Bad Sisters (Season 1), Episodes 1, 2 Recap & Ending Explained: Apple TV+’s ‘Bad Sisters’ is created by Sharon Horgan, who also stars in it alongside Anne-Marie Duff, Eva Birthistle, Sarah Greene, Eve Hewson, Claes Bang, Brian Gleeson, and Daryl McCormack. It is based on the Flemish series, ‘Clan’. Toxic masculinity’s hypocrisy and despicability are put up against female agency in what is an excellently acted and written show, that has a darkly comic tone to temper the pathetic nature of the qualities it is dealing with.
Bad Sisters (Season 1), Episodes 1, 2 Recap:
Episode 1 – ‘The Prick’
Struggling to compose herself, Grace prepares for the funeral of her husband, John Paul Williams, who is lying in his coffin with an erection. Dealing with this predicament becomes a complicated affair for her. Her other sisters, Eva, Ursula, and Bibi soon arrive. Becka, late and rushing to the venue, causes a man on a scooter to skid and fall on the road. She apologizes and reaches the church just on time. Among all the sisters, Bibi is the least interested in pretending to mourn.
The action shifts to a Christmas Eve dinner six months earlier at Eva’s house. We find out that the Garvey sisters are orphans and that they have a family tradition of going swimming on Christmas Day. JP is unrestrained in his callousness towards others, like calling Eva a spinster, asking her if her big announcement is that she’s pregnant even though he knows she’s infertile, or getting extremely annoyed at being approached by one of Ursula’s kids who has Down Syndrome. Becka tells everyone that she’s about to start a massage business of her own. We are also informed about Eva and JP working in the same office where she has applied for a promotion. He then proceeds to break up the evening by leaving for home early with Grace. She is in complete denial of his cruelty, meekly defending everything he does. The other sisters all despise him and call him a ‘prick’.
The following morning, JP tricks Grace into drinking a glass of champagne, pretending that it’s to celebrate Christmas. Later, as she’s leaving to meet her sisters, he brings up her being drunk and going swimming as being a threat to her and Blanaid, their daughter’s, safety. When the sisters are informed about Grace not going swimming, they’re infuriated at him being the cause behind the breaking of their tradition. After their swim, the sisters discuss how JP is essentially destroying Grace’s relationship with them. Bibi suggests murdering JP, quite seriously, before they all jokingly chip in on how they’d go about doing so.
In the present, Thomas Claffin, who runs Claffin & Sons Insurance, is dumbfounded at the prospect of having to pay £875,000 as insurance owing to JP’s death. His wife is pregnant and weeks away from delivering their baby. With his half-brother, Matt, who is the man that Becka almost had an accident with, he decides to visit the funeral in order to look for clues that would reveal some foul play in his death and thereby prevent him from having to pay the money to Grace. Matt is completely against such an intrusion on a day like that. At Grace’s house, Thomas finds out that the sisters were not fond of JP. On being asked about her whereabouts on the night of JP’s death, Grace states she was with her sisters.
An insensitive comment by Thomas about their father makes Matt leave the funeral. At a nearby bar, he runs into Becka who has left the funeral too because of an absence of alcohol there. The two start flirting and Becka gives him her phone number before leaving. On the way back home, Thomas reveals to Matt that their company is on the verge of bankruptcy and if they have to pay the insurance amount to Grace, they’ll have to close their doors.
Grace goes over to Eva’s place and informs her about lying to Thomas about being with her and her other sisters on the night of JP’s accident when she really was waiting for him at home. Eva is a little disconcerted at the news but assures Grace that she’ll back her up. Eva, Ursula, Bibi, and Becka meet up to discuss how they’ll handle the situation as they’re all in the spotlight now for the insurance investigation. Their conversation, especially Ursula’s fear about going to jail reveals that they were complicit in JP’s death. The sisters promise to look out for each other no matter what.
Episode 2 – ‘Explode a Man’
In a flashback to some time after Christmas, JP puts his name up for the same promotion that Eva had, essentially to spite her. Ursula is having an extramarital affair and JP comes across her with her boyfriend one day. At home, he is especially tyrannical. He doesn’t allow his daughter to wear a bra, or dance in certain ways since he views them as being vulgar, or go to concerts and gives her a pro-life broach to wear. Bibi brings up the plans to murder JP in front of Eva, who is completely against the idea. Bibi is serious though and a hint is provided at JP having done her serious harm in the past. At Blanaid’s confirmation ceremony, JP accuses Eva of sexualizing their daughter before mocking her infertility, again. He calls Grace ‘weak’ and hints at Ursula having an affair in front of her husband.
Following this, Eva shows up at Bibi’s place, now convinced about the latter’s plan to murder JP for the greater good. He is going on a hike after which he’ll spend the night at a cabin in the woods they own. Bibi plans on rigging the place to catch fire in a manner that’ll look like it’s an accident. They survey the place once and decide that no matter what, Grace and Blanaid shouldn’t even be near the cabin on that night. To ensure this, Eva gives two tickets to a Lizzo concert to Grace, something that JP is completely against letting Blanaid go to, encouraging her to have a night out with her daughter who Grace believes is becoming increasingly distant from her.
In the present-day timeline, Thomas is convinced that there’s foul play and interrogates Eva, following which he steals her garbage expecting to find evidence. He then decides to exhume JP’s body and hoodwinks Grace into signing the permission required to carry the procedure out. Matt, who is completely against stooping to such tricks, is annoyed with his brother’s antics. Because of his work, he doesn’t get back to Becka who keeps trying to set up a date with him. One night, they run into each other at a bar where Thomas is present too and she deflects him. They’re still unaware of each other’s connection through JP’s case. After a while, he calls her and a romance starts to blossom.
Bad Sisters (Season 1), Episode 2 Ending, Explained:
After trudging his way laughably through the hike, JP’s feet are inflamed and he’s in terrible pain. He calls Grace when she and Blanaid are at the concert and is infuriated at Eva after Grace, out of nervousness, throws her under the bus. He angrily goes to sleep while struggling with his feet.
Eva and Bibi are waiting nearby and the former has cold feet so the latter goes into the cabin by herself to rig the place. Eva soon joins her though and they do the deed. Soon after this, the cabin explodes and is set on fire. But to their chagrin, JP turns out to have been outside and unharmed because he was calling Eva, possibly to reprimand her about the tickets and there’s no network inside the cabin.
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