Anna and Bates should break up. Seriously. Dead serious here.
Bates has a violent side. It was clear during his time in prison when he was threatening his fellow inmates. Now, there was a little back-and-forth action to that, in that some of them were threatening him in return, but still.
He also does not react in a calm, rational fashion when confronted with a difficult situation. Witness his attitude toward his ex-wife before her untimely death. No, he didn’t kill her, but we can all understand why he was a prime suspect. Now view his reaction to Anna’s rape. He said all the token things about caring for her and loving her, but his primary focus has been finding and punishing the person who did this to her – not allowing the justice system to handle that punishment.
Consider that Anna’s first inclination after the rape was not to tell Bates, because she believed that he would try to kill Green. Any husband might react initially with similar thoughts, and would be perfectly justified in thinking like that and wanting to defend his wife’s honor, but with a sane, rational person that is where the idea would stop. Green should be dead, and is, so justice was served. But did Bates kill him? We do not know that yet.
Mr. Bates is not entirely beyond help, but unless he learns to check these murderous tendencies and raging temper – this relationship shouldn’t continue. Anna should move on. It does not matter whether he was responsible for the death of his ex or of Mr. Green. Anna needs someone who is more mentally stable and who is not always a suspect in someone’s murder.
And while we are on the subject, can we talk about how the writers keep excusing all of this bad behavior by Mr. Bates by showing him through Anna”s eyes as some kind of victim? And how, by some miraculous coincidence he might be fingered for two deaths and be completely innocent of both? Isn’t that rather unbelievable outside of the world of TV dramas? I think yes.