‘Louie’ Recap (Season 3, Episode 3): “Miami”

Louis makes a new friend down in Miami on FX’s Louie.

On the third episode of the third season of Louie, Louis goes to Miami and meets a lifeguard named Ramon. Louis and Ramon get on well: Louis makes Ramon laugh and Ramon shows Louis the side of Miami he normally wouldn’t get to see. If you aren’t familiar with the show Louie already (I don’t know why you’re reading this recap if you aren’t), then this might sound pretty boring; actually, it’s fascinating, mainly because C.K. uses this new relationship to examine how weird heterosexual men act in relationships that could almost be classified as homosexual.

Males have strange relationships with one another: most of us get on well with one another and we are always up to go and do things together, but there’s always a barrier between the two men. We are afraid of getting too close; we are afraid of being thought of as anything other than purely heterosexual. As Louie points out in the episode, this is a strange thing to worry about: homosexual people don’t worry about being considered heterosexual, do they?

Strangely enough, “Miami” is less about Miami and more about friendships. Based on the male adults I have know in my life, men don’t acquire more friends as they grow older; they have fewer. The only people we have seen Louie with in this show so far besides family members and the odd date are comedians, and I’m not sure even Louis would actually classify them as “friends” (except for maybe Doug Stanhope last season, but that was more when they were younger). Ramon is the first friend we have seen Louis have, and he’s a new one nonetheless. It is the newness of their relationship is what makes Louis so uncomfortable: again, men aren’t supposed to make new friends as they get older; after all, people might think they’re in love (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

What I loved about this episode is that Louis and Ramon’s relationship is a complete accident. Louis is swimming in the middle of the ocean when he notices someone packing up the beach chairs where he’s left his stuff; he shouts and waves, which Ramon the lifeguard takes to mean that Louis is drowning; he then leaps into action, pulling Louis to shore. Louis tries to tell Ramon that he wasn’t actually drowning countless times, but Ramon isn’t having it. And thus a beautiful but short friendship is born.

There are a lot of great, bizarre scenes in this episode. Besides the awkward but delightful scenes between Louis and Ramon, there were two other scenes that I really liked. The first is a quick bit of stand-up where Louie says he hates balloons. That’s it. It’s such a strange moment to include in an episode, especially with absolutely no explanation. Who hates balloons? Louis C.K. The second was the end-credits scene, which I think is the first behind-the-scenes scene we’ve seen in the show so far. It’s C.K. in the middle of the ocean trying to direct his cameraman and crew while Ramon pulls him to shore. It’s another strange, one-off moment, but it’s also fascinating just to see how it was done. I wouldn’t mind seeing more behind-the-scenes moments in this show in the future; hell, I wouldn’t even mind an entire episode about C.K. making Louie. How meta would that be?!

Image credit: FX

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