It’s funny and fitting in a way that a series titled I Love LA would move its season finale to New York City (and offer I Love NY as its onscreen title). Will Maia, Alani, and Tallulah (Rachel Sennott, True Whitaker, and Odessa A’zion) find themselves in an I-heart-NY state of mind? Or will they find their trip to the Big Apple basically a confirmation of why they enjoy living in sunny L.A.?
Maia, of course, is ready to embrace New York City. She’s already wired and anxious and speed-walking through Lower Manhattan, talking a mile a minute about how she’s fine with the seven day no-contact agreement she made with Dylan (Josh Hutcherson). She’s manic (obviously), and it’s funny how both of her friends read that in diametrically opposed ways: Is this healing or is this concerning? Either way, Maia is not paying much attention to what’s around her. She’s ready to text Dylan in a very grown-up way and let him know that, uh, her plane landed fine. He would want to know that, right?
He does. Or, rather, his thumbs-up text suggests he does. Which, to Maia, is basically an insult. It’s enough to make Maia (sporting a nice blowout and a little black dress) continue to pick up smoking as her NYC vice.
You do wish Maia had more levelheaded friends to help her through this ordeal. Instead, Tallulah fuels her friend’s manic episode by complaining about Dylan’s chivalry (which she’s always found borderline offensive), all while projecting the kind of scenario Maia needs to believe is true: “He’s obviously having a mental breakdown on the inside,” she says, which…well, more on that later.
As the two arrive at the Antoine fitting for the Formé dinner, it’s clear they’re in uncharted territory. Surrounded by professional models and assistants (equally aloof and scathing in their disdain for anyone else, really), Maia and Tallulah find they’re not in Kans—er, Los Angeles anymore. There are no sunny smiles here. Just indifferent scowls.
Antoine is perfectly cordial as he hands Tallulah the dress for the dinner, which ends up being a simple black one that’s chic and fits like a glove. Considering our Ritz Cracker/bag thief girl was hoping for a big fashion moment (she’s looked around and seen plenty of eye-catching numbers), she can’t help but be disappointed. Not that Antoine will hear any of it: “You’re not a model. You just do your funny videos and steal things.” She should just be happy she’s invited.
If you know Tallulah, which he clearly doesn’t, that’s not what you want to tell her, especially as she and Maia know this dinner could be their ticket to leveling up. And that’s rarely done in an elegant black dress. Which is why, as Maia bores the models on break nearby, Tallulah steals what looks like a wildly revealing green dress and heads straight for the door, pretending nothing of note has happened.
Meanwhile, in Los Angeles and sent on Dylan duty, Charlie (Jordan Firstman) arrives to find Maia’s maybe-still-boyfriend rearranging spices while listening to heavy metal. His version, we assume, of a manic episode. Offering an unlikely shoulder to rely on, Charlie insists the two talk out what’s going on, bro-style. Just as Tallulah gives incredibly bizarre-sounding advice to Maia (all while perhaps misreading the situation, even if occasionally offering welcome pearls of wisdom), Charlie is both wildly helpful and also borderline chaotic. Yes, he knows Maia needs constant validation, but to sum the intricacies of Maia’s own texting philosophy (Charlie cannot believe Dylan just thumbs-upped her text!) as “bitches be crazy” feels both on-point and unhelpful.
Charlie is better once he decides what the two need is some role playing (wig included, naturally). What would Dylan say to Maia if she was right there. What insecurities about their relationship would he voice? What fears and anxieties about how he feels he’s not her priority would he feel emboldened to say out loud? Plenty, obviously, but as it turns out the role-playing skit is most helpful for Charlie, who’s clearly using it to work through his own relationship issues with Andrew (the fuckbuddy he’d lost to a Din Tai Fung date). Which snaps them both back into action. What Dylan needs is to go wild!
So, what would he most want to do with this break? Charlie is obviously hoping for a wild night out. Dylan, though? He wants to watch the Ken Burns Vietnam doc. We all heal in different ways, right?
Because, across the country, Maia is healing in a decidedly different way. Eating out with Alani and Tallulah (at a place Ben himself recommended), she’s relishing being an uninhibited New York City girl. Which is put to the test when Ben (wearing a ring, as Alani breathlessly admires) approaches their table (super chic, right outside on the sidewalk) and basically talks down to them all (he even outright calls Tallulah a small fish in a big pond), quickly setting the tone and stage for what will happen. He’s leaving his credit card at the bar. Why don’t they all keep drinking on his tab and then he can go pick it up at the hotel room the next day?
It’s the perfect scenario for what Maia has in mind for her own wild evening (she wants to be a “babe, pig in the city”) and hilariously, we’re deprived of knowing just how wild the night is. We only see the results: blood on the sheets in their hotel bed as Maia and Tallulah learn they got matching tattoos (“The Nightmare Before Business” which apparently will be Maia’s company name?). They’ll both get them lasered off when they get back to L.A. but this does bring up one tiny problem: Tallulah isn’t wearing a gorgeous black dress to the Formé event. The green dress she stole is, to quote Maia as she holds it up to scrutiny, “so fucking backless!” It’s a nightmare. What will Antoine do when he realizes Tallulah stole this dress?
Maia goes into crisis mode and realizes the only one who can help her is…Charlie, who makes the mistake of putting Maia on speakerphone, in hopes she’ll talk about how much she misses Dylan and how beat up she is over it all. Oh how wrong. As ever, Maia is in a crisis of her own making, unable to think beyond her job, which drives Dylan away. Charlie is blunt: Antoine will not be happy. But perhaps he can help. (He is better with dresses than he is with interpersonal stuff.)
Thankfully, Maia at least gets a bit of a break to make her indecent-proposal moment with Ben happen in her hotel room. He’s as much of a sleazebag as we know he is (he was dining out with his wife just the night before when he went over to Maia’s table!), and it’s clear this is all a power move. He asks Maia to touch herself for him, while he spits on her. She’s to do what he wants while he stays inviolate, watching her: “I’m not gonna fuck you today.” (Not literally, at least.) But he does offer a job (and a $400,000 salary!) and insists they work with Tallulah together.
You can see Maia slowly realize this is not what she wants. The blurred lines between the sexual fantasy and the reality of that kind of work relationship feel impossible to discern. It’s a fascinating conundrum, especially wrapped up in a character who is still figuring out how messy she’s allowed to be and who put herself in this very awkward situation to begin with (where consent and agency are thorny, tricky things to untangle).
And so she’s wondering whether she can even say no to the offer. After all, Tallulah would kill her if she doesn’t take it. But Maia is done being underestimated and taken for granted and feeling like she needs to use her agency (or lack thereof) as a way to get ahead. And so we get our final friendly advice courtesy of Charlie: just lie. After all, that’s what leveling up in this world is all about. (Is he the worst of them?)
Which is what she does: In her telling, Ben only offered Maia a job if she dropped Tallulah as a client, which, obviously she refused (much to Tallulah’s joy and outrage). Sigh. And so all is well, as they get dressed for the dinner only to find the entire block around them is gridlocked because a crazy person stabbed a famous person (uh, that would be Alani’s dad, who got stabbed by his stalker, whom Alani had been fooled to believe was her father’s mistress).
But traffic won’t keep them from her dream fashion moment. They know better. They’ll walk the streets and take the subway (while “Dreams” by The Cranberries plays in the background). At the same time, we see Charlie arriving at Andrew’s workplace with some Din Tai Fung (“You know I could be basic, too”) and, in a greater shocker, Dylan waking up next to Claire.
Not that we dwell too much on that. The focus, as ever, has been on Maia and Tallulah. As they race into the subway, we get a quintessential NYC scene: two gorgeous girls in beautiful dresses set against the craziness of the train, including the gem that’s enough to snap them out of their dreamy haze. “I think you both look beautiful,” a guy tells them, “but my rat thinks you’re sluts.”
“I miss L.A.,” Maia says in quiet defeat, giving us the kind of cliffhanger sitcoms of yore used to give us, and which we had to wait months (and not a year, as we do these days) to see how it would all get resolved. Will they make it to the dinner? Will Antoine care about Tallulah going rogue with her dress? Will Dylan tell Maia what happened with Claire? Will Charlie and Andrew try and make it work? Will Alani get a meatier subplot worthy of Whitaker’s dry comedic talents?
Stray observations
- • Okay, I was mostly being facetious when I noted that I Love LA was riffing on Friends last week, but now that I see we’re doing a “We were on a break!” storyline between Maia and Dylan, I need Rachel Sennott to confirm she stans Ross and Rachel.
- • One thing I Love LA does really well is depicting the way those who have grown up as digital natives have come to understand their online interactions (a text message, a thumbs up, a phone call, etc.) in truly serious ways.
- • How meta does a line like “Well, I happen to be an expert at making people realize why they’re mad and then making them way madder” read now following Firstman’s Heated Rivalry kerfuffle?
Manuel Betancourt is a contributor to The A.V. Club.
