‘You’re The Worst’ Gang Gets Emotional Over ‘Wistful’ Final Season At TCA

Lisa de Moraes

Updated Fri, August 3, 2018 at 7:43 PM UTC

Fifth and final season of FXX’s You’re The Worst has been “very wistful” star Chris Geere told TV critics at TCA.

And series creator Stephen Falk noted that people started asking how it would end around Season 3. He joked about hoping to “stick the landing,” and how much he hated Breaking Bad for having done it so perfectly, and making that phrase a thing. Falk’s goal is for the season to end in an “organic way”…”playing with the idea of commitment and what that means and what it means in a legal structure and personal structure and what it means to one’s personal development.”

“Me and my writing staff were trying to be cognizant of not worrying too much about sticking the landing – while making sure we do it, at the same time.”

The first episode of the last season is an homage to 90’s romcoms and does not involve any of the series characters for the first two acts.

“This was always a big gooey love letter to the tension between cynicism and belief in romance” and the movie genre. “I wanted to break form and have fun,” Falk said, acknowledging his appreciation of Notting Hill and how he thought it would be a fun change to recreate that movie’s press conference with his characters.

“I worked hard to find a way to do it and it’s one of my favorite episodes,” he told bemused TV critics.

Tonally, he acknowledged, it’s “as winky as those movies were,” he acknowledged.

Geere, meanwhile, said a scene this season that mirrors one from the series pilot five years earlier got him thinking about how much his narcissistic, brash, stubborn Jimmy Shive-Overly character has grown, though, “not as much as you want him to,” he speculated.

On a personal note, his son was three weeks old when the pilot scene was shot, and he’s now nearly six. “I feel very different; I still feel as grateful. I remember how nervous I was that first day and here we are…the neighbors still hate us for filming there,” Geere joked.

He’s never experienced the “fangirling” of more mainstream comedies, but Geere insisted that when people tell him “thank you for telling this story,” or “I’ve had problems with depression” that the show addressed in a unique way. “that means so much more to us as actors than ‘Oh, my god! You’re on THAT show!’”

Aya Cash, who plays cynical, people-pleasing, self-destructive Gretchen Cutler, began to cry when talking about the “deep admiration” they have for each other. “I just think we’re really lucky to get to play off each other” calling their relationship “rare in this business.”

Falk said he was spoiled by this cast, speculating, “I will never get to work for actors like this. I give them anything and they kill it – and they’re the nicest people.”

As a Brit, Geere said, the general attitude he’s found working in this country is “’we’re lucky to have you’…I’m not saying it’s the opposite in England, but there is an element of appreciation here which forces me to up my game.”

He thanked TV critics in the room for the support they’ve shown the series over its run.

“I started as a recapper for TelevisionWithoutPity,” Falk jumped in, telling the critics, “I really respect you guys and you’re the reason we’re still on the air, along with FX being so awesome. So I want to thank you guys.”

With that, he and his cast applauded the TV critics which, note to all series in their final season TCA at-bats, is exactly the way to TV critics’ hearts.

Last fall FX Networks announced Season 5 would be the FXX comedy’s last, a decision made mutually with creator-showrunner Falk.

You’re the Worst, from FX Productions, put a dark twist on the romantic comedy genre. Shive-Overly inadvertently found himself paired with Cutler and, after a whirlwind courtship, and a very rough post-cohabitation period of dealing with Gretchen’s clinical depression, the pair were forced to learn how to manage a relationship in the face of tragedy when Jimmy’s father unexpectedly died. Jimmy proposed, then disappeared. Now broken up, and involved with other people, both struggle to move on while constantly being pulled back toward each other.

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