In this episode Dara reveals that he is unaccustomed to the comfort of pajamas. This fact is relevant to a very recent late-night incident that he shares. That same incident concluded with an inherent contradiction relating to the presence of both love and rejection.
In acknowledging that tension, Dara begins to talk about romance as a form of idealism. He argues that the conscious demonstration of love, regardless of the recipient, is an act of romance that is tethered to an idealised concept of love.
Romance has arguably fallen out of fashion at the movies, but Dara just watched two very accomplished romantic films and found himself moved in very different ways by each. The Tom Cruise vehicle Jerry Maguire (1996) and Celine Song’s exquisite Past Lives (2023) may not seem to have much in common, but they are hugely successful love stories on their own terms.
And what happens when love is not part of one’s foundational experience? Ask Sylvester Stallone, who leaves no doubt as to where his deepest wound originated.