S3E8 "Nathaniel Needs My Help!"
This episode takes place two weeks after the last one, and Rebecca and Nathaniel are in a relationship now, not just sleeping together. This leads Rebecca to start to fall into her old ways. She manipulates George into helping her try to make Nathaniel and his father close. She finds Nathaniel's father's schedule, and attempts to stage an "accidental" run-in with him. However, she ends up finding what she believes to be a second family that Nathaniel Sr. has. Then, she tries to stage a meeting between Nathaniel and who she believes to be his sister. Through all of this, Rebecca is doing what she was doing throughout the first season. She is manipulating people and trying to meet up with them at specific times to get things to go her way.
Luckily, things don't go exactly the same way, since Rebecca is a different person now than she was two seasons ago. She's doing the type of things that she did before, but now she has her therapy group and new doctor to give her perspective, and he helps her realize how what she is doing with Nathaniel is similar to what she was doing with Josh. I wish that Rebecca did recognize how horrible her manipulation of George was, though their dynamic was really funny throughout the episode. At the end of the episode, Rebecca shows up at Nathaniel's, and while we don't know yet what exactly she is doing, it looks like she may be breaking up with him.
Rebecca isn't the only one falling into old patterns in this episode. When she sees Darryl trying to pick a woman whose egg to use to make a child, Paula decides to help him pick, and then tracks down the woman they chose when she discovers that this woman no longer wants her eggs to be used. Like Rebecca, Paula convinces herself that she can do this because she's doing it out of a place of love and caring. Paula learns her lesson in a more obvious way than Rebecca. When she gets so focused on getting this woman's egg that she doesn't think about the consequences, she ends up costing Darryl money, and she doesn't really think of Darryl when she expresses her relief that the egg was not fertilized. However, in the end, she comforts Darryl. These two really seem to have grown closer recently, and I love it.
The rest of the episode dealt with Josh, who is preparing to move out of his parents' house and into Hector and his mother's. Lourdes really wants Josh to go, but he is packing very slowly. This ends up actually being not an annoying Josh story as it seems to be in the beginning. Josh realizes how his life has changed ever since Rebecca came into town. At first he is angry about that, but then he realizes that it is actually a positive. When Rebecca expressed belief in him and encouraged him, it caused Josh to see the bar higher for himself. This story works very well into this episode because it contrasts Rebecca's manipulation in the main story, showing that she is not all bad. While her obsession with Josh wasn't good for either of them, some good did come out of it. I also really liked how Josh went to Rebecca and thanked her, and how the two were genuine with each other in that scene.
And now for my thoughts on the songs of the episode...
"My Sperm is Healthy": This song really didn't feel that necessary, and it wasn't exactly the most enjoyable, but Pete Gardner makes the most of it. The best part of this song though was Mrs. Hernandez reacting to it, and her criticisms of the people that followed Darryl around the office dancing.
"Get Your Ass Out of My House": This song was an absolute delight. I thought it was really funny when other parents and their grown-up kids showed up, relating to the words that Lourdes was singing. Lourdes Chan is one of the show's best recurring characters, and this is one of my favorite moments from her.
This was a strong episode, as Rebecca and Paula went back to old habit but went about them differently, and Josh actually grew up a little bit. I wish the show wasn't having so many episodes without some of their main characters (especially Heather, who I miss whenever she isn't around), but I understand that this is probably for budget reasons.
Score: 9.5/10
What did you think of "Nathaniel Needs My Help!"? Leave your thoughts in the comments!