Review: Big Little Lies Settles Nicely Into the Darkness
When a television series like Big Little Lies returns for a new season, the first episode back often feels like the first day of school. You catch up with your old friends, notice a few fresh faces, get an overview of what’s in store. It’s light and easy, convivial, more nostalgic than eventful. All of which is especially true for HBO's aforementioned Big Little Lies, which kicks off its second season Sunday with the first day of a new school year at Otter Bay Elementary School.
Of course, as great as the kids on this show are—Chloe (Darby Camp), the mature beyond her years daughter of Madeline Martha Mackenzie (Reese Witherspoon), especially—it’s the parents who are exciting to see again. The Monterey Five are back, and at least externally, little has changed. Madeline is still trading gossip, ruling the school with an iron stiletto, and getting into it with her teenage daughter and ex-husband. Renata (Laura Dern) spends the episode in a power pose, hovering over a new teacher and posing for an actual magazine spread. Celeste (Nicole Kidman) remains caught in a nightmare. And Jane (Shailene Woodley) is still slightly off to the side, dancing on her own. The only person acting funny is Bonnie (Zoe Kravitz), now withdrawn, her smooth, youthful face tired and aged. “I killed someone,” she has to remind Madeline. “That’s heavy.”
Though not all of these characters are feeling the weight of the first season’s central act—the frenzied killing of Perry Wright (Alexander Skarsgård) at an Elvis and Audrey-themed fundraiser—the episode title, “What Have They Done?”, suggests they will. Creator David E. Kelley doesn’t come right out and quote that famous Exodus (and Magnolia!) line, but he might as well: “We may be through with the past, but the past isn't through with us” might as well be a tagline for Season 2. The finale of the first season may have provided closure, giving us answers to the show’s many mysteries—who died, who killed them, who was bullying Annabella, who’s Ziggy’s dad. But in its return, Big Little Lies is purposefully upending the very notion of closure. You can only retreat to the beach for so long; eventually, the pleasant montage gives way to reality.
The first season’s boldest gambit was breaking the present with the future, flashing forward to the fateful fundraiser night and to the Greek chorus of parents and school faculty being interviewed by the police afterwards. Now that the future is the past, the show is faced with looking backwards. Director Andrea Arnold opens “What Have They Done?” with the Monterey Five on the beach, as they were at the end of Season 1, reflecting on what went down as light waves break against the shore. It turns out to be a nightmare Celeste is having—one of many. The dream sequences and other flashbacks are filmed in the same artful fragmentation as the first season’s flash-forwards, but they’re more rare, and they don’t hold the same suspense. Now that the murder is solved—at least for the audience; the authorities’ investigation doesn’t seem to be over—Big Little Lies is becoming less mystery and more soap opera, less experimental cinema and more standard prestige TV.
But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. With some of the suspense and filmic flair stripped away, these characters shine just as brightly. You don’t need the specter of murder to enjoy Reese Witherspoon sparring with, well, almost everyone (a couple of red velvet cupcakes will do). The absurd portrayal of Monterey wealth, privilege, and extravagance might get old someday, but it hasn’t yet. The only thing that’s subtle in Big Little Lies is the humor (sometimes), and Sunday’s episode is low key a gas. Adam Scott can barely contain himself when Nathan (James Tupper) repeatedly calls his Ed a “snide fuck.” The Otter Bay principal leads the parents in singing the school song at an assembly, wearing an otter hat and hopping around like a child. And then there’s the physical awkwardness of Renata getting caught between two lines of a practicing marching band after intimidating her daughter’s new teacher.
Oh, and lest you forget, there’s a new character in the mix this season. The show doesn’t waste any time introducing Meryl Streep as Mary Louise, Perry’s pursed-lipped, extremely outspoken mother. She’s there, at the edge of Celeste’s bed, to wake her from her nightmare at the beginning of the episode. And with her outward curiosity about what actually happened to her son, Kelley teases that she may represent a more real sort of nightmare for the Monterey Five. Whether or not she lands her daughter-in-law and her co-conspirators in any legal trouble, she’s sure to dredge up past trauma—and be a thorn in Madeline’s side (“I find little people to be untrustworthy,” she tells her when they meet).
I’m getting ahead of Sunday (I’ve seen the first three episodes), but Mary Louise’s refusal to let her dead son lie is where Big Little Lies thrives in its second season. She’s not a perpetrator of abuse, but in her defence of one, she prevents the trauma from receding. “Even in death, his message lives on,” Celeste’s therapist tells her at one point, of the way Perry has kept his hold on her subconscious. Perry’s message is that Celeste is to blame. She, of course, is not, but the abuse retains its power—over her, and also in propelling the show. Season 2 of Big Little Lies may be less thrilling and less formally daring, but this year’s drama looks to be equally rich, and maybe more nuanced too.
Originally Appeared on GQ
