Hannah is back at one as “GIRLS” is having an Awesome season – Season 4 Episode 4 & 5 Recap : TVREVIEW

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GIRLS, Girls Season 4 Episode 5 Recap, Girls Season 4 Episode 5 Review

Aren’t you just LOVING “Girls” this season?

I think it’s the fact that we are finally seeing some change in these self-absorbed characters, with Hannah (Lena Dunham) probably being the most changed. Or not changed just yet, but she is going through a major transitional period. While it’s sometimes hard to watch, it’s real and the shows crew manage to keep things entertaining.

At the end of Episode 4, I have to say I was so incredibly disappointed with Adam (Adam Driver). After debating it and feeling miserable the whole while, Hannah decided that Iowa and Grad School just wasn’t working for her. The overly-critical, and uber-snobby students she was working with criticized every single thing she did and misconstrued a letter she distributed to all them that was mostly positive. Hannah realized what makes her happy, and Grad school wasn’t it, so she came back to Brooklyn. First thing that happens is she comes into her apartment and finds Adam with a whole new girlfriend.

I had always been an Adam fan, and by the end of Episode 5 I regained my love for his character, but I was so disappointed in him at the end of Episode 4. He had always been so honest and loving and caring and supportive, so it was devastating to see he was just like every other guy.

Ultimately, he’s not like every other guy.

Episode 5 was HILARIOUS in dealing with Hannah dealing with her newly-single reality. At the end, Hannah and Adam had a really heartfelt (and extremely well written and acted) talk, and even though it sucked for Hannah I really sided with and understood Adam. Their relationship wasn’t really working, and it wasn’t destined to last forever, as much as we wanted to see it work we all kinda knew it wasn’t going to. And I felt like Adam’s parting words to her were so sweet and genuine, it’s hard to be mad at the dude for trying to be happy on his own. So we are left with Hannah back at square one. She has no job, she isn’t in school anymore, she has no boyfriend, and seemingly no purpose. And I love that we get to see her start from the ground up yet again.

Jessa (Jemima Kirke) though!!! I mean… does ANYBODY like her? And if so, WHY?

There wasn’t much of her on Episode 4 (thank god), but her little appearance in Episode 5 shows that she is the most despicable character on the show — and maybe all of TV. I just don’t understand her, and her need to hurt people. I don’t understand why she would try to hook Adam up with his new girlfriend Mimi-Rose, and I don’t know why she was so flippant in telling Hannah like it was no big deal. When Hannah punched Jessa’s arm, I was seriously hoping for a lot more. And Jessa would have deserved it. Hannah left things with “you’re a fucking bitch” (deserved), but it looks like Jessa is still on the show and hanging out with the rest of the girls next week. So I don’t get it.

As far as the rest of the girls, Marnie (Allison Williams) has probably had the most interesting story these past two episodes. Details are slightly fuzzy, but Desi (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) comes to her house and says he broke up with Clementine. Although Marnie puts two and two together and realizes it was Clementine that broke up with him. I loved the look Marnie gave at the end of that scene, where she is aware of his lies but she decides to go along with his fairytale for whatever ulterior reason she has.

Shoshanna (Zosia Mamet) spent all of Episode 4 with her former boyfriend Ray (Alex Karpovsky), who is almost literally going insane because of the noise pollution on their block. They spend the day together, but neither of them talk about possibly getting back together. Shosh is still apologetic about how she treated Ray, but Ray acknowledges that he became a better person because of her. Ray (based on a small statement he made in Episode 5) seems to have feelings for Marnie that he won’t allow to surface, and that’s the ONLY reason I see for him not wanting to patch things up with Shosh in a romantic way. Because she obviously needs him.

This Recap kinda sucks, but I’m going to end it now. I just wanted to say that I’m loving the show this season, it has maintained a really funny and and I’m REALLY curious how things will go from here on out.

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“GIRLS” gets Darker, but still funny AF – Season 4 Episode 3 Recap : TVREVIEW

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Girls Season 4 Episode 3, Girls Season 4 Episode 3 Recap, Girls Season 4 Episode 3 Review

After such a fun time last week, this weeks episode of “GIRLS” was a bitter darker… and I lived for it. It was that episode where these characters are finally facing their immaturity and realize they need to grow up and move on.

Our lead Hannah is still in Iowa, but not having a good time. She rejoices in having lots of down time because she only has one class a week, but she is also second guessing her writing talent as she consistently gets bad feedback from her study group, and she isn’t using her free time to write. She’s also frustrated by the limited communication between her and Adam.

Hannah is upset, and seemingly scared that this decision isn’t for her. In one great scene (funny because it was so harsh) at a Poetry party Hannah goes off on each member of her writing group and tells them why they suck. Dunham really did a good job of letting the viewers feel her frustration in this scene which showed more of her insecurities than anything else.

And it seems like Elijah IS there to stay, as he has made loads of friends in Iowa and is now flirting with photography (“I just realized that I got so good at taking selfies that I wasn’t feeling challenged anymore. Then I thought what would happen if I turned the camera around.” “). I don’t know that him being there makes all that much sense, but I’m just happy to have him. He’s such a great energy to the show.

Back in NYC, Shoshanna hits the interview trails and begins her life as an adult. Her one interview was funny, she and the person had a great rapport but Shosh turned the job down because she was using it as a “test-interview”. It’s just another example of Shosh’s lovable naivety and how it will ultimately lead her to disappointment. I think her character is going to have a very interesting season.

Next up is Marnie, who is finally allowing herself to see her relationship with Desi for what it is. She doesn’t want to admit she’s a mistress, so she goes to the realist Ray for advice and he tells her she needs to forget about him (and they end up having sex! okay!?). Later it seems like a record label wants to sign Marnie and Desi, thinking they are a real life couple. When they have to admit they aren’t together, Marnie finally has the realization that she doesn’t really want to make music with him if he isn’t going to be her boyfriend. She light-weight sabotages the meeting, and we are left with Marnie second guessing her path again. But mostly I think we were left with Marnie finally letting go of Desi and their unhealthy situation.

Adam and Jessa are getting chummy as they both participate in Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. They seem to get along fine, as he can relay his frustrations with Hannah to her and she can get some positive influence from him. He admits to her that he doesn’t enjoy talking to Hannah because she only talks about superficial bull, which is the reason they’ve restricted their calls to once a week. And apparently he admitted to Jessa that there may or may not be another girl in the picture (I was unclear on this actually).

Ultimately, because Jessa is such a little kid, she ends up getting thrown in jail and so does Adam for trying to help her out. Once they get out and Jessa shows absolutely no remorse, Adam gets her ALL THE WAY TOGETHER by telling her she needs to grow up.

Jessa, in a really uncharacteristic turn, cries out that she “needs a friend”. It was a small line, but it does signal the fact that maybe Jessa FINALLY wants to change. Adam didn’t walk back to her (I don’t remember), but it felt like her crying out to him was genuine, so we’ll see what comes from it.

This recap is breif, but that’s because Girls has set us up for an interesting turn when it returns in two weeks.

So much Fun in Iowa – “GIRLS” Season 4 Episode 2 Recap : TVREVIEW

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Andrew Rannells, GIRLS, Girls HBO, Girls Season 4 Episode 2 Recap, Girls Season 4 Episode 2 Review, Lena Dunham

“GIRLS” was so much fun last night, I imagine this recap is going to be a short one. The second episode of season 4 focused on Hannah (Lena Dunham) acclimating her New York state of mind to her new life in Iowa. The entire episode took place in Iowa, and though that might have been a little jarring since we are so used to the East Coast landscape, the episode was a huge win. The reason the episode worked is because even though we know she’s a narcissistic spoiled brat, we really do love Hannah and so it felt nice to spend a whole half hour with her. And we also love Elijah (Andrew Rannells), but we’ll get into him later.

Basically the episode started with Hannah getting a really cute and cozy new place, learning that in Iowa you can leave your bicycle without locking it and it won’t get stolen (in general), and having a really hard time in her writing workshop where her hilarious over-confidence turns into frustration because she feels misunderstood when everybody in the workshop trashes her work. In the span of about a day, Hannah goes from super excited to thoughts of suicide (not that she was actually thinking of doing it, she tells her parents, just thinking of new ways to do it). Feeling frustrated and alone (her home sits in a dead zone for cell service), Hannah is surprised to see Elijah dropping in. “I hate everyone that isn’t you” Hannah says after Elijah tells her he’s OVER New York and wanted to be here for her because she sounded depressed.

It wasn’t clear if Elijah had plans of STAYING in Iowa or not, but that’s not important. What’s important is that the two went to a “rager”, and all kinds of hilarity ensued and my LIFE was gotten. I LOVE watching Hannah dance around and be silly, and we got plenty of that. Hannah drunkenly tells a freshman who is upset that her out of town boyfriend is cheating that she needs to go out there and “bust a nut”, this is while Elijah is jacking off a cute boy upstairs, and before Hannah starts a weird jello/paint wrestling match downstairs.

This was a perfect episode in my eyes. Like I said in a previous recap, the beauty of this show is the writing and the fact that even though we see all of the flaws in Hannah it’s impossible to NOT like her. She’s so fun, and funny, and daring (I mean, look at the clothes she wears when she walks out of the house), and clearly doesn’t give a fuck about what anybody thinks. However the workshop provided a much needed shot to Hannah’s ego, so it will be interesting to see just how much she grows from the experience.

And let’s talk about Elijah for a second. We LOVE him! Ever since his very first appearance on the show, he has been such a great presence on the show that every time he pops up we smile. And I couldn’t have smiled harder than last night when he showed up out of nowhere. Like I said, it wasn’t clear if he was planning on staying in Iowa with Hannah, but I’d love it if he did. He’s a really fun counterpart for her, but in addition he’s a really good dramatic actor as we’ve seen before. So yeah… MORE ELIJAH PLEASE!!!

This also sets up the season in an interesting way. As much as I’d love to just stay in Iowa and follow Hannah, it’s obvious that this season will have a lot of jumping from NYC to Iowa and it will be interesting to see how the writers and directors tackle this.

All is well (and by well, I mean the same) with the “GIRLS” – Season 4 Episode 1 Recap : TVREVIEW

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Adam Driver, Girls HBO, Girls HBO Review, Girls Season 4 Episode 1 Recap, Girls Season 4 Premiere, Girls TV Review, Lena Dunham, Zosia Mamet

Season 4 of “Girls” started off on a really nice note last night, as the premiere was a casual way of catching us up with Hannah (Lena Dunham) and the gang. And no surprise, in the months that have passed not MUCH has changed.

Hannah and Adam are back together, and Adam (Adam Driver) has officially become a working actor taking whatever gig pays the bills, yet he’s still this tortured artist who can’t take a compliment and thinks everything he does stinks. Hannah is supportive but mostly she’s worried that he doesn’t care about her leaving for Iowa in days. She wants to make a plan and him being Adam he’d prefer to go with the flow.

Though it was incredibly understated, the Hannah and Adam story of last night was really sad because I think both of them knew it was the beginning of the end. Where at first Adam says they’ll talk 10 times a day, later on he says he’s “shit” on the phone. And the morning when Hannah’s parents come to pick her up, and Marnie (Allison Williams) pops up to help move, Adam fakes sleep and watches her leave from his window.

It felt like Adam was relieved and almost happy that Hannah was leaving, because the fact that he didn’t run out there and give her a big goodbye hug and kiss is really telling.

Let’s back track though, because the majority of the season opener was spent at a Jazz Brunch where Marnie and her musical partner Desi (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) are performing more corny/acoustic/folk songs. Marnie is still carrying on a musical and sexual relationship with the guy, who we first see with his face up Marnie’s ass before a passionate screw over the kitchen sink. At the actual gig we find out that he’s still with his girlfriend Clementine (Natalie Morales), but Marnie still carries on a phony conversation with her where she apologizes for even giving the impression that she’d screw her boyfriend. Ending with a “ok GIRL”, in the fakest tone ever.

And even though Marnie has apparently been doing the music thing for months now (I wasn’t really clear on how many months had passed since the finale), she still hasn’t developed a tough skin. Little kids whining and people laughing during her performance sent her in breakdown mode where she ran out and cried until Elijah (Andrew Rannells) whipped her into shape. (By the way… MORE ELIJAH PLEASE!) So it looks like Marnie is still her insecure self, and it’s highly likely that she’ll give up music and try to find yet ANOTHER thing to be passionate about. Sigh!

Jessa (Jemima Kirke) is still assisting photographer Beadie, the woman she nearly killed last season. She’s in for a rude awakening when she find Beadie’s daughter there, she goes off on Jessa and her irresponsible and toxic ways. I loved that moment because while the daughter (played excellently by Natasha Lyonne) was telling Jessa things she needs to hear, it was also a pretty funny moment because of her delivery. Anyway, Jessa is now out of a job and she takes out all of her frustrations on Hannah, who she is a complete bitch to at the Brunch. However, I could care less about Jessa and her feeling that Hannah is being a hypocrite. I was hoping that by this premiere Jessa would have found some sort of responsibility or maturity, but apparently not.

Which leaves Shosh (Zosia Mamet), Shoshana who finally graduated but seems completely un-emotional about it. It was GREAT to see Ana Gasteyer play one half of Shoshanna’s dysfunctional parents, but other than that there’s not much to report about Shosh other than she cut her hair and that her and Ray (Alex Karpovsky) MIGHT be on the path to mending their relationship. There was a strange conversation when she was leaving the brunch where Ray was very smiley yet silent as Shosh apologized for trying to “force” him to get back with her at the end of last season. For the simple fact that Shosh’s story was so scant this week, I think this season will be a great one for her character.

Last nights episode was really good, because it reminded us why we love (or hate) the show. It’s a fun, funny, light slice of life series that’s never too serious but never really predictable. And the premiere has definitely set us up for an interesting turn of events for possibly all of our GIRLS.