Jane the Virgin Struggles to Accept the Things that Can’t Be Changed in “Chapter Eighty-Nine”

Well, Jane the Virgin, you’ve burned me too many times to believe that The Love Triangle storyline will ever really be done with, but in the interest of willing that dream into being, I will—for now—go along with your efforts to convince me that Rafael (Justin Baldoni) is truly Jane’s (Gina Rodriguez) once and future love. I mean, to all her stalker-y credit, Jane certainly believes it, so I guess that leaves me no choice. Okay, Jane! I believe you! Now make better decisions!

Before we get into Jane’s week of wildly bad judgment, though, and how all of it so completely diverges from the calm she evinced at the end of “Chapter Eighty-Eight” accepting the long game it would take to win Rafael back, let’s first take a moment to appreciate all the Jane-free narrative arcs whose progress in “Chapter Eighty-Nine” really worked: Alba’s (Ivonne Coll) relationship with Jorge (Alfonso DiLuca), which got to move forward in a way that was both romantic and earned; Rogelio’s (Jaime Camil) dream project, which hit a snag at the network notes stage that was all too believable; and Petra’s (Yael Grobglas) ongoing arc of personal growth, which found a new milestone in her willingness to let go of the happiness she recently re-found with JR (Rosario Dawson) for the good of her daughters’ mental health.

This last storyline, which included everything from high, soapy intrigue (Petra turning the twins’ parrot-nanny in to the cops after overhearing her speaking Czech in the Marbella’s courtyard) to heartbreaking reality checks (Petra discovering that the twins saw JR holding the gun on Miloš, and learning the extent to which that, matched with their school’s active shooter training, has traumatically impacted their young lives) to Petra wearing the most beautiful blouse she’s put on in ages (flowing and silky with a pattern of bright emerald monstera leaves, so 2019), was especially strong. And although much of that strength stemmed from the incredible control Grobglas always has in keeping Petra balanced on the knife’s edge between power and vulnerability, just as much came this time around from the fact that “Chapter Eighty-Nine” allowed both JR and the twins (Ella and Mia Allen) to act not just as accessories to Petra’s growth, but as active agents of their own.

For JR, this is a return to form a long time coming—while she may have been introduced to the Jane the Virgin universe last season as a complex character who got to grow and change as Petra grew and changed, she has spent the majority of Season Five stuck as little more than the reluctant object of Petra’s redemptive romantic pursuit. Giving her the chance to reflect on her half of their romantic partnership, and to be intentional in how she approaches fighting for the right to be a part of both Petra’s and the twins’ lives going forward, lets JR return to the nuanced dynamism she had as a character originally. For the twins, meanwhile, the revelation that they have been emotionally tangled up in the soapier aspects of Petra’s life for a long time, and that they are both old enough now and engaged enough with the world to have taken it upon themselves to do something about it, is completely new. In terms of how the Jane the Virgin kids are deployed within the show’s larger narrative, it’s always been Mateo (Elias Janssen) whose character has got to grow and change for its own sake—which has made sense, as Jane is the show’s central protagonist. That Ellie and Anna are revealed in “Chapter Eighty-Nine” to have been steering their own ship on the seas of Petra’s world for some time, then, seems to confirm something that has seemed obvious since Petra and Jane’s friendship has been centered time and again since the Season Five premiere: Petra is now as much a heroic protagonist in Jane the Virgin as Jane herself is.