The Girls Recap for Men: Denial and Judy Collins

Every week, a man from Esquire will take to The Culture Blog to write about the latest episode of Girls, the endlessly-talked-about and sometimes-watched HBO series created by and starring Lena Dunham. Some will like the show, some will hate it, some somewhere in between, but hopefully there will always be something to learn. Especially for men.

Season 2, Episode 8: "It's Back"

This is the point of the season where we go into an episode assuming that all the characters will reach some level of catharsis in a relatively short period of time, and the central events of "It's Back" — Shoshanna cheating on Ray, Hannah being diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder, Marnie realizing she wants to be a singer, and Adam going on a successful date with a new girl — clearly chart the path of destruction we'll hopefully see unfold over the next two weeks.

The episode begins with Adam calling Hannah, who doesn't answer. Immediately after she ignores his call, though, she starts doing double, triple, and eventually octuple takes looking for him as she walks down the sidewalk. She goes home, and, after opening and closing her door eight times, shoves eight potato chips into her mouth. (It seems a bit on the nose that she does all of these things eight times in the season's eighth episode, but we'll take it.)

Out for a casual stroll in Washington Square Park, Ray and Shoshanna inform Marnie that her ex-boyfriend Charlie's mobile app has taken off and he's managing "like, eleven employees," according to Shosh. Marnie makes a surprised Marnie face (kinda like this one) and quickly excuses herself.

"We may never see her again," Shoshanna tells Ray, sounding as caffeinated as ever. "I do not trust anyone anymore." Her rant on honesty is cut short, though, when Radhika, a rollerblading college friend, comes over and invites them to a party. Shoshanna accepts, citing a fear of being branded as too couple-y with Ray and thus not social enough. Ray refuses to attend the party, because he's 33, and, we agree, it would look creepy, but that sends Shoshanna marching away.

It's clear that Adam isn't yet over Hannah, but he's making progress. He spills some much-needed soul at his AA meeting: "It wasn't love the way I had imagined it. I just felt weird if I didn't know what she was up to. I liked knowing that she was going to be there, and warm, and staying the night."

After the spiel, Adam offers to bring the cookies to the next meeting, and one of his fellow recovering alcoholics tries to set him up with her daughter. Adam agrees, and it actually goes really well. His date, Natalia (who is really hot), works for a private eye (which is really cool), isn't put off by Adam's only-slightly-caustic goofiness (which could be a miracle), and thinks dating is awful (understandable).

When Marnie visits Charlie's tony Chelsea office, she's visibly impressed by his newfound success. He informs her that his app Forbid (which will forbid you from contacting burned bridges like your ex-girlfriend) was inspired by their breakup. Charlie assumes she's there because she needs money. She tries to deny it, but is cut off by a loud group of employees who drag Charlie off to a lip-dub session for a YouTube music video.

Hannah's parents, meeting her for dinner and a Judy Collins set, almost instantly pick up on the fact that her OCD is back, setting off an argument that again demonstrates both sides aren't entirely fair to each other:

"You think we didn't experience it? You think we didn't suffer worrying about whether you'd have a normal life?"


"No, we don't know why you had OCD. We don't know why. I mean, we're still married. We never raised a hand to you. It's not our fault."

"Well, it's genetic, which is sort of the ultimate 'your fault.'"

Their attention is turned away when Collins launches into the very sad "Song for Judith." Hannah has to leave for the bathroom (hitting one man eight times on the way).

Shoshanna arrives at her friend's party alone, but attracts the attention of a young doorman on her way up. Her friend Radhika winds up ignoring her at the party (it's hard to blame her; if I knew a Shoshanna, I'd ignore her, too), but Shoshanna's earlier claims about trust go out the window when she makes out with the doorman in a back room after giving him a fake name.

In a brilliant scene change, we cut to Ray sitting on Shoshanna's bed, reading a book in his boxers as Marnie comes home from work. Marnie complains to him that Charlie is doing so well.

"It doesn't matter how right you do things. Because you know who end up living their dreams are, like, sad messes like Charlie. And the people who end up flailing behind are people like me, who have their shit together."

"Marnie learned another life lesson. How adorable."

Sarcasm aside, Ray actually is there to help her: "Turn this potential energy into kinetic energy. Stop being a cartographer and become an explorer."

That's when Marnie finally admits to wanting to be a singer, and after a few bars of Norah Jones and more biting encouragement from Ray ("You are never going to look this good again"), we kinda believe she won't suck at it.

Hannah meets with a psychiatrist and we get a little more background on her obsessive-compulsive past. She struggled with it in high school, masturbating eight times a night, neurotically checking if her parents heard her, moving toothbrushes around sixty-four times, and still they wouldn't look right so she would have to do it over, etc. It all sounds horrible, and her grey-whiskered shrink stares back at her with all the warmth of a polar bear. Weirdly, Hannah seems to admire that.

"I don't really think you would understand any of my problems because you seem like you have a tremendous amount of willpower and general togetherness," she says. When he asks why she thinks that, she assumes he's fishing for a compliment. Really, she said it because she feels the opposite about herself, and — like Marnie — she's not comfortable admitting that she doesn't have it together. The men in the episode seem to be stable, for the most part: Ray is a rock; Adam is taking steps to improvement; Charlie is getting paid and giving orders. The women need others to coax their flaws out with a tow truck, then want to cover them up. Hannah tells her shrink:

"I will really do anything you say if you tell my parents I'm OK."

"Are you?"

And on the subway, as the episode ends, Hannah tells her father, prescription clutched in hand, "I hate it when you look so concerned about me."

Credits roll. Cue Judy.


Advertisement - Continue Reading Below
More From TV