[Header Image: Christina Hendricks as Beth Boland, Julian Gant as JT, Mae Whitman as Annie Marks, and Retta as Ruby Hill | NBC]
Back in February, right before season 2 of Good Girls started, I wrote a blog post talking about some things I was hoping to see during the season and today I’m going to revisit that post to see if any of those things happened. Before we jump into it, if you want to read the original post, you can find it here. The original list wasn’t in any particular order but this post will follow that same order.Rio
The first thing I wanted was more of the complex relationship between Beth, Annie, and Ruby and we definitely got that in season 2, in fact their relationship became even more complex. We saw a lot more arguments and the girls butting heads (sometimes as a trio or sometimes as duos) but the best thing is that they always came back from it. While we do experience some pretty hard lows for them, they always seem to come back stronger. The girls may fight and fall out on more than one occasion but the season continued to prove that they’ll always be there for one another. It was also added bonus that we got those flashbacks in episode 8, while it mostly focused on Beth and Ruby we still got to see that trio have been a packaged deal for a long time and it’s more confirmation that they really do love each other. In the end, we definitely got more ups and downs with them which is exactly what I was hoping for.
The second thing I wanted was to see more variety in the jobs that Beth, Annie, and Ruby do and we did get that to some extent. Right at the start of the season the girls are tasked with killing Boomer and by episode 6, they’re working with drugs. We even saw Annie and Ruby do another job in Canada even though it did go wrong. While there really wasn’t a huge variety, they’ve definitely moved passed simply washing Rio’s fake money and what we did see worked in terms of pacing and the skill levels of Beth, Annie, and Ruby.
Another thing I wanted was more of Beth and Rio’s Relationship and we most definitely got that. I was curious to see where their dynamic would go and how things might change for them. We got to see that he is naturally always ahead of her in some way which makes sense considering he has way more experience than her but we also get to see moments where they seem to be on par with each other. Those moments didn’t happen often but they were still interesting to watch. Their relationship also crossed a line and became about pleasure as well as business. Things certainly don’t end well for them but throughout the season there was definitely a good amount of focus and a shift in their dynamic.
As well as that, I wanted more about Rio. While we did get to know that his first name is actually Christopher (or maybe that’s an alias?), he has a son, and we even saw his apartment, he’s still a bit of a mystery. It did feel like we had more focus on him and he certainly came across as more than just a crime boss or the leader of a gang, he definitely felt more human. This is one of those ones from the list that was partially covered but I’ll definitely still be hoping for more in season 3 and I think at that point, if there isn’t much more depth to him, then it’ll really start to become a problem.
Along with that, I also wanted to know more about Rio’s Operation. We didn’t really get this in terms of back story which is a shame because it would have been interesting to know how things got started up and what really goes on at the core of everything. However, we continued to see how Rio handles his business to some extent and the girls got even closer by continuing to be involved with the money laundering but then getting in even deeper with the drugs. While we do get some more depth than season 2, I’m only going count this as being partially covered during season 2.
Next on my list was Dean’s fate. We found out early on in episode one that Dean was the one to get shot and it was Rio who pulled the trigger. He doesn’t die and surprisingly enough, he doesn’t go to the cops either. There’s a lot of hurdles connected to Dean. He doesn’t make things easy for Beth at all and it takes an incredibly long time for him to finally admit their marriage is over and bring up divorce. His cheating was called out again this season after we discovered he slept with more than just Amber and he once again put the dealership in bad shape. The only thing from season one that wasn’t called out was the cancer. Maybe Beth confronted him and we didn’t see it or maybe it was never covered because there was so much going on. It would be great if it was brought up in season 3 because for now, Dean is still very much around.
Next up was Stan’s career and that certainly took some blows this season. Initially he’s upset after finding out that Ruby was involved in the Fine & Frugal robberies but he risks his career to get back the pen cap (the only evidence against Beth and therefore Ruby and Annie). Between Ruby standing up for herself (defending what she did because it saved Sara) and Turner targeting him and showing how shady he can be, Stan’s opinions change drastically. Ruby ends up being honest with him about everything and he seems to be more understanding about it all, even when he loses his job and is arrested. While we don’t know for sure if he’s going to be reinstated, Turner finally did clock on to the fact that Stan is a cop and his career came tumbling down pretty quickly.
Now, I did have Eddie on my list but that one was pretty wishful thinking. I do think it’s possible for him to come back but considering it hasn’t happened in season 2, I’m going to say that it never will. It’s a shame but I do think if the writers realised how liked he was going to be, they would have least used him more while he was on the show.
My penultimate point was the FBI investigation. It definitely didn’t slow down this season and in fact, Turner became more obsessed with getting Beth. There were a lot of close calls this season and we were even introduced to another agent, Noah, who went undercover to get closer to Annie. Really we didn’t get too deep into the centre of the investigation but there was certainly more focus on it this season and there was an obvious shift considering Turner’s focus seemed to be more on Beth. While the investigation wasn’t exactly a success, Turner seemed to gain an advantage at the end of the season. So even if the FBI investigation is shut down, it doesn’t look like Turner will be stopping any time soon.
And my last point was Sadie. We saw that he was trying to figure himself out in season one and so I was hoping for some more continuation of that as well as just more about Sadie in general. In season two, we actually had a coming out scene where Sadie tells Annie he’s a boy. It was such a simple but beautiful moment that was handled perfectly. Although there wasn’t too much insight into that in season two, we did see that Sadie chose to use he/him pronouns and has seemingly come out to various people considering even Noah uses those pronouns (in front of Greg) and Annie refers to Sadie as her son to other people. We also know, thanks to episode 10, that Sadie is trying to get on puberty blockers. And beyond his identity, we also saw a rift between him and Annie this season and how, despite what’s going on with his parents, he remained close to Nancy. There wasn’t too much focus on Sadie this season but what we got really expanded on everything we knew and continued his story.
Surprisingly enough, most of what I wanted actually happened. Eddie was really the only one that didn’t happen at all. Rio and his operation were only partially focused on but the other seven points were touched up on in pretty decent detail. Not all in the way I thought but still satisfyingly enough. In the end I think season 2 of Good Girls delivered for me. I wasn’t actually expecting to get half of what I put on my list but I did and then some. If definitely has me even more hyped for what might be to come in season 3.
wonderoes 