Diksha Sundriyal
Joe Goldberg’s story with Love Quinn advances to the next step at the end of the third episode. In the fourth, he relishes in the feeling of what makes Love different than Beck, and how it is turning him into a better man. The episode draws further parallels between the protagonist’s previous and current relationship and gives the audience a criterion to measure Joe’s character growth. But in doing so, ‘You’ also makes itself (not to be repetitive, but) repetitive.
You Season 2 Episode 4 Recap
Falling in love with Love is different than it was with Beck. That is what Joe keeps telling himself. Love is a very different person and she brings out the best in Joe. By far, she is not the one who has caused him to stalk, hurt or kill anyone else. The last time around, he had already butchered Benji for Beck. But while Love keeps the unnecessary drama out of his life, Ellie walks further into the mouth of danger and Joe has to take a step to end it once and for all.
You Season 2 Episode 4 Review
After fighting with himself for not jumping into the relationship with Love, Joe finally relents. In the fourth episode, we see him trying to not do the things that he had done with Beck, and once again, he finds himself in the same loop. He had many challenges with Beck, one of which was the co-dependent nature of her friendship with Peach. He could see that Peach was bringing Beck down, and this way, she would never reach her full potential, neither would their love blossom as it should. He had tried to get in Peach’s good books, he had tried to become friends with her, just as he did with other friends of Beck. But, in the end, he knew that Peach had to go. She was too bad of a tether for Beck, and would eventually lead her away from him.
With Love, he comes across a similar relationship. This time, a brother. Love and Forty are twins; they have been together their whole life, suffered through bad times and shared the good ones. This isn’t the kind of relationship that Joe can find a solution to. He can’t separate Love from Forty, no matter how much he holds her back. In this situation, Joe does try to control his true feelings and be supportive of both siblings. But just when he shows that he is trying to be different, he does something, even though unintentionally, that tells us that he is still capable of killing people close to the one he loves.
Whatever twists and turns ‘You’ tries to bring in its second season are yet to surprise us. The addition of Joe’s backstory is a nice touch, and I hope that it isn’t just another move to encourage sympathy for the devil. A good number of people are already head over heels for Joe, and it is not really a good sign. This calls for a balancing act, something that brings back our attention to the question: do good intentions cancel out the bad actions? This means that we can expect Joe to do something horrible, more than he has done in the past, in the near future.
Another thing that the flashbacks into Joe’s childhood trigger is the age-old question of whether evil is born or made? And above all, does the tragedy of your own life justify you destroying the lives of others? From here on, if the show focuses better on addressing these questions and themes, it would be worth moving forward into the season. But, if we are going to get another series of events where Joe does everything he wants to in the name of love and gets away with it, while also making him dreamier for the section of the audience that already favours with him, then there is really no point to all of it.
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