Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story premiere recap
Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story moves away from John Meehan and Debra Newell and into the story of Betty and Dan Broderick. The murder of Dan Broderick was a very highly publicized case in 1989. Several books were written about the Brodericks, along with many made-for-television movies.
In the latest dramatization of their story, Amanda Peet plays Betty and Christian Slater co-stars as Dan.
Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story premiere: A divorce to kick things off
The premiere of Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story doesn’t take long to get into the action of the story. Throughout the first episode, we see how Betty is dealing — er, not dealing — with her impending divorce from Dan.
Within the first ten minutes of the episode, Betty crashes her car into Dan’s new house, and he responds by committing her to a 72-hour psychiatric hold, complete with a straitjacket to enhance the dramatics.
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Betty is driven to such antics after learning that Dan has sold their beloved Coral Reef house. She contemplates burning the entire place down, but can’t bring herself to do it. She settles for ramming her car into his front porch instead.
Once Betty gets out of the hospital, Dan extends an olive branch to her in the shape of a trip to Keystone with the kids.
She and their two sons and two daughters have a great time together in their suite, which Dan pays for in its entirety.
The only problem is, Dan’s act of kindness gives Betty hope that he might not really want to get divorced. She starts to theorize that everything he’s doing proves that he still loves her, including the fact he refuses to pay the retainer on her attorney.
Betty’s friends try to encourage her to get back out there, play the field, get a job, meet new people, do things to make Dan realize what he’s missing when he sees her moving on.
To Betty’s credit, she does make an effort. She and her friend Janet visit the local bar for drinks and dancing. For a moment, it looks like Betty might even be forgetting about Dan, but then she starts seeing a vision of him on the dance floor, and her brief Dan respite goes out the window.
She can’t even keep herself from calling him when she gets home just to remind him of a funny inside joke they shared in their happier days. All of this motivates Betty to postpone finding a new lawyer.
Well, Dan isn’t hesitating as she had anticipated. He’s moving forward, full steam ahead, including suggesting that she relinquish custody of her children to him.
Yet Betty still puts off finding new representation. Then the kids come over to visit her, and she finds out the boys are in therapy, Betty freaks out after learning that her sons might be frightened of her.
She gives Dan an expletive-laden piece of her mind over his voicemail. Unfortunately, all of her kids are standing in the doorway, having overheard all of it. It doesn’t exactly help her “I”m not crazy” defense.
At the end of the first hour, Betty has neglected to find a new lawyer despite everyone’s advice, and she doesn’t even know when the hearing is. Betty expects Dan to have postponed it again, but she doesn’t double-check.
So when Dan shows up o court and Betty doesn’t, the judge rules in his favor, granting all of his terms — including the custody agreement and lack of child support payments.
The final scene shows Betty in an interrogation room sometime in the future, after shooting her husband.
Dirty John Season 2 Episode 2 recap: The second hour returns to the past
In the second hour — Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story Episode 2 — we return to the beginning when Dan and Betty first met. While the first episode focused on Betty’s somewhat crazy antics, the second hour highlights how Dan spent the majority of their relationship gaslighting and manipulating his wife.
We learn that Betty and Dan first met in 1963 during their college years. Betty lives with extremely conservative parents, which is important to know considering the values instilled in her during her strict Christian upbringing help explain her future relationship with Dan.
At first, Betty and Dan look like a sweet, picture-perfect couple. They support each other, they have fun together, and for the most part — seem like the perfect match.
But things change after the two of them get married. During their first morning together, Dan tells Betty he canceled housekeeping so they could spend more alone time together. Betty asks him why he’d want to sleep in an unmade bed, to which he responds, “why should I have to? You can do it.”
During their early dates, Betty questioned why Gloria Steinem was important. She wondered what the reason behind feminism was. Betty was raised in an environment that told her she should be a housewife, and that’s what Dan wanted.
At first, she is able to follow her dreams of being a teacher, but those slowly get thrown out the window as Betty is forced to support Dan’s medical career. He continually manipulates and pushes her to do more for him so he one day earn good money.
Betty has to work multiple jobs while being pregnant to keep them afloat. Then Dan decides he doesn’t want to be a doctor, but would rather do law. Amid all of this, Betty continues to get pregnant. She eventually gives Dan five kids in total, although one tragically dies shortly after being born.
Even worse, the pregnancies take a toll on Betty’s mental and physical health. During one, she pleads with Dan to consider letting her get an abortion, but he puts his foot down, guilt-tripping her into going through with the pregnancy.
Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story Episode 2: Dan & Betty move to California
After years of being overworked and abandoned by her husband as he devotes himself to his career and leaves his pregnant and exhausted wife at home, they finally start to do better financially and move to San Diego, California.
Dan has a cushy new job at a law firm, and for a while, that’s enough — until it’s not. Eventually, Dan begins thinking about going into his business for himself by opening up his own law practice.
Betty is supportive of this idea because she’s seen how his old firm has affected other men there, like Martin, the husband of her friend from the firm (played by Joelle Carter).
While Betty and Dan are setting up his new firm, Betty discovers she is pregnant once again, I believe, with their fourth and final son. After giving birth, she tells Dan she wants to get her tube ties. He says that’s fine, but he doesn’t look super happy about it.
However, she later learns from her friend that Martin cheated on her, although he told her that it didn’t mean anything. Betty clearly looks worried by the news, wondering if Dan would ever do that to her.
The second episode also juxtaposes the flashbacks showing the beginning and maturation of the Broderick’s marriage with Betty’s future trial. Several witnesses discuss what happened on the night of the murders and whether or not they had any inkling of what Betty had done.
A few of them claim Betty called multiple people that night, and most of them claimed they had no idea she had just murdered someone because she was so calm after.
At the very end, the detective tells the court that overall, Betty fired five rounds. As Betty said at the end of the first episode, only one bullet hit Dan. The others scattered around the room and the fifth was found in Linda’s body (Dan’s new wife, who we haven’t yet met) when she was taken to the morgue.
What did you think about the series premiere of Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story? Are you planning to watch the remainder of the season? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
New episodes of Dirty John Season 2 air Tuesday nights at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT on the USA Network.