I agreed with that, but how were we going to handle Jim?
They've been building him up as the antagonist from chapter 2 - is this about fathers and sons? I don't know anymore. They both have shitty fathers, but Maddox's isn't around and may be low key homophobic, but he's just indifferent and hasn't harmed Maddox or Xavi like Jim has. It was maybe eluded to that he beat Maddox before, but not that we've seen and after being set up to show how Maddox and Devon were similar, he basically drops out of the narrative. I think it's definitely saying something about shitty parents, like we don't owe our parents anything or something more insidious about like breaking the social contract or some bullshit, BUT it's not even one of the major themes, not the number one lesson you'll learn from watching this.
However, Jim gets increasingly more evil (I mean by inches, he starts off pretty high on the evil meter). He stabbed Devon, he was one of the factors for making Maddox and Devon enemies, he tried to murder Devon, he made Devon feel worthless and unlovable as a kid (which Devon later tried to do to Maddox... is this why Devon was worried about turning into his dad?), he sent his kids to prison for no reason, made them all homeless... and everybody in the town hates him (though not enough to Ken McElroy him) When people go against him on their own, they fail, but when they work together they can eke out little victories - but they've always been mostly reactionary. If they can work together and prepare, that can bring him down, like in "Into the Woods".
This is a story about community, and about family (obviously), and about coming together to defeat a foe or a common enemy or whatever and working together. It's about community supporting one another, even if not strictly legally, and surviving through violence. It's about healthy versus unhealthy complication and violence - there's a lot going on in this love story about two dudes having a lot of gay sex. I'm into it.
