When Big Love ended last week I knew there was one person who would be equally disappointed in the finally and miss the show next season as much as I would, Nicole Zierlein. Nicole has an excellent blog of her own you should be following and before I even asked her to write something for ApeDonkey she was already working on it. Thanks again Nicole for contributing and the invitation is always open for more.
When Big Love premiered, I was pretty skeptical. How could I watch a show about a man and his three wives even if one of the wives was Chloe Sevigny? Polygamy was not interesting to me in the least, especially considering everything we had seen in the news regarding Warren Jeffs and his followers. The fact that the show was on HBO still didn’t convince me. The first season went by, and I didn’t watch one episode. It wasn’t until my friend told me over and over during season 2 that he could see me in Nicki that I finally decided to give it a chance. (By the time the show ended, this was really more of an insult than the compliment he intended.)
In my opinion, this show was a work of art. It was perfectly cast with Bill Paxton as the husband and Jeanne Tripplehorn, Chloe Sevigny, and Ginnifer Goodwin as the sister wives. Sure, some of the children weren’t perfect, but as far as the relevant characters go, the cast rocked. The acting in this show was so spot on that my favorite wife changed each season. I found myself identifying with the sister wives more than I ever thought I could. Although, in the end despite what my friend thinks, I am much more Barb than Nicki or Margene.
The show did exactly what Bill tried to do all along: convince us that polygamous unions can work. It showed the practical stuff like who does the shopping? How many moms do the kids have? To the most pressing: when do they have sex with Bill and what do the other wives think about that? Turns out that head wife Barb is really good at organizing things from finances to scheduling which wife slept with Bill on which night. Said schedule could be altered if a wife was trying for a baby.
Big Love took a couple who had been married for years before Bill decided he had a calling to plural marriage. My first question upon watching the show was: how did he convince Barb into doing this? You knew from season 1 that she wasn’t really convinced about the whole plural marriage thing. The more she talked about how much the family meant to her, the more you realized that she was never really on board. How did Bill convince her? Simple, he knew she loved him and would do anything for him. My heart broke for her, which would happen over and over throughout the series. Who can’t understand being manipulated like that?
I loved how the show allowed Barb to find herself more and more each season. And in finding herself, she realized that she didn’t need Bill. We saw Barb as mother extraordinaire, Mother of the Year (almost), return to school and as the person who truly was the heart of the family. She didn’t just run the houses, she made sure the wives were taken care of even when Bill wanted to ignore problems. This season Barb felt called to be a priesthood holder, a big NO in Bill’s religion. Barb stronger than ever, continued on the path and found a church where she could live her calling. Of course, for me the big letdown came when Barb who was about to get baptized in a different church didn’t follow through because her family wasn’t there. While I could understand the love and need she had for the family, it was just so disappointing to see her go back to someone who really treated her like dirt.
I think what I liked best about this show was how each wife evolved, except maybe Nicki who was basically always a bitch. Her lines just got meaner and meaner. But since I’m kind of mean, I liked it and until this season, loved her character. Nicki Grant, the cold sister wife who came from the compound: you never knew until the third season if she was capable of love. Her marriage to Bill was part of a business arrangement between her father and Bill. Nicki was the child who grew up yearning for her parents’ love and never being good enough for them. Turns out, she was also placed in the Joy Books and became a teen bride. I suppose that would make any person as cold as ice. My absolute favorite Nicki scene was when she worked undercover in the DA’s office and started dating someone else. When she finally came clean about it, I watched the scene over and over. Second best storyline for Nicki was the family finding out she was on birth control. While she almost let someone else take the fall for her, she did finally come clean, but was not really apologetic about it. That is what was great about Nicki, she had no problem telling you what she thought regardless of your feelings. One last fave of Nicki was her giving it to the red headed kid that bullied her son. As the mother of a son who was bullied by a red head a few years ago, I could only applaud her actions.
The fact that I liked Margene so much was a huge surprise for me. She was the young hot wife who loved sex, (although she wasn’t the only wife that loved sex). She was so much more than something pretty to look at though. She had a huge heart and loved without boundaries. Her charm allowed her to make a fortune without any help from the family. Ginnifer Goodwin did such a good job in this role that it was believable first, that she considered herself a mother to Ben, the teenage son of Barb, and then later allowed Ben to comfort her when she couldn’t have Bill at her side. I thought the ending of the show with her going off to do missionary work was out of character, but really, it wasn’t. I mean, yes it was a bit much for her to leave her children, but she grew so much over the seasons that her leaving Utah to save the world actually made sense. She realized she had a life outside of the Henrickson’s family compound. I only wish Barb had found that life.
Big Love even showed us how you date in a plural marriage. I went back and forth on this storyline. It was interesting to watch Bill date a new woman, as well as the sister wives date her. Of course, Nicki hated her, and at that point we found out that Nicki had voted against adding Margene to the family. Maybe Nicki knew Margene wasn’t of age? I didn’t really like Anna, but once Barb decided she did, I changed my mind about her. When Anna left the family, I was kind of relieved for the storyline to end. This storyline did show us another example of Bill screwing over Barb: having sex with yet another person outside of their marriage. Thanks, Bill.
My favorite seasons were probably the first and third, with the fourth season being the worst. The first season introduced us to the family and showed us how they lived. We saw one daughter who didn’t agree with the lifestyle and looked for support outside the home. We saw how Barb’s family reacted to her lifestyle, they disowned her. I loved every scene with Ellen Burstyn as Barb’s mother. The fourth season was just too much: the run for Senate, the casino and trip to Mexico didn’t do much for me.
The thing I hated most about Big Love was the crazy characters. I know that Grace Zabriskie is an amazing actress, but almost every scene she was a part of drove me crazy. That is until this season, I actually liked the storyline with her having dementia and depending on Frank, the husband with whom she had a volatile relationship. (In fact, the last scene of him killing her was one of the few scenes I actually liked from the last episode.) But if I hated Grace Zabriskie, I hated Bill’s brother, Joey, more than any character on the show. I just couldn’t handle how stupid he was.
Dealing with those characters was worth it because the show provided us with Roman Grant, one of the best villains on television. I loved how devious he was and how his wife helped him nonstop. I was so sad when they killed him, and I couldn’t believe that Joey of all people did it. Roman was always one step ahead until the pillow.
Alby was another great character. You wanted to feel sorry for him as a gay man growing up in that environment. There was no way he could live out in the open, but even before the love of his life committed suicide, he was just an asshole. This season he was awesome, but the end for his character, getting shot in the shoulder by Bill, was lame. The great thing about Alby and Roman for that matter was that they could convince anyone to do their dirty work.
I watched an interview with the creators of the show, and they explained that they were ending this season because they didn’t feel they had enough material for another season. While I see their point, the way they ended things was a cop out. I actually didn’t mind Bill getting killed, my problem was how things ended for the interesting ones: the wives. There was no reason for Barb to stay. I could see Nicki (and Margene possibly) staying, but Barb grew so much, and while growth doesn’t have to mean a life alone, it should mean a life where you are respected and Bill clearly didn’t respect her.
Despite my disappointment with how the show ended, I am going to miss Big Love. I really became invested in the sister wives and cared about each of them. I found myself rooting for this marriage to work. I wanted them to live in the open and continue to show people it could be done. That it wasn’t all prairie skirts and long hair. I wanted Bill to wake up and stop alienating those around him.
Every year, there is talk about Grace Zabriskie getting an Emmy. Chloe was finally awarded last year, maybe it was a Golden Globe. This year has to be the year for Jeanne Tripplehorn. She was so damn good.
