Mina Starsiak Hawk Says She Got 'Nasty' Comments from Legions of 'HGTV Women' After Ending of “Good Bones”
The HGTV star also says the show's fans told her she was letting them down by wrapping the long-running show, on the latest episode of her podcast
Mina Starsiak Hawk is reflecting on the end of Good Bones, more than six months after announcing that the eighth season of her long-running series would be its last.
On the latest episode of her podcast, Mina AF, the HGTV star tells sociologist Danielle Lindemann that she’s often asked about the show’s longevity.
“I think for us, it really was because we had so many characters. You could relate to at least one of us,” she says.
Starsiak Hawk started her Indianapolis-based home renovation business, Two Chicks and a Hammer, with her mom, Karen E. Laine, in 2007. While Laine retired from the company in 2019, she still appeared on the show, which also featured Mina’s brother Tad Starsiak.
“You could relate to at least my mom, or me, or my brother Tad, because you were like a young 20-something-year-old trying to figure s--- out, breaking stuff,” Mina explains.
“And I think it’s been really weird or unpleasant for a lot of people when the show ended the way it ended and kind of that curtain was pulled back a little bit, like ‘Oh, her and her mom don’t have a perfect relationship like it looks like on the show,'” she continues. “And then you get people going back and saying, ‘You know what? I could actually see that. I could see them being irritated with each other.’”
Mina has been candid about tensions with family members during previous conversations on her podcast, saying she wasn’t “in a great place” with either Tad or her mom.
Later in this week’s episode, Mina says it was necessary to end the show because “the finances weren’t making sense.”
She notes that it’s a common misconception among viewers that everyone seen on Good Bones was employed by her company, when — as she's previously pointed out — her relatives and other costars actually haven’t worked for Two Chicks “for the past handful of years.”
“There was also this thing happening in the background, because I was the only one that owned the company, where no one else gave a s---. They were all just there having fun, which was lovely, and it was just too much to keep going.”
However, Good Bones fans have been vocal about their disappointment on social media.
"When it ended, it wasn't just letting down the people on the show and the production team that was making the show and had jobs, and my family who was getting paid to be on the show,” she says. “It was letting down this whole world of HGTV women and they all told me that I did and that they were very upset about it.”
“It was a very weird six months of emotional, not good headspace because even though I feel like I'm very balanced about what I let into my psyche and what I don't, it's still really hard to have people say nasty s--- all day, every day, and not kind of let it affect you," she adds.
In January, Mina gave an update on her family rifts while revealing how she navigated the holidays with husband Steve Hawk, with whom she shares 5-year-old son Jack and 3-year-old daughter Charlie.
As for Christmas Day, Mina says, “I did end up going to all the family celebrations.”
“There’s a lot kind of lingering and unsettled in my family land, and I’ve finally gotten to the place where I’m just okay with that,” she added. “And I don’t need to put any more energy into it until some outside energy is put into it in a way that makes it worth re-engaging.”
Related: Mina Starsiak Hawk Addresses Commenter Who Said She Looks ‘Angry’ on ‘Good Bones’
Ahead of Good Bones’ series finale in October, she reflected on what she wishes she had known before finding fame on the show.
“I think I knew … that this was going to be hard and it was going to challenge relationships, because when you put anything under a spotlight, in a pressure cooker, there’s the opportunity to explode,” she said. “And I myself am not stable enough to not explode at times."
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Mina noted that her "whole complicated family organization" includes a lot of different personalities and "people with so many different issues, weaknesses, things left to learn.”
She added, “I just wish I had known how bad it could be.”
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