Mormons are crazy. No, that’s not strictly true; I think most religion is pretty crazy in one way or another. If you read Under The Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer you can see some of the craziness that led to the formation of this religion. But essentially, it’s not that much crazier that most religions. One of the big issues that a lot of non-Mormons have with this religion is the whole polygamous marriage concept. Most branches of Mormonism do not approve of multiple marriages, but if we cannot laugh at the crazy man with many wives, what’s the point?
Big Love looks at several aspects of Mormon life in Utah. One is the main family; Bill Henrickson(Bill Paxton) has three wives, Barb (Jeanne Tripplehorn), Nicolette (Chloe Sevigny) and Margene(Ginnifer Goodwin) and has children with them all. They live a quite mainstream existence – they have three separate houses with a communal backyard area. Most people don’t know about their complicated relationship, not even the neighbours. But Bill also has to deal with his family back on the compound. These are the types of Mormons regularly featured on Jerry Springer and the like. You know, wearing prairie dresses and often one man has, like, twenty wives (often sisters, often very young) and a million children and they live off welfare. On the compound there is ‘the prophet’, Roman Grant (Harry Dean Stanton) who is out to destroy Bill.
It’s a very interesting show, but I lost steam for it somewhere around the third season. There have been five seasons made, but for me I don’t really care what happens from here.
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