Another episode that’s regrettably light on Andrew Rannells, but I still like it, mainly for giving us a major plot for Elijah! Love that for him, and love that for me.
Since Andrew’s epididymitis forced him to stopped masturbating, he’s spent his time doing other things—like his homework! And it’s paying off, with good grades and parental pride. Flush with his accomplishment, he’s visited by Petra the Ambition Gremlin, who urges him to funnel all his energy into achieving high goals for his future. Elijah, tired of “being the only non-horny kid” he knows, searches online for ace community, which in turn helps him to explore what asexuality looks like for him. And when Jessi gets an invitation to hang out with Nick’s sister Leah, she goes overboard in her desire to impress and imitate the cool older girl.
Petra, as lampshaded in the show, is a character from Human Resources, which I still haven’t seen. She’s voiced by Rosie Perez, which is cool, but I prefer seeing the puberty creatures arise organically out of the kids’ circumstances on the show—this feels a little more shoehorned in. In this storyline, I like the angle of Maury missing Andrew since he stopped masturbating, and his feelings that Andrew is “cheating” on him with Petra. I also like this line from Andrew, as Petra encourages him to consider all he could be and have: “Huh, power. Never had it, kinda want it.”
I’m really glad that 1) the show is continuing to explore Elijah’s asexuality and 2) that they’re not just looking at it from Missy’s perspective. And given that Elijah is voiced by Brian Tyree Henry, it’s kind of even more impressive—he could’ve just been a prominent guest star, but he’s being integrated into the cast, which is awesome. Being ace can be lonely because it’s an orientation that’s so often misunderstood, and it can be especially tough in a hormone-fueled setting like middle school. “All these guys are, like, obsessed with their own crotches,” Elijah laments to his Hormone Monsters. Even as the show acknowledges that the internet can be a wild west of misinformation and hate speech, I love that Elijah does find community and resources there, and the show explores right along with him, diving deep into aspec possibilities in ways that I rarely see in fiction.
A bit like in episode 2, Jessi gets a little too obsessed with something, to the point where she makes it weird and uncomfortable. In this case, it’s wanting to emulate Leah and be liked by her. When she asks Leah, amazedly, “Hang out? You mean like friends?”, and Leah casually confirms, “Yes, Jessi, like friends!”, it’s so cute when Jessi and Connie’s heads explode in tandem. Jessi has frequently been portrayed as one of the more “mature” kids and has dealt with some heavier stuff like parental divorce and depression, so I like that we get to see her being kind of naïve and insecure about something and going way overboard with it.
As I said, not much Rannells today. Matthew appears briefly in a couple scenes, adjacent to Andrew’s plot. Because Andrew doesn’t want Maury around when he can’t masturbate, Maury is doing that thing where he pretends he’s doing so well without Andrew, all the while not-to-subtly pining. As such, he makes loud proclamations about how satisfied he is just to be Matthew’s Hormone Monster, all the while making sad eyes at Andrew and ignoring what Matthew might actually need from him. Matthew attempts to be supportive, telling Maury, “Okay, you can drop the charade, honey. I know that breakups are tough.” But he can’t fill the Andrew-shaped hole in Maury’s life, because, as he points out, “I’m not a sex criminal!” (Cue Maury wailing, “I know! I miss Andrew!”)
Unless there’s something I’m forgetting, we haven’t really seen Maury directly contrast his relationships with Andrew and Matthew before. The way he interacts with both boys is very different, because, again, the two are incredibly different people with different puberty concerns, but we don’t generally see him talk about one when he’s with the other. Normally, though, he’s pretty attentive to Matthew when he’s around, so it just goes to show how much he’s spiraling after Andrew kicks him out of his life, that he openly ignores Matthew in favor of pining over Andrew while trying to pretend he’s doing the exact opposite.
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