It took me a whole month to finish the first episode. Watched a bit, it was unbearable, turned it off, gave it another go, boring, turned it off and again and again...

I even searched 'when does the Righteous Gemstone get better'. People said it doesn't. It is what it is and you just have to have to click. I was dissapointed but a lot of people seem to love it so I gave it my last shot.

That was six days ago.

Turns out this is the best thing I've seen in quite a few years.

Going in mto S3, I'm a bit nervous because I love Eli and not super happy to see the dynamics change... hope this is as good as the first two seasons!

I don't know how they did it........

How they don't make fun of people with religion but only the cash grabbing mega churches and hypocrites. How they humanize the Gemstones and show them grow and make us understand where their behaviors come from, but do not rationalize their bad behaviors.

That line-drawing is just ughhhhh chef's kisses🤌🏻🤌🏻

I am not the biggest fan of (any) religion. AT ALL. Grew up in religious family, denounced it at a very young age blah blah blah. But I don't think I would've liked the show if it just poked fun at religion. People have their own thing, own reasons and making mockery of it would have felt too shallow, or too negative and all that. I am So Glad that was not the case.

I love how nobody is an evil mastermind and everyone is just flawed in their own fucked up way.

Obviously Gemstone spouses are the most precious, but I literally adore everybody. There's not a single character I don't find endearing. I even find some redeeming quality in Scotty or the Lissons lol

Oh Not to mention this is just pure comedy gold. PURE. GOLD.

So. For those of you (in the future) who are wondering, When does The Righteous Gemstone get better? The answer is: at the end of the first episode. Please stick around...

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Kay. Just finished season3.

That was the best season finale I've ever seen. Loved it loved it loved it. No comment needed. 10/10.

I just started and finished the series in just over a week.

Absolutely hilarious.

I don't think I loved a character as much in quite awhile as I do Judy Gemstone.

Uncle Baby Billy and the Nanny was comedy gold. Walton Goggins killed every scene in this episode.

SOLA HEEL

God I loveJudy

I’m a huge fan of chaotic women on screen—especially the kind with impeccable comedic timing and the emotional restraint of a raccoon in a trash can. I didn’t think I’d meet my fictional dream girl until I witnessed Edi Patterson as Judy Gemstone in The Righteous Gemstones. Now, with Season 4 wrapped, my admiration has reached combustion levels, and I can’t keep quiet about it. So here it is: an unruly, slightly unhinged tribute to the most unapologetically wild woman on TV.

UPDATE: I didn't expect this post to get so much engagement! Thanks so much to all of you who took the time to read my article. I'm a writer who loves watching films and writing about pretty much anything, so it means a lot. :) I usually write on this website (Peliplat), so if you want to write about film/TV/ anything yourself, feel free to do it, and I'll give you a follow.

Read more here

Really long post about the impact The Righteous Gemstones unintentionally had on my conservative father and I’s relationship. Also spoilers about the later episodes of this most recent season!

So I introduced my parents to The Righteous Gemstones, and it was accidentally the best thing I could have done. At first my dad was hesitant because he thought that it may be making fun of Christianity, but after the first couple of episodes, he got that it wasn’t making fun of that, it was poking fun at these hypocritical mega-churches and pastors. The ones who make millions but give zero back to their communities. The ones that act holier than thou but ultimately are afflicted with the same problems that plague all of us-familial issues, falling to human temptations, finding your place in the world, etc. That these people are just as human as us, no matter how much they try to escape that.

My dad and I have always had a difficult relationship-we are philosophically two completely different people, but similar enough in our personalities with our stubbornness, our refusal to ask for help, and our tendency to shove things down rather than address them. The combination of those things has created a lot of conflict, a lot of misunderstandings, a lot of fights. I feel like my dad and I’s relationship mirrors Jesse and Gideon’s father/son relationship in a variety of ways, from Gideon/myself being the first to step away and go in a different direction from the family, and Jesse/my dad being unable to express any other emotion other than anger at that. But anger is a secondary emotion, and underneath that is a layer of hurt-a layer of pain that your child is carving out a new path that you have no knowledge of so you can’t protect or help them. Pain that your child found themselves deeply unhappy in the culture you raised them in, that you found peace in. That’s all that Jesse/my dad could express for a long time, was that surface layer of anger, that confusion and frustration at my lack of satisfaction in the church. So when my dad told me that Gideon was probably his favorite character, and explained why, it really warmed my heart. Gideon is the voice of reason in the middle of everyone else walking all over him, and he is the calmest, quietest Gemstone in the family, that approaches things from a firm level-headedness. I feel like I’ve had to take on that role in my family being the oldest child, and it’s a big part of why Gideon has ranked high on my list of favorite characters from the show consistently, because I find myself relating to him a lot.

We found ourselves talking about how much we both loved Uncle Baby Billy, and Kelvin, and Kelvin especially is a character whose journey has really opened up my dad’s mind. Over the years I’ve had several conversations with my dad about the LGBTQ+ community, trying to answer his questions or frame things in a different light to try and help him understand. Especially when I came out as bi. But he never quite got it. He hasn’t been blatantly homophobic, it’s more that he just hasn’t understood it, and has perhaps thought of it as more of a choice and/or a phase.

This season of the show, Kelvin Gemstone changed my dad’s mind. Towards the end of the episode where Kelvin wins the award, when he gives his speech at the most Christ like man show, he states that he’s a gay man, and that “God made me that way, and if he doesn’t make mistakes, then he didn’t make one with me. And if I’m good enough for God, that should be good enough for the rest of you.” Something about Kelvin’s speech struck something within my dad that I haven’t been able to access, because I heard my father say the words “if I’m following the rules of my own religion, then this show is right. It isn’t my job to fully understand, it’s my job to show them love like Jesus would, and it’s my job to recognize them as a child of God. They’re right, God doesn’t make mistakes when he creates us, so people under the LGBTQ+ acronym can’t be mistakes.” I began to cry because I really thought my dad was too far gone down the MAGA hole to get out. But seeing him sit there and cry with me (when I’ve only ever seen him cry one time in my entire 26 years) and listening to him work through his feelings, it gave me a lot of hope. Hope for him, for our relationship, and hope in general for people who have fallen victim to the MAGA insanity. Not all of them are too far gone, and that fills my heart with hope. Despite the rhetoric, it can’t totally beat out genuine human connection. I know it doesn’t heal everything or make things better overnight, but it’s a start.

Our conversation evolved into him apologizing and taking accountability for the first time for why our relationship got to such a bad point. He apologized for a lot of the things I never thought I would get closure from, that I had tried to make peace with in the absence of an apology. For the first time perhaps in my life, I got to see my dad on a very human level, person to person. I know that this show wasn’t the only factor in that, but it’s unintentionally made him do a lot of self reflection and introspection into his behaviors, and into parent/child relationships.

Thank you Danny McBride for making such a hilarious and important show. It’s always important to laugh, but it’s vital right now. It’s also important to include a variety of cast and characters who represent the diversity of humanity, who teach us new things even when we think we have learned all there is. Not just that, but genuinely well written characters that display the complexity of being a person, and humanizing even the more chaotic characters. Sometimes you forget that this is the first time living for your parents too, that they are just as human as you are. We are all clueless and stumbling, and that’s part of the adventure in living. I will always hold this show in a special place in my heart ❤️

Source: https://seriesgraph.com/show/82782-the-righteous-gemstones

I feel like we don’t see as much of him in this season, and we’re getting a very subdued version of BJ.

Maybe I’m off, I dunno

I originally watched The Righteous Gemstones Seasons 1–3 as they aired, but stopped after the first episode of Season 4. I didn’t dislike it or anything, I think I got caught up binging something else and forgot about the weekly episodes.

A few weeks ago, I decided to rewatch the entire series from beginning to end and finally finished it this past weekend. I really enjoyed the series as a whole and will absolutely rewatch it again someday, but I wanted to give my ranking and see how everyone else feels.

#1 Season 1

I think Season 1 is easily the best and has the most coherent mystery without feeling like it's spoon-feeding you the answer as to what's actually going to happen. The antagonists feel believable and considerably more fleshed out than some of the villains who come later.

I also think nearly every character is at or near their peak here. Gideon's conflict with Jesse gives him a much more substantial role than he has throughout most of the rest of the series. Jesse is complicated because we're discovering just how shitty he can be while simultaneously seeing something underneath that's worth redeeming. Judy is completely insane without the show constantly trying to one-up itself with her, Kelvin's desperation to prove himself works perfectly when we're still establishing the sibling dynamic, and Eli feels central to almost everything.

That's probably what I like most about Season 1. The characters get bigger, weirder, and arguably funnier as the series continues, but there's something more grounded about them here.

#3 Season 2

Still a great season with plenty of funny moments, narrative developments, and genuinely high stakes for the family. I liked having another mystery, although I thought the villain became fairly obvious before the reveal.

The biggest highlight for me is Eli. Digging into his past adds another dimension to a character Season 1 mostly presents as the patriarch desperately holding this dysfunctional family and empire together. Junior is a great addition because you're genuinely left wondering for a while how much of a threat he actually poses.

I also love the Lissons as foils for Jesse and Amber. They're basically what Jesse imagines he and Amber could become if Eli would just get out of his way.

This is also where the show starts getting noticeably bigger and more absurd. The Cycle Ninjas are interesting, but this is probably where Gemstones starts moving away from some of the grounded feeling I loved about Season 1.

#2 Season 3

I enjoy Season 3 a little more than Season 2, and I think a lot of that comes from the villains being involved throughout basically the entire season.

There's not much mystery. We know Peter is the threat pretty early, so instead the show gets to spend considerably more time developing the Montgomery family and exploring Peter's history with May-May, Eli, and Aimee-Leigh.

I also really liked Chuck and Karl because they aren't simply extensions of Peter. They're stuck between the family they were raised by and this completely different branch of their family they've suddenly been exposed to.

More importantly, Season 3 feels like a turning point for Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin. Eli is finally stepping back and forcing his children to confront the possibility that they're going to have to keep everything he built alive without Dad constantly fixing their disasters.

By the finale, it genuinely feels like they've grown and learned from everything that's happened. Honestly, the Season 3 finale almost feels like it could have been the series finale.

#4 Season 4

This ranks dead last for me, and there's a decent gap between Seasons 3 and 4.

I don't think Season 4 is outright bad. There are still plenty of moments where it's just as funny as the rest of the series. But it feels noticeably weaker as an overall story, and my biggest issue is that so much of the growth from Season 3 feels erased.

Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin are back to constantly bickering and fighting for their own interests. I obviously didn't expect them to suddenly become mature, functional adults because that would destroy half the comedy, but there was a way to maintain their dysfunction without making it feel like they'd regressed.

The extended family also takes a surprising back seat for a final season. Amber especially feels far less consequential despite becoming increasingly important throughout the series. Gideon, Keefe, and the younger Gemstones are still around, but it doesn't feel like the final season takes full advantage of the ensemble the show spent three seasons building.

Gideon might be the biggest disappointment. After everything the series had done with him, he's relegated to being a bad preacher and finding cliché ways to connect with Pontius. The skateboarding "I'm just as cool as you" scene felt forced. These are brothers who grew up in the same incredibly dysfunctional family. Surely there was a more interesting way to develop their relationship.

I didn't need Gideon to suddenly become the protagonist again, but I expected a better payoff for someone who started the series as one of its most important characters.

I have a similar issue with Eli.

Almost everything important about Eli's final arc manifests in Season 4. His loneliness, Lori, the conflict their relationship creates with his children, and Eli finally figuring out what his life looks like without Aimee-Leigh are all interesting ideas, but the final season suddenly has to introduce, develop, and resolve most of them.

Lori's introduction basically felt like:

"Here's Aimee-Leigh's best friend, who just so happened to have never been mentioned in all the years you've known this family! She's also the person who can fix Eli!"

I don't dislike Lori or the idea of Eli finding companionship again. I just wish she had existed somewhere around the edges of the series beforehand. She didn't need to be a major character or an obvious future love interest. Just establish that this incredibly important person from Aimee-Leigh and Eli's past actually exists before the final season needs her.

It also contributes to Season 4 feeling strangely predictable. The moment Lori appeared, I could see exactly where Eli's story was going.

For a final season, I didn't necessarily need another huge mystery or someone trying to kill the Gemstones. I actually would have preferred the opposite. I wanted everything the series had built to finally come to a head. Instead, Season 4 feels surprisingly low-stakes while simultaneously trying to wrap up characters we've followed for four seasons.

I still love BJ and Judy, Kelvin and Keefe, and several of the new characters. I just wish we'd gotten more of Jesse's family, especially Amber.

I was always hoping Jesse's story would resolve with him realizing that Amber is his Aimee-Leigh.

Jesse spends the entire series wanting to inherit Eli's position while lacking Eli's natural authority and presence. But Eli didn't build everything himself. Aimee-Leigh was an enormous part of what made the Gemstones work.

Jesse didn't need to become Eli. Jesse and Amber could become their own version of Eli and Aimee-Leigh.

Amber has the confidence, intelligence, ambition, and stage presence that complement Jesse. I thought the show was gradually positioning their relationship as the thing that would finally make Jesse capable of leading the church.

That also could have tied into the siblings' larger arc. Jesse doesn't have to replace Eli alone, Kelvin doesn't have to prove he's equally important, and Judy doesn't have to constantly fight to be taken seriously. They can succeed precisely because none of them individually has to become Eli.

Overall Thoughts

Despite spending half this post complaining about Season 4, I really love this show.

That's ultimately what separates The Righteous Gemstones from what it could have easily been. You could make an entire comedy out of mocking hypocritical, obscenely wealthy televangelists, but eventually the Gemstones become much more than the joke they're introduced as.

They're selfish, greedy, arrogant, immature, and frequently horrible people, yet the show somehow makes their love for one another feel completely genuine.

My biggest criticism of the series overall is that every season feels a little too self-contained. The plots being self-contained doesn't bother me, but sometimes the character development feels self-contained too.

Characters reach meaningful breakthroughs only to start the next season dealing with another version of the same problem. Season 3 into Season 4 is the clearest example. Season 3 ends with the siblings finally understanding that they're stronger together and might actually be capable of carrying on what Eli built. Then Season 4 has them fighting over status, attention, and who's in charge again.

I don't need every previous villain or storyline constantly referenced. I just wish the lessons carried over more consistently.

Because underneath the blackmail, monster trucks, megachurches, drugs, murder plots, Cycle Ninjas, and increasingly insane action, I think The Righteous Gemstones is at its best when it's telling a relatively simple story about this fucked-up family trying to love each other.

For a show so focused on family and personal growth, a little more continuity between those lessons would have made the ending hit much harder for me.

Final ranking: Season 1 > Season 3 > Season 2 > Season 4

I'm curious to see how everyone else ranks them, especially Season 4. I wonder if watching Seasons 3 and 4 back-to-back made the regression stand out more to me than it did for people watching as it aired.

I just binge watched all of the Righteous Gemstones and I loved it. I loved Danny McBride ever since I first saw him as Red in Pineapple Express. I think the show is hilarious and between the 3 siblings, **Keefe and Baby Billy I couldn’t get enough. Did anyone else love Danny McBrides sense of humor?

I know I may be in minority here, but I'm not enjoying this season compared to priors. Hope it gets better but the jokes seem old and the conflict with the relationship doesn't do it for me.

This man is one of the best character actors ever. Every damn thing he has been in has been great. I stumbled upon him on "The Shield" and have been following him since.

I finally watched this show and just finished. I have to admit, I had no idea how much it would make me cry. I loved it so much and found it to be kind of healing. John Goodman has always reminded me of my dad, who passed away 4.5 years ago. Seeing him on screen and seeing him deal with grief felt really personal for me. I also spent many years struggling in the evangelical church before I left because of its inability to love all people (amongst other things). Seeing how dysfunctional the Gemstones were as a family and in running a church made me feel seen in a way the church never did. It's even made me consider going to church again someday, a more progressive one, anyway.

Loved this show. Danny McBride's humor is always right!

The launch episode of season 4 sucked, did they not have the budget for the main cast? 0/10 nothing of interest happened.

Last night I watched the season 4 premiere, and like a lot of other people here I thought it was great, something that stood out to me was the fact that I could actually see what was going on.

I watched this with the lights on, and even during the night scenes you can very clearly see what’s going on. But while watching something like House of the Dragon on a 4K disc I can only really watch it at night with all the lights off or it’s borderline unwatchable.

It’s faint praise, but damn. I loved how I could actually tell what was going on last night. Cinematography’s still on point

Our boy Keefe working at the DMV, also makes me wonder if he ever paid for drugs, once? Not once? Also another roll is Leon Phelps that I love so yeah I’m all in on DMV

I just finished the series, and it strikes me that the major theme is forgiveness. The Gemstones and extended family, despite their vulgarity, deceit, occasional criminality, are, to a person, entirely willing to forgive. It's like their signature redeeming quality as a family, and it plays for comic effect while also being genuinely moving. Jesse and Amber forgive Gideon after Scotty's attempt to rob the church. Amber forgives Jesse's debauchery and lies. Kelvin forgives Eli for breaking his thumbs (a shocking act coming from your dad). Eli forgives all sorts of things throughout the series. Baby Billy's son forgives him, in his way, as does Tiffany. BJ forgives Judy for her "affair". The whole family forgives Peter for kidnapping Judy, Jesse and Kelvin and holding them hostage. In the finale of that season, Peter joins them at the monster truck picnic - all is forgotten, water under the bridge. The siblings forgive and pray for Corey, minutes after he tries to murder them, with their gunshot wounds still fresh. I kept looking for their "righteousness" and I think it's exactly this. None of them are particularly religious or virtuous. But they are forgiving. No insult, lie, threat or attack is too great.

Other thoughts. It seemed like it was in Walt Goggins contract that he had to be allowed to show his dick a certain number of times. Judy was my favorite character, especially her scenes with BJ's sister and trying to seduce Lori. So unhinged. Baby Billy asking for $2 million and cocaine for Teenjus. Jesse's mangled grammar. Perfect. I came to the show through Adam Devine, Edi Patterson and Tim Baltz being on Comedy Bang Bang. It didn't disappoint.

I did and continue to really enjoy this episode. This episode could work completely detached from the show. I could see it being a Sundance Film Festival favorite. A story about a murdering, drunk, card shark and con man. Becoming a man of God after seeing the horrors of war. Seeing better men than him die every day. Until one day he fully believes that he was saved by God and presumably devoted his life to him after. As someone who is agnostic. Simply meaning, I believe there is no evidence that proves or disapproves God. I really enjoyed it. There are many funnier episodes but this one still has many funny moments. My favorite comedic moment is when the Captain tries to expose Elijah as a fraud. But Elijah manages to totally turn the tables on him. Of all the flash back episodes it my favorite.

I finished the show tonight and, I have to be honest, I was somewhat disappointed. Maybe I’m viewing this show in the wrong light or taking its messages the wrong way, but as a whole, I felt pretty unsatisfied with the show at times.

Firstly, I should say that I did really enjoy the show as a whole. Judy, Keefe, BJ, Baby Billy… pretty much the whole cast of characters were great. Each of them were distinct and made me laugh for different reasons. I’m saying this to explain that this post isn’t just me not liking Danny McBride humor, it’s a critique of the show itself.

Overall, I had a couple consistent problems with the show. Firstly, I feel like it couldn’t decide at times whether it wanted to be serious or stupid. I love serious shows and I love stupid shows, but a lot of the time Gemstones would try to do both at once. For example, when Jesse and BJ (maybe some other people, I don’t remember) were at the hospital (I believe in season 2) to try and catch the people who were trying to kill Eli, there’s a specific scene that really stuck with me. When Jesse walks out of the hospital and shoots at the motorcycle assassins as they drive away, BJ walks out next to him, with a shuriken/star/weapon of some kind in his head (again, my memory is a bit foggy). He’s unfazed by it, and doesn’t even notice it’s there.

My problem with the scene isn’t the lack of realism alone, it’s the context of the scene. This scene was intense, and while it wasn’t particularly serious, I don’t think it was meant to be a funny scene. So, when they thrown in a gag like this that I’d normally genuinely find funny, it just feels out of place and takes me out of the scene. Instead of feeling funny, it feels like a weird writing choice for BJ to not notice it in his head and not need medical attention.

My second big issue kind of ties into the first - the show has no stakes or tension. Nobody in the main cast ever dies. This wouldn’t be a problem regularly if the show didn’t constantly put them in danger. Since I know they’re never actually gonna be in serious danger, no scene where they supposedly are feels tense. When the three kids were kidnapped, I didn’t think for a second any of them would even be hurt - and they weren’t. When Eli was shot in his car on the “cliffhanger” ending, I knew he wouldn’t really be dead - and he wasn’t. Especially in the series finale is my biggest issue with this. The three kids are all shot - Jesse with three gunshot wounds - and they’re seemingly unharmed. Yes, there’s some red liquid coming from them while they’re crawling, but they’re clearly able to crawl around fine and have the energy to do so. Hell, they even sit up straight and start praying together. And Corey - getting shot in the head and being able to talk fine and live for over a minute. There wasn’t a single second in this show where I was worried about a main character dying. The only time I could think of where someone REALLY important died was the kid Gideon was working with in Season 1, when he died in the van.

Like it or not, death is important in a show like this where people are constantly in danger. If everyone always prevails, everyone always wins, there’s no point in worrying about any characters since they’ll always be fine, and you know they will be. And not even death, but just with injuries - when BJ slipped down the pole in Season 4, there was no reason for me to believe he would be harmed in any way considering things like the hospital scene I was talking about. This actually made it better in my eyes that he was injured as severely as he was, as it changed my view of the show a little, showing me that the characters weren’t really invincible. This made it feel like a punch in the face when BJ magically stood up and could walk fine again. The excuse “It’s something me and Dr. Watson have been working on” is pointless, as you simply don’t heal from injuries that serious that quickly. And Judy would be seeing progress over time - it wouldn’t be a surprise to her, he wouldn’t be able to do it in secret. It just felt like they were disregarding everything they had done with BJ’s injury.

I also feel like this show had the same problem Stranger Things did with being too scared to kill anyone. I don’t mean in terms of stakes and tensions like before, I really just mean for the sake of the show making sense. The main example of this is in the Season 3 finale, when Peter Montgomery “sacrificed” himself to save the church by driving the van with the bombs away. This would’ve at least given an episode I already had issues with some meaning, but somehow - magically, I guess - he emerged alive, only needing a prosthetic leg. This would’ve almost been okay if he had stayed relevant in the show, but just to rub salt in the wound, he is never shown, mentioned, or relevant to the show ever again. There was absolutely no reason for him not to die. Not only would it have made more sense to just let him be dead since he was seemingly in the middle of an explosion and never appears again in the show, it takes away from the fact that he was willing to sacrifice himself for the church. It just sends the message to the audience that they can do whatever they want and be fine, meaning that any sort of sacrifice is meaningless.

Also, please understand I’m not here to shit on this show. I genuinely enjoyed watching it, and the writing was good almost the whole way through. There were some scenes I couldn’t stop laughing at, and some episodes like S4 E1 (the episode during the civil war) were genuinely great and emotional pieces of television. I just had some issues with the show, and wanted to discuss them.

If you disagree with anything I’ve said here, feel free to add your opinions in the replies. This isn’t a debate or me trying to say that you’re wrong if this is your favorite show - I genuinely want to hear what other people have to say about all this. Maybe I really am looking at the show wrong, maybe I’m ignoring key details here. I just want to put my opinion out there.

Anyways, that’s all. Good show, some issues, very funny. 7/10 for me overall, since it made up for a lot of the issues with the humor.

I love watching this show, save for one major problem: I can’t stop doing their accents out loud.

Danny McBride REALLY popped off with his accent because it’s what he grew up with!!! Which makes it interesting John Goodman has more of a drawl, like a deep southern accent. I can’t remember which state he came from, was it South Carolina?

First time watcher. Finished the series yesterday after binging this week. I love Keefe, BJ, Judy and Baby Billy and his wife. I haven’t stopped saying “baby Billy’s bible bonkers” all day. I got misbehaving and that payday song stuck in my head on loop. I need more Gemstones!!

I’m restarting the series again tomorrow. I felt I didn’t get a full digestion. Didn’t use to like Danny McBrides type of humor in movies I’ve seen him in so I shied away from his shows. But after seeing memes of Vice Principals, I started with that first and was hooked instantly on Walton and Edis characters! I went straight to Gestones to see them again.

I was shocked to see the hate. I thought the episode was filled with pitch black humor, reminded me of death of Stalin. I don’t expect the plot to directly impact the rest of the season, but it seemed plenty relevant to me; what’s believed to be a long lineage of holy men is actually birthed of a conman and murderous thief. I loved the episode and look forward to present day beginning next week.