“So how does this work?” Joanne (Kristen Bell) asks her boyfriend, Noah (Adam Brody), after he makes a grand romantic gesture at the end of Nobody Wants This Season 1. The unlikely duo, a sex-and-dating podcaster and a devout rabbi, have spent the past several months navigating how to balance their intense chemistry and their seemingly incompatible lifestyles.
In the final moments of the season, Joanne tells Noah that she’s not quite ready to commit to converting to Judaism — a nonnegotiable for Noah, who’s dedicated his life to the religion and was just offered a promotion to become head rabbi at his synagogue. But is Joanne’s hesitancy a deal-breaker?
Apparently not — because after Joanne shares her fears and the couple seemingly part ways forever, Noah races to confront her and prove that he’s not ready to give up just yet. The two share a knowing gaze before a romantic kiss. But what does that kiss mean for their future? Read on to find out.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Brody tells Tudum that his interpretation of the ending is that Noah is telling Joanne, “I put you first. Everything else will work itself out, but I’m saying that you are my priority.”
Which is a romantic notion, but it’s easier said than done. “In the light of day, will he still feel that way? I don’t know,” Brody adds. “It’s an open question.” Should the series continue, the actor says, “I think that’s what the show can explore. What should he do? What should she do? What version of sacrifice is worth it? What constitutes growth, or what constitutes dimming yourself to be with someone else? It’s a sacrifice, but ideally you grow together and you’re better for it — you don’t have to lob off a limb.” In short: time will tell.
During much of the season, Joanne tried to win over her boyfriend’s strict mother, Bina (Tovah Feldshuh). Noah’s sister-in-law, Esther (Jackie Tohn), is an even tougher nut to crack, considering she’s best friends with Noah’s ex, Rebecca (Emily Arlook). While it seemed that Joanne had finally thawed some of the iciness between them, Bina and Esther double down on their hatred for her and vow not to welcome her into the family after all.
Tohn says Esther has spent most of the season coming to terms with the fact that the double dates with her brother-in-law and best friend are no longer. “Mourning is probably a bit of a dramatic word, but she’s going through her own thing of how sad she is,” the actor tells Tudum. “We had a good thing. We went on vacations. It was the four of us, and now what is it? Who’s this new person?”
Part of Esther’s problem has to do with the budding friendship between her husband, Sasha (Timothy Simons), and Joanne’s sister, Morgan (Justine Lupe). The duo bonded as their siblings grew closer. “We’ve lost our respective loves, in a certain way,” Lupe tells Tudum. “Our siblings are our best friends, so they’re leaning on each other in that act of losing their everyday companions.”
Sasha is happily married to Esther — in fact, Simons and Tohn tried to show how much the couple love each other. “We had a lot of conversations about trying to make sure that you saw some real fun between Esther and Sasha. They have a good relationship. It’s not just Esther banging the table at her hapless husband,” says Simons — but he feels a strong kinship with fellow “loser sibling” Morgan. “Even as it gets a little bit weirder between them, it does make sense that whatever loser sibling connection they have, that is a connection,” Simons adds. “It’s them trying to navigate what that connection really means or what is behind that. They can’t deny that there is one, but what’s underneath?”
So not only does Esther see her idyllic foursome end, she’s also threatened by this other woman who clearly has a bond with her husband. “At this point she has less of a problem with Joanne,” Tohn says, “and now it’s like, ‘Oh, these sisters have got to go.’ Joanne came into our lives, now there’s a second one who’s wreaking havoc? It’s bad enough that our fearsome foursome of Sasha and Esther and Noah and Rebecca [is finished]. This new girl comes along, now her trash sister is talking to my husband?”
By the way, says Tohn, “I’m speaking purely from Esther’s POV. I would marry Justine if she’d have me. But from Esther’s point of view, the wheels are falling off. There’s secrets that have been happening. I don’t know how deep they are, and before the end of the season, we don’t discover that. What actually has been going on? How close are they? And either way, I think through Esther’s eyes or even my own, I think the betrayal there is obviously [that] it’s [been] kept from her. It’s not great to find out that your partner has a hot new gal pal he gives rides to. What’s happening?”
Nobody Wants This is now streaming on Netflix.
