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Have you ever seen one of those diagrams mapping out the complete human nervous system? Aside from being super creepy in a Cronenbergian body-horror sort of way, it’s fascinating to marvel at how complex and interconnected our bodies are, including our precarious brain chemistry. And while it’s certainly not a competition, women’s bodies and minds are certainly complex and interwoven in their own unique way. Especially given that they are constantly commodified, controlled or otherwise imperiled by legislative and interpersonal overreach.

In this month’s Fiscal Spotlight column, we’re taking a look at three short narrative films created by women, each examining issues of female protagonist’s physical and mental wellbeing in response to moments of stress and trauma. Here we’ll take uncomfortable trips back home to reunite with aging parents, the honeymoon suite for surprising discoveries and an intense doctors’ room conversation revealing an unsettling pattern of behavior.

Vera Season 4 ITV

Vera returned to ITV tonight with On Harbour Street, a story that began innocently enough with D.S. Joe Ashworth’s (David Leon) daughter gently trying to awaken a sleeping passenger on a train. It quickly became apparent that Margaret Kraszewski (Annabel Leventon) wasn’t going to wake up from this sleep. The pensioner had been stabbed, but how could such a crime have gone unnoticed on a busy commuter train?

The investigation got off to a slow start with Margaret’s known acquaintances at a loss to explain a motive for her killing. Eventually, Joe and Vera (Brenda Blethyn) crossed paths with a potential suspect — Dee Sinton — an alcoholic who’d just been thrown out of a shelter where Margaret volunteered. Dee didn’t have much of an opportunity to explain herself before she too wound up dead. Another murder? or an accident? I won’t...