S03.E08: Genetically Inferior Beta Males

[Tara Ariano]

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Gretchen parents her friends, but has mixed results; Jimmy goes on Vernon's podcast; Edgar tries alternative therapy; and Lindsay pushes Paul to the brink.

[arc]

trailer: 

[whiporee]

Aya was awesome. Gretchen as her mom was awesome. 

Jimmy in the park was awesome. Edgar's actual speech about pot was awesome. 

Vernon's podcast was awesome, if for no other reason than Becca's and Vernon's interactions. And that it was sponsored by Red Napkin. 

But the Paul and Lindsey stuff is an unfunny joke that's gone way way way too far. I love this show, but that stuff makes me squirm, and not in an pushing-bounderies way. It makes me squirm the way i did watching a second grader sing "Radioactive" at school talent show the other night -- not good, not entertaining, not challenging, not funny and completely inappropriate. This is a smart, funny, insightful show, and unless they are building toward a Paul or Lindsey suicide, there's nothing redeemable in this plotline at all. 

[Megan]

The Lindsay/Paul story line is awful. She's turned into an unfunny cartoon.

[Wanderdown]

There is nothing about the Lindsay story line that couldn't be solved by shooting Lindsay into the sun.

[Adultosaurus]

Lindsay's baby talking, Edgar's child-like voice, and Jimmy's overwroughtness have finally taken their toll on me.  I would watch a Vernon/Bec podcast spinoff though.

[whiporee]

4 hours ago, Wanderdown said:

There is nothing about the Lindsay story line that couldn't be solved by shooting Lindsay into the sun.

Paul's gotta go, too.  He's only slightly less despicable in this than she is.  

And she at least can be fun, funny and charming.  He's got nothing but the trail behind him.  

[BeckyThatcher]

I don't really understand the end-game of the Paul, Lindsey, family plot. It's just disturbing right now. 

 

But Gretchen's "Sometimes I think I want this more than you do"- mom role play was awesome!

[Traveller519]

I have a bit of a different take than most. I liked the Lindsay/Paul story more than the Gretchen one. The Gretchen one was completely predictable and bordering on cliche. Lindsay and Paul's had stuff I did not expect and genuinely made me laugh. Specifically the reading of the community bulletin and news while she was having sex with Raoule. Then the trying to talk himself into being a cuck as "our fetish."

[Wouldofshouldof]

2 hours ago, BeckyThatcher said:

But Gretchen's "Sometimes I think I want this more than you do"- mom role play was awesome!

Is that the shirt you're wearing?

[scrb]

Maybe what they're going for is that Lindsay is acting out, trying to push Paul away.

But yeah, what's the point of humiliating his character so much?

[panthergirl13]

I've officially entered hatewatchland with this show, but even that might not last. I'm just bored.

[iMonrey]

I love the little moments that show us how out of touch Jimmy is with everyday, normal things, like playing fetch with a dog. "You retrieved the projectile. Why?" Vern and Becca's podcast was hilarious too.

[NorthstarATL]

I hated Lindsey/Paul, AND I hated MomGretchen! I know it's for laughs, and I know we can't go an episode without having how awesome pot is beat into our skulls, but Gretchen, of ALL characters, should know enough to let Edgar just be. Isn't she the one who didn't want to be "fixed"? Well, stop "fixing" others. Or is is the contradiction we're supposed to find funny/ironic?

  Lindsey/Paul is going nowhere until she figures out that sex is not going to fix her problem, unless the show is trying to tell us that it would? Because being dependent is MUCH more Lindsey's problem. I have no idea what could fix Paul.

   I liked Jimmy's day off/out, and also his revelation that, with his father gone, he had no real direction. Been there. Was that a look of fear on Gretchen's face when Jimmy mentioned that maybe he wasn't meant to be a writer? I am intrigued.

  The podcast was fun, but I would watch a spin-off of Gretchen's therapist.

[Adultosaurus]

23 hours ago, Wouldofshouldof said:

Is that the shirt you're wearing?

I just might be the worst because I literally said this to my husband last week before an event.

3 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I love the little moments that show us how out of touch Jimmy is with everyday, normal things, like playing fetch with a dog. "You retrieved the projectile. Why?" Vern and Becca's podcast was hilarious too.

I don't think they've ever given us reason to accept how out of touch Jimmy is with things...that's what bothers me.

[wendyg]

I think that despite Jimmy's procrastinating habits - and that mash-up last week of how he spends a day "writing" will be familiar to professional writers everywhere - he's spent most of his life reading books and pursuing a very narrow range of other activities. His father said to him, more or less, "I'd give you the ball, and you'd sit on it and read a book." Granted, he's older than this, but a friend of mine when we were in our 20s wasn't sure whether dogs could walk up and down stairs on their own. He'd grown up in an apartment building and always taken the elevator.

[DrSpaceman73]

There is nothing funny about Linday's storyline.  She is just being a selfish witch (or something that sounds like that) who doesn't want to grow up now that she is pregnaent. 

[JustaPerson]

It seems like Lindsay is realizing that she and Paul just aren't going to work given what she mentioned about getting an "abobo" in that text to Gretchen. I don't want to be crass, but I think for the sake everyone involved that would be the right decision. 

[whiporee]

I'm pretty sure she's not pregnant. False positive test or something like that -- I don't think she ever had a sonogram or anything. I hope so, because I'm ready to see Paul go away. I like Lindsay in all situations except those involving Paul, so maybe this will be the end of that. 

[iMonrey]

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Was that a look of fear on Gretchen's face when Jimmy mentioned that maybe he wasn't meant to be a writer? I am intrigued.

I think it was just the realization that she "broke" Jimmy, like she broke Edgar, despite thinking she could fix them.

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I don't think they've ever given us reason to accept how out of touch Jimmy is with things...that's what bothers me.

Isn't it just that he rejects all the social norms of life?

[Traveller519]

On 10/24/2016 at 0:22 PM, iMonrey said:

Isn't it just that he rejects all the social norms of life?

I certainly think that's a big part of it. But as wendy says above, it's that his interactions with peopleare largely though books. He's always left a little bit of a buffer between him and other people via literature.

[Ottis]

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I have a bit of a different take than most. I liked the Lindsay/Paul story more than the Gretchen one. The Gretchen one was completely predictable and bordering on cliche. Lindsay and Paul's had stuff I did not expect and genuinely made me laugh. Specifically the reading of the community bulletin and news while she was having sex with Raoule. Then the trying to talk himself into being a cuck as "our fetish."

And I saw it just the opposite way, with Lindsay pushing harder while Paul tried to adjust and accept. Nothing happened that surprised me. Their story doesn't upset me or anything. I just don't know what the point of it is.