Platonic – Season 1 Episode 4 “Divorce Party” Recap & Review

Divorce Party

Will’s plans start on a good note as episode 4 of Platonic begins. He is brought back home by a young girl, Peyton. They set up perfectly to have sex but Peyton’s roommate, Maddison, spoils the mood. She starts watching the final episode of Succession which distracts Peyton from focusing on Will. He senses the moment has passed and takes his leave.

While surfing Instagram, he finds posts from Audrey that announce she is moving in with her Norweigan boyfriend. At the same time, Sylvia and Katie go to their friend Christine’s “divorce party.”

As opposed to making it a sad affair, Christine and her friends have decided to celebrate her newfound independence from marriage. Before they assemble, Sylvia discreetly tells Katie what she is going to say when the host asks her to speak up. It is simple, profound, and crisp, but something that eludes people when asked to work on the fly.

Katie is put on the spot and uses Sylvia’s lines. She manages to pivot well but messes up when she mentions how miserable her mother was after the divorce.

Stewart and Charlie discuss Sylvia’s “speech-eating” debacle from the last episode. Both agree that she needs to get back on the employment wagon and cool off some energy. Charlie has already made plans to set up a work interview for Sylvia with his friend Kirk. Stewart advises Charlie to not be pushy and approach the issue with casual and laid-back energy. Charlie doesn’t know how to be like that but says he will try. Turns out that Stewart was right and Sylvia does not take Charlie saddling this on her out of the blue well.

The next day, she is anxious as she keeps looking over at the cards. She is scared of calling Kirk and decides to hang out with Will to level herself. Will is himself a wreck. But he is more taken aback by how petty Audrey has gotten by posting the announcement on social media when she knows he will see it. She decides to throw him a divorce party like Christine and Will agrees. Before she leaves for it, Charlie once again reminds her to make the call, making her even more defensive about it.

A nice, gentle, adult dinner evening in celebration of Will has been planned. Sylvia is the only woman at the table. The others are Will’s close friends and frat friends of Andy, Audrey’s stepbrother who is an investor in the bar. The mood quickly turns as Reggie and the boys start taking over from Sylvia and they eventually agree to go out to a strip club. We see noteworthy differences in how Sylvia interacts with Will and his friends, and her friends in her social circle.

Anyway, she is not on board with the idea of going to a strip club. Will does not want to go without her and misses the old times they did wild stuff together. Sylvia expresses her disdain at places like these clubs, indicating that she has outgrown them. Will, though, is like that same teenager who never grew up. He gets very animated – and so does Will – when he tries to convince her to come. He drops the strip club idea and suggests they do cocaine instead.

Little do they know that Reggie has in fact brought cocaine and ketamine. The former is mostly harmless but the latter is a “rave drug.” Sylvia starts freaking out until the effects of the drug hit her. In her weird state, she says everything with calm and laid-back energy, including phrases like she’s angry. The boys go grocery shopping next and the full effects of Special K start showing. Sylvia goes flying around the floor, disturbing grocery items in the supermarket and being kicked out by the owner for damaging goods.

Will takes her to his house and she wakes up about two hours later. He apologises for disrupting her settled adult life. Sylvia compensates for his feeling of inadequacy by mentioning the job interview that Charlie had to set up for her.

Inspired by the night, she decides to call Kirk, not knowing it is 2am. She panics and does not pick up the callbacks from an angry Kirk. Will continues his courtship of Peyton, who seems to respond to his advances. Sylvia gets back by nearly 4am to the house and we see Charlie opening his eyes to check the time and let out a sigh of concern.

The Episode Review 

Episode 4 saw the former throw a “divorce party” for the latter, which is certainly out of the ordinary. It was an opportunity to show perhaps why Will hasn’t been able to sustain a meaningful adult relationship with Audrey and why he is so different from Sylvia.

All in all, this is another decent episode and it certainly leaves the door open for next week’s follow-up.