From its initial evaluation, Rebel Ridge feels like a Reacher story, but treated in a much, much better way than the milquetoast narratives of the said novel series. The small-town corruption Reacher handles with his burly stature and wits as a one-man army is changed into a more intangible problem, which in the movie, Terry Richmond handles with prolonged, methodical investigation, and he is not alone in his crusade against suburban police crimes—the court clerk of Shelby Springs township, Summer McBride, is his trusted ally. Unlike the Reacher-like stories, where lead female characters are often reduced to moles or a second fiddle/romantic partner of the titular character, in Rebel Ridge, Summer McBride’s role is much more empowering and as important as that of the lead, Terry Richmond himself. To such an extent that we can denote her as the secret protagonist of the narrative, not only because the plot remains incomplete without her assistance in unraveling the legal loopholes of the plot, but also because her own character arc is much more significant in the context of the narrative.
Spoilers Ahead
Why Does Summer Decide To Help Terry?
Ex-Marine Terry Richmond is reasonably flabbergasted after practically getting swindled in broad daylight by a couple of Shelby Springs township’s crooked cops, who take all his savings after pressing false charges against him. Eventually, he finds himself helpless and alone when reaching the town hall. He realizes there is no way of getting the money back through legal aid, as the town lacks a public defendant in the first place, and his hopes of saving his cousin, Mike, from imprisonment by posting bail in time grow thin. Help arrives for Terry in the most unexpected way as court clerk Summer McBride sympathizes with his situation and walks him through the existing modus operandi of the town’s police force of exploiting the legal loophole of civil asset forfeiture law. Summer digs deeper into similar cases to eventually discover an entire syndicate run by the town police force—and she does all this by putting her own life and career on the line. After Mike’s death, Terry walks away from all the mess, leaving Shelby Springs as a sordid memory of the past, but Summer continues to insist he stays as she is willing to get to the bottom of the crisis. She herself becomes a target of the vengeful cops, who punish her for assisting Terry by secretly drugging her and warning her to back off. Like Terry himself, the question starts hovering in viewers’ minds: why is she stubbornly going to such lengths to court danger? The reason is hinted in her sordid past, but the truth is more complicated than a simplistic redemption act.
A reserved Summer has been playing her cards pretty close to her chest so far, but Terry risking his freedom and life by returning to Shelby Springs to rescue her allows her to trust him a bit more—to share how, in order to get rid of demons of her past, she felt implored to help Terry and make an honest effort to expose the existing corruption in the town. Summer had a tough time battling her addiction, and similar to Mike, she was unjustly pinned with high charges for something that isn’t even a crime in a fair sense. In her most desperate moment, Summer found herself cornered as her husband filed for divorce and won the custody of their daughter, as Summer, who couldn’t even afford a lawyer, had to helplessly take all the blows life had to deliver. Judge’s pity allowed her to take up the job of court clerk, and since then, she has been living a clean life, making efforts to win back custody of her daughter. But seeing Terry in a pickle, she decides to risk that glimmer of hope of turning her life around, as she finds a kindred spirit in him, cornered by a powerful, oppressive administrative and legal syndicate that has been plaguing the town, of which she too has been a victim. More than her own predicament, Summer fears not getting the chance of reuniting with her daughter and that she will not be able to become a mother to her daughter, whom she looks up to. Summer’s history as a former addict was exploited by her husband in his battle for their daughter’s custody; putting a narrative of Summer failing as a mother out there was easy enough in a rigged system. Ashamed of her past, Summer wants to make things right and win her lost self-worth. By going against the system, Summer wants to prove to her daughter that her mother has what it takes to stand against the overpowering, oppressive system, while the rest lack the courage to do so.
But is it merely a shared feeling of being wronged by the system or a personal quest to redeem herself in her daughter’s eye that motivates Summer McBride to put her life, her career, and her future in jeopardy? The answer is no. Throughout the movie, she had multiple chances of backing off; unlike Terry, she risked losing everything, and still, she chose to persevere against every severe odds. The reason is simple: Summer believed in doing the right thing above everything else.
What Happened To Summer At The End?
Summer’s misery continued as, while assisting Terry to steal the hard drives of police vehicle dash cams, which could have proven the deep-rooted corruption, she decided to make a detour to steal her urine sample, and was abducted by the police, and Steve overdosed her again—in a sadistic way of reminding Summer of her agonizing past. However, in the end, Terry was able to save her life using a nebulizer, and later on, she was admitted to a hospital, where she hopefully made a complete recovery. Here’s hoping Summer gets her chance to reunite with her daughter and be the proud mother to her like she wants to become.
