Firefly Lane Episode 1 recap: What is going on between Johnny & Tully?

Netflix’s highly-anticipated adaptation of Kristin Hannah’s novel Firefly Lane has finally arrived. As much as I wanted to fall head over heels in love with this new series, I came away from Firefly Lane Episode 1 feeling a little cold. But more on that later, let’s set the stage.

Firefly Lane revolves around the powerful and complicated bond between two lifelong friends Tully Hart and Kate Mularkey. The two met as tweens during a turbulent 1974 summer when the beautiful, mysterious Tully arrived on Firefly Lane with her neglectful, earthy mother, “Cloud.” Where Tully was effortlessly cool and immediately popular, Kate had always been the nerdy girl at the bottom of the social pyramid. Yet despite their seemingly polar opposite demeanors, Kate and Tully find themselves inextricably drawn to one another.

Throughout the first episode, we’re shown Kate and Tully’s friendship from the beginning era to their early adulthood and later to the present, which is set in 2003.

In the first year Kate and Tully met, Tully became an instant hit at their school. She impressed boys and girls alike, fitting in seamlessly with Kate’s peers in a way she never managed. By the end of the first episode, Tully even scores an invite to a party with one of the popular guys in town, leaving Kate by the wayside.

Perhaps the only way Kate has Tully “beat,” so to speak, is in her home life where Kate has a loving, albeit strict set of parents, and a brother, while Tully is the only daughter of Cloud, a woman who cares more about getting high than she does her kid. It also looks like Kate’s brother might be gay, as Tully happens to catch him kissing his male best friend — but she pretends like she didn’t see anything.

Firefly Lane Episode 1 recap: Tully betrays Kate’s trust with Marah.

Fast-forward to adulthood, and Tully’s beauty and brains have taken her to the world of broadcast journalism, where she is employed as a newscaster. Tully helps Kate get an assistant job at the station, and Kate immediately becomes smitten with her charming, Australian boss Johnny.

Then we skip forward yet again to the current status of Tully and Kate’s friendship and subsequent lives. Tully is now a famous talk show host, akin to Oprah. She gets stopped for autographs and attends movie premieres with A-listers on the regular. Meanwhile, Kate is going through a divorce that is hitting her teen daughter Marah particularly hard. She’s acting out, cutting class, the usual. Despite their different places in life, Kate and Tully are still best friends in regular contact with each other.

As Marah’s godmother, Tully volunteers to talk to her and see if she can figure out what’s going on. Over lunch, Marah expresses frustration at her mother, who she feels doesn’t understand her. She also begs Tully to help her get on birth control because “everyone else is doing it!” although she claims she isn’t having sex.

She hasn’t talked to Kate about this since she says her mother won’t understand, but her cool aunt Tully surely will! Tully is hesitant to get involved, but ultimately Marah persuades her to sign the form. I can’t begin to say how bad of an idea that is, and I’m curious if it’s even legal since Tully isn’t Marah’s guardian.

Firefly Lane Episode 1 recap: Kate uses Tully’s name to get a job.

Elsewhere, Kate is trying to start a new job. She wants to get back into journalism despite taking off more than a decade to be a stay-at-home mom and raise Marah. Now that she’s getting a divorce, Kate is eager to restart her career. She gets a job interview to be an assistant to an editor for a magazine but fails to impress the interviewer.

Firefly Lane Episode 1 recap: A PTA event triggers a bad memory for Kate.

We pivot back to Kate, who is shopping for a dress to wear to a fundraiser at Marah’s school. While out, she runs into her PTA crush Travis. After some small talk, Kate invites Tully to be her date to the fundraiser. As a testament to their friendship, Tully blows off a George Clooney movie premiere to go with Kate to the event.

She even lends Kate a dress — a slinky, silvery number that looks fantastic on her. Kate also opens up about her fears of what will happen after her divorce, and Tully supports her. At least she was brave enough to try and have it all. It’s in moments like these you can see the genuine love between them. But it’s also evident that Tully’s “fabulous” life is more of a facade and not nearly as glamorous for her as people would like to believe.

At the PTA event, things quickly go sideways when it becomes obvious that Travis only had eyes for Tully because, as is the trend, he’s a big fan of hers. When Kate gets pulled away to help with something, she watches as Tully and Travis dance together, and it reminds her of a similar incident from when they were younger.

One night at a bar, Tully teases Kate about her crush on their boss Johnny, remarking that she had once thought of pursuing a fling with him herself but hadn’t because he signs their checks — and now she definitely won’t if Tully is interested. Yet when a drunken Johnny comes to their table and invites them both to dance, their trio quickly becomes a duo as Johnny focuses solely on Tully.

When Kate sees her best friend and Travis, all she can think about is that night years ago. She ditches Tully and goes home. Then she takes refuge in her daughter’s room, cleaning things up while Marah sleeps. And that’s when she finds the permission slip for birth control, signs on the dotted line by Tully Hart. Considering Kate probably feels like the one thing she has that Tully doesn’t is a child, and yet she sees now that Marah went behind her back to her best friend, I’m sure this was like a double gut punch for her.

But wait, there are more surprises in store! When Tully gets home to her penthouse, she finds a box of donuts for her from Max, followed by a knock on the door. Thinking it’s her midnight donut fairy, she opens it, only to find Johnny standing there. It turns out that Johnny is Kate’s soon-to-be-ex-husband! So why is he at Tully’s? He begs her to let him stay the night because he made a huge mess of his life. So, will Tully let him stay? What is the truth about their relationship?

Final Thoughts on Firefly Lane Episode 1

Overall I felt like Firefly Lane Episode 1 was okay as a story installment but rather weak as a pilot. I’m not sure I’m buying the “genuine” friendship between Tully and Kate just yet because they both did some awful things to each other in just one episode. Why did Tully sign that paper? And is Kate seriously so petty she up and abandons her best friend at an event she attended as her guest just because Tully danced with her crush? I also don’t know if Heigl and Chalke’s chemistry is strong enough to make this work, although Heigl is giving a great performance here so far.

Most of all, I feel disheartened that so much of Kate and Tully’s issues boil down to men. The episode’s overall plot felt ambling and directionless, and I would have liked a better-paced episode with more structure.

All of that said, however, I do think there are elements to like here, and I know it is the first episode of a ten-part season, so I’m willing to cut the show a lot of slack. I’m hoping that once we see Tully and Kate‘s past relationship unfold, it’ll enhance the show as a whole. Because since their bond is the bulkhead the entire series is built on, it really needs to work.

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What did you think about Firefly Lane Episode 1? Do you plan to keep watching? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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