Big Bang Theory: 10 Ways Penny Matured Throughout The Series

The Big Bang Theory is a show full of character growth and development, one of the most notable being Penny’s. With a show consisting primarily of male protagonists, Penny stood out from the beginning. It wasn’t until the show was a few seasons in that another female character was added into the main cast, making Penny the female character with the most screen time.

As The Big Bang Theory progressed and the viewers got to grow with the characters, Penny’s transformation became one of the best on the show. Watching her go from the girl next door to the one everyone goes to for advice throughout the course of the show’s 12 seasons was extremely satisfying for fans.

Her Dress Sense

While this may not seem like a sign of maturity, with Penny it most definitely is. In the first season, she is seen wearing very sorority-esque clothes which, given that at the time as a young woman in her early 20s, is understandable. However, as the seasons go by, her dress sense starts changing and evolving, just like her.

Penny’s growth and maturity can easily be seen in her ever-changing closet, going from playful booty shorts when she was working at The Cheesecake Factory while trying to make it as an actress to more adult pantsuits when she gets a 9-5 job. Moreover, her clothing also changes to be more professional as she starts to realize her value as a powerful and intelligent woman.

She Starts Valuing Herself

While her clothing shows viewers how she perceives herself, Penny’s relationships are also an important factor in understanding how her self-worth evolves throughout the seasons. In the first season, Penny is mostly with guys who don’t value her, the prime example of this being Zack, which forces her to strive for their attention however she can. However, after dating Leonard, this all changes.

Penny’s relationship with Leonard makes her realize that she deserves to be treated a certain way. This helps her not only with her future relationships but also with how she treats herself and the choices she makes for herself. Even when Penny does get back together with Zack on The Big Bang Theory, she starts to stand up for herself when he doesn’t treat her well.

She Becomes More Organized

As the seasons go by and Penny starts adapting to adulthood, she starts to minutely make changes in her lifestyle. She slowly starts to build up a schedule instead of spending nights out partying and becomes more regular with simple tasks, like doing her laundry. A lot of these minor changes become more prominent once she starts her job as a salesperson.

More importantly, the fact that she goes from someone with no financial sense to someone who takes a job for financial stability because she wants to pay off her debts shows how her mindset has changed.

She Becomes Smarter

For a long time at the beginning of the show, Penny was portrayed as a dumb character, especially because of her constant comparison to the professions others had. However, as seasons went by it started becoming clear that Penny was far from dumb.

Not only was she always street smart, but she also starts showing her true potential. A glimpse of this can be seen in “The Werewolf Transformation,” when Leonard teaches her how to play chess and by the end of the episode, she’s beating him at the game. In a way, being in the company of Sheldon and Leonard on The Big Bang Theory allowed her to realize that she didn’t need to dumb herself down for others.

She Becomes Ambitious

It would be unfair to say that Penny was never ambitious, given how hard she tried to become an actress, however, her ambition became much more prominent in the later seasons. Once she got a job, Penny’s growth into a responsible adult is much more obvious.

Examples of her ambitions can be seen in season 12 when she chooses to take the promotion offered by Bernadette and becomes Head of Sales at the pharmaceutical company she works at. One of her best qualities is her ability to strive for success despite the possibility of failure in her professional life.

She Gets A Job

Even though Penny doesn’t make much headway as an actress, she keeps trying for years. It isn’t until season 8 that she finally calls it quits on her acting career and becomes a salesperson at a pharmaceutical company.

The switch to a well-paying job shows how much Penny has grown throughout the show, going from someone who never cared about professional or financial stability to someone who realizes that she needs to be able to fend for herself and her future better. Her acceptance of the new job also comes with little struggle because she manages to find something that she is good at.

She Becomes Money Conscious

Penny’s track record for finances was established as very bad from the second season when she borrows money from Sheldon in “The Financial Permeability.” She also borrows money from Leonard and is considered a freeloader by many. But this changes drastically on The Big Bang Theory when Penny finally gets a job.

After taking the job at Bernadette’s pharmaceutical company, Penny’s financial situation starts getting a lot more stable. She starts to actively think about costs and focuses on paying back debts that she has accumulated over the years. Her financial maturity is especially shown in season 9 when she admits that the only reason she hasn’t left her job, which she hates, is because it pays well.

She Wants To Improve Herself

One of the best changes that viewers watch Penny go through is the growth in her desire to improve herself. She goes to Sheldon to learn about science, not just to be able to understand Leonard but to know more about the subject. And although she fails, it’s the attempt at learning that counts, which is commendable.

A better example of this is when, in “The Extract Obliteration,” viewers find out she is attending college. This revelation is a great example of Penny’s growth because, in the earlier seasons, her opinion of a college education was pretty obvious. Additionally, the fact that she doesn’t want Leonard’s help with her assignments because she wants to work on them herself also shows how much she’s changed. Season 1 Penny would have jumped at the chance to palm her work off to someone else.

She Becomes Friends With Amy & Bernadette

Before she started hanging out with Amy and Bernadette on The Big Bang Theory, Penny didn’t seem to have any female friendships. After their first interaction without the guys around, in “The 21-Second Excitation,” they all start bonding and slowly become closer.

Having female friends is great for Penny because she gets the chance to share things with them that she couldn’t have shared with Sheldon or Leonard. Additionally, friends who were both extremely smart and working in stable jobs helped Penny sort herself out, just like Penny’s experiences and advice helped them out.

She Goes Beyond The Stereotype

Even though she started out as the girl next door, by the end of the show, Penny was far from the stereotype she was first portrayed as in the first season. With each passing episode, the writers slowly made her shed that persona for a new, more evolved one where she became much more sensible and grounded.

Not only that, over the course of 12 seasons, she became much less self-absorbed and lost parts of her vanity. She started to care for people in her friend group and became closer to everyone, especially Bernadette and Amy. Furthermore, her habits of freeloading and unrealistic expectations also dissolve into a person who is conscious that being an adult comes with certain responsibilities.