TV Review: You’re the Worst (2×04) “All About That Paper”

For the majority of this week’s episode of You’re the Worst, everything happens with very little consequence, splitting up its core cast once again to play with the secondary characters. This includes a return of Janet Varney as Lindsay’s aggressive sister, now pregnant, and Paul and Gretchen’s unreliable client Sam, played by Brandon Smith. It’s a light, relatively funny episode, and shows that the minds behind the series have a confidence in its extended cast, able to have them do the majority of the comedic lifting. However, this leaves the leads floundering a bit as they wait to be given anything of real significance to do. It’s telling that the most impactful moment of the episode is the last minute or so as Gretchen sneaks out of the house she shares with Jimmy, burner phone in hand and a troubled look on her face. We don’t know where she’s going but the manner in which she left isn’t promising. We care about Gretchen, we care about Gretchen and Jimmy being together, so of course it’s the one scene that could directly cause consequence to both leads that matters the most.

While I haven’t minded the cast being split up so much this season, I am a fan who believes they all are at their best, and funniest, when they’re in a room together. Breaking them up is never going to be as effective, even if for the most part they get enough mileage out of their own respective, singular storylines.

Lindsay’s the only one who’s really had any sort of story arc this year and it’s currently the one I’m the invested in since it’s clear she’s spinning off the rails. Finally given divorce papers from Paul and unwilling to believe that he’s lost total interest in her, she schemes to get him back even though she never really was that interested to begin with. This is all about control for her. It’s about being wanted by someone, about being loved even when you don’t love that person in return. For all that Lindsay screams of confidence, and how self-assured she is about herself 90% of the time, these are the insecurities that persistently ring about in the back of her head.

Not to say that these insecurities at all justify herself trying to impregnate herself with Paul’s frozen sperm. Edgar arrives just as she’s making this impulsively dumb decision and doesn’t understand what’s happening as he’s shoved out of the house so that Lindsay can scrape the sperm out of the microwave, only to burn herself with it, forced to cool herself off with a popsicle.

Can I go on the record and say that that has to be the weirdest sentence I’ve ever typed? Thank you You’re the Worst. 

Lindsay is literally scraping the bottom of the barrel at trying to find happiness in a past life that never provided much to begin with. It’s a sad state for a character to find themselves in and made even more so when we realize that Edgar was at Lindsay’s door to tell her how he felt for her and was rejected without understanding why. Edgar’s storyline seemed like one big lead up to him developing an interest for improv, something that will become much more interesting after he begins partaking in the activity.

Gretchen and Jimmy are actively growing comfortable in their couple status, even if both refuse to admit it and aren’t even aware that it’s happening. Gretchen makes an offhand comment about checking in with him later while they’re both at work and he mocks her. They then spend the entire day doing just that, whether it’s Gretchen texting Jimmy about a lost jolly rancher or Jimmy video calling with Gretchen to join him at a strip club. They find genuine amusement in one another and are some of the very few people they enjoying being around. It’s a fun little running joke that never needs a real punch line, even if it ends with the two meeting at a bar to talk about their days after they’ve been sharing their activities throughout the day already. Jimmy has decided to pursue writing his second novel after spending his day with an author looking for a comeback who believes that because he’s writer he needs to create artificial moments of spontaneity, something that repulses Jimmy. However, Chris Geere does get one really nice understated moment when the author tells him how much he enjoyed his first book, pointing out details that no one had noticed before.

Gretchen meanwhile had spent her work hours trying to rectify a fight created between Sam and his group, only to realize that the drama had been picked up online before fabricating more drama. It’s a very smart, Gretchen thing to do, even if by the end of the day her biggest takeaway was that she found the jolly rancher.

And then she leaves in the middle of the night to do who knows what and it seems mildly out of the blue after the day she had but also very in line with what we know about the character. What interests me is if this is going to be something that get’s resolved in the next episode or if it’s something that will be dragged out. Gretchen did just pay Jimmy six months of rent, which implied she was there to stay for a while. Was it that long term commitment that sent her running? Was it the increasing amount of stability she was feeling in her life? Maybe it’s nothing at all but with Gretchen’s penchant for self-sabotage we can never be too sure and the distress written over Aya Cash’s face makes me worried (a little worried) about what’s going to happen next.
7/10