This article contains spoilers for Miss You, Love You.
Odd-couple dynamics have fuelled films for decades, and Miss You, Love You leans fully into the trope. Written and directed by Jim Rash, the film debuts May 29 at 8 PM ET/PT on HBO and will be available to stream on HBO Max. The premise initially sounds slight: a widow forced to spend a week with her estranged son’s assistant while preparing for her husband’s funeral. However, Miss You, Love You soon reveals itself as a tender exploration of grief, resentment, loneliness, and mutual understanding.
Much of the story connects to a single succulent. Diane (Allison Janney) cannot keep the plant alive after her husband, Henry, dies, despite feeling obliged to try. Plants were his thing, not hers, but caring for them becomes an extension of her grief and one final responsibility she cannot bear to fail beyond planning the funeral itself. When Jamie (Andrew Rannells) first arrives and suggests the succulent may be over- or underwatered, he offers to save it anyway. The metaphor is obvious, but Miss You, Love You handles it with enough sincerity that it never feels heavy-handed.
Jamie arrives in place of Tyler, Diane’s son. Tyler is overseas researching a new book and claims it is too dangerous to travel home in time for the funeral, though all is not as it seems. Diane instantly bristles at the arrangement. Jamie insists he is only there to help with practicalities, not her grief itself, but Diane immediately sees through the lies – something she thought he would be better at, given that lying is what assistants do best. The script gives Diane some wonderfully sharp lines – particularly when Jamie confirms she is not “a lot”, only for Diane to respond, “That’s a shame because I’m trying to be” – and Janney delivers each one with a biting wit.
Tyler never physically appears on screen, but his absence dominates much of the 97-minute runtime. More than 25 minutes pass before we begin to understand Diane or Jamie independently because so much of their situation naturally revolves around discussing Tyler. Ordinarily, that would feel like a flaw, but here it works surprisingly well, given Rash has written a deliberate slow burn. What makes the dynamic so effective is the film’s clear understanding of both characters’ defences. Jamie presents himself as warm and endlessly accommodating despite his awkwardness, while Diane deliberately sharpens herself into someone difficult to love. Their conversations often feel combative, even when a genuine connection begins to form.
Janney is phenomenal throughout, but the film only truly clicks once Rannells begins matching her intensity. Jamie initially appears to be a people-pleaser, but as the film unfolds, he becomes more complicated. His feelings for Tyler – though obvious – gradually reveal themselves to be painful and rather one-sided in any meaningful sense. The pair met years earlier in a gay bar in West Hollywood before Jamie became Tyler’s assistant and, frustratingly, something adjacent to a partner. Jamie’s unresolved feelings toward Tyler, alongside the weight of caring for his terminally ill parents before their deaths, hang heavily over the narrative.
If anything, the film’s strongest material emerges in its quieter moments, when Diane and Jamie lower their guard. Jamie discussing coming out at 35 after both of his parents had already died proves devastating, particularly given how it contrasts with Diane’s realisation that her son was gay during his childhood. Likewise, Diane reflecting on Henry’s final days becomes almost unbearable in Janney’s hands. She recalls finding him after a fall during the night, but not realising how long he had been calling for her help because the illness had weakened his voice. Janney plays Diane as a woman suffocated by guilt, anger, and exhaustion, all while resenting herself for feeling any of them toward the man she loved.
There are moments where Miss You, Love You risks becoming too slight for its own good. The pacing occasionally drifts, and some revelations arrive exactly when you expect them to. Others, particularly regarding Jamie and his deception, arrive more abruptly, even if the film partly explains his motivations through its exploration of the responsibilities we choose and those forced upon us. Though Rash’s script fails to explore Jamie’s caregiving responsibilities deeply enough, particularly the lingering resentment Jamie appears to carry over the role he played in his parents’ final days.
It’s also difficult not to think of Remarkably Bright Creatures. The plots are not identical, but the crux is similar: an older woman meets a younger man, and the pair gradually begin leaning on each other through their turmoil. The difference here is that Diane and Jamie are not related but are tied together through Tyler. Miss You, Love You derives its title from his signature message to both, and the genuineness of it becomes a point of debate between them. They force one another to confront uncomfortable truths neither wants to admit.
The film’s most painful insight is that love and resentment often coexist. One argument between Diane and Jamie highlights this perfectly, with each recognising their own heartbreak reflected in the other. It’s the scene where Rannells steps up opposite Janney, and together they gut you. By the time Miss You, Love You reaches its closing moments, the film has earned both its tenderness and its use of “You’re the First, the Last, My Everything”.
Miss You, Love You may not become a film many will revisit regularly – if at all – but it remains worth watching regardless. Led by Allison Janney and Andrew Rannells, it offers a compassionate, painfully human portrait of grief, caregiving, and learning how to let people in.
