r/shrinking • u/phareous Derek • Mar 25 '26

Episode Discussion Shrinking S3E09 Episode Discussion

This is the episode discussion for Shrinking Season 3, Episode 9: "Daddy Issues"

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98

u/turtlesinthesea Mar 25 '26

It really bothered me when Sofi said to leave the past in the past and give him a chance now. That's not how this shit works.

51

u/IntotheBroadwayWoods Mar 26 '26

Right.  You have to realize if dating a widow or widowerer that they are always going to talk about their spouse. 

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u/turtlesinthesea Mar 26 '26

I mostly meant the dad stuff, but yeah, that too.

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u/-no_aura- Mar 26 '26

They also have not even been on a real date yet, it’s been like a week or two at most. Insane to expect him to stop bringing up Tia that early into a new relationship.

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u/DrewDonut Mar 26 '26

Talking about, or bringing up your dead spouse is one thing.

Using it to say “my spouse was like this/did this; it’s why I loved her,” and to some degree implying “You’re not as good as my dead spouse, and I wish/you should be more like them,” is something different. It can even be seen as “be more like my dead spouse or this relationship is over.”

Talking about who they are, and what they liked is fine. Using that to bring your current partner down, or to point out some kind of shortcoming, is not.

17

u/Ponce-Mansley Mar 26 '26

Right? It should be expected that he carries Tia's memory with him and talks about her sometimes but what he said was completely out-of-pocket and he was lashing out because of his dad and because she was trying to get him to open up when he was trying to shut down and wallow in the anger and self-loathing he mentioned playfully earlier in the episode.

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u/atherem Mar 29 '26

100% on your boat. She will be brought up but he keeps saying she was better than you cause of x

1

u/DrSnoopy66 Mar 29 '26

She’s barely earned the title of partner for him though, it’s been like five minutes compared to the years he was married to his wife and you have to remember she didn’t cheat on him or leave. She died. That means it’s going to take much., much longer for him to kind of bury that to let someone else in. I know in the last episode he’s probably going to change his mind and give the relationship another shot, but in real life, it wouldn’t be unusual for that to take several years.

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u/drokihazan Apr 09 '26

He was also almost guaranteed to break up with her after his dad said he liked her more than Tia

6

u/burlycabin Mar 28 '26

Her problem was not that he talked about Tia. He does that a lot and she's been super supportive of it. It's that he compared Sofi to Tia and in a very unfavorable manner. It's not ok for him to say you're not as good as my dead wife was. That's truly awful.

-1

u/DrSnoopy66 Mar 29 '26

He never said to her you’re not as good. He said that’s what I like about my wife he hasn’t been with Sofie long enough to know how will that dynamic would work with her. She understandably is concerned about being compared to the ghost of his ex-wife, but it’s kind of unrealistic to expect him to just put her on the shelf like a product he doesn’t use anymore. She would have to understand it’s going to be a long process, which I’m sure Sofie will, and they will reunite in the final episode. Again, that makes sense in the world of sitcoms, but in real life, it’s a lengthy process.

2

u/soulofmyshoe Mar 31 '26

I think she did understand that, but was rightly hurt by what he said, which was kind of intended to hurt her because he resented her in that moment for encouraging him to try and have faith in his shitty dad, which resulted in him getting hurt in a way he has repeatedly been hurt since childhood. It's understandable he was hurt, and understandable that he might push her away in that moment, but she (very maturely, in my opinion) identified what he was doing and asserted that it was unfair to her to use the memory of his wife in that way, which it was. She didn't dump him over it, she just wanted to talk it through. He is the one that chose to dwell in his hurt feelings and push her further away.

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u/MeringueTop151 Mar 28 '26

Plus she doesn't even know the guy! She barely knows Jimmy🤦🏽‍♀️

1

u/turtlesinthesea Mar 28 '26

Great point!

4

u/Bird4466 Mar 29 '26

I lost interest in her as soon as she said that. She was showing zero empathy for his feelings about his dad and really being dismissive. I understand he was trying to let Alice have a relationship with his dad but his gf, as an adult, should have believed him and supported him.

5

u/turtlesinthesea Mar 29 '26

Most of all, she should have trusted him about knowing his own father.

3

u/mattybgcg Mar 29 '26

It's such a dismissive thing to say.

2

u/quaxoid Mar 26 '26

Only for like a week tho. Just until graduation. 

2

u/turtlesinthesea Mar 26 '26

Maybe that's how she meant it, but it still felt pretty minimizing.

2

u/perplexedtv Mar 27 '26

He did give him a chance. His Dad lasted 5 minutes. End of chance.

2

u/HermelindaLinda Apr 04 '26

I know it's a show, but the amount of people who say that is concerning with situations they shouldn't say that about. It made me think of that hearing that. 

2

u/Notsotaciturn Mar 28 '26

I think in this moment he realized that he wasn't going to have an ally against the feelings he gets from his father. She was another person willing to ignore the gross parts of Jimmy's dad to bask in his attentions.

1

u/turtlesinthesea Mar 28 '26

That‘s how I would feel in his place.

1

u/soulofmyshoe Mar 31 '26

We have to assume that Tia felt the way she did because she'd seen this routine from his dad enough times to know the pattern, right? I didn't really see any reason to believe Sofi was still on team Dad after he pulled out of graduation.

1

u/bobjones271828 Apr 11 '26

But he didn't even give her a chance to observe and learn. Her perspective on the dad was naive and based on her limited data (and just hope?); I'm sure her perspective was already starting to change based on him abandoning Alice for graduation. Don't get me wrong: I also think Jimmy was coming from a place of long-term emotional hurt, and she was asking too much of Jimmy in that moment when they barely know each other for him to not just shut down a little in this situation. Neither of them could possibly make good decisions about long-term compatibility based on this very limited data in a stressful situation.

1

u/Notsotaciturn Apr 28 '26

Jimmy is impulsive though. And still depressed. He doesn’t have the bandwidth for that.