In the future-
Bill = Roman. We are already seeing this.
Ben = Alby. Ben doesn’t seem to be a leader of any kind, has personal flaws.
Nicki = Sarah? Nah. Teeny maybe? Give her something to do next season… poor girl gets a growth spurt and is basically written out of the show.
Hm. As for Alby, I’m curious to see what happens with him. I do think that with all the hints they’re dropping that at some point, Bill is going to end up taking over or doing something to show he’s not all that different from Roman.
Ben is getting a bit scary. I get that he’s got a bit of a crush on Margene, and I can see why he’d be pissed at that guy for being obnoxious about having slept with her…but the whole forbidding her from coming to the store had a paternalistic/patriarchal vibe that I don’t like so much.
You mean Sarah=Nicki, right? I doubt Sarah would turn out like that. If Barb left Bill, Sarah would go with her. If not, I still think Sarah is a decent kid with a good heart, not a narcissistic brat like Nicki. I think Sarah disapproves of The Principle and probably will leave the sect, if not LDS entirely, as soon as she’s old enough. We don’t know enough about Teeny to say, but I did like her based on her reaction to Rhonda: “What is WRONG with you?”
In order for any of Bill’s kids to turn out like Nicki, there’d have to be dozens of them, raised in the sheltered/oppressive environment of the compound. The people on the compound survive with so many kids via transfer payments from the government-- they are not self-supporting like the Hendricksons, they don’t have all those nice things. Would Bill ever cross over into that territory, making the women in his family wear Little House on the Prairie clothes, getting food stamps, etc.? Seems unlikely. Rather, he’d just delve more and more into questionable businesses to make enough money to keep his family in the style to which they are accustomed. Slipping into Juniper Creek-like living conditions also might not fly with Barb and Margene… though how much would they have to say about anything if it got to that point?
I liked how Lois found out that since she’s Frank’s legal wife she gets claim on all his property 
! I agree that Bill is getting less and less likable. So what will bring Alby down? The missing money or being caught with another guy 
? Or both. It’s starting hit Adaleen that she could lose her status as the first lady of the compound. The only way a woman can exercise power the is through a man. If she can’t be the First Wife of the Prophet she might as well be the Mother of the Prophet.
Can someone explain the whole “Bill paid for his dad to marry lois” thing? That confused me a bit.
Last season, Bill’s dad’s first (and legal) wife died. He originally promised Lois that he would legally marry her upon the first wife’s death, but then renegged on that deal. Bill, who still liked Lois at the time, paid his dad a few thousand dollars plus some Home Plus merchandise to honor his original agreement and marry Lois.
In the episode “Roberta’s Funeral,” Frank’s first wife, Roberta, dies. (In Juniper Creek, a man is only legally married to the first wife, who also has a number of other privileges.) After Roberta dies, Frank has to decide which of his other wives he will choose to become first wife.
Lois is hoping this will fall to her–being legally married to someone gives you protections under the law, after all. She asks Frank to make her first wife and he, typically, refuses. Finally, at the funeral, Bill cuts a deal with Frank–he’ll give him money and fix his roof in exchange for taking Lois on as his wife.
Lois only found out about that now, apparently.
ETA: What friedo said.
On preview I see it was answered not once but twice. Damn you guys are fast but since I haven’t posted in a Big Love thread in a long long time I’ll post anyway.
It’s amazing the upswing in quality in the second season. Every episode leaves me wanting more. I only hope the third season gets even better.
I’d be happy with this.
How is it that Sarah is so level-headed and Ben is so weird? Is it the age/maturity level, or just the fact that Ben is male and was raised with different expectations?
I’m coming away from Big Love with the belief that all polygamists are hypocrites, and that they’ve adopted The Principle for all the wrong reasons – greed, convenience, insecurity, lust.
Guess now I’d better go see just what “The Principle” says. 
Ben can’t just be nuts?
On a more serious note Sarah seems to have (mostly) come to grips with what her family is and views herself as an outsider looking in and gets some peace from that. Whereas Ben it a a square peg trying to pound himself into a round hole and wondering why it hurts so much. He has the pressure and the desire to emulate his dad but not the inclination or will (or hypocrisy depending on how you judge Bill’s actual morals). It’s tearing him apart he views himself as a failure believes his dad thinks he’s not living up to his expectations and isn’t equipped to understand any of what’s happening to him or what he’s doing. So with all this pressure he exhibits inappropriate and bizarre behavior in the best of times and whenever he sees anything that hurts the small comfort zone he built for himself to keep his delusions going he is forced to lash out so he doesn’t examine his own world too closely.
The character of Joey seems to have changed. He’s much more in control and less wimpy in the past couple of episodes than he was during the first season. Was that explained within the context of the show?
He did fall off the wagon a few episodes ago but he seems to be fine now.
I’m assuming it’s partly having to step up while Wanda was institutionalized. And partly having the new girl/possibly wife (Cathy? is that her name?) around.
Ben’s getting really wildly mixed messages from authority folks.
Sex is sinful- but his father is righteous and is a one man stud-horse. Plural marriage is righteous and beautiful, but you can’t tell anyone about it because everybody but us is wrong and sinful, although most of the people we can be open about it to- Juniper Creek- are the worst people of all. Nothing is more important than family but your grandfather is not welcome in this house and you can’t tell anybody your little brothers are your little brothers and we don’t like you hanging around your mom’s family either. Plural marriage is a revelation from God and nobody knows what goes on between you and God, but Rhonda’s marriage to Roman is not a true revelation even though far more people accept Roman as a prophet than accept Bill (which is just his family).
The kid would have to be the most stable teenager who ever lived to not be hopelessly screwed up.
And then there’s the fact that the adults are very positive about their situation - “Oh, I love my sisterwives!” “We’re all very happy together!” “The Principle is a right and holy choice!” but there’s no way he can not be aware of the tension and issues going on between the four of them.
Barb is clearly unhappy and getting unhappier. I think she was talked into taking Nicki because of the cancer situation…and then kind of forced into accepting Margene because if she accepted the Celestial Revelation for Nicki, why not Margene?
I see her definitely as getting more and more disenchanted with this situation, especially with her reaction to Margene’s “What about when we get a fourth wife?” and Ben’s blithe “I’ll just take a second wife.” YMMV, but I took her reaction as “What have we DONE?”
Was anyone else mildly shocked at the Bishop suggesting Barb could come back to his ward if Bill weren’t able to spiritually lead the family? Simply because the suggestion of disrupting families (especially by talking to the wife) seems so counter to LDS. Personally, I took this in one of two ways:
a) Either the show’s writers didn’t realize it might seem a little “off” for him to be suggesting that to Barb or;
b) He sees that things are so SERIOUSLY wrong for her that he’s taking a little bit of an unusual course.
or c) I’m full of crap. Always a possibility.
I really wanted to see Rhonda married to Roman, just because I hate Rhonda and it would serve her right. I wonder if the thought of going from potential youngest/prettiest queen of the Prophet to a nobody after her human interest stories stop (either because the shooting’s more interesting or because a betrothed child bride of a dead old polygamist isn’t interesting) will make her return to him or, if he dies, marry the new prophet Alby.
shudder Rhonda and Alby…now that’s a disturbing thought, but all too plausible.
Alby doesn’t seem to like Rhonda all that much, though…based on their season 1 interactions…
I wonder if he maybe saw her as an emblem of Roman’s power (he who has the youngest female) and was jealous - or maybe he just knew she was going to cause trouble for Juniper Creek. After all, Nicki seems to have been high in Roman’s affection and Alby doesn’t care for HER very much, either.
I could definitely see the two of them saying “I hate you and you hate me, but together we can do a LOT of damage.”
Good point.
What was with the telephone call between Nicki and Alby? Was he spelling it out to her that there would be a meeting (and thus the office would be empty)?
I don’t really know but am inclined to doubt it. He said something about “I’m sure I can count on your support” (I’ve only seen it once so far) and once I saw the rest, I thought he meant he assumed she would come and be a witness for him. (Did I imagine the look of relief on Adalene’s face when someone ELSE witnessed for Alby?)
After all, there is some question about whether Nicki’s loyalties lie with Juniper Creek or Bill, based on her previous actions. He might have thought she’d come and support him, her brother, to continue to be close to the one in power (seeing as how she remained close to Roman despite the Bill situation).