Valerie Does It All
Season 3
Episode 4
Editor’s Rating
3 stars
***
Val’s character has found her footing, but the show hasn’t figured out its stance on AI.
Photo: Erin Simkin/HBO
It would be easy enough for a Hollywood satire like The Comeback to turn Valerie Cherish into a monstrous diva. Instead, she comes across as a relatably flawed person whose constant need for validation sometimes trumps her better instincts. Over the first two seasons, we witnessed her frequent self-obsession blind her to the needs of the people she was closest to. Then came a true act of self-sacrifice in the season-two finale — it was a moment of tremendous growth for the character that appears to have stuck, and in season three, we’re seeing a more evolved Val. Now if she’s being held back, it’s less by her own failings and more by the failings of those around her. This switch-up to the formula makes new episodes of The Comeback compelling to watch, even as the season’s big-picture storytelling remains a bit muddled.
Case in point: The filming of the How’s That?! pilot in “Valerie Does It All” illustrates one of my larger issues with the season so far in what it’s trying to say about AI. The audience at the live taping is shown a cold open in which Beth sneezes and a piece of the bed-and-breakfast she’s been dusting collapses. “I thought I was the only thing barely hanging on here,” says Beth, and while Josh laughs a little too loudly, the audience doesn’t. Val and Jimmy both agree they need a bigger blow to end the scene. Josh, who looks like he’s about to cry, defends the line and refuses a rewrite. Marco’s suggestion of “I’m so surprised the house is falling apart” isn’t even a joke. Ultimately, they go with the AI-scripted “Well, I guess those ants were termites.” No, it’s not laugh-out-loud funny, but it’s solid enough and undeniably better than what the human writer came up with. I know The Comeback is not actually making a case for AI sitcoms, and I don’t need every beat of the show to validate my own distaste for the technology. But I’m not entirely sure what we’re meant to take away from this scene — especially since it follows a scene last week in which Val and Jimmy both like the new scene that Al wrote, which Josh dismisses as overly sentimental. The show seems to waver on a key question: Is AI an existential threat because it’s too good or because it’s not good enough?
Thankfully, the subsequent scene gets at the heart of the problem with artificial intelligence. Once they’ve finally wrapped reshoots, Jimmy tells Val he won’t be directing any more episodes. The show can never be truly great without real writers, he reasons. “The machine is fast and cooperative, I’ll give it that, but I saw every one of those jokes coming and so did you,” Jimmy says. “Surprising only comes from a group of writers huddled in a corner beating themselves up to beat out a better joke.” The veteran director, who has long been a voice of reason on The Comeback, explains that you need the “broken beautiful souls” of writers to take their pain and create something brilliant and unexpected. He’s laying it on a bit thick, but I appreciate the show’s clear articulation of why humanity, however flawed, will always win out over the machines. While the rest of the episode takes a broader approach to lampooning AI’s limitations, Jimmy’s earnest parting words say it all. Meanwhile, Lisa Kudrow continues to do incredible face acting as she reacts to everything he’s saying, clearly wounded to hear all this from someone she respects so deeply. When Jimmy explains that he walks away from any project he’s not having fun with, Val asks if she’s not fun, and I honestly thought I might start crying again. (We’re getting Kudrow that Emmy!) It’s the show itself that’s the problem, Jimmy assures her. “It’s a shame, too,” he adds. “This was a really good part for you. Could’ve been the one.” Oof.
While Val was doing reshoots, Mark was out getting drinks with Fernando, a doorman in the building whom he’s decided to befriend. He returns home hammered, and his sloppy attempts to get Val to sleep with him are hard to watch — he keeps calling her Mrs. Berman, which may be because that’s what Fernando calls her, but it feels more like a desperate reclaiming of his “head of the household” role. “I hate this new chapter,” he admits, defeated. I hate this new Mark, so I can relate! Val brushes him off; she’s distracted reading the script for the next episode of How’s That?!, which has some pretty serious issues. The next day at the table read, she brings up her concerns: Why is the rest of the cast barely in the episode? Who is this new character, Nathan Drake? And most important, why is Beth in jail? The new director, Brian, isn’t much help, telling Val they should let the crew build the jail set and then see how it plays. But there shouldn’t be a jail set at all, Val insists. They’re spending money on something that doesn’t make any sense, and as executive producer, it’s her job to point that out. In a great visual gag, crewmembers walk by carrying a piece of the new set and Val is briefly framed as if she’s behind bars. By ignoring the red flags and proceeding with the show, she’s found herself in a prison of her own making.
Val meets Evan, the tech guy who’s tasked with troubleshooting any problems with Al. He explains that the episode is the result of an AI hallucination, which is what happens when the program gets confused and makes shit up. In this case, it has misinterpreted Beth’s joke about killing her brother in the pilot and put the character in jail, then added Nathan Drake from the Uncharted video-game series. (Played by Tom Holland in the 2022 film adaptation, which I swear doesn’t exist despite making over $400 million.) As Val comes to terms with the fact that a glitch in the system has produced an unfilmable episode, she’s also fielding complaints from the other actors. P.D.P. points out that he has only one scene and it’s him baking a file into a cake. “Is this a cartoon now?” he asks. I’ll admit that’s sort of how I feel about The Comeback doing this AI-hallucination plot, which is pushing the boundaries of believability — not that Al would produce something so stupid but that no one but Val would flag it as a serious issue. I understand the point the show is trying to make, though, which is that all the responsibility is falling on her shoulders. That becomes even clearer when Valerie tries to get Billy to help, but he’s too busy taking part in Variety’s “50 Over 50” photo shoot. It’s now up to Val and Val alone to get a new script from the writers.
Unfortunately, Valerie doesn’t get the response she’s hoping for at the writers’ office. Mary reveals that she and Josh are only there to babysit Al and lend the project credibility, not to do any writing themselves. That seemed obvious from the jump, but it’s news to Val, and it still leaves the problem of a second episode that doesn’t work. Everyone who could help is either otherwise occupied or completely indifferent. Facing a dead end, Val threatens to call the studio, but Mary isn’t budging. “I am not going to fucking teach Al to be better,” she fires back. “I’m not helping to build the scaffold that kills my profession. We took this job because if it works, it’ll be a paycheck forever, and now I don’t even give a fuck if it works or not.” In fact, Mary seems enthusiastic about the prospect of the show failing. After confirming that she and Josh will not be delivering a new episode, she closes with “I hope Rome burns to the ground.” It’s a thrillingly nasty performance from Abbi Jacobson. Her mocking “How’s that?!” to Valerie is especially harrowing.
Out of options, Val locates Billy at the “50 Over 50” shoot and tells him the situation is worse than they’d thought: “She’s not here to help! She’s here to watch Rome go on fire!” Billy shows as much concern as he can muster, which is not much. When Val demands he call the studio, he suggests she explain the situation clearly so he knows exactly what to tell them. In reality, he has recorded her rant as a voice note and sent it over to NuNet to avoid having to do any of the legwork himself. I appreciate that Val is furious — Billy’s behavior gets more egregious every week — even if the meanest thing she can say to him is that he really let her down and isn’t being a good producing partner. Jane’s take is better: “That was fully fucking disturbing. Who the fuck does that guy think he is?” But Valerie, who now understands she’ll have to keep wearing too many hats to save this show, is already trying to put a positive spin on the situation. “Sometimes it’s just up to just me, and that’s okay,” she says. “I love a challenge. It’s an opportunity to rise to the occasion.” She’s going to need to maintain that perspective because I have very little faith that Brandon Wollack is going to save the day.
• In another episode that’s lighter on the jokes, I did laugh out loud at the perfect observational humor of Billy’s “No one listens to voice-mails, send me a voice memo.”
• I also love that Mary is writing Inside Out 6: Riley Loses Her Virginity.
• Call me immature, but the very visible prosthetic seen when Josh is wearing his tiny shorts — and Val’s subtly horrified reaction — did make me chuckle. Relatedly, are we supposed to infer that Josh and his trainer have an inappropriate relationship? Mary flinched a little at the mention of her husband’s workout buddy.
• As for jokes that didn’t work for me at the writers’ office, the assistant downstairs filming a TikTok video feels like another lazy jab at Gen Z, much like Patience’s malingering.
• While I like the story beat of Mark befriending the building staff out of desperation, I was less amused by Fernando trying to start a fight with the warm-up comic at the taping.
• Are we ever going to see an episode of Finance Dudes? This week, we learn Mark is in danger of being fired, which prompts Valerie to suggest that she film with him. She also warns Billy to “never say bad things about Mark.” I hope she’s not reading these recaps.
• Of course, the moment that really landed for me was the callback of an overhead camera capturing Val rehearsing the same line over and over while getting distracted by food. After a long day at work, I do want to see that.
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