‘Never Have I Ever’ Season 4 Episode 4 Recap: “Wrecked My Future”

By now the idea of Desi kids being pressured to achieve academic success is common knowledge, but there’s a certain type of student who puts that pressure on themself. Since day one, Devi has been gunning for Princeton and in the final season of the series, she’s finally getting a chance to make her mark and get one step closer to that dream.

In Never Have I Ever Season 4 Episode 4 (“…wrecked my future”), Sherman Oaks High hosts a college fair that brings representatives from all of the major colleges across the country into one room. It’s a moment that Devi has spent her life preparing for and she’s confident that her honor roll grades and extracurriculars will land her a spot at Princeton. Only adding to her smugness, the Princeton rep is Indian and Devi thinks she’ll be a shoo-in with the brown connection. 

Except that she forgets about her manners altogether. Cutting to the front of an enormous line, Devi rattles off her resume and brags about her accomplishments to a startled Akshara, the admissions representative from Princeton. Not knowing when to stop, Devi even tries to explicitly lean into the fact that they’re both Indian, but Akshara shuts her down immediately. It’s the moments like these where I want to grab Devi by the ear and reprimand her for her short-sighted antics. In what world did she think that would impress an admissions counselor?

Feeling down about the whole interaction, Devi confides in her new boyfriend Ethan (whom, I might add, she is having incredible sex with while she has the house to herself). He offers to slash her tires and cause havoc, but Devi knows she has to apologize and ask for another shot. After all, she’s not one to back down from a challenge. Devi finds Akshara at lunch and reintroduces herself in a much more mild and approachable way, and to her credit she starts to win Akshara over. Ethan also makes an appearance, but instead of threatening her, he gushes about how smart Devi is and pulls out a copy of the Honor Roll that he stole from the principal’s office. 

It seems to work until Devi finds out Ethan also stole Akshara’s wallet. She breaks up with him and goes to Akshara’s hotel to return it, choosing to admit to the incident rather than running away from it, and Akshara in turn is happy to see Devi’s true character shine through. 

Ben’s College Fair day isn’t off to a great start either—he almost chickens out of talking to the Columbia University rep and then gets paint from one of Margot’s art projects on his shirt. Devi offers a momentary truce and swaps shirts with him so he has a fresh button-down for the conversation. While he makes it clear that he still doesn’t want to be friends with her, it’s obvious he’s touched by the gesture and might even make him rethink the harsh statement he made in the premiere about their inability to support one another. 

Fabiola has her heart set on a robotics school, and has shortlisted a couple with great programs including Michigan (as an alumna, I’m obligated to point out its mention) and Howard. But her mom knows just how smart Fab is and encourages her to also look at a few Ivy League schools for early decision — including Princeton, which will likely only take one student from their school in the first round of admissions. Fab knows this is Devi’s dream school and that she’d kill her if Fab stole her spot, but after talking to Akshara about their robotics program, Fab decides to do what’s best for her and apply to the school anyway. It’s almost guaranteed that Fabiola will secure the spot instead of Devi, and it’ll be fascinating to see how the future episodes will tackle what Devi will absolutely view as a betrayal.

Paxton gets put on College Fair snack table duty and he’s paired up with the new, young Literature teacher. They have definite chemistry and are certainly the two hottest teachers on staff, so there’s an inevitable romance brewing here. The new assistant swim coach also gets his groove back by telling off the kids who think he’s a loser for coming back to high school, and flexes his faculty position by threatening a Saturday detention and 9am lunch hour. 

At home, we don’t get to see Margot’s hot dad (he has a name: Andres) but we do get a hint that Nalini is also enjoying the view: she casually mentions that he’s working on a few other projects around the house, long after the termite stairs were repaired. Meanwhile, Kamala gets Lasik eye surgery and while she’s resting on the couch, she thinks she overhears Len talking to another woman in the house (a woman who calls him “sweetie,” I might add). We don’t know enough about Len yet to make a judgment call about his intentions, but it doesn’t feel great to know that he’s sneaking around behind Pati’s back. 

Radhika Menon (@menonrad) is a TV-obsessed writer based in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared on Vulture, Teen Vogue, Paste Magazine, and more. At any given moment, she can ruminate at length over Friday Night Lights, the University of Michigan, and the perfect slice of pizza. You may call her Rad.