There’s something almost perverse — and very symptomatic of our current era — about watching a series that hasn’t even figured out its own personality yet glide effortlessly into a guaranteed second season. I Love L.A. can barely stand on its own legs, especially now, in its fourth episode, which spins more than it progresses, and still, HBO stamped it: renewed. Perhaps because, more than originality, what drives a project like this is its ability to capture the zeitgeist of the zillennial influencer. And in that, at least, Rachel Sennott already understands the game better than her own characters.

“Upstairses” takes place in the specific micro-hell where the Californian dream goes to die: daytime parties in the Hollywood Hills, those great theaters of vanity where networking and desperation exchange knowing glances under merciless sunlight. If I Love L.A. had already been betting on the idea that online life is an endless performance, here the subtext becomes text: nothing is spontaneous, nothing is casual. Everything is content. Everything is a transaction.

Tallulah, Maia, Charlie, and Alani arrive at a party hosted by Quen Blackwell — playing a supersaturated version of herself — and immediately understand they’re not there to have fun but to survive. Or to level up. Or at least not to sink. Everyone wants something, but no one knows exactly what, and that’s the show’s fundamental issue: these characters exist in a void so recognizable that, at times, the narrative lacks the dramatic tension needed for real movement.

And yet, Tallulah — always floating between effortless charm and professional laziness — is the one who finally brushes against something resembling depth. When Quen pulls her aside and begins poking holes in her “it girl on the rise” persona with questions that sound more like warnings — “What are you trying to be? Who got you that bag, you or the algorithm?” — she unravels quietly. It isn’t just insecurity; it’s something closer to mourning an idealized version of herself she was never sure she actually was.

When Tallulah is swallowed by Quen’s content studio — a temple of ring lights, endless takes, and a Hackers-style “click farm” — the show finally exposes the machinery behind what it tries so hard to satirize. The promise of glamour collapses into an exhausting, artificial, dehumanizing treadmill. Her panic feels genuine; the satire is sharp.

Meanwhile, Maia and Alani sneak into the forbidden part of the house — a running joke about “celebrities and their upstairses,” always more interesting than whatever happens downstairs — and find Elijah Wood in a delightfully bizarre version of himself: hypochondriac, semi-feral, oddly childlike, and genuinely happiest watching The Simpsons clips. It’s a fun cameo, but the script overloads the characterization with too many comedic “games,” diluting what could have been a cleaner, sharper bit of satire.

By the end, when the three girls find each other again, something genuine surfaces in the middle of all the chaos: the relief that, despite illusions, empty promises, and constant competition, they still choose each other. For now.

But it’s also clear that I Love L.A. needs to start answering its own questions. The show nails aesthetics, the frenetic rhythm, the anthropological absurdity — but it lacks soul. It lacks direction. It lacks something that justifies why this group matters beyond being an accurate (and brutal) snapshot of an ecosystem where everyone wants to be seen but no one knows why.

And maybe that’s why the early renewal feels like such a shock: because the show is still figuring out whether it has something to say beyond the obvious.

Episode four doesn’t move. It doesn’t evolve. It doesn’t deliver anything we haven’t already seen — but it does make clear that there’s potential to grow. To deepen. To understand that, in Los Angeles, not every light is illumination.

Sometimes, it’s just a reflection.