TV Review: Broad City (2×02) – “Mochalatta Chills”

After the first episode of season two set things in motion (kind of) for the two leads, episode two brings the complete focus on the two young women and how they’re coping with their current career.

Illana is told by her boss to actually try and pretend like she’s an employee despite her increasingly inappropriate work attire, and she steps up to the task in her own outrageous way and buys a discounted discount white suit while she’s at it. Abbi, on the other hand, sick of her roommate’s interference in her life, tells him to get out of her apartment for once instead of sitting on her couch getting sores on his back from being immobile for so long.

And she, magically, gets her wish. Or at least she believes she does when she walks into her apartment and it’s empty.

Let’s all pause for a moment in gratitude for the comedic gift that was the utilization of Lady Gaga’s song “Edge of Glory.” When Abbi walks into her apartment and realizes that her slob of a roommate Bevers (John Gemberling) isn’t there and it’s the middle of the day, you can already tell that there’s been a shift in the way the show is being executed. There are sepia hues pouring out of the window, it’s all grown glossier, and the camera circles Abbi in an aerial shot. And then she steps out of the room naked (with censor blurs, of course) and dances to “Edge of Glory,” and I know it’s early in the year but it’s already my favorite scene of 2015. I’ve seen the episode twice now and it makes me laugh harder than anything else has in a while.

While it’s hard to view the comedic pair as anything less than a dynamite duo, it’s Illana Glazer who seems to get more of the credit, and I understand why as someone who has praised the actress. If there’s anything Glazer has that captures more focus it’s her innate confidence, something that’s immensely appealing in female actresses and particularly in comediennes. She is so unquestionably comfortable in her own skin on the show – something that’s bereft in the media that would rather bury some insecurity into female characters – with her personality, relationships and appearance that it’s difficult not to be drawn to her since she seems to be daring us to look. However, her big personality doesn’t diminish what Jacobson is doing; it’s just incredibly different. Her physicality is subtle (and hilarious), so when she’s allowed to go all out in moments such as “Edge of Glory,” you realize she has the same magnetism as Glazer; she just allows it to peek out rather than wear it proudly.

This is a good thing, since Abbi once again this week is the focal point of the episode as well as the highlight. Illana’s storyline is fun and it’s also nice to see her irritating her fellow employees, but it’s Abbi’s desperation to become a trainer rather than a cleaner and forcing herself to help train Bevers that gets the biggest laughs. Bevers is undeniably annoying, and we understand completely as an audience why she’d be so reluctant to help him out after he’s taken over every other space in her life. However, as Illana tells her, it’s a moment where she can take a bad situation and turn it into a positive one.

Of course, this all goes well for maybe an hour tops before Bevers falls off a treadmill from exhaustion and needs to be taken to the hospital, giving up on the working out thing as he’s leaving. Abbi is demoted despite the progress she made and the status quo is back to normal.

Illana, however, takes a step up at her job, even bringing in some revenue by the episode’s end with the aid of her three interns that she hired for free to do all of her work. It’s a special kind of Illana initiative.

The episode ends on a note in the style that emphasizes one of the reasons I love this show. Beneath the raucous humor and crude jokes it’s a show that prioritizes the friendship between two young women, and it’s nice to see just how deftly it handles the little moments such as the two lounging on Abbi’s bed as Illana plans her birthing process. It’s nothing monumental, but it’s a small moment in an episode with a lot of big laughs that shows the closeness of the two without making it over-the-top. Friendship, a lot of the time, is about the in-between moments when conversations are sporadic and a little weird, and Broad City understands that.

7.5/10