You’re The Worst Recap: S3E4 “Men Get Strong”
By Emily Scott
In this episode, Gretchen tries to force Jimmy to process his grief before they go on a cruise. Healthy, right?
You’re The Worst, Image via FXX
Gretchen and Jimmy
The cold open finds Jimmy, the morning after the previous episode, claiming he was blacked out and didn’t remember anything. After Gretchen re-tells him that his dad died and re-gives him a blow job to try to make him feel better, he admits that he lied about being blacked out in order to “steal” the blow job from her. He claims to be completely unaffected by his dad’s death, and at first Gretchen is relieved. However, when Gretchen meets up with her therapist to gloat that she was wrong, Justina tells her that the grief is going to happen sooner or later. So the rest of the episode finds Gretchen attempting to make it happen before they go on the “Famous Pets of Instagram” cruise.
Initially, she takes a creatively blocked Jimmy to a graveyard to elicit some kind of emotion, only for them to end up mutually deciding that “funerals are sexy” and to have sex in someone’s mausoleum. They proceed to a paint-your-own pottery place (to be surrounded by real loving fathers and their kids), and Jimmy almost makes a breakthrough when observing a father yell at his child for breaking something. But when he talks to him further, trying to stoke his own feelings of inadequacy in the eyes of his father, he discovers that the kid is actually just a terrible person. Finally they head to a British pub, where Gretchen takes on an accent to impersonate Jimmy’s father and evoke some sort of outburst. It appears to be working, complete with building inspirational background music, until Jimmy farts. Surprise; the “feeling” he had coming on was flatulence.
You’re the Worst, Screencap via FXX
I mean…seriously? Sex in a graveyard, kids saying bad words, and fart noises. This was supposed to be the comedic meat of this episode. The past few episodes have been such a cognitive leap from the first two seasons, which were both strong and original. As far as I can tell, there haven’t been any changes to the creative team, but suddenly they are defaulting to these lame non-jokes and trying so hard to be edgy. Why? They don’t need to. Not when they are capable of smart, hilarious “Sunday Funday” episodes and a season-long, highly accurate mental illness storyline that won them the majority of their viewers. Long story short, I don’t hate You’re The Worst; I’m just really disappointed in it right now.
Ultimately the episode ends with Jimmy discovering, after smelling his dad’s scent on a soccer jersey, that he actually feels joy at being free of his father. He shoves everything that reminds him of his dad in a drawer. In case that symbolism wasn’t enough for you, the drawer pops open as soon as Jimmy leaves the room.
Edgar
Edgar is very, very not good right now, which we know even though he was barely in the episode. He talked at the beginning of the episode about having a meeting with someone from the VA that day, and I was excited to start seeing him get back on track. But we don’t. There is a brief shot of him, calling Jimmy to say he can’t pick them up because his car broke down. It’s unclear whether this is supposed to be before or after the appointment, but he was drinking whiskey straight from a full bottle. So that’s not good.
Later on, Gretchen makes a weak attempt to be a concerned friend by asking him how it went. He says fine, and that he doesn’t want to talk about it, with an air of sarcasm, which is highly uncharacteristic for his generally hyper-sincere personality. Given that we don’t even see him at his appointment, I am wondering if he even went at all, or even if his car really did break down. But this is one thing this show has a history of doing well. It took several episodes for Gretchen’s odd behavior to be fully explained as depression, with the writers keeping us as much in the dark as Jimmy or the other characters. I’m excited to see how they pull Edgar’s storyline together.
You’re The Worst, Screencap via FXX
Lindsay and Paul
I always want to start this section with, “UGHHH LINDSAY.” Most of the time it’s because she did something terrible and irreparable, but this time it’s more because it’s hitting me how sad her life is, and how she truly doesn’t feel like she can get out of it.
So, Lindsay is still pregnant (I keep half-forgetting and then remembering and being so upset). After seeing Jimmy’s reaction to his father’s death, Lindsay decides to start making an effort, because “I want my kids to be sad when I die.” So she drags Paul to a parenting class, where they run into Becca and Vernon. After a bit of struggle, Lindsay ends up acing all the mom-related challenges, like swaddling and diapering. She loves being good at it, and seems to take a lot of pride in it. Until Becca, despite her jealousy, tells Lindsay that she was “born to be a mom.”
“What if there are other things I’m meant to be, and I can’t find out?” – Lindsay
Lindsay has never been excited about motherhood and wifeliness and only chases them as status symbols or ways to avoid being alone or unloved. So this hits her pretty hard. As she helps a random dad from the class shop for baby things, she has a very real moment with him, saying, “What if there are other things I’m meant to be, and I can’t find out?” It’s so great to see Lindsay really be vulnerable. I love her psychotic half-Stepford wife, half-Playboy bunny persona, but I also love to see her be a real human being.
After the guy she’s talking to tries to comfort her by telling her about his own story of a “second chance” with his new wife, Lindsay misinterprets it as flirting and tries to make out with him. He strongly rebuffs her, and she seems really embarrassed, and it’s really sad. Lindsay’s fear of being somehow unlovable causes her to do some crazy-ass things; not the least of which was turkey-basting that baby into herself to trap her monumentally boring husband. But I hope this particular backfire helps her realize that she does not need an escape hatch to get out.
You’re the Worst airs Wednesdays on FXX.