'Beauty and the Beast' Season 2 Retrospective Pt. 3: The Case for J.T. Forbes

Credit: The CW

But I'd argue that while those are the show's two most crucial characters, the dynamic of the show wouldn't work nearly as well unless the supporting characters were compelling. Not only are J.T. (Austin Basis) and Tess (Nina Lisandrello) interesting to have around, they're also absolutely necessary as additions to the show. Cat needs someone other than Vincent to bounce her feelings off of, while Vincent needs someone who understands the biology of what he's going through to a more critical degree. I suppose we could have gotten other people to fill these functions if the show really wanted to deepen its ensemble, having Heather (Nicole Gale Anderson) become Cat's confidante while Gabe (Sendhil Ramamurthy) became Vincent's -- since he would understand what being a beast is like better than J.T. could. In essence, those stories would have served to further alienate our leads from the people they considered their closest friends, and could have made for some interesting interpersonal drama. Hell, the show even tried this by bringing in Tori (Amber Skye Noyes), who repeatedly rubbed her "primal" connection with Vincent in Cat's face, arguing that she could never understand what it's like to be a beast. Of course, I'm of the mind that that particular story didn't work as well as it probably should have. Thus, the series doubled-down on emphasizing the importance of Vincent and Cat's connections with their respective best friends, which brings me to my next point...

In many ways -- ways which I intend to line out in this essay -- J.T. Forbes is actually the most important character in the show, from a narrative standpoint. This is to say that very little of the narrative this season would be accomplished, much less understood, if J.T. weren't around. What's funny about this is that I'm not entirely sure this is something the show is even aware of, which makes it all the more uncanny for J.T. to be as crucial as he is to the events of a given episode. For as much as Vincent and Cat are the nucleus around which everything happens, they're not always the impetus. And even when they are, there isn't a whole lot they can do in a given situation without context.

J.T. provides the context, not just for Vincent and Cat but also for the viewer. He's a surrogate for the audience, sharing in our shock, awe, and disbelief, while positing theories and conveying necessary information. Maybe it's a cheap expository tactic, but J.T. is often such a likable character, and his interactions with Vincent so natural, that his use as a narrative device isn't always something you might notice. But that doesn't negate his importance to the overall story. If anything, it makes him quite possibly the show's stealth MVP...

THE CASE FOR J.T. FORBES

I'm going to go over three reasons why I think J.T. was integral to this season in a way the other supporting characters weren't, and then I'll open the floor to let you voice your opinions on whether you agree or disagree, and whether or not you feel J.T.'s involvement in the main storylines ultimately constituted a positive or a negative. I'm tackling this essay not just because I'm a huge J.T./Austin Basis fan, but also because I want to set a challenge for myself, to make a thesis that doesn't seem to have much support, and try to argue that it's true. I might succeed, I might fail, but hopefully in reading this, you'll come to a better appreciation for the character, or at least realize something you hadn't before. That's all I really ever seek to accomplish with my essays and reviews, like with the "Villains" essay last week or the "Vincent's Amnesia" retrospective the week before. So I hope you enjoy this. Let's get to it...

Credit: The CW

Point #1: This entire show technically wouldn't exist without J.T.

In "Recipe For Disaster", we learn that J.T. was the catalyst for everything that's happened to Vincent over the last ten years. In his attempt to protect his best friend and ensure his safe return, J.T. signed Vincent up for the Muirfield experiments without his knowledge, putting him on the company's radar. Clearly, it's not as if J.T. anticipated that Vincent would become a Beast, or that he'd have to spend the better part of the next decade on the run, living in the shadows. I suppose could argue that it was actually the death of Vincent's brother that compelled all this, since Vincent likely wouldn't have enlisted in the Army in the first place had he not been killed. Hell, he would have just been another soldier in a war if not for J.T.'s actions -- one who might not have even come home. It's hard to know in a game of "What if?" scenarios, but one thing is certainly likely: if Vincent isn't turned into a Beast, he never seeks out Vanessa Chandler. If he never seeks out Vanessa Chandler, he's not there on the night Vanessa Chandler is killed, meaning he isn't there to rescue Catherine either. Thus, Cat is likely killed on the night her mother dies.

But the domino effect doesn't really end there either. An unfathomable amount of crimes would have gone through unpunished if Vincent hadn't been turned into a Beast. Sam Landon's (Tom Everett Scott) plan would have succeeded, Muirfield might have been able to continue on in its twisted experiments unimpeded, and a series of murders would have remained unsolved. Then again, I suppose you could possibly argue that characters like Tori and Evan might still be alive if not for their involvement in all of the Vincent-related drama stemming from his being a Beast. But I think the positives of Vincent's transformation into a Beast outweigh their negatives to such a staggering degree (from both a narrative perspective, and from the perspective of where these characters inevitably end up) that it's virtually a good thing that J.T.'s good intentions went south.

Credit: The CW

Point #2: J.T. brought back Season 1 Vincent:

Much like turning Vincent into a Beast, this wasn't a direct act on J.T.'s part, but rather an instance in which J.T. being victimized compelled Vincent to action. In much the same way J.T.'s victimization by Gabe in the season finale, "Deja Vu", spurred Vincent to hunt him down, J.T.'s kidnapping in "Recipe For Disaster" (which is pretty much a turning point episode) prompts Tori to play the hero. Despite being a relatively inexperienced Beast, Tori goes on the hunt for J.T. and his captors, actually succeeding in tracking him to his abduction location before Vincent does. This is all well and good, except things immediately go haywire.

So why is this significant in bringing back the Vincent we knew from Season 1? Well, in an attempt to rescue J.T. to win Vincent's favor, Tori ends up getting herself killed. Since so much of that first half of Season 2 is centered on a completely different Vincent than the one we came to love way the hell back in Season 1, Tori's death ends up becoming necessary for Vincent to grow in any kind of fashion. In short, Vincent's humanity is brought back to the fore in the moment of Tori's death, recognizing the tremendous cost in caring about another person. In a lot of ways, Tori's death is what opens Vincent's eyes to the brevity of life, and the uselessness of spending so much of that time apart from the ones you care about. Maybe these tragedies will always happen, but that doesn't mean you should go through life alone.

If J.T. isn't kidnapped, Tori doesn't die, and Vincent doesn't lose some of the obstacles impeding his ability to get back to recognizing how vital Cat is for him. Granted, I feel kind of bad referring to Tori as an obstacle, but sometimes I wonder just how much of a character she really was in her own right. Did she exist for any other reason but to impede Vincent from making this realization about Cat's significance in his life? Was her only purpose in dying, thus getting Vincent back on the road to being who he was in Season 1? It's hard to tell, even now, especially since her death was catalyzed by J.T.'s kidnapping, giving her even less agency in her own storyline death. But what I do know is that J.T.'s kidnapping began the domino rally that resulted in Vincent rediscovering his feelings for Cat and working to win her back.

Of course, J.T.'s kidnapping also led to one another detail that makes the character irreplaceable in his significance...

Credit: The CW

Point #3: J.T. created the Beast serum used by Sam and Gabe

Much of the latter half of the second season sees Vincent and Cat slowly making their way back to each other while working on foiling the diabolical plans of both Sam Landon and Gabe Lowan, respectively. These missions brought them much closer together, even drawing the attention of government agents that ended up proving invaluable to Vincent and Cat's future. But the serum that creates those threats that Vincent and Cat have to neutralize is mostly the result of J.T.'s finished work. Granted, it's not as if J.T. actually wanted to do any of this. I'm sure J.T. would have preferred not to have been imprisoned and forced to work on a serum that could result in the deaths of countless people. But the end result of his work was a series of adventures that brought Vincent and Cat closer together, and removed the remaining impediments to their relationship.

In particular, Vincent returned to a form of selflessness through his dealings with Sam Landon, in talking him down from the ledge in "About Last Night", while also declaring his intention to defend what matters most to him against Gabe in the season finale. J.T.'s actions indirectly bring Vincent's character journey full-circle, as he's forced to become introspective through the consequences the serum's creation has on the world of this show. Okay, maybe it's flimsy evidence in its own right, but then, I never said the argument was necessarily concrete, just that it could be made. And I'd argue that while J.T. isn't exactly a series lead, he's one of the most integral characters in causing the actual story of the show to occur. This is without even getting into his indispensable weekly contributions as a man of science, since I imagine the characters in any given episode would have very little idea about the biology or science or history of what's going on, were J.T. not around. And, by extension, that makes him indispensable to the viewer.

What do you think about J.T. Forbes? Is he indispensable to the show's story, or could he be replaced with the show still maintaining its quality and drama? Sound off in the comments! Only two more essays left, so I'll see you next week. Thanks for reading!