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You S3 Ep 5: Into The Woods
From Decider: https://decider.com/2021/10/16/you-season-3-episode-5-recap/By Tara Ariano
Roughly six months have passed since You Season 3 Episode 4, and we’ve arrived at a moment of transition. Love and Joe think the time is right to transition out of regular therapy sessions with Dr. Chandra, who wonders if the concern is financial, but since we last checked in, A Fresh Tart has become a great success. Love’s friendship with Sherry has surely been a huge aid in getting her more foot traffic. It’s also, evidently, contributed to an evolution in Love’s style: whereas Theo, at their first meeting, had noted that Love must be new in town if she hadn’t succumbed to a full-time athleisure wardrobe…
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…that’s what she’s rocking for therapy, along with fake lashes, highlights, and a new side part. She’s also let Sherry style her — and Joe, apparently — for a photo shoot for the invitation to Henry’s first birthday party. Joe remembers when Love thought over-the-top kids’ celebrations were tacky, but he understands that embedding Henry in the neighborhood’s social life is integral to getting him admitted to the ultra-exclusive Ashman School.
Joe’s not the only one who’s noticed how Love has changed to fit in to Madre Linda: she’s stayed in touch with Theo since he’s returned to school, though we learn she drew a hard boundary, forbidding email contact but making herself available to rescue him with Ubers when he gets drunk. Joe discovers the credit card charges when he walks in on an intense-looking exchange between Love and Theo at the Quinn-Goldberg front door; when she explains that she’s looking out for Theo because no one else is…
…Joe gets mad enough to punch a wall. But then, Joe’s got his own problems. He finds suburban life very boring. He’s annoyed when Love calls him out in therapy for not having made any friends. And he’s experiencing impotence. When Cary suggests that Joe join him and the other husbands for a hunting trip, Joe reflexively declines — there’s party prep to be done! — but Love hems him in by saying she can handle it. This will take Joe away from the library, and the limited amount of flirting with Marienne he’s permitting himself, but, reluctantly, he goes.
Throughout the season, we’ve been getting glimpses of Joe’s life as a foster kind in a group home, bullied by bigger kids. Cary’s Iron John fantasy of a hunting trip rekindles Joe’s deep suspicion of other men, particularly when they run in packs. Even a guy with lots of perfectly normal male friendships might be put off by Cary’s extremely aggro overtures. He snatches a wrapped sandwich out of Joe’s hand, declaring that they won’t be eating any food they haven’t killed themselves. They also have to make their own fires, solve issues with fellow hunters by physically fighting them, and forego shirts and phones. When Joe expresses doubt with fellow “hunters” one-on-one, both say Cary saved their marriages. Kiki’s husband Brandon (Christopher Sean) lacked purpose after essentially retiring in his thirties to “un-school” his children; Cary helped loose his inner beast. Jackson (Bryan Safi), Andrew’s husband, seems to find Cary’s affectations mildly annoying (“Must we abbreviate everything?”), but appreciates these getaways as a chance to scream, cry, and “break shit” like a tantruming child; for him, these weekends are less about rediscovering masculinity than being a kid again.
Cary, unfortunately, knows more than Joe realized about Joe’s specific masculinity, Love having told Sherry about Joe’s recent impotence. So he’s not going to let up on Joe, making him run into the woods and find prey for his dinner. Joe is upset when Cary catches a squirrel and holds it too tight; when Joe refuses to kill it and asks Cary to release it, Cary kills it, with his bare hands. Recognizing that Joe is perturbed, Cary challenges him to a fight, and while Joe tries to resist, he does punch Cary back before shoving him into some brush…
…and off a short cliff. Joe drags him back to camp, assuming he’s fatally injured him, but Cary wakes up right before Joe gives him the kiss of life and matter-of-factly re-sets his dislocated shoulder. Joe thinks Cary’s about to rat him out for the rough shove, but Cary praises him instead: “Goldberg is a fucking animal….You are one fine specimen of a man, Joe.” Surrounded by the other husbands beaming with pride, Joe breaks down sobbing in relief. They saw the darkness in him and didn’t reject him. Can he, perhaps, add them to his team?
While all this is going on, his other teammate is dealing with Theo. Though she had hoped to keep things friendly, asking him about rumors she’d heard that he’d been struggling in his studies, it’s clear he wants more from her and isn’t ready to let go even before he calls her from the police station: he’s been arrested for driving an electric scooter drunk. Love’s never ridden one, so they go wilding in a park, both on a single scooter, before falling off together. Sprawled on the grass next to Love, Theo admits that he isn’t blowing off his classes because of Natalie’s death: it’s that he can’t stop thinking about Love. Each accuses the other of harboring unrealistic fantasies, but let the record show it is she who kisses him this time, and while the camera cuts away, it sure seems like they had sex! When Love trudges home, Dottie warns her away from Theo. Learning that she missed Henry’s first steps while she was out fooling around seems to snap Love back to herself, and when he texts a “…hi,” she texts back another boundary: “Never again. Find someone your own age.”
When the couple reunites, Joe is practically a different person, his internal monologue still moved by the acceptance with which he was met in the woods. It’s something he’s longed for his whole life, but he darkly comments that it always comes with a price…
…sending us back into a memory of little Joe at the group home. The kind nurse saw Joe almost push his bully down the stairs, and tells him if he had she wouldn’t have snitched. Joe sadly says he chickened out, but the nurse says it’s because he’s not like them. She knows what it’s like to get picked on, and suggests that the two of them look out for each other.
Oh no, is the price little Joe had to pay for this attention whatever she’s grooming him for?
Anyway, in the present, Joe is feeling no pain, and bangs the hell out of Love before she gets a notification that the alarm is off at the bakery. Joe offers to go check. While he’s gone, Love hears loud moaning from outside and sees Theo in Matthew’s backyard, getting head from a long-haired person kneeling in front of him. Did he follow Love’s advice and find someone his own age, or is that, possibly, Sherry?! It would explain why she knows so much gossip about his academic career, and why Theo is so contemptuous of her.
At the bakery, all is well, because Joe rigged the alarm sensor himself to get some time to himself. He recognizes that Love needed an outlet with Theo, and so does he. He’s stalking Marienne, but just a little: no keepsakes (like the bracelet he almost stole from her desk earlier); no social media. Just watching. “You won’t find out,” he purrs, to the You to whom he is legally bound. “You can’t. I’ll be careful, so, so careful. Things will be different this time.” If by “different” you mean “the same”?
Roughly six months have passed since You Season 3 Episode 4, and we’ve arrived at a moment of transition. Love and Joe think the time is right to transition out of regular therapy sessions with Dr. Chandra, who wonders if the concern is financial, but since we last checked in, A Fresh Tart has become a great success. Love’s friendship with Sherry has surely been a huge aid in getting her more foot traffic. It’s also, evidently, contributed to an evolution in Love’s style: whereas Theo, at their first meeting, had noted that Love must be new in town if she hadn’t succumbed to a full-time athleisure wardrobe…
…that’s what she’s rocking for therapy, along with fake lashes, highlights, and a new side part. She’s also let Sherry style her — and Joe, apparently — for a photo shoot for the invitation to Henry’s first birthday party. Joe remembers when Love thought over-the-top kids’ celebrations were tacky, but he understands that embedding Henry in the neighborhood’s social life is integral to getting him admitted to the ultra-exclusive Ashman School.
Joe’s not the only one who’s noticed how Love has changed to fit in to Madre Linda: she’s stayed in touch with Theo since he’s returned to school, though we learn she drew a hard boundary, forbidding email contact but making herself available to rescue him with Ubers when he gets drunk. Joe discovers the credit card charges when he walks in on an intense-looking exchange between Love and Theo at the Quinn-Goldberg front door; when she explains that she’s looking out for Theo because no one else is…
…Joe gets mad enough to punch a wall. But then, Joe’s got his own problems. He finds suburban life very boring. He’s annoyed when Love calls him out in therapy for not having made any friends. And he’s experiencing impotence. When Cary suggests that Joe join him and the other husbands for a hunting trip, Joe reflexively declines — there’s party prep to be done! — but Love hems him in by saying she can handle it. This will take Joe away from the library, and the limited amount of flirting with Marienne he’s permitting himself, but, reluctantly, he goes.
Throughout the season, we’ve been getting glimpses of Joe’s life as a foster kind in a group home, bullied by bigger kids. Cary’s Iron John fantasy of a hunting trip rekindles Joe’s deep suspicion of other men, particularly when they run in packs. Even a guy with lots of perfectly normal male friendships might be put off by Cary’s extremely aggro overtures. He snatches a wrapped sandwich out of Joe’s hand, declaring that they won’t be eating any food they haven’t killed themselves. They also have to make their own fires, solve issues with fellow hunters by physically fighting them, and forego shirts and phones. When Joe expresses doubt with fellow “hunters” one-on-one, both say Cary saved their marriages. Kiki’s husband Brandon (Christopher Sean) lacked purpose after essentially retiring in his thirties to “un-school” his children; Cary helped loose his inner beast. Jackson (Bryan Safi), Andrew’s husband, seems to find Cary’s affectations mildly annoying (“Must we abbreviate everything?”), but appreciates these getaways as a chance to scream, cry, and “break shit” like a tantruming child; for him, these weekends are less about rediscovering masculinity than being a kid again.
Cary, unfortunately, knows more than Joe realized about Joe’s specific masculinity, Love having told Sherry about Joe’s recent impotence. So he’s not going to let up on Joe, making him run into the woods and find prey for his dinner. Joe is upset when Cary catches a squirrel and holds it too tight; when Joe refuses to kill it and asks Cary to release it, Cary kills it, with his bare hands. Recognizing that Joe is perturbed, Cary challenges him to a fight, and while Joe tries to resist, he does punch Cary back before shoving him into some brush…
…and off a short cliff. Joe drags him back to camp, assuming he’s fatally injured him, but Cary wakes up right before Joe gives him the kiss of life and matter-of-factly re-sets his dislocated shoulder. Joe thinks Cary’s about to rat him out for the rough shove, but Cary praises him instead: “Goldberg is a fucking animal….You are one fine specimen of a man, Joe.” Surrounded by the other husbands beaming with pride, Joe breaks down sobbing in relief. They saw the darkness in him and didn’t reject him. Can he, perhaps, add them to his team?
While all this is going on, his other teammate is dealing with Theo. Though she had hoped to keep things friendly, asking him about rumors she’d heard that he’d been struggling in his studies, it’s clear he wants more from her and isn’t ready to let go even before he calls her from the police station: he’s been arrested for driving an electric scooter drunk. Love’s never ridden one, so they go wilding in a park, both on a single scooter, before falling off together. Sprawled on the grass next to Love, Theo admits that he isn’t blowing off his classes because of Natalie’s death: it’s that he can’t stop thinking about Love. Each accuses the other of harboring unrealistic fantasies, but let the record show it is she who kisses him this time, and while the camera cuts away, it sure seems like they had sex! When Love trudges home, Dottie warns her away from Theo. Learning that she missed Henry’s first steps while she was out fooling around seems to snap Love back to herself, and when he texts a “…hi,” she texts back another boundary: “Never again. Find someone your own age.”
When the couple reunites, Joe is practically a different person, his internal monologue still moved by the acceptance with which he was met in the woods. It’s something he’s longed for his whole life, but he darkly comments that it always comes with a price…
…sending us back into a memory of little Joe at the group home. The kind nurse saw Joe almost push his bully down the stairs, and tells him if he had she wouldn’t have snitched. Joe sadly says he chickened out, but the nurse says it’s because he’s not like them. She knows what it’s like to get picked on, and suggests that the two of them look out for each other.
Oh no, is the price little Joe had to pay for this attention whatever she’s grooming him for?
Anyway, in the present, Joe is feeling no pain, and bangs the hell out of Love before she gets a notification that the alarm is off at the bakery. Joe offers to go check. While he’s gone, Love hears loud moaning from outside and sees Theo in Matthew’s backyard, getting head from a long-haired person kneeling in front of him. Did he follow Love’s advice and find someone his own age, or is that, possibly, Sherry?! It would explain why she knows so much gossip about his academic career, and why Theo is so contemptuous of her.
At the bakery, all is well, because Joe rigged the alarm sensor himself to get some time to himself. He recognizes that Love needed an outlet with Theo, and so does he. He’s stalking Marienne, but just a little: no keepsakes (like the bracelet he almost stole from her desk earlier); no social media. Just watching. “You won’t find out,” he purrs, to the You to whom he is legally bound. “You can’t. I’ll be careful, so, so careful. Things will be different this time.” If by “different” you mean “the same”?
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