-Rebecca doing crazy things for Josh-related reasons is nothing new for Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (It's actually the premise of the show), but bringing Valencia in as her partner and enabler helps freshen up the formula to a fair degree and deepens the story by making it about Valencia's complicated feelings about Josh moving on as well as Rebecca's. Josh was a significant force in both of their lives and even though they now feel free to talk about what they didn't like about him and claim they're better off without him, moving on is never that simple. It's also fun continuing to explore Rebecca and Valencia's new friendship dynamic and I'm glad the story never turns them against each other, even if Valencia is put off by the whole "Rebecca thought she was pregnant" incident.
-Between her stalking of Josh on Instagram, her willingness to go along to Silver Lake to scope Anna out and the way she secretly steals Anna's keys and expertly breaks into the eyebrow salon, it turns out Valencia is a lot more like Rebecca than it initially seemed.
-Moving on also can come at different times for different people as the end of the episode shows Valencia finally ready to move on (or at least get laid), while Rebecca isn't quite there yet, which seems right. Valencia has been broken up with Josh longer after all.
-As a huge cat lover, I'm glad that curiosity only managed to injure the cat instead of kill it.
-Anna didn't have a lot to do in her first appearance but we learn a lot about her here as she turns out to be Valencia's Valencia, impossibly cool, stylish and kind. She's also a Celebrity Eyebrow Stylist, a job that's absurd enough to provide a lot of comic mileage throughout the episode and also a job that I totally believe is a real thing.
-Even before Rebecca and Valencia see Josh on security footage going on and on about how much he likes Anna, his one big scene in the episode makes it obvious that he really likes her. I am curious about how much she likes him though. The episode establishes that she likes how simple and uncomplicated he is in comparison to the L.A. hipster crowd, but is she going to be satisfied with that simplicity forever? It feels like the show is making Anna be to Josh what Josh was to Rebecca and Valencia, where he is going to be much more serious about her than she is about him until she ends it and he becomes a crazy ex. Hmm, I guess we'll have to see how that plays out.
-I'm surprised the show let Rebecca and Valencia get away with both running over Anna's cat AND erasing the security camera footage of said incident before spending the night combing over footage. I assume the other shoe is going to drop with this eventually unless the show keeps Josh and Anna off in their own world for the rest of the season, but for now it was a bit of a relief. I'm not sure I could've handled it if the comeuppance came that fast (I was freaking out when the plot cut back to them STILL in that damn store the next morning.).
-Paula and Scott's marriage has been on much steadier ground this season, but it gets faced with some turmoil when Paula gets lost in her law studies and misses Scott's barbershop quartet playing in front of Scott's co-workers for the first time.
-The interesting thing about Paula's conflict with Scott is how it subtly mirrors her conflict with Rebecca. Paula has been throwing herself into law school and becoming obsessed the way Rebecca threw herself into her quest for Josh. Scott has been providing love and support the way Paula did, but also feels like his wants and needs are being neglected and is getting frustrated by that. Ultimately Paula fails to come through for Scott just like the many times Rebecca didn't come through for her and it hurts Scott in a way that can't be easily smoothed over. Importantly neither Scott or Paula is portrayed as the bad guy in this situation. Paula's allowed to be excited about her law school journey and Scott's allowed to be upset that his wife didn't come through for him on a night that was important to him. It's a complex situation and it's nice that the show doesn't try to flatten it.
-I have been waiting to see the "West Brovinas" perform since the first time Paula mentioned it last year so it was nice to see it finally happen, even if we only got a small taste of their performance.
-Scott works in a shipping warehouse apparently. That makes sense.
-I became a bit concerned that the episode was going to end with Rebecca and Paula making nice and becoming friends again so I'm glad their fight will be carrying on as we go into winter break. I'm not saying I want them to be fighting for the rest of the season, but after the ugliness of their big confrontation last week and the episodes of build-up to that confrontation, it would feel cheap if their falling out got resolved so quickly. It's clear that they both miss and need each other though, even if they're not ready to make nice yet.
-Brittany Snow got to sing a tiny bit in her last appearance, but this time out she gets a full-fledged number with the seductive "Research Me Obsessively", a song about the joy of internet stalking that I relate to more than I feel comfortable admitting. I mean I've never done it anywhere close to the level that the song suggests but trying to find public information about a person online definitely has an allure to it and can be a serious time suck (I have no idea if Rebecca and Valencia were literally at it for 3 days but I'd believe it if it were the case). Anyways it's a cute song and a good showcase for Snow's vocal chops.
-The best song tonight though was definitely "You Go First", a rocking 80's power ballad (complete with Rebecca and Paula both sporting mullets at one point that grew in glorious length) that gets to the heart of the problem between Rebecca and Paula. They both see the other persons point and are willing to accept fault in order to be part of each other's lives again but neither of them wants to be the first person to admit fault. Their whole fight has become about their pride and they would rather be alone in their sadness than be the person who makes the first move. The song is also notable for being the first Rebecca/Paula duet since their reprise of West Covina when they first became friends/soulmates in the pilot.
-If short samples of Period Sex becomes this season's version of the recurring "I left my wife for a prostitute" joke from season 1, I'm totally on board with that.
-Do people frequently visit Instagram with laptops instead of just using the mobile app? I know that is a thing and I assume the show used laptops for display reasons or something like that but it seemed odd.
-How popular is Anna's eyebrow salon? "I heard Mary-Kate Olsen had to pretend to be Elizabeth Olsen to get in".
-Sunil and Valencia have never seen The Wire, which is crazy. Also Rebecca as Avon and Paula as Stringer makes total sense.
-Rebecca knowing how to read lips because she once took a deaf lover also makes total sense.
-I thought the stinger was going to reveal that there was something sinister about Anna after all, but it wound up being a joke about how ludicrous and expensive her eyebrow grooming business really is.
-Crazy Ex-Girlfriend returns with two episodes on January 6th. It looks like we'll be following up on Heather being the face of Miss Douche AND Rebecca's babysitting Paula's younger son. That should end well.
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