Girls Recap: Mimi-Rose Is Ready for Her Close-Up

“Close-Up” isn’t just the title of Marnie and Desi’s latest (terrible) song. It’s also an apt title for an episode that offers a closer look at the relationship between Adam and Mimi-Rose (Gillian Jacobs).

The episode opens with the guitar strums of the Zombies’ “Can’t Nobody Love You” with shots of Mimi-Rose and Adam’s digs, which look like something out of Better Homes and Gardens for Millennials. Adam wakes up in bed next to Mimi-Rose, who wrestles in her sleep, and tucks her in to make her feel safe and secure. Later, she follows him out to the rooftop, where he’s prepared brunch. How f***ing ideal. You can almost feel Hannah’s heart break as you watch this little scene.

Meanwhile, back at Hannah’s apartment, things are not as idyllic. Elijah’s back, living with Hannah again, and he’s eating her cereal.

“I ate the fuckers. Sue me.” – Elijah, on Cinnamon Toast Crunch

 A Major Dis to Zooey Deschanel & M. Ward

In true Marnie-and-Desi fashion, their entrance in the episode is the two of them having sex while listening to their (still terrible) music.

When they’re not busy boning each other’s brains out, Marnie and Desi lie in bed listening to “Close-Up,” which already has almost 100 downloads! Marnie’s excited, while Desi’s more excited about seeing what’s under Peter Pan’s tights. Amidst their canoodling and making out, Marnie expresses interest in opening their showcase with “Close-Up.”

“This is not one of our top two,” says Desi. Nor top six. But Marnie thinks it’s a chance to show some range and sing love songs—even though Desi thinks they sing Modern American Folk (although it’s mostly just crap).

Marnie describes their sound as “She & Him, but with romance.” This angers Desi.

“We are nothing like She & Him,” he yells. “How can we have completely different takes on the same band that we’re both in?”

Marnie wonders whether Desi just doesn’t like this song because she wrote it. Then, they start to argue about how they spend their time, with Marnie working on their music and Desi tinkering with his motorcycle (which is his main means of transportation! GOD, Marnie!).

While Marnie won’t be getting any “jobs” like she got in the first episode any time soon, Shoshanna is also farther away from securing a full-time gig.  This time she’s in an interview with Madame Tinsley’s, a Cup Noodles-type of brand consisting of food made from the finest dehydrated products available. Scotty (Jason Ritter), the interviewer, admits that it was named after his ex-girlfriend named Tinsley. Shosh admits that she hates the name and that it smells like Buttdussy. But in the end, though she clearly doesn’t want the job, she does get a date out of it—with the cute interviewer.

Mimi-Rose is No Open Book

Back at paradise, Mimi-Rose, still lounging around in her adorable pajamas, starts mining through her and Adam’s shared book collection (how adorable). Adam wants to go for a run. Mimi-Rose would rather not.

“Beginnings of a cold?” he says. “Sweat that out!”

“No, I can’t go for a run because I had an abortion yesterday,” she says nonchalantly. She can’t take a bath and put a tampon in, either.

Adam is startled. “Are you. . .what?” He looks perplexed, like he can’t tell if she’s being serious or joking.

And Mimi-Rose says it again, in an even more confusing tone. He asks if it was his. She says “Of course it was yours.”

In a strangely hilarious moment, she admits that she wants to share more with him than other boyfriends. Then, Adam asks how many abortions she’s had.

“I’m not going to share that with you because that is private,” she says. So much for being open.

In true Adam fashion, he throws everything off the table, like something a pretentious method actor (like himself) would do.

Adam demands to know who took Mimi-Rose with her to the abortion. In true MRH fashion, it’s another person with a two-named first name: Sue-Ellen Garth, someone Adam doesn’t even know. He also doesn’t even know whether it was a boy or girl, and Mimi-Rose explains that it was just a ball of cells, not yet fully formed to have genitalia.

“Isn’t this a decision that people make together?” says Adam.

“That’s kind of absurd,” counters Mimi-Rose. “We’ve been together less than seven weeks.” Sister makes a good point. After all, Adam doesn’t even know her middle name.

“It’s Rose!” he says.

“No, my first name is Mimi-Rose,” she says. “My middle name is Eleanor.”

In this scene, I think it’s clear Adam isn’t used to someone being so closed-off. He just came from a relationship with Hannah Horvath, who pretty much shares everything with the world, including bowel movements. She would have talked to him about being pregnant. However, Mimi-Rose is not Hannah. She’s just about the complete opposite.

 Hannah’s “Wow” Moment

In therapy, Hannah visits Dr. Rice (played by Bob Balaban), and they discuss Miss Mimi-Rose, the pinched-face, skinny bitch. Somehow, Dr. Rice seems to know exactly what Hannah’s nemesis looks like (probably via Google) and thinks that Hannah is handling this situation very maturely.

They discuss Hannah’s next steps and figure out that she’s a “helper.” Hannah feels like getting into Iowa was just something to impress her friends and make her mom happy. It wasn’t necessarily what she wanted. Dr. Rice feels like he just had a “wow” moment with her.

The Gang’s Back Together

Hannah gets the girls (and Elijah) together at a restaurant. Elijah explains how his experience in Iowa left him feeling empty, so he decided to come back to New York and be with these losers. Meanwhile, Shoshanna has decided that she’s just going to marry Scotty the interviewer/soup mogul and forgo all of her dreams and ambitions and become her mother. Marnie says that ending up with someone selfish will just make her feel worse (case in point: Marnie’s sorry-ass relationship at the moment). Jessa, who seems to have nothing better to do than hang with these people, complains that she’s at a table of the Island of Misfit Animals (maybe that’s in the UK version of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”).

Hannah has big news. She wants to get a non-profit job and help people. The gang is not very supportive.

“You’re the most selfish person we know,” says Elijah. “You wouldn’t even share a Kit-Kat.”

Marnie brings up the fact that when they lived together, Hannah kept the fire extinguisher in her room so she could save herself first in the event of a fire. Now, she wants to change the world. Elijah is skeptical. Anyone who wants to help others always has a hidden agenda. Like Mother Theresa.

“Mother Theresa LOVED being famous” – Marnie

Based on her look, they start picking out jobs she could take, which include girl who gets killed in a Lifetime movie and schoolmarm.

Then, it dawns on Hannah. She could be a teacher: “I can’t do, so I’m gonna teach.”

 

The Ballad of Adam and Mimi-Rose

Just when you think Adam’s going to pack up and leave (because. . .he’s packing up and leaving), he runs into Mimi-Rose on his way out. She admits to him that every morning, she wakes up before him and pretends to be asleep, just so he’ll tuck her in because she likes it and is really coming to depend on it.

Adam feels like she doesn’t depend on him at all. She’s so independent, and he has no idea what she’s working on. She never lets him in. Like Adam’s butcher (who he cares about), Mimi-Rose doesn’t need him, but she wants him. She didn’t lie to him. She just waited to share information with him until it was too late to chime in.

“Close-Up” pulls the switcheroo on the typical abortion storyline. Instead of Adam bringing Mimi-Rose flowers, she was bringing him flowers as consolation for her actions.

Ray Takes Umbrage

At a local meeting, Ray is on the docket to present his diorama, in an effort to help alleviate the noise pollution in his neighborhood, and when he waits and waits (and waits some more) to speak to the board, he speaks up and demands to be heard.

“Shame on you! You call this politics. This is a circus. [. . .] I take umbrage!” – Ray

Soon, all of the board members start turning on each other, bringing up infidelities and monetary indiscretions, but at least their getting the real issues out in the open.

Later, we see Ray working on a flyer on his computer: “Ray Ploshansky for Community Board and Chairperson.” Ray may have finally found his calling.

Speaking of callings, Hannah actually goes through with her vow to help people. The final scene shows Hannah entering a school building, presumably to work toward her new dream of teaching. Although don’t you have to have a teaching degree for that? We’ll see how Lena Dunham and company skirt around that issue next week.

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