S02.E06: Girl Meets The Tell-Tale Tot

[methodwriter85]

The other math that didn't work for me this episode- unless Josh is a 5th year senior, Maya is not going to show up to college as a freshmen when he's a senior. She should start college at 19.

 

I would not totally not be shocked if Sabrina and Uriah wound up dating. They both have the music thing going for them...I can at least see them being good friends.

 

If they needed to send Josh off to college, they could've had him going early so he would still be 16 like he should be.

Edited June 15, 2015 by methodwriter85

[skeskali]

I didn't feel like anyone put Josh in the wrong for not wanting to be in a relationship with a kid in 8th grade.  I felt like the girls were just trying to get Maya to actually talk to him, get her real feelings out there, and have him hear her, because it would be healthy for her.  Nobody ever gave me the impression that they expected him to start dating her or declare any reciprocal feelings, but just that they wanted to make sure he wasn't just dismissing her, because she had gone to a lot of effort to make this statement to him, and she's a kid.  I got the feeling it was more of a "this girl is going through her first crush, and we want to help her get through this without it being a complete disaster" kind of thing.  Once Josh sat and listened to her, no one was pressuring him to do or say anything.  He was the one who then made the decision to get up and leave so he could walk the girls home. 

 

I agree with this 100%. I also think there's a fair amount of "big sister wisdom" going on in this scene, as the college girls understood that if you tell a 14-year-old that her feelings will change, she'll stomp her feet, say "I'LL ALWAYS LOVE JOSH 4EVA" and ramp up her antics to get his attention, which could possibly end up with a worse result.  I think the writers honored Maya's feelings in the best way possible by treating them as real, not as the starry-eyed musings of a lovesick kid.  Us older and wiser audience members know she's a lovesick kid, but kids have to be allowed to figure that out for themselves.

Edited June 16, 2015 by skeskali

[skeskali]

I get the feeling I'm in the minority, but I rather liked that Cory and Topanga didn't drop the hammer on Riley for sneaking out (although, being grounded for 3 weeks is a pretty heavy hammer when you're 14). The whole premise of the show is about teens testing boundaries, figuring out who they are, and meeting the world. In a city like New York, that means seeing sights and doing things that may not fly in smaller cities/towns. It also means that Riley, Maya and the rest of the teens are probably a little more street smart than your average kid because they're growing up in New York City. This doesn't apply to Huckleberry though. He's hopeless.

Edited June 16, 2015 by skeskali

[KerleyQ]

Plus, I think they took into consideration that she didn't just sneak out to go party.  She went because Maya was going to go whether she went with or not.  Add in Riley's obvious huge dose of guilt, and they probably felt like this wasn't a time where they needed to bring down the hammer. 

[Perfect Xero]

I agree with this 100%. I also think there's a fair amount of "big sister wisdom" going on in this scene, as the college girls understood that if you tell a 14-year-old that her feelings will change, she'll stomp her feet, say "I'LL ALWAYS LOVE JOSH 4EVA" and ramp up her antics to get his attention, which could possibly end up with a worse result.  I think the writers honored Maya's feelings in the best way possible by treating them as real, not as the starry-eyed musings of a lovesick kid.  Us older and wiser audience members know she's a lovesick kid, but kids have to be allowed to figure that out for themselves.

 

My issue is that treating her feelings as real shouldn't involve forcing Josh to sit there and basically be called stupid for not returning her feelings.

 

It shouldn't involve saying they would tell every girl at NYU that Josh belongs to Maya.

 

It shouldn't involve them basically planning out the next 5 years of his life around Maya's feelings for him.

[KerleyQ]

My issue is that treating her feelings as real shouldn't involve forcing Josh to sit there and basically be called stupid for not returning her feelings.

 

It shouldn't involve saying they would tell every girl at NYU that Josh belongs to Maya.

 

It shouldn't involve them basically planning out the next 5 years of his life around Maya's feelings for him.

 

I don't think anyone was calling him stupid for not returning her feelings.  The girls even acknowledged that the age difference is too big right now, at this stage in their lives. They just wanted him to hear her out.  

 

The threat to tell everyone he belonged to Maya was over the top, yes, but it also wasn't about browbeating him into a relationship with Maya, it was about just getting him to listen to her, so she wouldn't walk away from this encounter emotionally damaged.  And I really didn't see them as planning out the next 5 years of his life with regard to Maya.  Those girls likely know that the guy you have a crush on when you're in middle school is not the same guy you're going to want to be with when you're the age they are now.  They've just lived those years.  And they also likely know that you can't tell someone in Maya's shoes "you'll be over this guy before graduation," because she won't hear that now, and she'll likely just dig in deeper to prove them wrong. 

 

What those girls did was basically let Maya down gently.  Yes, they forced Josh into taking part of that, but I think their hearts were in the right place, and I never got a vibe of "you have to return her feelings, and you WILL be with her as soon as it's age appropriate" off of the whole encounter.  

[methodwriter85]

That is a really good interpretation of it. I'm not a girl, and I think guys crush differently than girls do. I can't really think of anyone I crushed on that lasted more than 5 minutes.

[Perfect Xero]

I don't think anyone was calling him stupid for not returning her feelings.  The girls even acknowledged that the age difference is too big right now, at this stage in their lives. They just wanted him to hear her out.  

 

The threat to tell everyone he belonged to Maya was over the top, yes, but it also wasn't about browbeating him into a relationship with Maya, it was about just getting him to listen to her, so she wouldn't walk away from this encounter emotionally damaged.  And I really didn't see them as planning out the next 5 years of his life with regard to Maya.  Those girls likely know that the guy you have a crush on when you're in middle school is not the same guy you're going to want to be with when you're the age they are now.  They've just lived those years.  And they also likely know that you can't tell someone in Maya's shoes "you'll be over this guy before graduation," because she won't hear that now, and she'll likely just dig in deeper to prove them wrong. 

 

What those girls did was basically let Maya down gently.  Yes, they forced Josh into taking part of that, but I think their hearts were in the right place, and I never got a vibe of "you have to return her feelings, and you WILL be with her as soon as it's age appropriate" off of the whole encounter.  

 

Josh seemed to get that impression since he made a comment about them planning out his life.

 

The girls didn't even go as far as to say the age difference was too big now, just that it "seemed" that way, but in college they learned different math and that after he was in college he would be "smarter" and that he might be smart enough to see her differently.

 

I appreciated that they were trying to be sensitive to Maya's feelings, but they did so by putting everything on Josh not being "smart" enough. Even the other guy in the room (whose first reaction to finding out the girls were in middle school was to recoil and try to kick them out) put it on Josh after hearing why Maya likes him, "Dude, what is wrong with you?!"

 

As the older guy in that situation the absolute last thing that you want to do in even give the impression that you're encouraging the girl's feelings for you. Being forced to sit there while a group of your new friends encouraged her feelings, and act like the issue is that you're not smart enough, practically telling you and the girl that you "belong" to her, would probably feel like you were being gaslighted in hell.