Danielle Brooks is undeniably the lead of season five, tirelessly fighting for justice in the name of her fallen friend, Poussey (Samira Wiley), who gets suffocated by a guard in season four. Will her role as the prison's mouthpiece during the riot come back to bite her in the form of a harsher punishment or being separated from her friends? "I really couldn't tell you," she explained to THR. "At this point, I think Taystee would strive so much more being with those women, but I don't know who is going to be isolated. I don't know if Taystee will be isolated from everybody and what affect that will have on her feeling like she spun this whole thing and started it. She set off the grenade and now she's alone. If anything, I would pray for my character to at least still have Crazy Eyes or Black Cindy or somebody, even Piper. I think she's going to need to have someone to take the next step with."
Brooks also sees a correlation between Taystee's need to spread awareness for the injustice that happened to Poussey on the show and what black Americans face every day in the real world:
"When Poussey's death happened, I posted a picture of Samira and I and it got hundreds of thousands of likes. But when Sandra Bland or Philando Castile's deaths happen — and the list goes on — I only get a third of the likes, and a bunch of arguing in the comments. That's what reminds me that we have a long way to go. People get so invested in these fictional characters but forget that the whole reason we're talking about this is that it's actually happening. But I do feel like it's opening peoples' eyes. People all around the world are seeing the things that really matter to us in America and what we're dealing with as a society. The thing about all of this, as we have seen in the past five years, is that when you're incarcerated and not even seen as human, things can turn really quickly. People can blame people and point fingers and do all sorts of things, so I'm not sure how it's going to play out for Taystee, nor am I quite sure how she's going to take it."
