Orange is the New Black is the New Pro Wrestling

Hey Scott,

Since you’re also a fan of OITNB, I pose this question. Other than Oz, have you seen any other TV shows were characters who are merely glorified extras grow to become main characters on the show.

Specifically, Maria Ruiz was in S1 just the pregnant lady there to add further depth to Daya’s pregnancy storyline. Gets a minor storyline in S2 regarding her unemotional boyfriend visiting. Gets scorned in S3, and becomes leader of the Dominican gang in S4, to one of the main players in the riot in S5.

I feel like that level of progression is unusual for television, and is more common in pro-wrestling where yesterday’s jobber can be built to tomorrow’s main eventer; they just don’t do it well anymore.

What are your thoughts?

Orange is pretty unique in that Piper was the main character and driving narrative behind season 1 and then they realized that she was the worst and no one cared about Larry and dropped him. So it did kind of end up like wrestling with on the fly restructuring of the storyline, and former jobbers like Soso becoming major players.