Tuca & Bertie gives us a deeper look at codependency and intimacy

After a gentrifying moss took over the building in last week’s episode of Tuca & Bertie, the pair are roommates once again while Speckle is off hunting for the perfect doorknob for his (and ostensibly Bertie’s) dream house.

While Bertie is excited for all the Tuca time she can get, Tuca is absent, spending time with her new girlfriend, Kara (Sasheer Zamata). As Tuca and Kara fall further into their love bubble, Bertie’s codependency panic falls into overdrive.

“Sleepovers” smartly analyzes the history of Tuca, Bertie, and Speckle’s relationships through flashbacks that give us new insight into each of the characters we’ve only previously been told about.

Through glimpses of our main characters five years in the past, we see Bertie wrangling Tuca before she was sober while she and Speckle meet-cute at a party. By intercutting to the present, we learn that the foundation of Tuca and Bertie’s relationship was always a sort of sweet but toxic codependency.

Bertie was there to pick up Tuca when her alcoholism caused her to become a danger to herself and others; and Tuca is there to handhold Bertie alongside her anxious moments, including on her first date with Speckle.

It may be a slightly dysfunctional relationship, but it’s one that developed out of genuine need and caring, something Speckle sees as his attraction for Bertie outweighs any potential weirdness between her and her best friend.

The flashbacks allow Bertie in the present to realize her own spiral could be holding Tuca back (further helped by discovering one of Tuca’s bad thought cups that she hides rather than dealing with her thoughts plainly labeled BERTIE IS KEEPING ME ALONE).

“Sleepovers” is a sort of Gift of the Magi story of friendship. In the same moment Bertie realizes she needs to let Tuca go and find her own happiness, Tuca is ready to break out of her love bubble to spend time with Bertie (similarly helped along by some digs from Kara who refuses to see her comments as hurtful or worthy of an apology).

It seems like the season of Tuca & Bertie is building toward a thoughtful exploration of the pair’s friendship and relationship dynamics. How can they continue to be for each other in the way they always have while leading independent lives?

It’s a question numerous similar series have explored (Broad City and Shrill to name a few) but is nonetheless relevant and fresh here.

By the episode’s end, Bertie is stronger for having worked up the courage to spend time alone and support Tuca in a new relationship, but whether Tuca and Kara are going to last is up for debate.

What did you think of this week’s episode? Make sure to tell us in the comments below!