Togetherness, “Not So Together” (1.8) - TV Review
Season one of Togetherness has been simultaneously drawn out and rushed, and the finale punctuates that trend.
Season one of Togetherness has been simultaneously drawn out and rushed, and the finale punctuates that trend.
Broad City has had a lot of hilarious sexual moments, always from a feminist point of view, but nothing really compares to how typical gender representations were done the “right” way in Kirk Steele’s debut episode.
It’s Andre and Rainbow’s 15 year anniversary and they want to celebrate by bringing all of their family together for a vowel renewal ceremony. We’ve already met (and fallen in love with) Andre’s parents Pops and Ruby, but this week we get to meet Rainbow’s parents as well.
“Party Time” is probably the best episode of the season for its emotional honesty, but the season is still struggling to cohere. It’s unclear how much time has passed since Brett met Linda last week, but she’s already had a profound impact on his life.
After the oldest Johnson kid Zoey had an entire episode to herself, Junior gets his turn. Andre overhears in the morning carpool that Junior’s being bullied at school. Since Andre was bullied himself as a teenager, he figures out that he can help Junior defend himself.
This week, Blacki-ish tackles interracial dating when Zoey starts dating a white French boy named Andre. At first, it’s clear that her dad Andre Johnson has problems accepting him because he’s white, but his coworkers make matters even worse by insinuating that he’s likely to be very sexual because he’s French.
At this point, I’ve all but lost hope that Togetherness can salvage this first season. The show’s title and first couple of episodes described a show about four people lost in the transition to their forties supporting each other.
After last week’s depressing and disappointing episode, I was looking forward to a chance for the show to get back to what it does best: relatable silliness. There’s a fair bit of fun to be had with this episode as Michelle and company play a heated game of kick the can with strangers.
Sometimes Broad City can get just a little too specific. Many of the jokes this week didn’t land for me, like I wasn’t in on some hilarious joke everyone else knows about. On paper, it sounded hilarious – Abbi and Ilana wander all over the city trying to find the perfect party or as Ilana put it the “Narnia of Partias.”
So far, some of the strongest Black-ish episodes have been for holidays, such as the Halloween one. However, this Valentine’s one was unnecessarily acidic and mean-spirited. Andre uses World War I as an extended analogy for his Valentine’s day struggle with Rainbow.