The Big Bang Theory finally drew the curtains on its popular saga of young scientists and their awkward social lives with the airing of its 276th episode this month, earning the title of longest running American multi-camera sitcom. The show’s twelfth season brings substantial (but thematically consistent) growth to the otherwise static environment of reliable laughs.
The big surprise: Penny (Kaley Cuoco) — the aspiring actress from Nebraska who moved in next door a decade ago and eventually married experimental physicist Leonard Hofstadter (Johnny Galecki) — has an unplanned pregnancy and is happy about it, despite originally never wanting to have children. Like Kaley Cuoco described her role in a red carpet interview, it’s an “ending yet beginning,” and she’s “thrilled” with the story. “There’s not anything catastrophic, it’s just beautiful,” Cuoco told Entertainment Tonight.
But Vanity Fair columnist Laura Bradley didn’t find Penny’s change of heart and circumstances so endearing, for reasons having less to do with the craft of television writing and more to do with… well, Alabama and pro-life legislation... Click here for more.