Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Love Life’ Season 2 On HBO Max, Where William Jackson Harper Plays A Book Editor Who Feels Adrift After A Divorce

It seems like ages ago, but people forget that Love Life was HBO Max’s first original series, debuting on the service’s launch date in May 2020. It seemed like a soft launch for the service, given some of the shows that came later (The Flight Attendant, Hacks). But it was pleasant enough, with good performances. Knowing that Season 2 would focus on a different character, we figured it would be a good idea to review this season, too. Read below to find out why this was a good decision.

LOVE LIFE SEASON 2: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Scenes of people dancing in a bar. A narrator (Keith David) says “There is no destiny. There are no soulmates. There is no ‘one’. And yet it could be said that the core of human concern is to connect.”

The Gist: At the very informal 2016 wedding of Darby (Anna Kendrick) and Magnus (Nick Thune), which we saw in the middle of Love Life season 1, we focus on one of the guests, Marcus Watkins (William Jackson Harper), a guy whom the narrator describes as “chameleonic.” He’s at the wedding with his wife Emily (Maya Kazan), with whom he’s been together since grad school. But when the book editor goes outside to text with a millennial influencer who’s writing a book for him, his world is turned upside down when he meets Mia Hines (Jessica Williams).

The two of them hit it off and there was a spark between them like neither has experienced in a long time, but Marcus reveals he’s married and Mia reveals she has a boyfriend near the end of their initial conversation. But he stays in touch by sending her the promising manuscript he’s reading.

At work, he meets with Freddie (Jordan Rock), the grad student who wrote that manuscript. Toting a gallon of water to keep him hydrated, Freddie keeps calling Marcus “Barack” and cast doubts on both Marcus’ interest and his Blackness. Marcus complains to his buddy Yogi (Chris “Comedian CP” Powell) that there’s no reason anyone could doubt him on that count. But with Yogi he does seem different than he is with Emily or any of his colleagues.

Even before meeting Mia, things with Emily have gotten stale, and he continues to text with Mia, entering into an “emotional affair” with her. It doesn’t help that Emily works nights, and the autonomy that allows gives Marcus a sense of independence that makes him think something might happen with Mia. She invites him to MoMA’s member night, thinking he’s a safe choice because he’s married. But the discussion gets heavy, and when they return to her place, the attraction between the two is undeniable.

He leaves just before anything physical happens. But when Emily asks him why he’s getting home so late, his lie about a spontaneous client dinner doesn’t fly at all with her.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Love Life Season 1, naturally. It follows a similar format, with a narrator and each episode tracing the subject’s love life through their interactions with various people. But there are some big difference between the two seasons, as we’ll outline below.

Our Take: We knew that Love Life was going to examine a different character’s love exploits from season to season, but what the show’s creator, Sam Boyd, has done with Season 2 of the show is set up a different-enough paradigm to make the new season a completely different show, and one that in many ways surpasses the first season.

He and his co-showrunners, Bridget Bedard and Rachelle Williams-BenAry (Run The World) immediately change the viewpoint by putting the focus on Marcus, who’s in his thirties and already married when we meet him. So instead of meeting the usual “white single chick in the city,” which was always the vibe we got as Kendrick’s Darby stumbled through her love life in Season 1, we meet a guy whose life already seems settled at the start. When he unconsciously blows everything up, we then are intrigued at how he rebuilds, and the mistakes he makes along the way.

And race is certainly a part of the story, from the grad student Freddie questioning Marcus’ Blackness, to the fact that his parents and sister Ida (Punkie Johnson) never thought Emily was right for him. It’s an interesting contrast, given that Ida brings a multiethnic girlfriend to their parents’ anniversary party in Ann Arbor in the third episode; those are the side stories that make this season of Love Life a little more interesting than the first one. While much of the focus is on Marcus, putting some focus on Ida helps make the show more dynamic.

As it was in Season 1, Love Life is certainly an acting showcase for all involved. Harper, so good in The Good Place, plays Marcus with equal parts misplaced confidence mixed with the knowledge that he has no idea who he actually is. But Williams, Powell and Johnson also put in good performances, as do guest stars like Ego Nwodim as a playwright that Marcus moves too fast with, and Aline Mayagoitia as an aggressive college student.

Sex and Skin: Like in Season 1, any nudity is subtle.

Parting Shot: Emily, finding Marcus’ texts to Mia on their iPad, reads them back to him, ending with one that says he feels stuck.

Sleeper Star: As we mentioned above, we enjoyed Punkie Johnson as Ida, though we don’t see her until Episode 2. It leads us to think that she should be used on SNL a little bit more than she is now.

Most Pilot-y Line: As with the previous season, the use of the narrator is heavy-handed. While Keith David’s mellifluous voice is always something we like to hear, we still didn’t want to hear it as much as we heard it here.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Love Life‘s second season surpasses the first just by shifting the focus away from a subject we’ve seen so many times to one that has a messier, and more interesting, story.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.

Stream Love Life ON HBO Max