‘Big Mistakes’ Recap: Netflix Series Timeline & Ending

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‘Big Mistakes’ Recap: Netflix Series Timeline & Ending

Nicky and Morgan make so many miscalculations in Netflix’s latest crime comedy that we had to track and categorize all of them.
Photo: Spencer Pazer/Netflix

In Dan Levy and Rachel Sennott’s new comedy thriller Big Mistakes, pastor Nicky Dardano (Levy) and his elementary school teacher sister, Morgan (Taylor Ortega), take a necklace that does not belong to them and wind up getting involved with a whole slew of dangerous criminals, putting their lives and the lives of all the people they love in danger. Between some horrendous screw-ups, terrible decision-making, and some plain old bad luck, their situation, and that of their mother, Linda Morelli (Laurie Metcalf), who is running for mayor, only gets worse. Below, we track the biggest missteps and mistakes the Dardanos and those in their orbit make as Nicky and Morgan attempt to (sometimes literally) dig themselves out of the hole in which they’ve found themselves throughout Big Mistakes’ first season.

Big mistake: When Morgan and Nicky are tasked with getting their dying Nonna a necklace for her birthday before she croaks, all of their problems begin when Morgan steals a diamond necklace from the case at the chintzy Quick Post after clerk Yusuf (Boran Kuzum) repeatedly tells her it isn’t for sale. Like, emphatically. Some might say, suspiciously. It doesn’t matter; she steals it, and they put on their Nonna even though she is already dead when they arrive.

Bigger mistake: Nicholas! Just take the necklace off your dead grandmother’s corpse, my guy! Surely the good pastor has seen a dead body or two in his time, and yet still, he cannot pull himself together long enough to remove the necklace before his mother shows up to bring Nonna to her funeral and snaps that coffin up, even though he knows an unhinged guy with a gun who has seen where he and his family lives wants that necklace back pronto. He’s really going to regret that moment of hesitation. Probably right around the moment Yusuf shows up at Nonna’s funeral and forces Nicky and Morgan into the back of his truck. Morgan’s right: It really is giving kidnap-homicide.

My favorite mistake: Laurie Metcalf has an abundance of so wrong they’re right lines in this episode, but the best has to be her explanation as to why her mother’s best friend can’t make it to the funeral: “I just got word that your Nonna’s best friend Dina slipped at a Five Guys last night. Broke her neck. She’ll be in the hospital for the rest of her life. So you’re gonna have to read her poem, alright? And your father’s here, speaking of somebody who should’ve slipped at a Five Guys.”

Big mistake: Nicky tries to escape from the delivery truck only to fall flat on his face and be told by both Yusuf and his own sister that there really is no point in running. Yusuf knows where they live. All it does for Nicky is force him to have to go along with a story about being mugged and punched in the face because he was crying once he and Morgan finally arrive at Nonna’s wake. Not that he finds much sympathy from anyone, including his own mother, who gets one look at him and tells him that “people aren’t gonna want to look at that while they’re eating quiche.”

Bigger mistake: When an irate Nicky tells Morgan that this is all her fault and therefore her problem, she takes off to dig up Nonna’s grave and get the necklace before Yusuf swings by to skin them alive, as promised. But this means she needs to get rid of her devoted fiancé, Max (Jack Innanen), and the only way to get him off her jock is to tell him she cheated on him. Max, who has loved Morgan since he was 16, calls her a “slut pig,” and she agrees, she’s a “slutty pig whore,” but he corrects her: “I would never say ‘whore.’ You know how I feel about sex work.” All of which makes one wonder: Why not enlist sensitive, obsessed-with-her Max to help dig up Nonna? He would do anything for Morgan, and as we find out immediately after, she could use the help.

My favorite mistake: Watching a grown-ass woman spiral because digging up her grandmother’s grave is nearly impossible, and she’s going to die before she does anything interesting to the point where she simply lies down in the open grave and gives up is a delight. Even better? When Nicky, who of course won’t let his sister deal with this on her own, points out that she’s been digging up the wrong fresh grave this entire time. She begs him not to be mean about this, but who could help themselves?

Big mistake: Okay, wow, turns out the original sin of mistakes on Big Mistakes was Yusuf leaving a key in the case where the necklace was being “hidden” so Morgan could easily steal it. And when Yusuf makes Nicky and Morgan come with him to return the necklace to his boss, Russian mafioso Ivan, it makes it clear that Yusuf is kind of terrible as a henchman (his crippling anxiety and temper certainly don’t help), and, in comparison, Nicky and Morgan look like valuable assets. So being absolute disasters who somehow pull off theft and grave-robbing has only earned the Dardano siblings an ongoing friendship with Ivan (Mark Ivanir) and special flip phones that could ring at any moment with a new “favor” to perform.

Bigger mistake: Yusuf might rue the day he brought Nicky and Morgan to Ivan instead of just taking the necklace to his boss himself. Now he’s stuck driving them around to little jobs like renting a shady apartment by pretending to be a husband with a gambling and sex addiction and his pregnant wife. He has to listen to them scream at each other on the street about what the other needs (Morgan needs order in her mess of a life; Nicky needs a big, fat dick in his mouth) while they try to get out of this ongoing relationship with Ivan. But Yusuf brought this annoyance upon himself.

My favorite mistake: Morgan’s lie to Max has legs! And now he shows up with mother, Annette (Elizabeth Perkins), for peace talks, which, yes, does include him admitting to doing finger stuff with another woman. Linda’s ticked off because she had no time to prepare for Annette’s visit and only has a jar of peanut butter and pre-sliced deli cheese still in the bag to serve the formidable woman. But, hey, at least she can get some valuable intel: Linda’s run for mayor isn’t unopposed; Tom Donaldson, a Jimmy John’s franchise owner and boat enthusiast, is running too. Tom, being a complete asshole, inspires Linda’s resolve to kick his ass in the election.

Big mistake: The moment Nicky says he’s “leaning into joy,” you know he’s in for it. Sure, his secret boyfriend, Tareq (Jacob Gutierrez), told him he loves him and they’re going on a cruise together, but as Morgan points out, they are literally on their way to pick up a stranger from a prison for Ivan. No joy is here. Although Morgan’s head isn’t exactly in the game either, she and Max are engaged again, but it seems like she … is sort of into her new gig running errands for criminals?

Bigger mistake: In the previous episode, as part of his cover, Nicky asked the landlord to repaint the apartment. That comes to bite him in the ass, figuratively speaking, and his mom in the ass, perhaps literally, when the apartment isn’t ready for Ivan’s ex-con friend Andrei, and Nicky has to bring him to Linda’s for dinner. Andrei and Linda hit it off as she tells him about her mayoral opponent, and he tells her about how he was framed for importing an illegal flamethrower. They wind up having lots and lots of sex while Nicky is forced to listen from downstairs. From what he can hear, Andrei is a generous lover and, honestly, good for Linda.

My favorite mistake: I would listen to Linda Morelli telling her son he needs to get laid for hours. “Don’t take this the wrong way, honey,” she tells Nicky as they are cleaning out her mother’s assisted living apartment, “but God isn’t touching your body for pleasure.” Too bad she doesn’t bring this assertiveness to her first debate, where Tom “Sandwich King” Donaldson steamrolls her.

Big mistake: When Ivan tells Morgan that her brother is a liability, he really misjudges the situation. Let’s be real: both Dardano siblings have their pros and cons. When forced to go to a cattle auction to buy three Brazilian bulls, Morgan thinks she has everything under control, until she pisses off the auctioneer and they lose the bulls. It’s Nicky and his clergyman background who get them back from the family that won them without even having to pay for them. Who’s the liability now?

Bigger mistake: I’m torn between Morgan sleeping with Yusuf before he runs away because that’s simply not a healthy choice, or Morgan and Nicky not realizing that not only do those bulls have such big testicles because Ivan and Andrei (a former surgeon) have smuggled a bunch of cocaine in them or that they actually think that they can still get out of this relationship now that they’ve seen what Ivan is up to.

My favorite mistake: Either us underestimating the third Dardano sibling, Natalie (Abby Quinn), who uses her contacts to get incriminating pictures of Tom Donaldson on his yacht with sex workers, or Linda rethinking her tryst with Andrei with this banger: “Natalie, I had a felon inside me.”

Big mistake: By now, we know that Ivan isn’t actually in charge of shit, but is dying to get out from under the Italian mobsters he’s beholden to by side-stepping them and bringing his Brazilian bull balls drug smuggling route directly to the Brazilian cartel waiting for a big meeting in Miami. Seems like lying to and cutting out the people who have power over you to get in bed with a different group of criminals could have some consequences attached to it, but what do I know?

Bigger mistake: After Nicky stands up to Ivan, it looks like both he and Morgan can actually be free of this working relationship. They both try to move on and make changes: Nicky wants to be out with Tareq, which means he has to leave his job and Morgan tries to enjoy a normal suburban life with Max by doing truly heinous things like voluntarily exercising and going to a baby shower. When Tareq realizes he’s been scammed by the “Out and Loud” organization, Nicky will do anything he can to help him … which, yes, includes going back to Ivan for help tracking down the scammer in exchange for he and Morgan agreeing to go with Ivan and Andrei to Miami.

My favorite mistake: When Tom Donaldson crashes Linda’s barbecue and disparages Nicky and his recent sex scandal, he not only gives Linda a reason to sucker punch this loser in the face, but upon her release from jail, she gets a rousing moment in which she tells the press that no one fucks with her family. Sure, she is covered in face paint that makes her look like an evil possum, but still, this could turn the tide in the election.

Big mistake: I thought these two ding-dongs already learned about not going to a second location with any shady person, and now they are willingly, or for Morgan, enthusiastically, getting on a private jet with Ivan, Andrei, and their “security team” to go to Miami and “change the face of the New Jersey cocaine market?” And then they get on a boat with cartel leader Paolo without Ivan and his team? This seems bad. This seems like they’ve learned very little.

Bigger mistake: I don’t know, both Morgan and Nicky (definitely Nicky) are probably regretting the large amount of cocaine they’ve ingested in Miami if only so that they had been a little more clearheaded when a group of men show up and kill literally everyone else in the room — Ivan and his crew, all the Brazilians — but leave the two of them alive amongst the carnage with no explanation.

My favorite mistake: Who brings a giant edible arrangement to a dinner with the Brazilian cartel?

Big mistake: In one of their first interactions with Yusuf, Nicky and Morgan labeled him “a bit dramatic” — they should not have forgotten that assessment. Are they actually surprised that when Yusuf can’t get a hold of the Dardanos on their flip phones, he kidnaps them from their homes and ties them up? Morgan’s certainly caught off-guard: “This is how I hear from you?” It turns out he went to Ivan’s boss — the Italians — and it was the Italians who committed that cute lil’ mass murder in Miami. And guess what? Now Nicky and Morgan work for the Italians, too.

Bigger mistake: Morgan and Nicky really did not stop to think about how big this whole New Jersey mafia situation might just be, and that’s on them. When the election ends in a tie until Tom surprisingly concedes, Max’s mom, Annette, who has been Linda’s biggest supporter, throws a big party at her house. It’s during this party that Annette takes Morgan upstairs to her room to give her an engagement gift: the diamond necklace Morgan stole from Quick Post. The necklace belonged to Annette. The Italians work for her. Annette has been running the show the entire time, and now, not only does she have her well-manicured claws in Morgan and Nicky, but also in the town’s new mayor.

My favorite mistake: Of course Morgan accidentally runs over Max while grocery shopping. Honestly, I’m surprised this hasn’t happened at least twice before. Although it hopefully will be the last time, since during Annette’s big reveal she does tell Morgan that regardless of her feelings, she will be marrying Max, and if she ever hurts him again, Annette will kill her herself. Annette doesn’t seem like someone who makes many jokes, so Morgan would do well not to make that mistake again.