Lying About Rape on “The Closer”

On of my favorite TV shows is The Closer on TNT. Kyra Sedgwick is just awesome and she plays the character of Brenda Leigh Johnson which such depth and strength it’s a pleasure to watch. For those that are not familiar, Deputy Chief Johnson is in charge of the Major Crimes Division in Los Angeles (I think that’s what it’s called now, the name changed recently due to perceived racial bias…also an interesting episode!). Her squad treats her with the utmost respect (although they all have fun with each other too) because she is hard-working and gets the job done. And she has a knack of figuring out what has happened before any one else has a clue. The idea of “The Closer” is that she gets a confession out of the murder suspect before they lawyer up. This is her special talent. Anyway, that’s the background of the show.
*Spoilers about last night’s episode after the jump*

Well last night’s episode was about a young man that was shot in what looked like a drug deal gone wrong. Later it was revealed that instead of him being the innocent victim and the dealer being the target, the young man, Jake, was probably the target of the whole thing and the drug dealer got caught in the middle. Deputy Chief Johnson finds out that Jake had recently gotten his girlfriend, Vanessa, pregnant and she had, as a result, broken up with him. Vanessa had told him that her father was very angry and she never wanted to (or couldn’t, I forget exactly) see him again. Jake said all this as he was lying in the hospital dying. It was a very touching and emotional episode to be honest.
Later Deputy Chief Johnson finds Vanessa at home with her father and it comes out that she had told him that Jake raped her. It is clear that her father still is very angry about this and seems to be angry at Vanessa for…being raped? He says something along the lines during the heated back and forth of bringing shame on the family or herself…something like that. Then of course it is discovered that they own a gun and the son, Vanessa’s brother, had killed Jake. The brother is tackled to the ground and arrested as the father looks confused and angry. Vanessa tells him “This is all your fault. You got him so worked up about it” (or something along those lines). To which her father screams about Jake being a bastard who raped her. Of course then it is revealed be Vanessa that it was all a lie. Jake did not rape her. The father seems shocked and confused and Vanessa says “You kept calling me a whore. What was I supposed to say?” Deputy Chief Johnson quickly cuts in with “The truth!”
Now, it should be mentioned that Brenda had just held Jake’s hand as he died and it was incredibly sad and difficult for her. His mother was on a plane and so he was all alone, aside for Brenda who had to tell him that she loved him (he was delusional at this point and thought she was his mother). And yes, the lie about the rape obviously put this whole horrible mess into motion, but it seemed like she was putting all the blame on Vanessa. What about her father? Had he not shamed his daughter so much for being sexual she wouldn’t have felt the need to lie. And it seems he still felt it was partially her fault for getting raped. It still “brought shame.” Shame enough that he instilled the idea in his son to go out and kill this other boy. Obviously the whole secrecy about sex in that family in the first place fucked up the situation. Maybe if it wasn’t seen as so dirty Vanessa would’ve known how to engage in safe sex and wouldn’t have wound up pregnant? There were just so many avenues I wanted the show to explore but that was the end of the episode and they didn’t. I was left wanting more.
Oh and I should note that Vanessa’s last name was Almassian. They never said what ethnicity the family was on the show but it could easily be inferred that they were Middle Eastern. The actress that played her was Middle Eastern.
Does anyone else watch The Closer? Did anyone see last night’s show or have any feelings about it?