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<em>GIRLS</em> Recap: "Sit In," Or Hannah Holes Up In Greenpoint Apartment

Rebecca Fishbein

Published Feb 16, 2015

Modified Feb 17, 2015

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Rebecca Fishbein

Published Feb 16, 2015

Modified Feb 17, 2015

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In its uneven three and a half season run, GIRLS has offered up a handful of episodes that stick in your brain. There is, of course, Season 1's standout “Welcome To Bushwick a.k.a. The Crackcident"; the ever-controversial "One Man's Trash" from Season 2 also comes to mind, and this week, "Sit-In" joins the gang, serving up the kind of memorable heartache that reminds viewers why they bother tuning in in the first place.

We pick up right where we left off last week, in Hannah's apartment with Adam and Mimi-Rose. Adam is dating this juice-drinking, TED Talking creature, and there's nothing Hannah can do about it. She holes up in the apartment she and Adam once shared—one that has become his and Mimi-Rose's in the meantime, with her old life and memorabilia getting moved to a storage locker in Fort Greene—and waits for her friends to come comfort her, as friends do in times of crises. In a wise writerly move, we never leave Hannah's apartment this week, leaving us bottled up with her heartbreak and searing disappointment.

The friends show up, as friends are required to do in times of strife, one-by-one. Shosh is the angry one, shoving Mimi-Rose out of the way when she storms into the apartment. Jessa, who set Mimi-Rose and Adam up, is unrepentant, a move that is technically unforgivable but makes sense considering her budding friendship with Adam. It's tough, from a female friendship standpoint, to watch her side with Adam over Hannah, even if she's right. Next up, Ray, tender from the loss of both Shosh and Marnie, commiserates and tends to Hannah's accidental burn injury. And Marnie, better late than never, tells Hannah that it's time to let Adam go.

It's not surprising, from an outside perspective, that Hannah and Adam are not meant to last, particularly after everything that happened between them last season. But when you're inside that kind of relationship—one that's survived by a thread—it's easy to trick yourself into believing you're the exception to the rule. "I would have liked the chance to find out," Hannah tells Marnie, when she asks her if she thought she and Adam would have been a forever couple. "I think you have found out. I think you have your answer," Marnie tells her, and it's exactly what Hannah doesn't want to hear, what no one wants to hear, but must accept in order to snip that thread away.

The hardest thing here for Hannah, it seems, is not that she is losing someone she loves, but she's lost someone who loved her. "You were in love with me a month ago," she tells Adam. When Adam bravely comes clean, confirming the worst, the viewer too can feel the love Hannah will no longer carry with her. "What we had was real, and it was beautiful and intense and weird and terrifying, and there was a time I couldn't imagine myself with anyone else, ever," Adam tells her. "But you don't feel that anymore?" she asks. "No." Hannah's been questioning her identity and future as a writer all season, but another piece of her identity has broken off, too—she is no longer the person Adam loves. This is not an easy change, and anyone who's lost the love of another knows this will require reconstruction.

What GIRLS conveys here is what GIRLS should be doing every week, but doesn't always. This is what it feels like to have someone tell you they don't love you anymore. This is what it feels like when your life and home and even your physical apartment, considering Adam relocated her stuff and cut down a wall, is like nothing you can recognize anymore. This is what your heart feels like at 25, or whatever age, and there's something simultaneously soothing and terrifying about watching it played out here, because it seems real, for once.

There's something else at play here. One of my biggest criticisms of GIRLS is that, in three and a half seasons, none of the four titular ladies have developed enough as characters or people, or changed any of their circumstances for the better. Jessa is still an obnoxious mess. Marnie is still whiny. Hannah is still unemployed. Even Shosh, who was one last beacon of hope for GIRLS's female humanity, has devolved into an insufferable self-involved creature, though her interactions with Ray last week showed some slight improvement.

But Adam has changed, and this is significant. He is not the moody, miserable, creepy dude we met in Season 1. He's not even the moody, miserable boyfriend struggling with his career that we hated to leave in Season 3. He understands that he's unhappy and he's making the necessary steps to fix that. Even Jessa points out that he's "really opening up at our dumb [AA] meetings," and this is all a big deal. You don't hate Adam for breaking up with Hannah, you cheer him, and it feels good to root for someone on this show at last.

Some notes:

This episode is called Sit-In because Hannah refuses to leave the apartment under protest, but a sit-in is usually a group activity, making Hannah's lone effort all the sadder.
"When I was nine, I broke up with someone for hindering my creativity." Mimi-Rose makes Marnie look sufferable.
Please, please let Ray become the president of his community board, and potentially the world.
"Sometimes when Desi and I are woodshedding, we go on a cell phone diet." Marnie's still terrible.
Was Hannah's burn really that bad? Can't you run that sucker under cold water and move on? Am I bad at First Aid?
It's always a pleasure to see Gabi Hoffmann pop up on this show, even though I can't really understand what's going on with her and Laird. Also, let's pretend "creaming" "feet" is not a thing.
"Thanks for stopping by, kid." "Thank you for stopping by, but maybe don't call me kid anymore." I cried like a baby at the end of this episode. Fragile, handle with care.

Next week: Hannah puts the pieces back together and Ray goes to a Community Board meeting. RAY4MAYOR.

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Rebecca Fishbein

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