Review: Shrinking, "The Last Thanksgiving" | Season 2, Episode 12
A thesis statement finale teases tragedy to prove its point
“You really give a shit, don’t you?”
It is impossible to write about “The Last Thanksgiving” without first addressing the tension at its conclusion.
That might seem backwards: after all, there’s plenty of tension when the episode opens, as Jimmy works with Paul to try to figure out the best way to address his estrangement from Alice. But while there’s definitely conflict there, we sort of inherently know that it will be resolved. Even if it didn’t happen in this episode, the thesis of the show is that Jimmy and Alice both have people in their life that will give them the support they need to work through their problems. And as it turns out, between Sean passing along his own experience in therapy to Alice and Paul’s work with Jimmy, the two characters don’t even make it to Thanksgiving before they’re both in a place to hash things out (more on that in a bit).
But as we’re in the midst of the large Thanksgiving gathering at Gaby’s, the episode—scripted by co-creators Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein along with Neil Goldman—resets the stakes. As Alice texts with Louis, his friendsgiving plans implode suddenly: turns out that his co-worker’s friends know Louis’ story, and that this hadn’t been something the two had ever discussed. When presented with the new reality that the friends aren’t feeling as giving anymore and he’s been uninvited, Louis puts on a brave face but we know what this means. And we also know that Alice’s phone was just confiscated by Gaby as part of a larger disconnect, meaning that even before Louis ends up at the train station, we know that the show is setting up the possibility of tragedy.
I’ll admit I bounced off of this at first glance. Perhaps if we had known in advance that Louis’ co-worker was unaware of his conviction this would have tracked better, but it felt like it came out of nowhere, as though I could see the writers’ hands pulling at the rug under his feet. It’s true that someone grappling with mental health issues isn’t just magically fixed, as we saw with Jimmy last week, and so it’s not unrealistic he could react this way. It just can’t help but register as writerly given the timing, and it naturally pulls you out of the intimacy of the Thanksgiving meal.