"Girls" Talk

The “Girls” Emotional Age Recap: “She Said OK”

With our main characters pretty thoroughly fleshed out by now, the season has begun to explore the lives of the secondary players. For instance, Hannah’s editor David is socially maladjusted and probably has a drug problem. Adam has a sister (the brilliant and unrecognizable Gaby Hoffman) who is just as crazy as him but in totally different ways. I think the two of them might have been raised by taxidermied wolves. As usual, the titular girls continue to fluctuate wildly in age. One year forward, two years back.

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HANNAH
Emotional Age: 19

Though Hannah is turning 25 on the outside, she hasn’t quite left her teenaged mindset behind. Nowhere is this more apparent than in her interactions with Caroline, a master manipulator who plays her new hostess like a violin with bad tattoos. Homemaker Horvath is so eager to establish herself as a good person by showing understanding that she neglects to consider the consequences of her actions. Adam is basically the parent giving his child a test pet, and when she can’t handle the responsibility, he’s the one cleaning up blood and broken glass in the bathroom.

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MARNIE
Emotional Age: 16

You guys, did you pay attention to Marnie this week? Because she’d totally love it if you paid some attention to her. Not, like, the YouTube kind of attention from that atrocious video, but the in-person attention you get from taking credit for a party you threw with someone else’s money, or from singing with your friend who just said point blank that she doesn’t want to sing with you. But the important thing is that everyone was looking at her. Why let someone else get all the glory just because it’s her birthday? Dumb.

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SHOSHANNA
Emotional Age: 60

Shosh continues to be the CEO of Greenpoint. Her whole game this week is to perceive inherent truths and deliver them directly and without remorse. Marnie wants to pretend like she couldn’t get that video removed if she’d just bite the bullet and call Charlie? Shosh isn’t having it. Ray wants to talk to her awkwardly outside the party? Silent shutdown, she’s there with another dude, too bad. She even calls out her friends on how little they’ve accomplished, collectively and as individuals, over the past four years of their lives. Four years! They better watch out or they’re all getting fired.

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JESSA
Emotional Age: dead

No, but really, did she speak at all this episode? She’s become a sad wraith, wafting around her former haunts and trying to influence events by thinking really hard or sending out cold breezes, yet no one even knows she’s there.

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