About fifteen minutes into the first episode, I was sufficiently hooked. I liked the acting, the storylines and the occasional soap opera feel. I thought, great this will be a real guilty pleasure for my summertime viewing.
The last episode of season one, “Goodbye Stranger,” was a shocker. I just didn’t see it coming. Looking back now, I realize that Marilyn said a lot of people just didn’t understand her husband and she couldn’t leave the only life she’d ever known and those statements meant a lot more than they seemed to at the time. However, she was such an unlikeable person that it was easy to dismiss anything she said.
As I sat watching the season premiere this past Sunday, I wondered who was going to make it out alive. I thought it was interesting how the episode began with Pamela on the radio talking about the incident four days earlier and that someone close to them had died.My initial thought was Betty, the owner of The Hump Bar. She is kind of a central force in all the women’s lives’s, but not a main character. Someone they would mourn for but not change the basic dynamics of their lives.
I was absolutely shocked when it was revealed that Amanda Holden died. I bought into the whole sequence they had going on of Claudia Joy taking her daughter to UVA. They had scratches and bruises on their faces from the accident and everything.
It will be interesting to see how the loss of their daughter affects the relationship between Claudia Joy and Michael. The loss of a child is a seismic event, add to that the pressures of a new military promotion, and I see trouble on the horizon.
Roxy is one of my favorite characters on Army Wives, but I have to admit she was driving me to the edge of distraction this week. She had every right to be concerned about Trevor, but the fact that she couldn’t get her head out of her own stuff long enough to realize the tragedy that was going on around her was a little annoying.
The season premiere of Army Wives was much more emotional and life changing for the women than I expected. It seems like Lifetime isn’t necessarily going to play it safe with this show, and for that, they deserve kudos.
