Little Fires Everywhere Review: Picture Perfect (Season 1 Episode 7)
Finally! All of the characters have said what the audience has been thinking. Little Fires Everywhere Season 1 Episode 7, “Picture Perfect,” is cathartic in more ways than one.
First, there’s some irony here. I am writing this to critique a series in which the thing that annoys me the most is one of the main character’s needs to judge the lives of those around her.
Elena Richardson is the epitome of everything I dislike in a character, and nowhere are her one-dimensional views of a larger reality more on display than on “Picture Perfect.”
There is so much wrong with the actions Elena and her family have taken over the last seven episodes, but this is the one that finally decides to rip the skeletons out of the closet and shine a fluorescent light on them only to have the skeletons smack the light and for the process to repeat over and over again.
In short, this episode is emotional and it’s so exhausting.
There is so much fury in the heating home arguments that are balanced out so well against the tense and, comparatively civil, court proceedings. The ebb and flow to the dialogue, especially in the Richardsen house is particularly notable.
Still, the thing that continues to tick me off is Elena’s entitlement.
After Little Fires Everywhere Season 1 Episode 6, “The Uncanny,” I said that we had some much-needed clarity around the circumstances that led these women to where they are now. None of that excuses the complete lack of empathy Elena has for others, including her own kids.
Elena is out to serve Elena. To make Elena look good. Nothing more.
She’s constantly putting her own need for appearances and a “picture perfect” life ahead of her family, and genuinely believes that this artifice makes her a good mother.
If “The Uncanny”‘s trip to 1981 taught us anything, it’ that Elena is driven by guilt. Her biggest concern during this entire ordeal is the damage that being nice to Mia has done to her relationship with Linda. While there is a history between the McCulloughs and the Richardsons her relationship with Linda is the least of her problems.
Elena’s outburst when Izzy refuses to wear the tartan Keds for the Christmas photo reshoot is the most trivial fight this series could have dredged up. There’s a lot under that moment, and maybe the tartan Keds were the final straw, but this is the stupidest reason to lose your head.
Elena also crossed the line when she told Pearl the truth about her mother. That is a moment of pure malice and something that she didn’t have the right to do. It’s one of the moments that makes you want to scream, “Who is this woman and who made her judge, jury, and executioner.”
“Picture Perfect” is the episode that makes you lose any sympathy you may have for Elena. Her need to manipulate and blow up the lives of everyone around her is toxic. Reese Witherspoon plays that very well, but it’s also exhausting to watch as a viewer and what makes this a strong episode.
There’s one more episode left in Little Fires Everywhere‘s run, and it’s time for Elena to get her just desserts.
We already know from Little Fires Everywhere Season 1 Episode 1, “The Spark,” that someone is going to burn down her house, and that feels like the perfect retribution for someone as obsessed with status as Elena. As I viewer though, we have no idea who may have done it.
There are many people who would have a motive.
A good lead-in to that final question is Bill’s discovery of Elena and Jamie’s dinner while she was in New York. It’s a good reminder that Elena isn’t as perfect and good as she claims or as righteous as she thinks. Seeing Bill confront her about that, might be just the catharsis we need.
Kerry Washington’s Mia, in contrast, is already watching her lies topple around her. Moody has already let it slip that Mia is bankrolling Bebe’s defense, and Elena’s taken care of the revelation about Pearl’s origins.
Watching Washington on the stand evading Bill’s questions about how she and Bebe are in similar situations is like a master class. In a series with so much pent-up emotion, we didn’t need another explosive scene in the courtroom.
Hitting Mia where it hurts with Pearl is so much more personal and heartbreaking.
While this episode does have Mia and Elena distantly orbiting each other, Elena’s two daughters also had significant roles on this episode.
Seeing Lexie be awarded for stealing Pearl’s essay feels disgusting, and she doesn’t seem to feel guilty about it at all. Hearing her mother lavish praise on her for defying the rules is just as repulsive as reading about the college bribery scandal. It actually makes me wonder if this plotline would have hit differently had that news not broke last fall.
It’s no surprise that Brian is fed up with it too. Watching their relationship implode over that story feels like the right ending for their subplot. I half-want Lexie to come clean about the abortion to him as well, but at that moment she would be playing on his sympathy, and Brian deserves better.
Izzy also has some important lessons to learn on this episode, but unlike her mother and sister seems to actually take in what she’s being told. When Mia starkly says that she’s a white girl dressing her dolls up in blackface, she gets defensive at first but does ultimately listen to her.
She can’t undo the damage she did with her art project, but she can listen and do better.
Izzy’s the Richardson that seems to have the best calibrated moral compass, and it’s clear she doesn’t intend for anything she does to be harmful, but as she takes risks she’s gonna misstep and she needs to listen.
Mia’s words were very wise and carefully chosen in that scene, and the right Richardson heard them.
Stray Thoughts:
- Sometimes I have to remind myself that this series is all taking place in 1997, but then I see things like AIM and I am brought back to that time period. (RIP AIM!)
- April is basically a mini-Elena-in-training. I get that she’s not one of Elena’s kids, but seriously if she’s so obsessed with opinions she’s just gonna end up like Elena. I don’t want to label April, but if she can’t be honest with who she is that’s going to be a pathway to misery.
- I want to write something about the freshmen class that threw the door open on Izzy and April, but everything I type is just a string of expletives.
- Trip and Moody are gonna have it out, aren’t they? I get the feeling there’s going to be an explosive fight over Pearl.
- Elena, does a good mother cut her daughter out of the holiday photo then leave evidence lying around? Think about that for a second the next time you attempt to crucify someone for their actions.
- Are the Richardsons Scottish? Cos I feel like they shouldn’t be wearing Tartan if they aren’t. That’s the least of their racist and appropriation issues, but it feels like it needs to be stated.
What did you think of this episode of Little Fires Everywhere? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Little Fires Everywhere streams Wednesdays on Hulu.
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Lauren Busser
Lauren Busser is an Associate Editor at Tell-Tale TV. She is a writer of fiction and nonfiction whose work has appeared in Bitch Media, Popshot Quarterly, Brain Mill Press Voices, and The Hartford Courant.
2 comments
It’s Trip that tells Pearl about Mia paying the legal fees, not Moody
I understand the part of it where Lexi should tell the truth about using Pearls’ name at the clinic. However, I think the way you expressed this was completely inappropriate. Her father does not deserve to know his daughter had an abortion, he isn’t entitled to that because he’s a better person than his wife. Lexi isn’t obligated to tell anyone she had an abortion, let alone her parents. Yes, it was the right thing to do when she came clean about using Pearl’s name, but she’s still a high school girl who just had an abortion and it’s scary that you would insinuate she owes it to her father to know she had one. It is her body, not his. The fact that she admitted it and took responsibility to her mother who was destructive and manipulating with the information and had constantly been making “if you can’t have a baby don’t get pregnant” comments is what’s powerful.
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