Big Love Finale: Possible Spoilers in Replies

[nolabear]

But I'll just say MY prayers, at least, were finally answered...

[Duer 157099]

1. Oh I can't wait. I'm still several episodes behind

But there are a number of things it could be, lol.

[HardWorkingDem]

2. Watched it from the start...felt it's overrated, but ending right up there....

I've felt much of the praise for this show has gone overboard. Some of the writing was pretentious and lacking in realism (this season each episode seemed to have the three wives having a very public meltdown/argument that seemed out of place).

But with that, the ending was above average.

[Gormy Cuss]

3. I thought I was the only one.

;-)

[LynneSin]

4. I thought the ending was going to suck but instead it was one of the best endings

and reminded us this was not about Bill Hendrickson and his 3 wives but about Barb, Nicki, Margene and their husband.

Nataline Maines made the most perfect remake for the ending

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSewdymuupk

[dr.strangelove]

5. It was a good ending

It gave me the closure that I needed. A year later and they are still one family and Bill was sitting at the table watching them. Its what he wanted.

My wife and I were curious about the family finances. But she suggested that once Bill died, the state would back off the family and Home Plus might survive. I also thought that Bill was the type to have a ton of life insurance, and was probably worth way more dead than alive.

[WolverineDG]

6. They had to find some way to stop the train wreck

IMO, there were too many story plots (& some good ones) being developed for the series to end this season. It was as if they wrote most of the scripts & decided "aw, fuck, let's just end it all now & go on a cruise," so they did. Hence the "Cara Lynn goes to boarding school" meets an abrupt end & Adaline does a 180 & actually supports Ablie instead of trying to kill him.

It was obvious that they weren't ever going to resolve the polygamy issue, since that is still an on-going matter, but I did want to see Albie suffer some major pain instead of being hustled off to jail & Frank deserved a worser fate as well.

dg

[LynneSin]

7. I barely watched season #4, it was just awful!

They really try to expand it out way too much with the 'Adaline is pregnant' plot and Cara Lynn. I kinda felt like the end they focused just on the original family - when they did that 11 months later shot. No Cara Lynn but there was Sara and Teensy.

Seriously what happend with Teensy, wasn't she about the same age as Cara Lynn - why not have her with a storyline instead of creating a new character?

[WolverineDG]

9. They had turned her into a fundie Mormon, remember?

she went off to some brainwashing summer camp & came back full of hellfire & brimstone.

Probably they wrote her out because they had way too many story lines going at the same time.

dg

[dr.strangelove]

12. Cara Lynn was in that last scene

She walked in with Margene.

I felt bad about Teeny getting written out. The girl whop played her the first two seasons just aged out of the part. She grew up on a show that was not filmed quick enough. then they recast her and I never connected with the second actress to play her. It happens in TV though.

[nolabear]

8. I agree the plot got out of hand. I halfway expected a space ship to land!

But I have to admit I despised Bill from the get-go. I'm not opposed to alternative marriage but he used the "principle" to support his narcissism and to hold an only somewhat benign dictatorship over the family. I liked Barb a lot, Nicky creeped me out and I liked Margine. I think that's what they meant for me to feel and that was fine. Loved the Juniper Creek crowd and Bill's parents, and was saddened by that resolution, but thought it compassionate, though I wondered what happened to him as a result.

But by the end I was glad to see the women grow and achieve their independence under what they believed was Bill's approving gaze. Had he been there it wouldn't have been so approving, but that's how idealizations work. He gets to be the martyr in their new religion without actually having to be what he was, just a guy who believed something and tried to get others to believe it too.

And that ending version of the song was wonderful! I hated the "new" theme song anyway.

So Bill, buh-bye. On to Game of Thrones!!

[WolverineDG]

10. I thought we'd see Bobby in the shower nt

[LynneSin]

11. I have to admit that I couldn't stand Bill in the end

I really thought he treated Barb horribly especially in light of all the lies and problems Nikki had caused over the year. The only other ending that would have made me very happy is if Barb and even Margene finally said "Fuck this" and ditched Bill. Bill and Nikki were truly 2 horrible people who I don't think anyone should suffer being married to, but I suppose those 2 were really just a product of their environment since both of them were born & raised in Juniper Creek. I suppose I could see Margene sticking around since she was a child of a broken home and crazy mother but how Barb tolerated that marriage as long as she did baffles me. She had to sacrifice everything she believed in. When Bill divorced her so he could marry Nikki and adopt Cara Lynn - well if I were Barb I would have walked out on the marriage. All of her kids were either grown up or moved out of the house so there wasn't a whole lot that was holding her back in the marriage.

[nolabear]

13. In some ways I thought Barb was the most genuinely religious of the bunch.

She seemed to love but question, to think independently within the sphere of influence of being born into LDS and marrying someone who adhered to a self-invented dogma, and though I'm not a believer I can admire personal honesty and wrestling with it in whatever anyone chooses. That's the problem with Bill. He didn't doubt and so there was nothing to make him humble and compassionate.

Btw whatever happened to the waitress they were so in love with? Did that baby turn out not to be Bill's?

[LynneSin]

14. But she was also a part of a self-invented Dogma

isn't the basic concept of Mormonism is that it is self-invented?

[nolabear]

17. Well, yeah, it's sort of Mobius Mormonism.

As opposed to Mobius Baptistism, Mobius Catholicism, etc. You have to tie yourself in knots and it's not clear which side is which.

[LynneSin]

19. True but Baptist/Catholism are all based on Christianity from 2000 years ago

Whereas the Mormons decided they'd claim Jesus walked the earth a few hundred years ago in New York state and appointed Joseph Smith as the new prophet.

[Duer 157099]

15. Didn't they go back to Russia?

And the baby was Bill's, I think.

Honest to god, the last half of the last episode was the most fulfilling of any episode of any season. What does that say about a series? LOL

The thing that bugged me most about this show was how they played so fast and loose with temporal continuity. The way they'd go from scene to scene with no explanation of the intervening sequences of events. Or how about when Nikki's daughter has a melt-down and the very next scene shows Bill and his harem in the kitchen arguing. What about the daughter? All the adults just left her outside to her meltdown.

Sheesh.

I'm glad it's over. I really am.

[SoCalDem]

16. I am glad it ended too, but the ending was odd.

I really liked it in the beginning, but it got very odd after the trip "back east".. Maybe they changed writers?

I'm eagerly awaiting "The Borgias"..

[Paladin]

18. Good Ending. Kind Of Glad The Series Is Over, Though...... (n/t)

[riderinthestorm]

20. I've never seen the show but have a question for those who watched.

I'm not sure I could ever get over the inherent patriarchy, authoritarianism and narcissism of "the husband" with many wives in an LDS arrangement. The guy is the boss. These "marriages" aren't about equality at all. No matter the sense of empowerment the wives may feel as women in a common situation - the fact remains they are still broodmares in the relationship.

The very premise was/is a turn-off for me.

How did you all overcome the realities of an LDS polygamous culture? I'm not sure I could suspend my distaste no matter how well written. Full disclosure that I hate movies like "Monster" (with Charlize Theron and Christina Ricci) or others that portray women with obvious hostility so this isn't about hating on a religion but hating the concept of women as secondary, exploited or less than equal.