Jason Unger

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We never had HBO until last year. We've always been big movie people, but it never seemed worth it to pay extra to Comcast for a bunch of flicks that we could have watched on DVD months earlier.

Then came The Sopranos.

Yeah, you think you know where this is going … but hold on.

We got started on The Sopranos way late. My dad was a fan, so for one of his birthdays we got him the first few seasons on DVD. As it turned out, we ended up watching them instead.

We finished the first five seasons (and a half? six? whatever) right before the final half of Season 6 and decided it was worth to subscribe to HBO — and haven't looked back.

From Big Love to Entourage to Curb Your Enthusiasm to Ali G, HBO has the best original series on TV.

We also watched this show Tell Me You Love Me, which was basically softcore porn with a plot.

Now we're watching John Adams, the mini-series based on David McCullough's book of the same name, starring Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney. It's a fascinating look into the birth of our country, no matter how inaccurate the depiction of their teeth.

(I'm kind of hoping Giamatti says something about merlot at some point during the series, but I'm not holding my breath.)

For people who watch a lot of TV — like we do, yes, I admit it — HBO is worth it. We've been entertained way beyond the $10 or $15 a month we're paying for it, and we haven't even started The Wire, Extras or Rome.

When you think about paying $30 for two people to spend one night at the movies, a month of HBO is a steal.

And that's how it became our favorite channel.

Do you watch Big Love? Even if you don't, you've probably heard about it.

The two-line recap: a family of polygamists in Utah try to live the normal, American life in the suburbs while keeping their beliefs and practices underwraps from their neighbors and the patriarch's business customers.

It's a really well done show (another hit for HBO), tackling a topic that apparently is really interesting to people. The stories are interesting, the characters are well-written and played, and, despite the oddities of polygamy, there's something that nearly every viewer can relate to.

The show has become pretty popular, even getting positive reviews from real polygamists (reg. required).

While the women said "Big Love" had too much skin and not enough religion or humor for their taste, they agreed that it portrayed the Henricksons like any other American family, especially in an era of mixed marriages of all sorts, gay partnerships, single parents and serial monogamy.

Presumably in response to the show's popularity, ABC's Primetime did a whole episode on polygamy, interviewing a polygamist family on camera, even though they could have been arrested.

And if you've been watching the new season of House, you know that one of the characters vying for a job — Cole, a Mormon — was dubbed "Big Love" by House.

Recently, Law & Order SVU highlighted polygamy (watch the video) through a Nigerian family.

Big Love's influence is everywhere.

This isn't the first TV show to affect many aspects of popular culture, and it certainly won't be the last, but given the subject matter, it's certainly interesting to follow.

Of course, Big Love's subject matter is also highlighted in the political world, as Mitt Romney, a leading Republican candidate for president, has had to address religion's influence in culture and his own Mormon faith.

Now, no legitimate critic would suggest that Romney is a proponent or at all in favor of polygamy, but for many Americans, that's what they know of Mormonism (however inaccurate it may be.) Romney had to give a speech just to address religion because it's a factor that hangs over him.

It's a really interesting phenomenon, at lot of it thanks to this one TV show.