If nothing else, give Nobody Wants This credit for allowing itself a tiny bit of growth: After two seasons of exhaustingly circular conflict about whether a good-boy rabbi like Noah (Adam Brody) could ever really be with an agnostic Gentile sex podcaster like Joanne (Kristen Bell), season three begins not only with the couple moving in together, but Joanne starting Jewish conversion classes.
Finally, we’ve graduated from asking if to asking how. For a show whose very dithering had previously seemed to reflect Joanne’s fear that “no one wants to listen to happy,” it’s a welcome step forward. But as lifelong flake Joanne has learned many times over by now, wherever you go, there you are. Nobody Wants This might be on its way to becoming a sweeter, more even-keeled version of itself, but it can’t completely shake the bad habits that have made it nearly as exasperating as it is endearing.
Nobody Wants This
The Bottom Line
As endearing and exasperating as ever.
Airdate: Thursday, Oct. 22 (Netflix)
Cast: Adam Brody, Kristen Bell, Justine Lupe, Timothy Simons, Jackie Tohn, Tovah Feldshuh, Paul Ben-Victor, Stephanie Faracy, Michael Hitchcock
Creator: Erin Foster
Admittedly, it does feel good to bask for once in what feels right about Joanne and Noah’s relationship rather than fret over what might be wrong about it. The lovebirds are so giddy they wake each other up in the middle of the night just to coo: “Hey. We live together.” Nothing can pierce their romantic bliss, not even minor annoyances like Joanne’s inability to ever shut a cabinet door (“It’s like living with a ghost,” Noah complains adorably) or bigger ones like her almost sabotaging their first trip as a couple when she runs into a desperately needy fan (creator Erin Foster) at the airport.
Not, at this point, that there’s anyone or anything trying to ruin them anyway. With Joanne’s no-seriously-this-time decision to convert, previously insurmountable obstacles have melted away. Noah’s old temple is only too relieved to bring him back for a trial run, now that they’ve been reassured his life partner will soon become part of their tribe. His disapproving mother (Tovah Feldshuh) is all too happy to throw herself into turning her possible future daughter-in-law into the perfect rebbetzin (rabbi’s wife). There’s nothing at all standing between them and happily ever after, or so it seems.
Brody continues to excel as a romantic lead, combining the patience of a saint with the goofiness of a guy you could actually imagine meeting and falling for in real life. Bell gets to soften her character’s more abrasive edges; oh-so-kooky Joanne might still do obnoxious things like publicly brag about her and Noah’s sex life in an embarrassing attempt to one-up an ex (Avan Jogia), but at least she’s secure enough to be self-aware about it. And while I remain slightly underwhelmed by their chemistry, it turns out to matter much less when we’re not needing to be convinced every few episodes that theirs is a passion fiery enough to overcome every reasonable objection.
Their newfound sense of chill does not come without narrative cost. Nobody Wants This season three tones down its exploration of Judaism and Jewish culture significantly — like, to the extent that Christmas traditions get a more elaborate episode spotlight than any Jewish holiday does. (It makes some sense in context, but still.) With Noah’s career back on track, the congregation itself mostly fades into the background. Joanne’s conversion classes mainly function as a backdrop for simmering yet undercooked tension with guest stars like Sarah Silverman as Rabbi Eden and Andrew Rannells and Keyla Monterroso Mejia as fellow students.
Perhaps this is a response to critique of the show’s treatment of Jewishness in earlier years, or perhaps it simply reflects the fact that this is no longer a driving issue in the central romance. But given that Joanne’s will-they-won’t-they with Noah has doubled as a will-they-won’t-they with the religion, it comes as a disappointment that we don’t get more insight into her evolving understanding of the faith, the culture and her place within them — give or take a late-season speech about purpose and meaning that’s performed movingly enough by Bell to make you wish she’d had more material like it.
In the absence of any real and obvious issues for Joanne and Noah, the burden of dramatic tension falls more heavily this season on the ensemble around them. Primarily, this means digging into the connection between her chaotically self-absorbed sister, Morgan (Justine Lupe), and his endearing lug of a brother, Sasha (Timothy Simons).
On one hand, the chemistry between Lupe and Simons is undeniable enough (more so than the chemistry between Bell and Brody, for my money) that the show was always going to have to address it eventually. On the other, the series approaches it with a characteristic lack of subtlety, barreling over what should have been a poignant storyline about the very fresh separation between Sasha and his wife (Jackie Tohn, still excellent and still sadly underserved as brusque, brittle Esther).
At least it’s possible to understand what the series is trying to do with this plotline, which is more than can be said for some of the other elements that make up the narrative. Some missteps are deeply silly but easy to forgive — seriously, the absolute carelessness with which the show treats Joanne’s podcasting “career,” which seems to consist of her randomly waving around a microphone while flopping about the couch, has to be a bit at this point.
Others are more grating. I’ve come to understand by now that the writers (led by showrunners Jenni Konner and Bruce Eric Kaplan) and I have vastly different ideas about where the line falls between “endearingly messy” and “off-puttingly toxic.” Where I, for example, see Joanne’s passive-aggressive sniping any time Morgan gets even the tiniest shred of good news as a cruel and unpleasant reaction, they apparently see it as a cute and relatable expression of sibling rivalry.
In fairness, the performances (especially by comic MVP Lupe) are charming enough to almost pass it off as such, and the script so airy it never dwells on any wound long enough for it to fester. With its tight 30-minute episode run times, postcard-pretty L.A. backdrops, and an inherently lovable cast of actors you’ve loved in other things, this series has always gone down as a quick, easy binge, and that hasn’t changed in season three.
But as a romantic like Noah or Joanne would tell you, there’s an ocean of difference between settling for good enough and daring to dream of something magical. Nobody Wants This can certainly offer the former. It’s still got a ways to go before it can deliver the latter.