Louie 3.09 ‘Looking for Liz / Lilly Changes’ review

I sincerely hope you’ve taken the time to stay caught up with season three of FX’s hilarious and deliciously real when it’s surreally unreal, Louie, because the last few episodes have been excellent. Initially, this season didn’t seem to be hitting the heights reached in season two. After a couple of interesting stories including Louie’s whirlwind date with the sparkling yet completely manic woman called Liz to his complete avoidance of being face to face with his father for the first time in two years after an unnamed mishap occurred–Louie’s really finding a lot of interesting places to go.

That being said, this week’s episode wasn’t one of the stronger installments of the series. The first story dealt with Louie still pining over the  impossibly exciting Liz. Seems they only had that one date and then he never heard from her again. He shows up to the bookstore where she worked only to find that she quit recently. Without any other clues to go on, Louie reluctantly accepts the help of her replacement (in a guest starring role from Chloe Sevigny) who at first  merely seems into the romance of Louie’s search for the woman who changed his life. Things don’t end well is a bit of an understatement as Sevigny’s character is even more out-there than Liz herself was. A fact conveniently set aside by Louie when he recalls the memory of Liz to the nameless woman. It all felt like a joke set up without a punchline to bring it home and really called into question if they even screen employees at the bookstore at all before hiring them–crazy seems to be attracted to that shop in varying doses.

The episode’s second story was a glimpse into the kind of thing Louie will have to get used to dealing with more often as the father of two girls–the dreadful adolescence and teen years. Lilly is getting picked on at school which Louie manages to stop when he comes to pick her and her sister up. It’s sad to watch Louie try to use the old methods in order to cheer up his daughter only to find they just don’t work like they used to. If only carousels and ice cream could heal all of a young girl’s wounds forever, but sadly Lilly is ten years old so she’s entering an age where her life at school and elsewhere will become significantly more complicated.

When Lilly seems to run away we get to see Louie panic as he tries to find her but hopefully not have to inform their mother she was missing in the first place. Luckily for him, Lilly merely was hiding in the closet and the whole matter was resolved easily enough. My favorite part of the episode was when both Lilly and Louie stormed off into their respective ‘safe places’ (namely the bathroom for Louie with laptop clutched against his chest, and Lilly into her bedroom) as it showed them having essentially the same reaction to not being able to find some quick fix for Lilly’s hurt feelings. I’m glad they’ve kept these same child actors as they have an undeniable chemistry with Louie that’s only grown the more scenes they’ve shot together.

Not every show can hit it out of the park each week so Louie is allowed the weaker episode here or there. This coming Thursday’s installment looks incredible as most of the ones that deal with Louie’s day job in the world of comedy tend to be the better episodes of each season. As for the mysterious Tape Recorder (it’s what Liz tricked Louie into calling her at first), I think she’s better off like most manic pixie dream girls are and that’s in someone’s dreams. He’s clearly not ready to deal with the woman as she is especially when she ‘gets all sad’ at the end of the night. Louie will be better off with his image of her as he remembers her because despite the completely awkward (and really quite pointless) moments with Chloe Sevigny’s character, Louie is getting that much closer to being ready to be in a real relationship again years after his divorce.  That kind of character growth can’t be underestimated or undervalued.