Review: 'You're the Worst' - 'Other Things You Could Be Doing' 

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Review: 'You're the Worst' - 'Other Things You Could Be Doing': Stay?

Jimmy has to choose between a spiraling Gretchen and an appealing Nina in a funny, emotional episode

"You\'re the Worst" — which FXX just renewed for a third season — coming up just as soon as you tell me if I\'m going to be an aunt or an uncle...

"Other Things You Could Be Doing" represents the two extremes of "You\'re the Worst" at its best, in terms of both its tone and what its characters can be.

Tonally, it\'s at times as dark and despairing as any episode in this Gretchen depression arc, yet at other times incredibly lowbrow and/or silly with gags like Jimmy\'s response to Nina\'s disgusting feet, or Lindsay\'s confusion about Becca\'s baby, or Henry Rollins (guest-starring by tablet) wondering what on earth he\'s dong here.

And Jimmy is alternately heroic in finally realizing that he has to be there for Gretchen no matter what — he may not fully understand the nature of her illness, but he can at least see that she needs him there, no matter what she says — and utterly cowardly in how he attempts to get out of the date with Nina by hiding in the bushes and continuing the season-long "New phone who dis" running gag. It\'s remarkable that Chris Geere could play those two extremes — the serious man feeling destroyed as he listens to Gretchen order him to go sleep with another woman, then the Daniel Craig-esque upset baby lying on the ground rather than confront a woman he only vaguely knows — and have them feel like the same character, but it works. Jimmy building the makeshift tent for Gretchen (rather than trying to smother her with that pillow like Tony Soprano with his mom) was a lovely, unexpected touch on which to finish that story for this episode, even though it\'s obviously not going to be all sunshine and rainbows by next week\'s finale.

Jimmy\'s plan to bomb Gretchen with the love — or, at least, the company — of the people in her contacts list was also an elegant way for the show to incorporate its many recurring players (including the return of Justin Kirk as Rob from "LCD Soundsystem") without it feeling like a distraction from the main story, which has been an issue at a few points this season.

And the two subplots with Edgar and Lindsay did a nice job of charting their respective growth this season, even if Lindsay\'s pregnancy is almost certainly going to cause her to backslide. My only worry about Edgar and Dorothy is that things are

too healthy for them right now. Given that this is both a show about dysfunctional people and their relationships, as well as one where Edgar loses a lot of his creative utility if he\'s not living with Jimmy and supporting his every need, I fear that he and Dorothy are going to not only break up in the finale, but in a way that seems more motivated by the needs of the show than where he and she seem to be at together.

But that\'s something to be dealt with in the finale, and hopefully Falk and company can surprise me as much there as they have with so much of this excellent season, including this funny and poignant resolution to the question of whether Jimmy would leave Gretchen over this crisis.

Alan Sepinwall has been reviewing television since the mid-\'90s, first for Tony Soprano\'s hometown paper, The Star-Ledger, and now for HitFix. His new book, "The Revolution Was Televised," about the last 15 years of TV drama, is for sale at Amazon. He can be reached at sepinwall@hitfix.com

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Related Searches: You're the Worst, Chris Geere, Aya Cash, Desmin Borges, Kether Donohue, Stephen Falk

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So is Paul the father? This was an episode with a Maury Povich "You\'re not the father" reference at the sketch show.

This episode and the Halloween episode hit me the hardest. While I could predict most of the season ending threads, Falk and Company hit the beats home so well I could do little but sit back in awe.

The Gretchen "depression" arc has been sometimes troubling because of the situations it put Jimmy in, but this week handled it so deftly and true to the characters I fell in love with in S1 that I look forward to a S2 rewatch after next week\'s finale.

I am not 100 percent on the Lindsey pregnant bit but Falk has proved me wrong so many times I will trust in his storytelling abilities.

Can\'t they just put Gretchen on an anti-depressant and end this awful arc? Depression makes for terrible TV.

I don\'t disagree that it makes it more difficult TV to watch, but it also can have its wonderful moments like tonight\'s episode.

I\'ve been reluctant to make a post like this on Alan\'s blog, but here goes. As someone who has been diagnosed with clinical depression, the med thing can be difficult. It\'s all trial and error. In my experience, some don\'t work at all at one dosage, but then you up the dosage and you can\'t focus because you are nauseous with vertigo. Others just leave you in a haze, and who wants to live that life. One seems to work great and then you want to have relations with your partner and the locomotive is not ready to race through tunnel. One other just left me anxious all of the time and barely able to quit going to bathroom every 10 minutes.

All of that is to say that the response of to paraphrase "just put her on some anti-depressants..." is not the real way out. I look at Gretchen as having probably tried some anti-depressants at some point and they either didn\'t work or they made her feel worse. Therefore, she gave up on them and just excepted that she has to live with this. I can completely relate, as I did the same thing once. Then I saw someone new who worked with me and wanted me to be honest. For now, I\'ve got a med that works for me and it\'s all good. Depression sucks and I wouldn\'t wish it upon anyone.

Mostly I wish someone would just suggest it, or that she\'d say she\'d tried meds in the past. Because it seems awful of her friends to let her wallow and apparently get no outside help at all - which she clearly needs.

The sad reality is that the majority -the vast majority probably- of people don\'t know what depression actually is. They think that "go on antidepressants" or just wait for the person to "snap out of it" -as Jimmy suggested- is the easy answer.

Plus I think only Jimmy and Lindsay know that Gretchen has depression, and neither of them know how to handle the situation. Jimmy because as I said is just one of those people who think depression is just being really sad, and Lindsay because she has seen Gretchen go through that before and got better so she doesn\'t understand the gravity of the situation...

Great review as always. One point of clarification, I believe you mean "he (Edgar) and Dorothy are going to break up" not "he and Gretchen".

I thought that was the worst of the six episodes I\'ve seen so far.

That nobody gets Gretchen some help is worse than any of the massive Walking Dead plot holes.

And now it looks like this show\'s best character just dumped the lead character and drove off.

Bro, why do you even watch this show? You thought nina was the best character??

I guess I\'m fascinated by the critics\' attempts to push this show beyond its tiny audience with their combined efforts.

This is more of a serialized show than most sitcoms out there. By only watching six episodes, you\'re doing yourself a pretty big disservice.

Every week you come on to comment that this is the worst show on TV. Do you really think your contributing anything with your tantrums?

Do you think only gushing fanboys should post their opinions here?

Since you asked: Your opinion isn\'t much of an opinion. You didn\'t articulate why you found anything bad, you just called a few things bad. That\'s a useless contribution.

I don\'t know how to explain to you why having every single character on this show(including a doctor) not do the one thing that can actually help Gretchen, get her to a medical professional, spoils it for me.

It\'s like when everybody on Walking Dead does the exact wrong thing nearly every moment of the show kills my enjoyment of it.

You\'ve watched 6 episodes, hated them all, refused to watch the previous season for some backstory and still every week show up to blather. Why bother? If you had some insight other than "I hate this" it would be one thing, but this is just empty typing and seems like some sort of OCD.

Do you see the irony of your repeatedly reading and commenting on my posts that you dislike so much?

@Ponce - "...having every single character on this show(including a doctor) not do the one thing that can actually help Gretchen, get her to a medical professional, spoils it for me."

Why would you think that no one has suggested Gretchen see someone? Because they didn\'t show it? They also didn\'t show Jimmy explaining to the many people that came over to see her what exactly was going on.

Gretchen obviously doesn\'t want to go to a medical professional; it\'s already been made clear that she\'s suffered with this all her life and she\'s dealing with it in a way she\'s dealt with it before, for good or ill. You can\'t force an adult in their right mind to do anything they don\'t want to do.

IMO, you\'re making a fuss about something that is a total non-issue.

You can go to jail if you fail to summon medical help for someone in need.

She recently pulled a gun on somebody...she\'s a serious threat to herself and society.

Let\'s hope the finale doesn\'t gift us with the inevitable suicide attempt...

@Ponce - She pulled a gun on a group of people that were criminally assaulting her friends and stopped the assault. Somehow I don\'t think that qualifies as a "serious threat to society".

Again, I\'m sure people in her life have suggested seeing a professional, medication, etc. and she has declined. I don\'t need for the show to waste time on the obvious.

That\'s great if you\'re not bothered if no characters on this "realistic" look at depression brings up the only realistic treatment for depression as an option.

There\'s too much bitching and arguing here recently. I can\'t believe it, but the comments at AV Club are actually better than here, because (more) people not getting at each other. Alan\'s are still the best posts, but it\'s not much fun reading the comments any more. It used to be a more civilized place. Maybe all the noisy HitFix site crapola is chasing off the more reasonable and tasteful commenters.

But I still don\'t like the whole depression ark in a "comedy" hour.

I am glad it got renewed though..it is an interesting show even if I prefer the less "depressing" side of it.

I am glad that the show has this story arc. I hope it will help society understand depression better. Isn\'t it weird that it\'s always the comedies and not th dramas who manage to do this?

I\'m so glad that Jimmy stayed and I am even more glad that Gretchen felt something about that. She hasn\'t been crying in her car the last couple of episodes and I was worried she stopped feeling anything at all.

I also think viewers might be disappointed in any "conclusion" the show might give us. Just like "About a Boy" we might end up with the protagonist/antagonist (your pick) not actually in a loving relationship at the end. It might very well be that just being without feeling useless and void is the outcome of all this for Gretchen.

But until then is yet so much to show about life with this illness.. The worst thing would be if they just got rid of it completely. I would love for the show to have Gretchen live a life a la Wil Wheaton with her getting better but struggling. With alcohol, with her job, with her loved one(s). Wil is the one who keeps giving me insights into what life as a person with these kinds of struggles are. That even if you do something everyone would regard as insanely awesome you ge told how much of a struggle it is. For instance when he described how he played Magic at a Wizards of the Coast event and how another player he had a great game with told him he helped him get through some tough situations in life and how they both cried.

Just like on "Mom" there could be a long Arc of Gretchen getting better.

As for Edgar: he\'s the court jester on this show. He needs to suffer so we can laugh. his relationship is doomed no matter what. My bet is it won\'t be his fault and that it just can\'t be helped. Maybe there\'s a job offer, a sick family member.. He will move back in with Jimmy in the finale for sure. Most likely he won\'t even unpack at the new place

How can Edgar\'s suffering remain hilarious when Gretchen\'s suffering is taken so seriously? Jimmy is becoming a better person to care for her. How does he manage that while remaining a terrible one in his mockery and diminishment of Edgar?

That\'s also been bugging me, but from the opposite end. Last season, they found a way to make Edgar a funny character while still treating his PTSD as a real thing (and I think they still do, he\'s my fav). It was tricky and I was really impressed that they pulled it off, both making me laugh at the jokes about it and have some empathy for it.

Gretchen\'s depression has been well-handled from a dramatic standpoint, but it\'s not generating comedy. And that\'s OK, I understand the point of view that this stuff isn\'t funny. Except they made an issue that was just as serious funny before, and I guess it kind of bothers me that they aren\'t trying.

As Gretchen\'s all-consuming depression eats another episode, I feel like this is not the cynical sitcom I signed up for.

Chris Geere\'s performance was fantastic in Jimmy\'s scenes with Gretchen. The slow emotional recognition on his part that she needed him to stay was moving. The reveal that he\'d built her a living room fort was perfectly sentimental.

But I miss the madcap, dark-humored farce that You\'re the Worst was last season, and I don\'t know how it gets back there in the future. A realistic portrayal of depression is too serious to mine for cheap twisted laughs. A show that makes Edgar\'s PTSD tastelessly hilarious is treating depression with solemnity. Me no like.

Same here. The best element of the first season was the spiky, frictional banter between Gretchen and Jimmy. That chemistry has been dead since the writers decided they wanted to shove the show in another direction. A direction that is now all too common on cable "sitcoms" for HBO, FX etc.

I\'ve lost track of the number of half-hour shows marketed as comedies only to have them skew far more to the "dram" end of a dramedy to get some critical plaudits for being naturalistic relationship stories.

If a show wants to be dramatic, fine, then make a drama and don\'t pretend it is something else by throwing in a couple of funny moments. Dark and realistic storylines do not offset a lack of laughs and in the case of this show is just making a clumsy juxtaposition whenever it goes into some cartoonish sidebar about a rap battle or Jimmy and his television viewing.

The show this season just comes across as self-serving and hollow, like it\'s being used to scratch a writing itch that could never get a greenlight to exist on it\'s own, so Falk wedged it into another show.

The show may have been renewed, but I will not be back. Given the pitiful ratings this season I expect the numbers will barely register when it returns.

I think you guys have finally hit the nail on the head for me with some of my struggles this season despite being a fanatic of the show. Depression is being treated like a heavy dramatic device while virtually everyone else\'s problems are dark comic punchlines. While I think the show is illustrating depression in a new way, you do get the impression that its taken far more seriously than everything else happening on the show. I mean Jimmy is pretty much an alcoholic, Edgar has PTSD and Lindsey is in the middle of a divorce and most likely a sex addict. So why is depression the sacred cow of the show? This is actually what was really bothering me on several episodes, Jimmy seemed to be coming off like a douche for everything he did because he was insensitive. I\'m going to throw a little shade Aya Cash\'s way on this one because she is definitely playing all of this very dramatically and realistically so there is no way the rest of the cast can match her tone.

It sort of reminds me of Tom Cruise in Rock of Ages, everyone else in that cast went for camp and Cruise played it straight as a tortured rock star so the other actors looked lesser by comparison. Geere gets the brunt of it because he has always played Jimmy as sort of a douche with a heart of gold in almost sitcom style acting, but Cash is going for more of a method naturalistic performance in a dramatic role. Basically Cash belongs on Transparent and Geere belongs on New Girl.

This was a very good episode of television ... Conversely, this was not a very good episode of YTW ... Season 1 was vulgar, mean, cynical, and hilarious ... Season 2 has turned into some unrecognizable mush of rom coms and raunchy humor that reminds me of Judd Apatow movies - bawdy comedy trying to disguise an underlying message ... I think the only episode in S2 that really captured what made S1 so good was the first one (the blackouts made me laugh) ... Spooky Sunday also did but to a lesser extent ... I\'m glad this show got renewed but I wish they would go back to what made it the \'worst\' ...

Loved the episode. Peak of an excellent season. Also love that the show feels no need to stay the same year-to-year or to conform to some narrow definition of what it "should" be in telling its story. Mostly loved the wonderful Bad Plus song playing during the parade of Gretchen\'s contacts.

wow i actually cried at the end when gretchen started crying. wonderful episode, wonderful season. cant wait for season 3

I didn\'t understand what Jimmy saw on his car in the moments before the bartender pulled up. It looked like someone had written "you suck "in the dirt on the windshield, and had stuffed a rag in the gas tank? Did anyone get that?

Yeah, I was confused about that, too. My best guess is that Edgar did it because Jimmy skipped his show.

I can see how Edgar would think about detonating Jimmy\'s car before deciding against it. Proportionate responses aren\'t necessarily his forte.

Thanks, @Modok, I was trying to figure out who would\'ve done that.

Wow Aya Cash destroyed me in that last scene. Just lovely and painful all at once.

I haven\'t seen this posted yet, but my (almost certain) prediction is that Lindsey is pregnant with her brother-in-law\'s baby. She was high on drugs when they "cuddled", and the day after he offered her money! Right then I knew.

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