What I’m Watching: Pure

Pure: Season 1, Episode 5 (B+)

A friend from home coming to visit should have been a positive experience for Marnie, but rationalizing that a lifelong relationship meant that she could be fully honest ended up being completely destructive and a terrible idea. Helen did seem a bit too cool, and she was never going to let Marnie be the star of her own life during the visit. I hadn’t expected to see all of our characters together for a dinner party, and it was intriguing to see how they responded to each other. Shereen was typically awkward and not well-received, and even Marnie managed to make telling her to stand up for herself a demeaning act that negated that very advice. Charlie did pretty well, and I’m liking Amber and Joe more and more each time I see them. Helen, on the other hand, was cruel and eager to be the center of attention, and calling Marnie out for her disorder after insinuating that she wanted to get her hands on her breasts was cruel. To their credit, everyone else reacted decently, with Charlie giving her a nod of support and Joe later researching what it meant. I’m glad that Marnie has decided to write Helen off for the moment even if they did get back to a good place when she just abandoned her luggage at the bus station since she’ll be better off blazing a new trail on her own. Both Charlie and Amber are not making good romance decisions, though Charlie’s is likely to be much more impactful on his professional life. Amber almost managed to seem detached and uninterested, but that only lasted for less than a minute.