The Best Internet Reactions To That Explosive Big Little Lies Finale

The second season of Big Little Lies, one of the most highly-anticipated, star-stuffed shows of our time, ended last night. The entire run of episodes this year had been building to one thing: a confrontation between Celeste and Mary Louise, aka Nicole Kidman and Meryl Streep. The two faced off in a devastating custody battle for Celeste’s twin boys, one that culminated in Celeste providing video evidence of her (deservedly) dead husband Perry’s abuse.

Elsewhere in Monterey, Madeline (Reese Witherspoon) and Ed (Adam Scott) renewed their vows on the beach with flower crowns and their daughters (though we never learned if Abigail gave in and decided to apply to college); Renata (Laura Dern) destroyed her sleazy, nanny-loving husband’s room of sad grown-up toys; Jane (Shailene Woodley) finally felt healthy enough to begin a relationship (she and Corey kissed in the aquarium, which was very sweet); and Bonnie’s (Zoë Kravitz) mother died, she told her dumb husband that she had never really been in love with him, and she decided to turn herself in to the police.

The whole Big Little Lies project ended with a whimper rather than a bang; the whole finale was mostly the women reacting to crimes from men, with little resolution for themselves (except Madeline, whose subplot was… boring). And in an explosive article published earlier this month, IndieWire reported that BLL season two director Andrea Arnold’s work had been entirely recut by executive producer and season one director Jean-Marc Vallée. Since the revelation that a woman’s work had been taken out of her hands entirely, fans have been thus enthused about the show as a whole. And so the reaction last night was mixed, to say the least. Here, behold some of the best reactions, courtesy of—where else?—the Internet.