“On All Fours”, the ninth episode of Girls Season Two, had a dark undertone that seemed to sweep the characters further into their destructive behaviors. With only one episode left of the current season, it seems unlikely that any of the three remaining girls will get her act together or even fully hit rock-bottom.
Hannah continues on her downward spiral and still suffers from her latest attack of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). For the first time this season, Lena Dunham has her character, Hannah, barely speak. What the viewer does get to witness is her sad state and her general withdrawal from her friends. She spends the entire episode alone and struggles with a Q-tip that she lodges too far into her ear canal. It is the best reenactment ever done of someone trying to clean their ears. As usual, Dunham is a master of observation and she puts a trivial grooming technique into her episode and ,somehow, turns it into a metaphor for Hannah’s current emotional and mental state. When Hannah ends up in the ER, she acts like a scared little girl, and the viewer is invited to see just how fragile and vulnerable she is, underneath all of her witty sarcasm. On her walk home from the hospital, she conveniently (a tactic usually reserved for network sitcoms) runs into Adam. At this point, she craves any type of human compassion and she tries to reach out to him in her own way. Adam tells her he is out with his new girlfriend, and then leaves her on the sidewalk alone.
As predicted in my review last week, Adam is actually more scarred by this run-in than Hannah. He masks his hurt feelings by diving head first back into a bottle of Jack Daniels. After a night of heavy drinking and dancing, he treats his girlfriend like a cheap porn star and the viewer witnesses how disturbed Adam has become.
Shoshanna, Marnie, and Ray attend a party at Charlie’s new bourgeois smart phone App Company. Shoshanna, still feeling guilty from her tryst with a doorman, tries to avoid Ray most of the night. Ray detects that something is off and presses her to explain why she is acting so strangely. Shoshanna admits she held hands with a doorman, and Ray seems to not care. For a person who usually says exactly what she is thinking, this is Shoshanna’s first attempt at deceit and manipulation. I’m expecting it to blow-up in her face in the season finale. Her character is still quite innocent, and her indiscretion is more about being inexperienced and naive, rather than being a female player.
Marnie sings a song at the party against a new track she laid down the previous night, and completely embarrasses herself in front of Charlie and all of his coworkers. Charlie takes her aside to tell her that her current behavior is not cute anymore. But, apparently, he loves her anyway because the two hook up at the end of the night. This has been teased all season and Marnie is infatuated with Charlie and his recent success. This might be her rock-bottom, where she will finally have to figure out what she really wants.
The episode concludes with Hannah lying on the floor making a distressed phone call to her parents for help. She recognizes that her current mental state is off, and she reaches out to the two people who will not judge her. I’m expecting her to show her stronger side again in the season finale next week, because I don’t want to see this season end with Hannah’s destruction. Perhaps, Hannah and Marnie will spend some time together and help one another. Although, that is the type of happy ending that typically doesn’t happen in Cable dramedies.
FILM AND TV MANIA 