Netflix’s Human Resources season 1 recap guide: Episodes 1 to 10

Human Resources episode 2, “Training Day”

The second episode of Human Resources starts with poor Jose the Spider Receptionist breaking almost all of his legs in the break room after slipping in Gavin and Mona’s (Thandiwe Newton) er…fluids. Jose’s accident triggers an office-wide discussion on the Hormone Monsters’ bad behavior. They literally have sex all over the office—on desks, inside snack machines, even at Jose’s house—with no consideration for their coworkers.

Jose’s incident is the breaking point for the rest of the creatures. Corporate sends a training aide to handle the Hormone Monsters, an owl named Empathy Mulholland. None of the monsters want to take sensitivity training, but if Empathy doesn’t sign off on their completion of the session then they all get fired. So they don’t really have a choice but to learn about what it means to be a considerate employee! Surprisingly, Empathy’s methods are quite effective on the monsters and she ends up providing several of them with emotional breakthroughs, including Connie, Gavin and Maury.

The only Hormone Monster not impressed with Empathy’s therapeutic methods is Mona, who feels that Empathy is trying to make the Hormone Monsters into something they’re not. Sure, sex in the workplace might be bad, but for Hormone Monsters, sex literally is their workplace!

Empathy offers to discuss getting the Hormone Monsters a designated sex room so they can keep all their antics contained in one room. Mona agrees, so long as they throw in a flat-screen TV and a premium subscription to Starz (with a Z!). Now that they have their own special place to bang to their hearts’ content, the Hormone Monsters apologize to the rest of the staff and promise to be more considerate moving forward.

Elsewhere, Emmy is hiding from Becca after she gave birth so Walter decides to take her on a “Lovebug ridealong” so she can learn the true meaning of love. He brings Emmy to meet a few of his clients, specifically Yara (Nidah Barber-Raymond), an older woman struggling with dementia. Yara regularly dwells on memories of her past romance with a handsome waiter named Safi who she couldn’t be with publicly due to her family.

Every time Walter visits Yara, he gets swept away in Yara’s time distortions and watches her romantic entanglement unfold. But her memories are interrupted by the arrival of her son Amir. Amir visits Yara almost every day at the nursing home to check on her and make sure she has the nicest towels and her favorite rose tea. You’d think that would be comforting to Walter. Instead, he starts turning into a Hateworm, enraged at Amir (but really the world) for how unfair it is that Yara can’t be with Safi, that she’s getting older and stuck in a nursing home.

Emmy warns Walter he’s becoming a Hateworm, triggering another love lesson: “The line between love and hate is thin as hell.” It’s not until Emmy makes Walter smell some of the freshly brewed rose tea that he calms down.

The tea helps everyone relax, including Yara, and they’re transported back to her soothing memories where Walter reveals that he loses his cool almost every time he visits Yara. Despite the fact that Yara rarely knows who Amir is and Walter freaks out on him every time, Amir continues to visit his mother every day. “Well, he loves her.” Emmy realizes that love usually just means showing up for the people you love, so maybe she should start doing that for Becca!

The C-plot of Human Resources episode 2 is much better than the one in the first episode as it centers on two of the show’s best characters: Logic Rock Pete (Randall Park) and Rochelle the Lovebug (Keke Palmer). Rochelle and Pete share a client, Doug (Tim Robinson), and get into an argument over the best credit card for him.

Pete wants Doug to get a sensible card so he can start saving money to get his girlfriend Donna an engagement ring. Rochelle is more interested in getting Pete the card he likes: a garish purple Phoenix Suns card that encourages the user to spend $30k in the first few months in exchange for a purple leather jacket.

Despite promising Pete she’ll do what’s right for Doug, hinting at helping him get the better credit card, Rochelle instead gets Pete the Phoenix Suns card and helps him spend tons of money on decking out his entire (leased) car in Phoenix Suns memorabilia. When Donna sees it, you expect her to get pissed but she actually falls in love with Doug all over again and even proposes to him right there and then.

Pete is thoroughly confused by this development. “This makes absolutely no sense.” But as Rochelle says, “That’s love, baby!”

Alls well that ends well for Doug since former Phoenix Suns star player Charles Barkley finds out about Doug’s car and offers him a gig. Pete and Rochelle realize that they each have more to learn from each other as they reach a new understanding (and hint at romance in the future?). Rochelle even gives Pete the Phoenix Suns jacket as a peace offering.

Human Resources episode 2 soundtrack

• Walter’s song to Emmy: “Love is a Psycho” by Brandon Kyle Goodman
• End credits: “I Like the Way” by Tommy James and The Shondells

Best jokes and stray observations from Human Resources episode 2

• “I think you’re thinking of Spider-Man. I’m just a spider, man.”
• “I can’t go back to work on the flip-flop factory floor. It’s too hard to say!”
• I can totally relate to Connie saying she hates the Apple TV remote. I lose mine in my bed about 100 times a day.
• “It’s five o’clock in someone’s mental decline.”
• “Now you’re speaking my Danielle Steel language. Those books are porn.”
• A confused Rick chanting “Chex Mix.”