Yes, and she also worked outside the home, at the gas station. She is probably where Bill got his big, modern ideas, which resulted in him moving away from the compound.
One thing I was wondering: Did Bill’s father have more than one wife? If that was made clear, I must have missed it. When looking at the show’s site, I noticed that Bill’s parents have different last names, and that he has his mother’s last name, not his father’s. With the second and third wives, it makes sense that they don’t have their husband’s last name, since they can’t be legally married.
Yeah, she is. I wanted to slap her every time she spoke. She seems to have a serious competition thing going with wife #1 that fuels her spending problem.
The whole compound situation was really…squicky. How do you explain to a 14y.o. girl who thinks she’s queen because some nasty old perv married her that cancer is not God’s punishment for moving away from your family and having babies til your uterus falls out isn’t necessarily the plan?
Actually, I don’t remember that for some reason. Though now that you’ve told me twice, I shall remember it for sure! Thanks for clearing it up for me. So I wonder if his mom is the first wife. I assume so if she was keeping the other wives away. I wonder how many of them are younger than Bill?
I don’t think the Nicki character will turn out to be totally bad. She was nice to Marg at the end, anyway. I just think the girl has a lot of issues, and who can blame her? I get the feeling she goes to the extreme because that’s how to get attention. Competing with 30 other kids for your dad’s attention would certainly have that affect on you. She probably gets her sense of entitlement from being the prophet’s daughter, as well. It will be interesting to see how her character develops.
Aaaaahhhhh, that’s right. That little tidbit sort of slid right past without really registering. That would explain her expectation for defferential treatment. And also why the prophet thinks he has the right to 15% of all Bill’s stores, instead of just the first one. I was trying to reason out whether he’d loaned him the startup money or what.
I noticed that too. I thought that it represented the underlying misogyny in the family relationship. Notice how the son’s accomplishments were acknowledged by the father, while the daughter couldn’t even get his attention.
Overall, I love the show. The acting is so natural. They don’t go out of their way to magnify the differences between polygamy and monogamy. If anything, the show strives to show how this family is not all that different from what we consider “normal”.
I missed that. I just assumed Bill married these three women while they were all living at the compound where polygamy is normal. What other backstory was there?
Bill and the first wife (sorry can’t remember her name) were married and had the kids. She developed ovarian cancer (I assume) and had to have a hysterectamy (sp?). It being part of God’s plan to have as many babies as you can, they decided the best way was for Bill to marry Nicky as well. It seemed that if the cancer hadn’t of robbed her from being able to have more babies , Bill might not have become a polygamist. (Scenes from later in the season show Bill talking to his son about how Polygamy isn’t for every man.)
Margie (3rd wife) is not, as far as we know, from the compound. They mentioned that they got her from Colorado. Why the third wife remains to be seen.
Harry Dean Stanton, who will turn 80 this year, is a total badass, and if everything else about the show starts to suck he will be worth watching.
(Is it me, or did this show cast every single one of those actors that you know you’ve seen in a dozen other movies, but you can’t really name one? “Hey, it’s that one guy” sort of actors? Stanton and Bill Paxton are the kings of that group, but Jeanne Tripplehorn and Chloe “fuck the umlaut” Sevigny are up there, too. I guess Miguel Ferrer and that one psychiatrist from Law and Order were busy.)
Perhaps Nicky refused to have any kids anymore? While it may not be part of the religion (I assume you have to have as many kids as you can), being the Prophet’s daughter has some perks, I assume.
Grace Zabriskie, Bruce Dern’s wife – she was Sarah Palmer on Twin Peaks. 123+ credits listed, beginning in 1978. That’s pretty steady work, isn’t it, for a character actor?
Stanton will be 80? Dang. He hasn’t changed much in the 20 or 30 years since Paris, Texas and Repo Man. Those are the first roles I remember seeing him in. He looked exactly the same.
My impression is that Bill had a falling out and left the Compound, then later met and married Barb, who was never involved in a polygynous culture. But she knew his background, and they had agreed to have lots of children, so when she lost her fertility, the issue came up.
I’m certainly interested enough to keep watching. I liked the “water, water everywhere” theme with his impotence. And is it just me, or does the interaction between Bill and Barb seem like the “real” marriage, and his relationships with the other two more strained and distant?
I think it would be funny if they had, say, Charles Dance and Ron Perlman as guest stars.
Wow, I can’t believe he is that old. I actually remember him from Kelly’s Heroes in a small role and Pretty in Pink along with his classic role in Repo Man. I think he was in Alien also.
I don’t think so; it seems that the Compound is a sore spot with Barb. I was getting a lot of history there from the way she and Bill were talking about it. She went on about how she hated it and why.
Thanks for clearing it up for me. So I wonder if his mom is the first wife. I assume so if she was keeping the other wives away. I wonder how many of them are younger than Bill?