'Love Life' Episode 7, 8, 9, 10 Preview: Who will Darby Carter end up spending her life with?
Spoilers for 'Love Life'
The last three episodes of 'Love Life' took us to through Darby Carters (Anna Kendrick) relationship with Magnus Lund (Nick Thune) and her high school fling with Luke Ducharme (John Gallagher Jr). It was a crazy three-episode binge as we saw how Lund was introduced to Darby's life. After multiple flings, she had found 'the one,' or so she thought. HBO Max is set to release the last four episodes on June 11 and we're speculating what we can hope to see. Let's quickly recap the last three episodes.
Episode 4 showcased Darby's early days with Lund and how they grew closer and more comfortable as a couple. They had moved in together, spoke about having children and Lund even managed to impress Darby's mother. All was not great in their relationship though as we started to see the cracks when Darby got promoted to Assistant Sales Associate Antiquities but Lund had lost his job. Telling her that he is "f****** depressed," Lund starts to withdraw from a relationship. After a small squabble, he decides to go out to find a job only to be gone for over 24 hours leaving Darby extremely worried. Anyway, all is well that ends well as the episode ending sees Lund proposing to Darby after he returns from his short hiatus.
Episode 5 then brought us to Darby wanting to "look inward" as she decides to go to therapy after having trouble expressing herself to Lund in their relationship. Her passive nature and nervousness to anger him had now started to make Darby angry. The therapist says Lund may have "steamrolled" her and because Darby was so worried he'd break up with her if she spoke up, her therapist lets her know she's afraid of rejection. This prompts the session to go forward as Darby is asked to recall the time she had first felt rejected. Here is where we got to meet Luke Ducharme, Darby's high school fling.
On one of the thanksgiving breaks that she had spent at the boarding school she was attending, she got to "hook up" with Luke who had also stayed back. Telling her roommate she was "keeping it casual", she ignored the fact that Luke had wanted nothing to do with her after the Thanksgiving break had ended. On one horrible afternoon, Darby sees Luke walk out of her room after having "hooked up" with Darby's roommate. Experiencing a breakdown, Darby didn't want to reveal that she was upset at how she was disrespected and blurted out that she was crying because she had cancer. Years later, and back to the therapist's office, Darbys recalls that as a "stupid joke" as she reveals she had withdrawn from school after her lie was exposed. "Reflect on what it is that makes you feel like you don't deserve to be loved," the therapist had told Darby when she had left her office. That episode saw Darby not opt for therapy again because she having dig deeper into her feelings "require her to upend her entire life which was built on the carefully constructed fantasy that getting married was some sort of proof once and for all that she was "loveable." In this episode, it was confirmed that Darby was married to Lund.
Episode 6 saw the downfall of the duo's relationship as we see Darby stuck in a marriage that was one-sided, not to mention Luke Ducharme, now a lawyer was in New York. The episode brought Luke and Lund in the same narrative making a hell of a lot more trouble for Darby as she visits Luke, and ends up being unfaithful to Lund. While there is no justifying cheating, we were shown Darby's life slowly crumble as she came home to a man that didn't want to put in the effort to keep their marriage afloat. Lund wasn't even aware there was a problem, because he was the problem. It was an episode in which we saw Darby finally get up the courage to end her marriage to a man that ended up gaslighting her to get her to stay by threatening to commit suicide. She may have not stayed with Luke, he had left for Boston the next day, but her past helped her overcome her present and that was a huge stepping stone in Darby's life. "Luke represented the possibility of something better than Magnus," and nothing more. "It didn't get hard, you made it hard. Your dreams are NOT my dreams, that's what I'm f***ing telling you," she had told him.
So far the series has taken us through all the men Darby had invested her time and effort into. The list of men includes Augie Jeong (Jin Ha), Bradley Field (Scoot McNairy), Danny Two Phones (Gus Halper), Magnus Lund and Luke Ducharme. With the last episode seeing the breakup of Lund and Darby, we can't help but speculate that Darby would indeed want space in her 'Love Life' right now. We're also speculating that she would focus on her family and friends, and maybe stop looking for men to love her. The narrative of her friends/roommates may have been a secondary one, but we're speculating that Darby's life will bring their narratives back to the forefront in the next few episodes.
We think we would get insight into Zoë Chao's Sara, who is one of Darby's best friends and roommates. In Episode 6, we saw her going through a relationship struggle with her longtime boyfriend Jim (Peter Vack) and back in Episode 4, we have foreshadowed a story about Sara and her mom which she finds "depressing." We're speculating that we will learn if Jim and Sara stay together or was Sara with Jim because she just didn't want to break his heart? Why won't she tell Jim about her mother, what's the story there? She didn't want to move in with him to a home he had inherited from his aunt, instead, she had wanted him to flip it. While he was interested in moving forward and starting a family, Sara didn't seem to keen on it. We wonder how Darby would be a friend in this situation? She has been caught up in her 'Love Life' for so long, we wonder if she is able to think of others?
Also, we couldn't help but notice that in Episode 3, Darby had run to Augie (from Episode 1), her ex that had left to explore a better career opportunity. While Darby chose to deal with Augie's return by sleeping with Danny Two Phones, we wonder if Augue will make a return. The way he had looked at her the last time has us thinking that their love might not be lost? We don't think that Augie is the one Darby would end up with, if she does, that would be a surprise. Also, Darby's relationship with her family didn't take the front seat in the past 6 episodes, so we wonder if we'll find out how adult Darby gets along with her parents. We saw a small glimpse when Darby had gone out to dinner with Lund and her mother, where her mother seemed to want all the attention on her. We would think that if Darby was putting love on the back seat, will her family be involved in her life?
Mostly, we're hoping to see who Darby's adult relationship would be, as that would follow the pattern of the series so far. Since we know this is the last four episodes and that the series is a season anthology, this would mark the end of Darby's journey that we get to witness so, we speculate we'd see the man Darby would end up with.
The last four episodes of 'Love Life' will be released on Thursday, June 11, on HBO Max.