The hand that rocks the cradle indeed….

In honor of Mother’s Day, the staff of PCU got together and discussed some of our favorite, and some of our most despised, moms from Television. Here are just few of the moms who’ve made an impression on us over the years and why they stand out as awesome or downright terrible…

Adam
Best
Marge Simpson – The Simpsons – If you want to know how good a mother is, look no further than how badly it hurts when you disappoint them. Bart Simpson is truly the devil’s child, and while it’s usually played for laughs, when he hurts Marge, he knows it. Consider the time Bart was caught shoplifting, or the time he killed a mother bird. Marge’s disappointment was palpable, hurting the viewer as much as Bart. It’s moments like this that inspire Bart’s better angels and actually get him to be a genuinely good kid for a brief moment.

Worst
Peggy Hill – King of the Hill – Peggy Hill needs to be lit on fire and then the ashes should be sent into a black hole. Note: I am not a violent person. Why?  Peggy is insufferable and believes she knows everything when she very objectively doesn’t.  This is the point of the character.  You’re supposed to hate her.  It worked too well….

Brook
Best
Morticia Addams – The Addams Family – Morticia is the perfect mother. She encourages her children to experiment with life. To find the joy in the darker things. She watches over them without coddling them, and lets them make their own mistakes. Yet, she’s always there to pick them up and push them on to new things.

Worst
Norma Bates – The Bates Motel – Norma is the perfect storm for the serial killer she molded. Needy, overbearing, unstable; she tries to be the perfect mom and ends up doing everything wrong. Worse, she hides from everyone his (and her) issues, leaving them to fester into violent psychosis.

Doug
Best
Maya DiMeo – Speechless – Maya’s a great mom, who makes mistakes out of trying too hard. She worries about, and cares so much for JJ (her disabled son), that sometimes that gets in the way of relating to her other 2 kids and husband. There are times she she wants to do so much for JJ, to the point that she frequently forgets to let him live his own life as a teen, but it’s all out of a fierce love. She’s fiercely loyal to her family, and anyone who crosses any member of the DiMeo clan will feel Maya’s wrath.

Worst
Alice Cooper – Riverdale – Alice is a selfish, self-righteous bitch with a serious case of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy. She uses Polly & Betty to get attention, while emasculating her husband, and I would not be shocked if Betty’s mental issues weren’t a result of something her twit mother did. *WOOOOOSAAAAAAHHHHHH*

Sherri
Best
Maya Lewis – Scandal – The mother of Olivia Pope, is the antithesis of how mothers are portrayed in the media. Her career came before family. She’s an international terrorist but there is no doubt she loved her daughter. This woman has a strong personality, is stylish and intelligent. She isn’t a pawn or low level spy she is in control of her network and I believe planned the events that lead to her faking her death.  These traits were definitely inherited by her daughter.  Olivia could not have become the woman she is with a traditional mother figure in her life.

Belle
Erica Kane – All My Children – Yes, that’s right, like Brook I went to the wayback machine but the truth is that ‘Erica, Erica Kane’, was one of the best mothers on television. Yes, she was crazy, yes she was manipulative but the fact remains, there’s a reason she’s listed as a Mama Bear on her TV Tropes page. If you ever, ever, even thought of coming for her beloved daughters Kendall and Bianca, there was a more than even chance you would end up dead, as Michael Cambias (and many others), found out. Was Erica perfect? No, but she loved her girls and when Bianca came out of the closest – in one of the most groundbreaking storylines in the history of television – and Kendall suffered an almost debilitating (and real) heart condition Erica was there, keeping her girls safe, no matter what.

Hermione Lodge – Riverdale – In a town full of crazy, Hermione – for all her riches – is refreshingly down to earth. Trying to keep a level head as her husband plots from jail, with everyone in town gunning for her in his absence, she still manages to make sure Veronica knows she’s loved and lend a non-judgmental ear to the crazy kids of Riverdale.

Estella Rodriguez – Sense8 – When Lito, the super macho film star member of the Sensates, was forcibly outed he expected the worst and for the most part he got it. Yet, when he went home for Christmas to see his beloved mother, the person he was most afraid of confronting with his homosexuality, he was welcomed home with all the love in the world. In a scene that will bring tears to even the most hardened of hearts, Estella tells Lito that she always knew he was gay, and she always has and always will love him.

Worst:
Mary Winchester – Supernatural – This one hurts my heart. Mary Winchester, the matriarch of the Winchester family, the reason that John, Sam and Dean become the people they become….is a terrible mother. Brought back last season by Amara as a gift to Dean for reconciling her and her brother (and therefore stopping the end of the universe) Mary initially has a hard time adjusting to the fact that it’s been 30+ years since her death, which, understandable. However, it’s not that which got her on this list, it’s literally everything that comes afterwards. Mary, given the chance of a lifetime, chooses instead to run away from the children she lost, focusing on hunting and not the opportunity of getting to know the young men whose entire lives were built around honoring her. Worse she gets in bed (in one case literally) with the British Men of Letters, aka: Hogwarts, but with more murder, and compromises not only herself and her sons but every remnant of the American Men of Letters and the American hunters. Basically….Sam and Dean would’ve been far better off if she’d stayed dead.

Cersei Lannister – Game Of Thrones – As the architect of her own downfall it is unsurprising that Cersei has managed to bring everyone in her orbit down with her. Her unmitigated hatred for anyone and everyone who isn’t her directly led to the deaths of not one, not two but all three of her children. Thank the seven she doesn’t have any children left to destroy.

Dorothy Walker – Jessica Jones – Whooo boy. The woman who took in Jessica after her parents and brother’s death as a publicity stunt to further Trish’s career and who was secretly beating the living hell out of Trish, Dorothy is a vile, conniving, viper who would and did, exploit her daughters at every opportunity. Is it any wonder that Trish and Jessica have a 500 ft restraining order for her set up?

Those are our picks for the Best and Worst Moms in Television. Who are some of your favorite or most hated moms? And why? Let us know in the comments!