Welcome back to my weekly review and recap of “You’re the Worst.” To catch up on previous coverage, click here.
“Wear your stains on the outside of your clothes.”
In a conference call with Desmin Borges (Edgar) earlier this week, he spoke briefly and vaguely about this week’s episode of You’re the Worst “There Is Not Currently a Problem”. He said that it’s when all of the characters begin to fall down the rabbit hole, that there’s one character who first falls in while the others try to pull them out, before subsequently tumbling in themselves.
It looks like Gretchen is the first one to fall down and now it’s time to see how and if they’ll pick up the pieces, or, if Jimmy takes Gretchen’s end words about not trying to fix her, because he can’t, to heart.
From the very beginning of episode there is something noticeably off about Gretchen, so much so that we can tell even Jimmy notices, and it sets the tone for the episode, where everyone surrounding Gretchen is their normal selves, with Jimmy even starting the day in a chipper mood, before the yarn that is Gretchen’s stability begins to get tugged out until it all unravels, becoming a messy ball of drunken emotion. This is an episode that proves why You’re the Worst is so excellent because the humor is never lost, but the drama rings through in a honest, heartbreaking manner. Gretchen’s reveal that she is clinically depressed, that it’s something Lindsay has witnessed before, and that it’s something that Gretchen refers to her as her “brain being broken” shows that despite the mean spirited demeanor, these characters care, about themselves, about each other, even if they’re not so inviting to “randos” like Dorothy.
The only deviation we get from Gretchen’s plot is Jimmy’s obsession over finding a mouse that’s been making itself a makeshift home in in his garage, something he’s outraged to learn Gretchen and Edgar knew about and makes it his days mission to find it.
Gretchen however, has one sole mission, and that is to distract herself from the conflicting turmoil she’s feeling. She starts the day off drinking, adding copious amounts of alcohol into her bloody mary before quickly switching to a beer and so on, never in a scene without something to drink. Her mounting panic at being stuck in the house while a marathon keeps her edgy, dancing and moving to keep herself out of her own head and is helped when Lindsay arrives and doesn’t even question it. However, here distractions can only last herself so long, and once she realizes that there is no alcohol left, and after being turned down by both Jimmy and Edgar to get more, both of them saying that’s she’s probably had enough, she let’s loose in an angry, and unflattering tirade against everyone around her.
Beginning with Edgar, she mocks his issues with PTSD, a low blow to start things off and tells him to stop being so hung up with Lindsay, especially when she’s so pathetic that she’s still chasing an ex-husband who is soft and dating the female version of himself. Vernon doesn’t even warrant an insult while Dorothy get’s slapped with the “not attractive enough to play the lead but not fat enough to play the sidekick” comment, saying that improv is the lowest form of comedy and finally, in her anger, sets her sights on Jimmy. She pokes at his identity of a writer, making it out to be mere triviality, before shouting at all of them about how they’re an emotional vacuum before being distracted by the mouse running by, and proceeding to squash it with a book.
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Needless to say, Aya Cash killed it, delivering her single best performance since season one. The rage she exudes is just barely hanging on to composure and we see her next in her room, crumpled up into a ball crying, as Lindsay approaches her and asks her if “it” is back. Gretchen doesn’t want to tell Jimmy what’s happening, but Lindsay is the surprising voice of reason, saying that she’s never seen Gretchen share so much of her “disgusting self” with anyone and that she and Jimmy went into this relationship knowing full well that they were full of faults. It would be in Gretchen’s best interest to tell Jimmy the truth.
So she does, after Jimmy and the rest of the gang have given the mouse a proper send off via car exhaust.
She approaches him and Chris Geere get’s a marvelous moment of subtlety here as well, as his facade crumbles and his genuine concern wears through as he asks Gretchen to tell him what’s going on. She tells him she’s clinically depressed, that she’s been for a while and typically knows how to handle it but sometimes the lows catch her off guard and all she needs from Jimmy is to treat her normally, that he needs to know he can’t fix her.
There’s a storm of emotions on Jimmy’s face at this point as he asks her “can’t I?” We’re left in a place of ambiguity, not given exactly what it is that Jimmy is feeling as he hugs Gretchen and watches as a mouse runs back into his home, infesting his house with who knows what, showing that maybe even he isn’t capable of fixing everything.
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“Oh, I know you. You’re a theater girl”
“What are we, New Yorkers?”
“You guys have fun…dancing to no music.”
“And then some Asian boy handed me Gatorade which is weird.”
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“Is that your real vocie?” “Who’s the rando.”
“I slept in a sunbeam.”
“I ran through the people.”
“He’s kind of my back up side bitch, and he likes it.”
10/10
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