'Mom' Season 8 Episode 4 Preview: How will Bonnie and Adam mend the rift between Jill and Andy?
'Mom' is back after a two-week break. Season 8 began with the departure of Anna Faris' Christy and there was panic among fans as well as the cast alike on how the show could manage without her. Yet, things are slowly falling into place, as Bonnie (Allison Janney) proves that she can take on the reigns of the show.
Christy's departure was explained in the first episode: Apparently she decided to leave for law school, which seems like a fitting exit for the character who has been through several rough patches in her life. Bonnie is trudging on with life, and indulges in sleepovers with her friends and reconnecting with old flames, and going quite strong with Adam.
The next episode promises to be just as much fun. There are other characters' lives that are being thrown out of whack and Bonnie needs to piece it all together. The synopsis for Episode 4 reads, "Bonnie and Adam offer relationship advice when they sense tension between Jill and Andy; Tammy lends a hand when chef Rudy opens a food truck."
Faris had left the role to pursue other opportunities. In a statement, she said, "The past seven years on Mom have been some of the most fulfilling and rewarding of my career. I’m so thankful to Chuck [Lorre], the writers, and my amazing castmates for creating a truly wonderful work experience.”
'Mom' co-creator Gemma Baker previously told TVLine that Faris’s departure would not take away from Christy’s happy ending. “One of the beautiful things about recovery is that quite often people’s lives get bigger and better than they could have imagined,” she said. “And that will be Christy’s experience. We are pretty sure that our audience, many of whom have been rooting for Christy since the pilot, will be happy for her and satisfied by her new path.”
On deciding how to write Faris off of the show, Baker told Entertainment Weekly, “Although our show has killed characters off in the past, we never considered this as an option for Christy. Our audience has been rooting for her for seven seasons and that loss felt like it would be too devastating for them and for our other characters. It was important to us that Christy moved on to bigger things."
She added, "Quite often when people are in recovery their lives get bigger in ways they couldn’t before have imagined. And so that will be the case for Christy. She has been working toward her dreams for a while now and we feel like the audience will be happy for her. The character of Christy will live on and we will continue to get updates on what she is up to and how her moving on will affect Bonnie.”
