TV Review: You’re the Worst (2×08) “Spooky Sunday Funday”

Welcome back to my weekly review and recap of “You’re the Worst.” To catch up on previous coverage, click here.

“Spooky Sunday Funday”offers us plenty of great moments for all the characters involved as Jimmy rallies the group to give Gretchen a day she’ll want to remember, which all culminates in one of the more potentially upsetting moments in season two so far. Lindsay is told early in the episode by Paul that she always quits when things get tough, and it’s a theme that plays throughout the rest of the episode as the characters grapple with taking the easy way out or owning up to their shortcomings and dealing with shit head on.

Lindsay’s problems are the most by the numbers but she’s the character who has the toughest time taking control of her own life. All she needs to do is get her power turned back on and spends the episode on a downward spiral, until trapped in a no rules allowed haunted house, is given a pep talk by her tormentor in one of the strangest, touching scenes I think I’ve ever seen. Stripped to her underwear, and covered in fake blood, the Lindsay we see here is the one with her head on straight, and the moment she walks into her house to see the lights on and her toast burnt is oddly satisfying.

Edgar meanwhile is worried about two things. One, he hasn’t had sex in three years and two, hasn’t told Dorothy that he suffers from PTSD. This is all comes to light in the demonic haunted house (seriously, if those things are real, you couldn’t pay me to enter, like not a chance in hell.) After being attacked by one of the set performers Edgar begins to beat him up before being pulled away by Dorothy. He tells her the truth both about the PTSD and the sex, and Dorothy reacts in such a human and warm way that it’s not hard to think she’s been transplanted from another show.

And then we get the show of the two hipsters walking in on them having sex while Dorthy still has her beard on, and you realize she fits the tone just fine.

Gretchen and Jimmy is where things land on shaky ground for me, both for good and bad reasons.

I am so conflicted on how to feel about the Jimmy “trying to fix Gretchen” storyline because to me, there are two ways of looking at it as the viewer. One the one hand, Jimmy has immediately gone against Gretchen’s wishes, which is wrong, and he obviously has ill conceived notions about what depression is, just like most of the world. He believes that Gretchen being depressed equates to little more than her being in a funk. So yes, he’s being largely ignorant, and he should clearly be respectful of what Gretchen asked of him, especially after she opened herself vulnerably to him about her diagnosis.

On the other hand…this has to be the least self-obsessed Jimmy we’ve ever seen right? (And I realize this just might be how I’m reading it). His day’s mission is to make Gretchen happy, from partaking in Sunday Funday, an event his loathes, dropping a $1000 deposit so that he can rent her a Game of Thrones Daenerys costume, to willingly signing up for a haunted house built from the pits of hell and personal nightmares. His small smiles at her happiness, and his genuine hurt at the end after she get’s mad are both great moments for Chris Geere, and great moments for the character as well.

You’re the Worst has written Jimmy and Gretchen and co. so that I am not surprised by Jimmy’s ignorance or Gretchen’s anger, but I am surprised by Jimmy’s sincerity in wanting to “fix” Gretchen, even if the notion is both ludicrous and offensive. This is telling but it’s showing that a very small piece of Jimmy has changed.

Which makes it all the more upsetting when moments later, Jimmy begins a slight flirtation with the owner of Nina’s Bar, and is obviously in the middle of having a drink with her when Gretchen arrives. If anything between Jimmy and Nina is going to pick up remains to be seen, and I hope the show doesn’t go down the obvious path after separating itself so fully up until this point from it’s comedy contemporaries. We can put up with Jimmy and Gretchen being rude and dismissive, but Jimmy cheating would be a near impossible hurdle for the show to overcome it terms of likability for the character. The show needs to remember just why we were rooting for Jimmy and Gretchen to be together, rather than reasons why the character’s could probably do better with some time apart. It’s clear on both the character’s faces at the end that they can tell that they’re both lying through their teeth, and that there are undoubtedly some issues that need working on, but we as an audience need to want them to push through, even with the character’s are struggling with it.

Other things that made me laugh:

“Someday you’re going to have to learn how not to quit when things get hard.”

“A doctor costume for ladies…ugh fake.”

“You can do better than saddest girl at the rave.”

“I wouldn’t tell anyone you still touch girls over the bra, it’s too embarrassing.”

“It’s about the jizz in my brain and in my heart.”

And with that, what are our thoughts on this week’s episode? Are Gretchen and Jimmy on their way towards a relationship meltdown?

8/10