, she’s starting to see it romantically because of the history that they had so while I don’t think that he is doing it with romantic motives or at least it’s not coming across that way he’s definitely still interested in Charley so the ball is really going to be in her court. We see in the previews for the season finale of her asking a question of can people really change so you know that this is on her mind and I think that for them to have given so much time to Davis and Charley and centered around you know her sickness and getting the coronavirus and being healed from that and him supporting her through that I think that there is definitely something coming in season 6 that is going to lend itself to how did they make it back from all that they have been through.
Season 6 has started production they are already working on it so we should be getting there a little bit later this year I believe I’m actually excited I think Queen Sugar did an exemplary job this season being able to infuse current events with what is happening with these characters it is a beautifully written, beautifully shot, beautifully curated content show like it’s just so spot-on with all of the conversations that we are having and we need to have and I have been very, very grateful to be able to consume the series in the last nine episodes.
2 Comments