Diksha Sundriyal
Prime Video’s ‘Cruel Intentions’ focuses on the toxic psychosexual relationship of two step-siblings who are ready to do whatever it takes to get what they want. Caroline Merteuil is the head of a premier sorority at Manchester College in Washington, DC. Cold and manipulative, she knows exactly how to pull on someone’s strings to keep them in line, especially her step-brother, Lucien Belmont. Lucien is attracted to his step-sister, but she has kept him at bay so far. Still, there is a weird way in which they are sexually connected to each other. In the fourth episode, the show has a character talk about the connection between a person’s trauma and their sexual drive and preferences. A book is at the core of that context, and while its subject matter seems interesting, it is not real. SPOILERS AHEAD
Deirdre Dawson and Her Book in Cruel Intentions are Entirely Fictional
One of the prominent characters in ‘Cruel Intentions’ is Professor Hank Chadwick, who develops a complicated relationship with CeCe, who works as his assistant. In trying to understand him, CeCe discovers that Hank used to be married to a woman named Deirdre Dawson, and to understand her better, CeCe attends a book reading event featuring her and her book, ‘Fuck Your Trauma: How to Break Patterns and Break the Headboard.’ In the context of the book, Deirdre talks about sex as a way of dealing with one’s traumas, which rings a chord with several people in her audience. As enticing a read as it is made out to be, Deirdre and her book remain completely made-up. Both were created to serve the plot point relevant to the fourth episode of the season.
The presence of Deirdre and her book serves two purposes. The first one focuses on CeCe and her desire to understand Professor Chadwick. She sees Deirdre as an evil woman who broke the good professor’s heart. However, after the book reading, she sees that Deirdre is not at all what she pictured, and later, even the professor talks about her in supportive terms. The second focus is on Lucien and his complicated relationship with sex. It is not clear how he comes across Deirdre and her book, but he makes a mark on the author with his question and his presence, and later, we see them having sex.
Lucien having sex with Deirdre shows that age is not a barrier he considers while wooing women, and this becomes even more pronounced at the end of the season when Lucien has sex with another older woman. Moreover, Deirdre also points out some things about Lucien and the connection between his sex habits and his trauma that make much more sense later when the truth about his mother’s death and the sharing of sex videos with Caroline comes to light. Due to this, despite their brief appearance, Deirdre and her novel make quite a mark on the show.
Read More: Does Lucien Die in Cruel Intentions TV Show?
