YMMV / The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

• Alternate Character Interpretation: Evelyn is a self-admitted liar with a penchant for manipulation who's telling her own life's story. Everyone else who was a part of her life is dead by the time she tells it, so there's no one around to correct her. As such, it's reasonable to believe that some events did not happen the way she said, or that she played up the negative and/or positive traits in certain people.
  • Was Celia Saint James really the innocent, nice girl from next door? Or was she as cunning and vicious in her career as Evelyn was, and Evelyn chose to see and depict her lover as a pure person?
  • Was Evelyn actually a great schemer or just incredibly lucky, and is trying to cover for that by making it sound like she had full control over everything?
• Ass Pull: Some feel like The Reveal that it was Monique's father who was the lover that died with Harry in the car accident didn't have enough build up or hints to it, making the moment it's revealed feel like it came out of nowhere. It's also an arguably unneeded explanation for why Evelyn was so insistent that she be interviewed by Monique, when another one already exists: Monique's well written, well researched, and nuanced article about assisted suicide for those who are suffering from an incurable condition is what put her on Evelyn's radar. Evelyn had been recently diagnosed with breast cancer, and after watching her own daughter succumb to its effects, Evelyn knew that Monique would respect her decision to take her own life instead of go through treatment and an eventual slow death.
• Jerk Ass Woobie: Evelyn Hugo is by no means a good person, being willing to manipulate and lie about other people (such as her cover up of Harry's involvement in James' death) in order to get what she wants, and even she herself knows and acknowledges this. Despite that, or because of it, you can't help but admire her sheer drive and determination in coming from nothing yet reaching her goal, while also pitying how little she enjoyed hiding parts of herself just to maintain her reputation. The fact that she's essentially left alone in the end can drive this home.
• Squick: The lengths to which teenage Evelyn goes through to become a film star gets uncomfortable really fast:
  • Fourteen-year-old Evelyn "trades" off her virginity to 22-year-old Ernie Diaz as part of her plan to marry him and escape her hometown.
  • To secure better roles, seventeen-year-old Evelyn seduces Ari Sullivan, a nearly 50-year-old studio executive who turns out to have a "fetish for orally pleasuring under aged girls."