‘I May Destroy You’ Episode 6 Hits a New Devastating High for the HBO Series

From its opening salvo, Michaela Coel‘s I May Destroy You has not held back. But tonight’s episode of I May Destroy You strongly shifts focus from the central plot to dig into the origins of lasting trauma. I May Destroy You Episode 6 “The Alliance” offers us a flashback to an event from Arabella’s (Michaela Coel) youth, as seen through the eyes of someone Arabella once hung out to dry. It will leave you horrified, devastated, and above all, unsure of who the villain and who the victim is. “The Alliance” is, without a doubt, the most haunting episode of I May Destroy You to date, and proof positive of the series’ genius.

HBO’s I May Destroy You follows rising literary star Arabella as she attempts to piece her life back together after being both drugged and raped. It’s an experience that has both left her traumatized and with newfound fire. In last week’s episode, she used her platform at a prestigious literary event to call attention to an abuser in their midst. This week’s episode opens with Arabella visiting a sexual trauma support group run by an old school mate, Theo (Harriet Webb). She opens each session by saying, “I hate abusers. I think that abuse, grooming, assault, domestic violence are the most abhorrent qualities of our species.”

At first glance, it seems like a safe place for healing. However, before we even meet Theo, we learn that Arabella’s best friend Terry (Weruche Opia) distrusts her. Through an extended flashback primarily told from young Theo’s (Gaby French) perspective, we get a clue as to why: the white Theo once accused a Black classmate of violently raping her, when he did no such thing. However, as we see the events unfold for ourselves, the reality about Theo’s experience and choices become all the more murky.

When we first meet Theo, she’s a teenager shoplifting birthday gifts for her stepfather and eagerly texting a boy named Ryan (Josiah Mutupa). Almost immediately upon arriving at school, Theo leads Ryan to a section of the building under construction and begins happily giving him oral sex. Ryan, however, pulls out his flip phone and takes a photo of Theo without her consent. After a tense conversation, it’s revealed that Ryan will pay Theo for a photo — as he’s seen another illicit image of her thanks to another boy. Theo is horrified, but attempts to make the most of the situation by not only accepting the money, but trying to twist blame back onto Ryan.

Before returning to class, Theo cuts herself with a knife on the construction site. The blood catches the eye of teenaged Terry (Lauren-joy Williams). The allegation that Ryan violently raped Theo soon becomes a school scandal, prompting another boy to tell Terry and Arabella (Danielle Vitalis) about the photo Ryan sent him. Armed with this pic – and the belief that the “pics don’t lie!” — Arabella and Terry reveal Theo’s subterfuge. This lets Ryan off the hook and inspires Theo to hurl some pretty abhorrent racist insults at her mostly Black classmates.

Things get all the more upsetting once we follow Theo home. There, Theo tells her stepfather that her mother coerced her into testifying that her father sexually abused her just to win a custody battle. It’s a whiplash-inducing revelation that I May Destroy You conveniently wiggles out of confirming. Do we believe Theo now that we’ve seen how elaborate her lies can be? It’s impossible to say. While Theo lied about the specificity of her assault, she was certainly abused by Ryan. She is a creature defined by trauma, which perhaps explains why we’re left with the haunting image of Theo opening another support meeting, making her screed against abuse with a now seemingly rote delivery.

I May Destroy You Episode 6 “The Alliance” argues that it’s just about impossible to know how to adjudicate the everyday instances of sexual abuse. Theo was indeed abused by Ryan, but in attempting to secure reprisal for herself, she not only abused him, but herself to boot. When Arabella and Terry rally around Ryan, they simply believe they are protecting him from wrongful accusations leveled by a person of privilege. They are also ricocheting Theo’s own trauma back upon her, creating a loop of devastation that really has no end. The whole episode leaves us devastated and clueless as to whom to trust.

“The Alliance” might offer the clearest articulation of I May Destroy You‘s central thesis: abuse is everywhere and there is no obvious way to fix it. Coel refuses to make I May Destroy You Episode 6 anything less than devastating. The moral confusion that Theo’s story sparks only makes that pain hurt more. In most television betrayals of assault, we have an obvious idea of whom to condemn. I May Destroy You is unflinching in its refusal to give us an easy out with Theo’s story. That’s why the episode is so haunting and so necessary to watch.

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