There’s nothing about the premise “thirtysomethings navigating dating in Los Angeles” that screams “truly original television.” Yet FXX’s You’re the Worst, about a toxic relationship in a world of self-absorbed Angelenos, is just that: a sitcom that dodges the gimmicks and tropes of its genre and in the process offers up something truly authentic. It might even be heartfelt—even if it would go out of its way not to show it.
At *Worst’*s start, Englishman Jimmy Shive-Overly (Chris Geere) is a navel-gazing novelist in the middle of a sophomore slump. Unable to write a follow-up to his tepid first novel, Congratulations, You’re Dying, Jimmy is constantly distracted‐by alcoholism, by masturbating, by trying to write a novelization of NCIS LA. When he meets the brusque Gretchen Cutler (Aya Cash) at his ex-girlfriend’s wedding, the two hook up for what they both believe to be a one-night stand. This, of course, turns out not to be the case and they soon go from “I don’t do relationships” to full-on commitment. (Hey, we didn’t say there were zero clichés in this show.)
But while most sitcoms spend seasons solving the problems that keep its central characters from coupling up, the merging of Jimmy and Gretchen is where *You’re the Worst’*s problems start. This is a show about fear—fear of commitment, fear of buying in to an inauthentic life—and while being grossed out by the terms “boyfriend” and “girlfriend” don’t seem like huge dilemmas, on this show they will suffice. And once you get past the set-up, Worst does get into real issues, like Gretchen’s struggles with depression and Jimmy’s frustration at not being able to fix her.
It helps, too, that Gretchen and Jimmy are surrounded by actual well-rounded characters. Former Iraq Army vet Edgar Quintero (Desmin Borges) lives rent-free in Jimmy’s modest Silver Lake home, where he cooks and acts as Jimmy’s sounding board. Edgar suffers from PTSD, but Jimmy constantly dismisses Edgar’s real problems to talk about his inconsequential issues. Gretchen’s version of Edgar is her best friend Lindsay (Kether Donohue), who is unhappily married to the nerdy Paul (Allan McLeod). Of this group, Gretchen is the only one with a real job—she’s a PR rep for an unnamed rap group—but whereas any other show would just not acknowledge this point, You’re the Worst at least has the self-awareness to make jokes about the fact that no one works.
You’re the Worst came out strong in its first two seasons, and is returning for a third this summer. In the meantime, here’s how to catch up on the best not-really-a-rom-com sitcom ever.
Number of Seasons: 2 (23 episodes)
Time Requirements: Since the average episode is just 22 minutes long, you can easily get through both seasons in a week or so, but feel free to stretch it out to a more leisurely pace.
Where to Get Your Fix: Amazon, Vudu, Hulu (first season only), iTunes, Google Play
Best Character to Follow: Every character on the show has their moments, but Lindsay boasts the strongest character arc (and the most laugh-out-loud moments). In the first half of Season 1, she's little more than Gretch’s spoiled friend—married a guy she doesn't love but goes along with it anyway—until one day she snaps and cheats on her hubby with some rando from Dayton, Ohio. Then, over the course of a few episodes, she evolves from trophy wife to hot mess. Lindsay’s turning point occurs in the first season’s seventh episode, when Gretch and Jimmy flake on dinner plans with her and Edgar, and Edgar realizes they’re just sidekicks to their newly-coupled friends. “I’m Beyoncé, not Kelly Rowland,” Linds defiantly says. “If I’m in a motorcycle, I’m driving the motorcycle, not riding in that shitty little side motorcycle thingy for poor people and dogs.” (She constantly says hilarious non sequiturs about poor people.) Also, this girl can cover Kate Bush like nobody’s business.
Seasons/Episodes You Can Skip:
Even the worst episodes are good, so you may want to watch all of them. But if you have to skip a few, here are the ones that don’t quite coalesce with the others.
Season 1: Episode 4, “What Normal People Do” Jimmy dresses in Edgar’s fatigues in order to receive a veteran’s discount at a diner, and Edgar gives a speech at a veteran’s rally only to have an actor researching a role as a veteran take a disingenuous interest in him. Lindsay has her jaw wired shut to lose weight and learns it’s OK to be who she is. After an afternoon of day drinking, Jimmy visits Gretch’s apartment for the first time and sees what a slob she is. The episode does have funny bits—the veteran’s memorial is carved by Rumer Willis—but overall it’s just very predictable.
Season 1: Episode 7, “Equally Dead Inside” Besides a cameo from Sandra Bernhard and the sidekick line, this installment feels disjointed and a lot of it doesn’t make sense. For some reason Jimmy has a beef with a bookstore owner, played by the Progressive Insurance lady (Stephanie Courtney), who refuses to carry his book. Gretch, Jimmy, and Gretch’s work friend almost have a three-way. Gretch and Jimmy agree to not discuss emotions, and then celebrate finding “someone who is equally dead inside.”
Season 2: Episode 1, “The Sweater People” Yeah, this is the first episode of the new season, but it quickly succumbs to the guy-gets-cold-feet-about-moving-in-with-his-girlfriend clichés. Instead of communicating, Jimmy and Gretch spend several nights in a row staying up all night drinking and doing coke, and one night they party so hard they wake up with bloody noses and a stolen DVD kiosk laying in the living room.
Season 2: Episode 10, “A Right Proper Story” Jimmy’s caricature father and three sisters come to visit him. All they want to do is sit around and watch a singing show and tease him, and all Jimmy wants to do is impress them with his novel. Lindsay sums up Jimmy’s family the best: “I thought all English people were fancy, but these are like Alabama English people.” Gretch doesn’t have much to do in this episode except mope and annoy Jimmy.
Seasons/Episodes You Can’t Skip:
Season 1: Episode 1, “Pilot” Gretchen and Jimmy meet outside of his ex’s wedding; she thinks she’s stolen a food processor from the wedding gift pile but it turns out to be a blender. She goes home with him and they have sex, and Jimmy gets miffed that she stays the night. Thinking it was just a one-time thing, Gretch moves on to her occasional friend with benefits, Ty (Stephen Schneider), a douche-y filmmaker/artisanal water bar owner, but their sex lacks the intimacy of what she experienced with Jimmy, which is to say she could tell Jimmy crazy things like “I set my high school on fire to get out of math test.” Despite Jimmy saying she’s “19 types of trouble,” they acquiesce to their deep connection.
Season 1: Episode 5, “Sunday Funday” Gretchen, Lindsay, Edgar, and Jimmy meet for brunch and agree to do esoteric LA activities from a list Edgar made, but they’re thwarted when a group of hipsters steal his list and follow them around. “Fun hipster shit is just poor Latino shit from 10 years ago,” Edgar says. Gretch’s dilemma entails deciding whether or not to go to the Tribeca Film Festival with Ty, though Jimmy gets jealous and convinces her to stay with him. What makes this episode so fun is how they spend the day visiting real LA places (Blue Bag Records) and compete against the hipsters (the leader is played by *Silicon Valley’*s Tom Middleditch). This installment also introduces two recurring YTW motifs: the Patty Kohan open house (you’ll see), and Jimmy’s habit of stealing booze from people’s homes. Keep an eye out for those in future episodes.
Season 1: Episode 8, “Finish Your Milk” Gretchen performs a subterfuge on Jimmy by telling him she’s going to visit her parents when in fact they’re in town visiting her. Jimmy goes to the movies and runs into two guys from the rap group Gretchen represents: Shitstain (Darrell Britt-Gibson) and Honey Nutz (Allen Maldonado). They accidentally tell Jimmy that Gretchen’s in town with her parents, so he tracks them down at a country club. Gretch is a totally different person around her parents; they think she represents Josh Groban, and they force her to drink milk. When Jimmy tells her parents what a mess she truly is, it causes a rift in their relationship.
Season 1: Episode 10, “Fists and Feet and Stuff” Jimmy and Gretch deal with the aftermath of their relationship drama and eventual break-up. Also, Lindsay discloses she suffers from “cockaholism,” and a disgruntled Edgar moves out of Jimmy’s (and into his car) and gets a job at a gym. Lindsay, who doesn’t seem to care about anything anymore, tries to make out with Jimmy in front of Gretchen. Linds and Gretch talk about making “the punk rock choice” of settling down. “Is this feminism?” Linds asks. “We’re just running away from stuff,” Gretch replies. “I don’t think that’s feminism, I think that’s fear.” Lindsay’s husband Paul decides he wants to “consciously uncouple” from her, and Jimmy gets all Notting Hill on Gretch when he tells her “the worst possible draft of my life is the one without you in it. You goddamn floor me.” Of course as soon as Gretch rejects moving in with him, her apartment catches on fire, representing the literal burning down of her apartment and the metaphorical burning of their relationship.
Season 2: Episode 7, “There is Currently Not a Problem” The previous episodes unearthed the reason why Gretchen keeps sneaking out in the middle of the night: She likes to sit in her car and cry while playing Snake on a flip phone. Jimmy’s relieved she doesn’t have a “side bitch” but doesn’t know how to address her condition. During the day of the LA marathon, the friends spent the afternoon stuck inside Jimmy’s place. Gretch gets drunk and rips into her friends, telling them how pathetic they all are. Sensing “it’s back,” Lindsay talks to Gretchen and she acknowledges her college depression has returned, but Gretch doesn’t know if she should tell Jimmy about it.
Season 2: Episode 8, “Spooky Sunday Funday" A sequel to the first season’s excellent “Sunday Funday,” this one’s even better. It’s Halloween, and to cheer Gretch up, Jimmy’s planned a day of Halloween-themed activities with their friends. They get costumes and go to a haunted house that is so extreme it’s like wandering through a torture porn movie. Gretch pretends to enjoy the day but reiterates to Jimmy he can’t fix her, so he storms off and meets bar owner Nina (Tessa Ferrer), who’s the only one who knows what his costume is. They flirt with each other, setting up their brief fling in later episodes.
Season 2: Episode 9, “LCD Soundsystem” Of all the episodes in the YTW canon, this one is the most creative in terms of approach. For the first five minutes of the episode, it doesn’t follow any of the main cast members. It follows Jimmy’s fortysomething neighbors, a yupster married couple who go about their day drinking coffee and binge-watching TV shows. It’s then revealed Gretch has been stalking them, going so far as to “borrow” their pug Sandwiches for the day. She’s vicariously living their lives, wanting what they have, until she brings the dog back and hangs out with them. Rob (Justin Kirk, aka Andy from Weeds) asks her if she likes LCD Soundsystem. “Not really,” she replies. “I know what you mean,” he says. The band pens songs about the interstices of getting older, nostalgia, and not losing your edge, and the catch here is Gretch likes the idea of “buying in” until Rob shares how he misses his pre-child Largo days of partying all night. Her conversation with Rob leaves Gretch more depressed than ever.
Season 2: Episode 12, “Other Things You Could Be Doing” Gretchen’s depression hits a precipice. Jimmy’s ready to have an affair with Nina but not before texting all of Gretch’s contacts to come over and talk some sense into her. The hilarious montage of “friends” involves Sam talking about famous people who struggled with depression—including Boner from Growing Pains—but Honey Nutz and Shitstain inform him they all died. Neighbor Rob’s back, Vernon eats popcorn, and Henry Rollins makes a cameo via Skype. When nothing seems to work, Jimmy moves forward with his plans with Nina only to blow her off at the last second. He decides to stick it out with Gretch, and builds a pillow fort for her in what’s probably the best scene of the show (see below). Linds discovers she’s pregnant with Paul’s baby, the result of a strange occurrence with a turkey baster.
Season 2: Episode 13, “The Heart is a Dumb Dumb” Gretch becomes erect again, but Jimmy’s pissed she wasn’t on antidepressants this whole time. Gretch’s curious about Jimmy’s hookup, so she visits Nina at the bar and tries to make out with her. Jimmy gets “Level 4” drunk and wants Gretch to take care of him for a change. Linds tells Paul she’s pregnant, and he immediately dumps his girlfriend and asks Linds to get back together. At first Linds seems happy with the idea of starting over with Paul until he literally makes her ride in the sidecar of his motorcycle—exactly what she didn’t want. Gretch takes care of a sloshed Jimmy, and as they sit out on the stoop smoking, she says he said something “dark” in his sleep. “I love you, too,” she responds. This is the first time the “L” word has ever been mentioned between them, but they’ve worked their way up to it, and they both seem somewhat OK with it. If this episode were the series finale, it would be a perfect conclusion.
Why You Should Binge:
The series begs to be watched in succession, because only then do you get to watch the relationship between Jimmy and Gretchen unfold in real time. Also, in watching the seasons back-to-back, you pick up on all of the nuanced details and connections between episodes. You’re the Worst also has highly quotable dialogue and one of the better representations of depression on television, both of which make it incredibly watchable.
Best Scene—The Pillow Fort:
The second season makes up for the lack of warmth in the first with heartfelt moments that generate waterworks. Jimmy’s about to go away with Nina but decides to stay with Gretchen. She lies listlessly on the living room floor, and when she wakes up, she notices she’s sleeping under a pillow fort he made for her. She finally breaks free from her depression spell and exclaims, through tears, “You stayed!” This show isn’t known for mushiness, but the fact he decides to weather the storm humanizes Jimmy and exposes he’s not so selfish after all.
The Takeaway:
Relationships are tepid and confusing, but if you find the right person, stick with them, and stick with friends who will be there for you, even if you treat them like crap. The show’s also about fighting adulthood while also accepting it. Or as Jimmy beautifully sums it up in a Dylan Thomas rant to his child neighbor Killian: “I’m an adult. It means that I am beset upon at all times by a tsunami of complex thoughts and struggles, unceasingly aware of my own mortality, and able to contemplate the futility of everything and yet still rage against the dying of the light.”
If You Liked *You’re the Worst * You’ll Love: Shows about friends and romantic relationships such as Happy Endings, Catastrophe, Master of None, Friends, Togetherness, and Broad City.
