Lifetime's Army Wives: A Delightful Mixture of Truth and Fiction

As a real life Army wife, I was pretty skeptical last summer when the cable channel Lifetime premiered the drama Army Wives. However, my husband was deployed to Iraq at the time, and it wasn't long before I was hooked, along with lots of other people. The show has turned out to be Lifetime's most successful one in its 24 years of existence. Last week's premiere episode for Season 2 was a huge ratings success. Millions of households tuned in to see what would happen after Season 1's explosive cliffhanger.

Last summer, I read Tanya Biank's 2006 book Under the Sabers: The Unwritten Code of Army Wives, which is credited as the basis for Lifetime's hit television series. As I read the book, it became clear to me where the characters for the show came from. Biank's book, which is mostly about the shocking events at Fort Bragg in the summer of 2002, is not so much about a group of Army wives (and husbands) bonding over their circumstances as spouses to servicemembers. The book did, however, feature some rather unusual real life people whose true stories happened to make for good television characters. And so, Army Wives was born.

Season 1 dealt with plenty of realistic issues, ranging from a new wife getting used to life as an Army spouse to a Army Soldier dealing with post traumatic stress disorder. The show's setting at fictional Fort Marshall in South Carolina is, at this point, filmed on an old Navy base. That allows viewers to see cast members living in fairly realistic looking government duplex housing, although from my experience the housing Pfc. Trevor LeBlanc and Roxy live in is pretty nice. Season 1 also had a fair amount of drama thrown in. For example, the characters Claudia Joy Holden and Roland Burton are shown being held hostage by a Soldier who was traumatized by his time in Afghanistan. Just a few episodes later, Sergeant George Polarski enters the Hump Bar wired with stolen Army explosives, suicide bomber style. These two situations are not that realistic, but they make for good drama and allow new story lines to form.

At this point, Lifetime has aired two episodes of Season 2. Thanks to the show's huge success, the second season will feature 19 episodes. And, as it happens with many dramatic series that are based on true stories, I'm starting to see even more artistic license in the story lines, even though the show strives to present military life with as much accuracy and realism as possible. In the first episode, viewers find out that after George Polarski detonated his explosives, four people died, three were critically injured, and fifteen sustained minor cuts and bruises. It seemed that even though the explosion took place off post, everyone was taken to Fort Marshall's military hospital, including the Hump Bar's owner and non military dependent, Betty.

In the most recent episode, Roxy LeBlanc is shown once again getting upset and taking on the military establishment when she finds out Betty is going to be shipped to the local county hospital. Roxy thinks Betty should be able to get her treatment on post. But the reality of the situation is, if that explosion had actually happened, it's likely that everyone would have been taken to a civilian hospital. With a few exceptions, civilian hospitals tend to be larger, more modern, and better equipped to handle major catastrophes like the one depicted on Army Wives. In reality, even military members and their dependents would likely end up getting care off post, at least initially. And I'm betting that a lot of people would actually prefer it that way. It's unlikely that victims of an explosion off post would be taken to a federal facility, unless there was absolutely nowhere else for them to go to get timely medical care.

In another plot, the character Lieutenant Colonel Joan Burton is shown weighing her options after finding out she's pregnant. LTC Burton is on the "fast track" and is worried that her career will suffer if she has a baby. She is also concerned that her husband, Roland, whom she had recently considered divorcing, is only staying with her because she's pregnant. In episode 2, Joan Burton is shown at the military hospital, planning to get an abortion. However, in reality, Joan Burton would not be able to get an elective abortion in a military hospital, even if she paid for it. Military medical facilities are run by the federal government. Elective abortions have been illegal in federal medical facilities since 1996. Although there are ongoing efforts to get the law overturned, the reality is that Joan Burton would have had to go off post to a civilian facility for her abortion.

Despite these two instances, I think Army Wives at least tries hard to preserve some realism. For instance, Claudia Joy Holden, Denise Sherwood, and Claudia Joy's daughter, Emmalin, are shown shopping at what appears to be a real AAFES post exchange. As the camera panned around the store, I saw the telltale blue and red AAFES signage and store displays. However, Claudia Joy is shown getting very upset when she's told the store's next shipment of "thank you" cards won't be in for another week. It's as if AAFES is the only shopping option available to military folks. The reality is, Claudia Joy could have gone off post to look for her thank you cards... and she probably would have gotten a better selection elsewhere. Of course, I will grant that Claudia Joy was already a bit unglued because she was grieving for her daughter, Amanda, who was revealed to be one of the casualties in the Hump Bar blast caused by Sergeant Polarski.

I know Army Wives is just a TV show. Despite its occasional lapses in realism, I do enjoy tuning in on iTunes every week. I find the show very entertaining and fun to watch. I'm also glad that it's not a very political show, at least not so far. It's good to see a show about the military that focuses on the families and their roles. But I also think it's important to point out that while the show tries to preserve realism, it's not always a realistic portrayal of the military lifestyle.