'Army Wives' is a sobering reminder of what the Trump administration is erasing
Joan Burton's character may be one of the most significant in the TV series
Writer’s note on August 25, 2025: This post was written before I saw Season 6, Episode 11, and observed Trevor’s reaction versus Roxy’s reaction to the orphanage in Narubu. This episode also made me reevaluate rolling my eyes at Frank. I thought their stances would be the exact opposite. This episode was a solid conversation piece. The spoiler section was also rewritten after I finished the seventh season.
I never had any desire to watch “Army Wives” when it first aired, but Sterling K. Brown kept talking about his time on the show. During his podcast “We Don’t Always Agree” with his wife, Ryan Michelle Bathe, he brought up a particular scene that pissed off his mother — who called him after every episode but chose not to call after one episode. I wasn’t curious then and probably still wouldn’t have watched the show, which aired from 2007 to 2013, but I kept seeing the ROKU promo for it. I gave in and watched.
I was pleasantly surprised to find out I enjoyed Brown’s character Roland Burton, who is a psychologist, a husband, a father and reminds me of the real-life comical Brown. But there are other characters on “Army Wives” who are an acquired taste.
SPOILER ALERTS (START)
If Roland and Joan weren’t on this show, there’s a zero chance I would’ve finished it. Latasha came in way too late, and parts of her reminded me too much of Roxy. The rest of the women were painfully annoying, judgmental and know-it-alls.
After having two Black babies on a pool table to get $50K as a surrogate, down-to-Earth Pamela weirdly became smug. It’s also peculiar that this ex-cop didn’t understand why her husband, who was pretty much an undercover spy, wouldn’t tell her every minute of his day. Of all the people, I would think she’d understand why he couldn’t chat about it.
Roxy was the painfully stereotypical “dumb blonde” but without the likeability of someone like Rose Nylund from “Golden Girls” or Chrissy Snow from “Three’s Company.” She was having the same struggle over and over and over again, not comprehending that military deploy and she will move a lot. Complaining about this won’t change who she married. I’d also like to believe Chrissy and Rose would know not to wear an “I have crabs” T-shirt during a golf tournament. I’d rather hang out with Lenore Baker Ludwig for 24 hours versus spending 24 minutes with Roxy saying “fixin’,” “ain’t” and showing off her wedges.
Claudia Joy found out she had Type 2 diabetes and reacted like someone told her she had herpes, going into full-blown panic mode and barking at her whole household more aggressively than when her bratty teen daughter Emmalin ran away from home to try to marry a grown man. Emmalin made teenage Becky from “Roseanne” seem more tolerable and was difficult clear out of nowhere. I’m still unclear about the attitude change unless the goal was to give her a storyline. I was elated when Claudia died on the show, but the entire seventh season was obsessed with talking about this lady. Move on to a new storyline!
Denise, who I originally liked, became even more exciting after she got a motorcycle and returned to working in a hospital — even without the infidelity with two doctors, temporarily hurting the marriage with her rigid husband Frank. When Frank got a motorcycle and they rekindled their marriage, he became a comedic delight! Unfortunately, she was a snoozefest again in Season 5, and Frank went back to acting like G.I. Joe. When she wasn’t saying “Claudia Joy” 1,000 times per episode, she was mourning this lady’s death more than her own son and the doctor who died! You’d swear Denise and Claudia Joy was the lesbian couple instead of Nicole and Charlie. And I can’t wrap my mind around why Denise did a 180-degree turn and started acting like Lenore by the seventh season.
This show did not end well. I was annoyed. But I still loved Roland, Joan and their kids.
SPOILER ALERTS (END)
When I started watching, my eyes were on Joan Burton (played by Wendy Davis) and wondering whether this married couple would last three episodes, never mind both Black actors staying on the show for seven seasons. Outside of those two, Denise Sherwood (played by Catherine Bell) and Trevor LeBlanc (played by Drew Fuller) were my favorites.
“Army Wives” has turned out to be a surprisingly good show. Season 3, Episode 15, “As Time Goes By” definitely played into the white savior role during the Jim Crow era. Season 3, Episode 17, “Fire in the Hose” made me think of real-life Black behavioral therapist Charles Kinsey, who was shot by police while trying to help an autistic patient.
But Season 3, Episode 14, “Need to Know Basis” is the one that really left a lasting impression for me. Unlike the two episodes mentioned above, one particular scene would not have had the same response when the show first aired as it does right now in 2025 under a second-term Trump presidency.
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Sonequa Martin-Green’s Kanessa Jones meets Wendy Davis’ Lieutenant Colonel Joan Burton
I suppose this third-season scene in “Army Wives” would be impressive to women of any race and Black men, but it’s especially touching to Black women like me. A room full of men jumped up to stand like statues when the lieutenant entered the recruiting center, which led to a confused 17-year-old Kanessa turning around to see what all the fuss was about. Kanessa, who had been an edgy and athletic teenager, lit up when she saw a Black woman behind her.
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It was more than obvious that Trevor put Joan up to this meet-and-greet. There was nothing in the script that explained why this particular member of the army came to meet the hesitant recruit. But you know. I smiled at this fictional scene with a Black woman lieutenant from the South Side of Chicago (Bronzeville) talking to a potential recruit, wondering how many Black women (and men) experienced this in real life before joining. And then my smile fell, remembering that the Trump administration has gone out of their way to make diversity, equity and inclusion the mediocre excuse to remove all signs of Black and women veterans from military websites, including educational material from Arlington National Cemetery’s website.
Recommended Read: “GOP hates women so much that they erased a 'Golden Girl' ~ Yes, Bea Arthur was in the Marine Corps”
Trump’s goal was growing obvious when, during Black History Month, he abruptly fired the Air Force General CQ Brown Jr. as chair of the joint chiefs of staff. The next month, there was the web address change to “deimedal-of-honor” to describe Black Medal of Honor recipient Army Maj. Gen. Charles Calvin Rogers. And you would have to be wearing Sandra Bullock’s blindfold in “Bird Box” not to notice Trump’s U.S. military suddenly didn’t have a single woman in a four-star general or admiral leadership position.
Lisa Franchetti, the first female Chief of Naval Operations; Admiral Linda Fagan, the first female to lead the Coast Guard; and Lieutenant General Jennifer Short, the senior military assistant to the secretary of defense, were purposely removed. And if those three white women couldn’t make the cut, it was a given that Telita Crosland, the former head of the military’s Defense Health Agency, was going to have to go — and ended up being forced to retire after a 32-year career.
Although Kanessa and Joan are fictional characters, I re-watched that scene in “Army Wives” four times, wondering if any Black woman who wants to join the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Space Force or Coast Guard would even see an example like this in real life now. Or, will all six branches start looking like the same masked people kidnapping legal migrants off the street without explanation or “policing” the streets of Los Angeles and Washington D.C.