TV Review: You’re the Worst 3×01 “Try Real Hard”

It’s sometimes easy to forget about You’re the Worst until it’s returned to our screens at the end of the summer and which point no other show holds our grasp in the same manner. It’s a slight show with short seasons but the laughs and emotional heft they manage to pack into one half hour is impressive and sticks with you, demonstrated with Gretchens battle with clinical depression last year. Now, she and Jimmy are on seemingly healthy footing (for them), showcased in the explicit sex scenes that the premiere opens with, the most explicit since the series premiere, which serve as a reminder of why they’re together in the first place. The scene manages to be funny and sexy all in one go, with the two taking time to both mock one another while also enjoying the moment where Gretchen has the floor.

While the pieces have been picked up a bit there are still cracks that lay beneath the surface of the twos relationship as Jimmy points out that they still know very little about one another, evident when Jimmy learns that Gretchen hilariously doesn’t wash her legs. He spends the day trying to get to know her better with tidbits such as her being “generally spiritual” and never having eaten a blueberry because they looking like dolls eyes (“think about it”) while she tries to wrestle an “I love you” out of him after he states that nothing he said while blackout drunk can be taken seriously. However, his trying to learn more about her is his own way of stating his affection.

These two damaged love birds that bite have never had a simplistic look at affection and Jimmy is worried that saying those three words will infer a promise he can’t keep. Gretchen assures him by saying that just because they say it doesn’t mean that can’t bail if the going gets tough and despite the fact that she tells him she doesn’t need the words any longer, he succumbs and with a whole heck of a lot of adoration tells the pint sized spitfire that he loves her.

It’s as sweet as moments come on this series and it’s well earned. We can laugh at their commitment-phobic tendencies but when it comes down to it, these two gel and they’ve stuck through some admitted difficult times to come through it a stronger couple. We want them to succeed which makes the talk of bailing so early on in the series such a concern. Chris Geere and Aya Cash as per usual are delightful and the pair continue to share some of the strongest chemistry onscreen. It is slightly alarming though to begin a season with Jimmy apparently in the healthiest psychological state of the four main characters.

Edgar meanwhile is also dealing with relationship issues from last season with Dorothy after he bailed on moving in with her. However, the real problem comes in the face of the bedroom where he hasn’t been able to perform due to his PTSD medication. Edgars PTSD has always been a nice, underlying subplot that makes fun of the machine more than the individual dealing with the trauma and the episode continues it with Edgars mounting dismay and frustration at having something once so obvious and effortless as his sex drive taken away from him. Dorothy is still less a character than a supporting player to Edgars subplot but the moment where he imposes himself upon her when she asks him if he can just change medications was an upsetting moment for a character typically percieved as the most gentle, good natured of the bunch of assholes on the show.

Then there’s Lindsay, the character who we’ve grown to adore despite her penchant to be more directly cruel than the others, who has yet once again found herself in a mess of her own making. She did some terrible things in the last episodes of season two of You’re the Worst, culminating in her inseminating herself with a turkey baster of Paul’s stolen sperm. With the two now reconciled only because Lindsay didn’t like the idea of being thought of as less than to another woman, she’s been slowly driven up the walls at her new restrictive lifestyle-something she literally forced upon herself. So while Kether Donahue is quietly fascinating to watch as she slowly looses it at the end of the episode after being surprised with a stay at home meal, it’s less entertaining to watch her then lightly stab Paul in the side. It’s great for shock value but it a cruel move on Lindsay’s part and it’s tougher to justify her actions opposed to Gretchens or Edgars because every mess she’s found herself in has been all due to the selfish moves she’s pulled.

Needless to say the intrigue for the next episode is strong. You’re the Worst is addicting once it’s back on air and despite the slightly worrisome state the characters have been introduced into this year, it looks to be a slightly lighter season but with enough character moments to tide us over.

9/10