Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for The Four Seasons
Netflix’s new miniseries,The Four Seasons,remakes the 1981 film of the same name as it explores the life and marriages of a group of six friends who like to vacation together. However, their world is turned upside down when Nick (Steve Carell) leaves his wife Anne (Kerri Kenney-Silver), kicking off the series' events. Covering roughly a year,The Four Seasonsshows Nick moving onand making a new life for himself with his much younger girlfriend, Ginny (Erika Henningsen), while his friends are baffled by his choices. But, as the series demonstrates, life goes on despite the bumps in the road.
Every character inThe Four Seasonshas hardships.Kate (Tina Fey) and Jack (Will Forte)hit a rough patch and require counseling, and Danny (Colman Domingo) and Claude (Marco Calvani) have their own fights over Danny’s health issues. Nick may be happy with Ginny, but with his daughter, Lila (Julia Lester), unable to accept his new relationship and his inability to connect with Ginny’s friends, his life is imperfect. However, Anne gets the worst of it.
Very little good happens for Anne inThe Four Seasonsas her marriage falls apart. She is forced to deal with her ex’s new girlfriend, whom her lifelong friends are now spending time with, and she plans a funeral for her ex-husband just as she is moving on. Yes, Anne is petty in her split from Nick, directing unjust anger at Ginny. Anne may be the source of some of her own problems, but that doesn’t change the fact that she deserved better inThe Four Seasons.
Anne’s Love Life Is in Shambles in ‘The Four Seasons’
ThroughoutThe Four Seasons, Anne experiences a major life change that she doesn’t want. After 25 years of marriage, Anne is suddenly single again. While she isn’t blindsided byher marriage falling apart, Anne is still trying to get Nick to stay. The first two episodes center around her throwing a big vow renewal to surprise Nick and revive their marriage, proving she hasn’t lost hope when Nick breaks it off. It’sunfair to her that Nick doesn’t have a conversation about what isn’t workingfor him anymore.
Clear communication would have given her a chance to try and be more adventurous for him, or at least to come to terms with what was going on. In the end,Nick wasn’t happy, and it’s reasonable for him to leave, but he could have done so more maturely.And considering the years they spent together, he owed Anne that much.
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Throughout the rest of the series, Nick is dating the much younger Ginny, and Anne does not always handle the situation with grace. It’s especially hard because, unlike Nick, she doesn’t instantly find someone she loves. Anne deserves a fulfilling life, only to get kicked while she’s down. She eventually finds Terry (Toby Huss), bringing him on aNew Year’strip, but she seems annoyed by him and readily admits that he will likely not be around much longer. Anne wants to find her own relationship because that stable life is what she desired from the beginning, and the fact that Nick found his second chance while she is still struggling hurts.
Despite her understandable anger, Anne reasons with Lila on Nick’s behalf in Episode 6, “Ultimate Frisbee.” She is also the one who reminds Lila that Ginny is not a symbol of Nick’s choice, but a person. Yet Anne’s biggest moment of growth isin the finalewhen she has a heart-to-heart with Ginny and reconciles with her.Anne is in a difficult situation, and it takes her time, but she learns to embrace the reality of what happenedand shows kindness to Ginny, which she didn’t have to do.
In ‘The Four Seasons,’ Anne Doesn’t Get the Support She Needs
Nick isn’t the only one who wrongs Anne, considering that, shortly after her marriage ends, the friend group goes on vacation with Ginny without telling Anne. They have been herfriends throughout the years, too, and no one thought to be upfront with her. Instead, the group cuts her out of their yearly vacation without addressing the topic or offering to have a different trip with her. This is cruel, as Anne is the one who was left and is clearly not healed.Anne needed support from her friends, and no one delivered.
Anne even shows up at the same place, planning to confront them about this treatment, but thinks better of it. She lets her frustration go, and when a storm comes and everyone needs a place to take shelter, she lets Kate, Jack, Danny, and Claude stay with her until it blows over.Anne shows understanding toward her friends despite the way they ignore her feelings,proving that she is a complex character and deserves more consideration, even when she is not at her best.
Anne Is the Source of Some of Her Own Misery in ‘The Four Seasons’
Despite being a victim of her circumstances, Anne isn’t an innocent party. She is petty in her split from Nick, stealing his room during afamily weekend at Lila’s collegeandmisdirecting her anger towards Ginny.For a while, Anne would not even use Ginny’s name because of her resentment when Ginny didn’t do anything wrong. Nick started dating Ginny after he and Anne split, and Ginny does her best to minimize the awkwardness between them. She offers not to attend the family weekend and doesn’t make a scene despite the way Anne and Lila treat her. Anne ends up in such a dark place that she kisses Jack, who is not only one of her close friends, but he is married to Kate, which could have been a much worse situation if Kate had not forgiven her so readily.
Most significantly, as she admits in the end, Anne didn’t really know Nick. Their marriage was deeply flawed because, as soon as Nick left, he found happiness in being a totally different person, and Anne struggled to understand that. She tries and fails to stop things from changing. AfterNick’s death, Anne tries to erase the last year, controlling the funeral and cutting Ginny out. However, she realizes her mistake, acknowledging that their relationshipwascomplicated.Anne is imperfect, and her resentment and pettiness made things worse, but she deserves more than the constant heartache and pain she has received.
