Shrinking is back for another funny, sweet, and emotional season – one that also very much feels like a final season, whether it ends up actually being that way or not.
The characters remain as likeable and engaging as ever, with creators Bill Lawrence, Jason Segel, and Brett Goldstein all understanding that the key to a show of this sort is making sure that the people seen hanging out together feel like people you’d want to hang out with too. The first two seasons understandably put a lot of the show’s emotional focus on Segel’s Jimmy, as he tried to move forward with his life in the wake of his wife’s death in a car accident. On a show that centers the importance of taking care of your mental health, it’s made clear that Jimmy’s issues are not all magically solved forever now, but his storylines are a bit less centered and dramatic this time out. The stakes are still important on a personal level – can he finally begin having a healthy dating life again, like say, with Cobie Smulders’ Sofi? – but not as intense as trying to make peace with the remorseful man who caused your wife’s death.
Other characters are dealing with a ticking clock, however, in ways that will most certainly affect Jim, beginning with his daughter Alice (Lukita Maxwell) nearing her high school graduation and potentially moving across the country. Then there’s Paul (Harrison Ford), whose Parkinson’s disease is worsening, leading him to have to finally face the question of how much longer he’s able to continue to work as a therapist in a way he’s tried to put off until now.
Ford has been absolutely fantastic in Shrinking, with one of our most beloved old-school movie stars getting to tap into aspects of his talent he rarely had to before as the classically curmudgeonly yet deeply thoughtful and empathetic Paul. In Season 3, Paul makes friends with a fellow Parkinson’s patient, Gerry, played by none other than Michael J. Fox. Fox isn’t in as much of the season as one might hope, but it’s still obviously a huge deal that he’s in it at all, given this is his first live-action acting role in several years. His scenes with Ford are very impactful for a couple of reasons. First off, it’s freaking Harrison Ford and Michael J. Fox sharing the screen together! These two men have wildly different on-screen personas, but are both incredibly iconic parts of cinematic history, cemented forever as the faces of beloved franchises.
Then there’s the fact that, yes, Fox is now notably physically impaired by the real-life Parkinson’s he was diagnosed with decades ago, and there’s a strange mixture of sympathy and selfishness in wishing he didn’t have to go through that, and could still move and speak in the way we remember as fans of the man and his work. Yet, as he’s proved over and over in interviews and appearances, and again does here in his performance as Gerry, Fox remains as filled with intelligence and wit as ever, still able to deliver a comedy punchline like he was born to do so. Gerry’s and Paul’s mantra, one clearly shared by everyone else working on Shrinking – including Spin City co-creator Lawrence, reuniting with Fox – is one that is easy to embrace as well: “Fuck Parkinson’s.” Ford and Fox have a terrific, warm on-screen rapport, and the scenes they share with Neil Flynn as Paul’s buddy, Ray, make it easy to imagine a spin-off about this trio.
There are some moments early on in Shrinking Season 3 that feel like the show is in danger of repeating itself. Yes, it makes sense that Gaby (Jessica Williams) would have her own anger towards Louis (played by co-creator Goldstein) for being the drunk driver who caused the death of Jimmy’s wife, Tia. But on a TV show level, we already went through storylines about both Alice’s and Jimmy’s anger towards Louis, so it can’t help but feel redundant. Thankfully, as the season progresses, plotlines develop about Gaby’s dynamic with a new patient (Sherry Cola), along with her thoughts on where she wants her career to go, that feel more unique.
Even by sitcom standards (and this is far more of a comedy-drama hybrid), Shrinking pushes credibility as far as the specific dynamics of its central friend group and their found family dynamics to the point that there are occasional meta jokes about it. Jimmy is the connective tissue for everyone, but yes, it is weird if you take a step back and think about your college best friend hanging out with your next door neighbors and your therapy-patient-turned-pseudo-roomate without you. But the show’s writing and cast make it all work, and it’s easy to be invested in storylines like Sean (Luke Tennie) trying to navigate his relationship with his dad and his own career aspirations, or Brian (Michael Urie) preparing for both the reality of being a dad and what the long-term dynamic is supposed to be with the woman whose baby he and his husband (Devin Kawaoka) are adopting. The show can lean a bit too casually saccharine at times, but then it has a dramatic scene involving someone really tapping into their inner pain or their inner joy, and it is undeniably impactful and heartfelt…and yes, dang it, it can make you cry, or at least it sure has made me cry.
Neighbors Liz (Christa Miller) and Derek (Ted McGinley) get some strong material as well, as Derek’s accidental ingestion of some drugs – a comedic highlight of the season – leads to new revelations. And after youngest son Connor (Gavin Lewis) got the focus in earlier seasons, Season 3 shifts to Liz and Derek’s oldest son, Matthew (Markus Silbiger), showing up with problems of his own to navigate. Alongside the series regulars, recurring cast on Shrinking like Lewis and Silbiger continue to shine, with the likes of Rachel Stubington, Wendie Malick, Lily Rabe, and Damon Wayans Jr. all fitting in seamlessly whenever they appear, joined this season by more heavy hitters via appearances by Jeff Daniels and Candice Bergen. Daniels is very good as Jimmy’s dad, a guy who’s able to perform the role of Fun Grandpa way more than he’s capable of being emotionally available for his family in the way they’ve needed due to their loss.
As Season 3 continues, it begins to feel more and more like a final season, as not only Alice’s and Paul’s storylines, but multiple others, begin to coalesce into the idea of great change on the horizon. This feeling of impending finality is so notable, I did what I suspect other viewers will do, and searched online to see if I’d missed an announcement that Season 3 was intended to end the series. Instead, I found an interview Lawrence did at the end of Season 2 where he did state he had a specific three-season story planned, with the idea of then moving into a different three-season story (like two trilogies in TV form?).
As it happens, Shrinking Season 3 does work perfectly well as a conclusion to the entire series, perhaps intentionally so, to protect themselves should the show actually end up here. In fact, it works well enough that it makes me a bit hesitant if I’d even want more seasons, given that it feels like a very satisfying story in this form.
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