Summary
Not Suitable for Work finds the characters at their lowest ebbs just in time for a finale that will presumably reverse their fortunes.
It could just be me, but is there something a little unsettling about a Christmas episode airing in the middle of summer? Maybe it’s particularly noticeable in Not Suitable for Work because the show hasn’t done a great job of emphasising the passage of time. The double-bill release cadence hasn’t helped with that either. It was only a couple of weeks ago that these characters met; as of Episode 8, months have elapsed, and all of their personal issues and anxieties are coming to the fore at once.
“Denver Is for Lovers” is the penultimate episode of Season 1, which means it’s all about setting up the finale. And since this is a rom-com at its core, that means bringing everyone to their lowest ebbs just in time for an ending that will, presumably, get everyone on the right track. The pairings write themselves, and since recent episodes made a point of clearing all of the obstacles out of the way, there’s no real reason why Kel can’t end up with Abby, and AJ can’t end up with Davis, and Josh can’t… well, it’s a little unclear what Josh will be doing. He might have starved to death by then.
We might as well start with him. After aggressively instructing his father to clean up spilled coffee, he has now been completely cut off from the family finances, which means having to learn some harsh lessons for the first time. Until now, he didn’t even know how much he earned; in the cold light of cancelled credit cards, he realises he’s technically impoverished and has to survive on food stolen from the TV studio snack station.
Josh gets comparatively little to do here, but he is responsible for the best recurring gag of the episode, which finds him stealing so much buffet from the Fisher-Stassen Christmas party that by the end of the night he can barely lift the bag he’s hiding the Tupperware in. Other than that, he largely floats in and out of everyone else’s subplots, which is easy to do since they (almost) all coalesce on that Christmas party.
Not Kel’s, though. After one of his students, Beth, rumbles him for leaving his classes unattended so he can make auditions, Kate punishes him by making him chaperone the winter formal, which is a big deal for the students, especially Beth (who’s very funny; I wish we saw more of her each week). When Beth ends up crying in the bathroom because her dress doesn’t fit, it’s Kel who comes to her aid, calling Abby for an assist that pulls her away from the subway in such a rush that she accidentally leaves behind an extremely expensive Prada jacket she pulled for her prospective new client. Abby saves the day where Beth’s concerned, but losing the jacket tanks her deal with the client, for which she blames Kel. And to think, there was finally a romantic spark between Kel and Abby at the formal, one pronounced enough that even Kate noticed it.
With Kel otherwise occupied, Davis takes Josh to the party as his plus-one. He’s planning to clean up with the ladies to take his mind off AJ, but that’s easier said than done. When AJ tells him that she knows why he’s being standoffish with her — she asked Josh, who told her — Davis is clearly still bothered about it, but it’s also obvious that AJ doesn’t seem to realise that Davis is romantically into her. She’s primarily just concerned about keeping her relationship with Bill a secret, since it’s “getting serious”.
The big development of Not Suitable for Work Episode 8, though, is that Bill doesn’t quite agree about the seriousness of this relationship. Red flags abound when AJ gifts him the class ring he never got — she found it on eBay through a dead classmate — and he acts very strangely, mentioning that he’s going away over the holidays for some “work stuff”. Later, Josh overhears him telling someone that he’s taking his girlfriend to Aspen, and repeats this to AJ, assuming he was talking about her. This is enough to tip AJ off that he’s seeing someone else.
When Abby gets back to the apartment, AJ is already there sobbing. Abby insists that they go and confront Bill, and he’s forced to tell AJ the truth. He and Catherine got back together since he believes they’re more compatible. He needs a partner like that, who doesn’t really challenge him, so that he can cope with the work; he also believes that AJ will likely need to find someone like that too. Initially, I assumed this was going to be a temporary break, but Bill’s explanation feels quite final. I assume it’s to finally clear the way for AJ and Davis.
This is certainly the implication. The episode ends with Davis confessing that he’s nowhere near as over AJ as he was pretending to be, so that relationship is very much on the table. If Kel can make up with Abby, which should be pretty easy, then there might finally be some traction there, and maybe Josh could consider getting Elena back if he really thought about it. We’ll have to wait and see, but after “Denver Is for Lovers”, the season finale seems like a pretty enticing proposition.
