Little Fires Everywhere Review (Spoilers)

*Karen = Reece Witherspoon’s character

 

Mia’s attitude sucks.  She is rude the entire time.  The hostility boils barely beneath the surface–I wouldn’t have anything to do with her based on that demeanor alone.  The character is totally unlikable, snarling and growling her way through pretty much the entire series.

I think one of Karen’s biggest mistakes is not listening to her own gut feelings.  She shouldn’t have rented to Mia.  If I (as a white person) was looking for housing and it was a year lease, but I wanted month to month–they would tell me no.  Karen should not have felt white guilt and stuck to policy.  Also, hiring your tenant as house-help is a terrible idea–for both women.  It puts Karen in an awkward position if the renting doesn’t go well, or if the house-manager job doesn’t go well.  And it is a horrible idea for Mia to allow one person to be in charge of her housing and income.

I knew Mia would have a back-story.  I thought maybe she was raped, maybe Pearl’s dad was stalking them so they were running, or she had some sort of criminal charge she was on the lamb about.  But by the time the series finally revealed Mia’s background, it was already too late, I couldn’t overcome my dislike for the character.  The order of the episodes matters!  Maybe if her past was revealed sooner, I could have had empathy.  But as it was, the background wasn’t compelling enough to justify all her poor decisions and surly attitude.

When Mia says, “You know how to advocate for yourself.”  As if it’s not her responsibility as a parent to step in and make sure Pearl gets in the appropriate math class.

Mia wants

Mia’s professor is way out of line!  Taking coke in front of a student–offering it to the student.  Sleeping with a student.  That lack of boundaries and the power dynamic is predatory, and I didn’t care for it.

The author/screen writer didn’t make Mia’s dreams clear enough.  I thought she was having PTSD and that Pearl was a child of rape until I found out Mia was just afraid of being discovered.

Karen comes off as hyper-controlling, but it’s actually Mia who is the controlling one.  Mia controls when her and Pearl move and where they go.  She continuously says Pearl belongs to her, which never sat well with me.  She controls the length of the lease.  She takes a nonsense job she doesn’t want to control Pearl at Karen’s house.  Mia takes control of her coworker’s life, and baby search even though it’s none of her business, and they only knew each other for 3 months.  Mia controls what kind of life, and what luxuries Pearl gets–to the point she doesn’t sell art for Pearl’s life, but will sell it to pay her coworker’s lawyer fees.  Mia controls when Izzy can come by to do art.  Mia talks suggestively about fire and new beginnings to impressionable and angry Izzy–then sends her right home.  Mia is the one pulling the strings the entire series-yet she gets the better treatment of the 2 main characters.  I think Mia is a sociopath.

I didn’t understand why Pearl choose Trip over Moody.  She had a lot of fun and quality time with Moody.  He was intellectually on her level.  He treated her nice.  She tells her mom Trip is easy and dumb, so I don’t get why she threw away her relationship with Moody for his brother.  Though I did like Izzy’s point to Moody that just because he likes Pearl, and just because he’s nice to her, doesn’t mean Pearl owes him anything, and it doesn’t mean he owns her.  I liked the message, but I think the author went against Pearl’s character to set up the situation to have Izzy say that quote and to bring Moody down a  couple of notches.  It’s not really consistent writing.

Mia made the decision to steal the baby she was carrying as a surrogate.  And she didn’t even have the courage to tell the parents that she was backing out of their deal (or to give back a portion of the money).  It’s ethically, and contractually wrong, but the author never punishes her, Mia is treated like a hero.

The author actually punishes most of the mothers, which I did not like.  Karen was punished for giving up her fiance’ because he decided he wanted a travel career instead of kids.  She was punished for putting her family first and having a part-time job at a small publication, and for living her life for her kids.  The adoptive couple were treated as pretentious, insensitive and less-than, even though they wanted kids so badly, and loved the baby for the 1st year.  The surrogate family was treated as an inconvenience to Mia and Pearl’s story.  Bebe had a more sympathetic story line, but also was questioned for being poor, illegal, and single.  The author has peculiar and stringent ideals about motherhood, instead of accepting all types of mothers and situations as legitimate.

I didn’t think any character was likable, and I don’t think any one of them took accountability.  But not all of them were punished for that.

Mia and Lexie were my 2 least favorite characters.

Karen got a bad deal.  Yeah, I said it, and I stand by it.