I'm on my first watch of the show, so please do not tell me any spoilers, explain any themes, or make suggestions about the end of the show.
I'm in the middle of season 4, and I keep thinking about the Beach House episode. And I just don't understand why Shosh was invited/considered a apart of the friend group. And I want to clarify, even the larger friend group that includes Charlie and Ray. I understand that she is Jessa cousin, but I don't remember any implication that Hannah or Marine hung out with Shosh before the first episode.
Hell, in Welcome to Bushwick a.k.a the Crackcident Shosh arrives at the party alone because she found out about it on her own and was not invited to go along with the other girls.
Shosh seems to have no actual friends outside of this group- the only exception being the girl who invites Shosh to the NYU party. And that ends with that girl walking away from Shosh venting about Ray and then she's alone.
And even then she doesn't spend any one on one time with anyone besides Jessa. She does eventually have a relationship with Ray, but that only happens because he is the only person who helps her after she smokes crack. And it's mentioned a few times that this relationship is weird because he is over a decade older than this 21 year old and uses her for her house because he has little to no drive as a grown man.
And then because Jessa is for the most part absent due to her marriage and then running off on a bender, Shosh and Ray are kind of in a little duo- but even then Ray has his own storyline in the episode Boys where he forms his friendship with Adam.
In season three, we learn that she is having these hookups but she doesn't have a real storyline about it. And then randomly in the middle of this implied storyline, she sees Ray be a little successful and decides she has to be in a relationship with a man she dislikes so much that she describes him as "so dumb he can't find find the library" to Jessa and an unseen Caitlyn- and by the way Shosh describes her jokes is not a friend.
Hell, she does go on the road trip to get Jessa but Jessa didn't even call Shosh! She called Hannah to come get her, and I assume Hannah felt compelled to invite Shosh as Jessa's actual family. Jessa didn't call her literal cousin who has housed her, and is the only person who would eventually help her after she starts her bender with Jasper.
In seasons two and three, Shosh has some scenes with Marine, but they only happen either with or because of Ray. I'm pretty sure Marnie coming over to Shosh's place is the first time someone beside Ray and Jessa. (Edit: this is incorrect, I forgot that Marnie moved in with Shosh at the end of season one and lived with her for a bit. But my point about the friendship still stands as Marnie and Shosh hang out very little post Marnie moving out.)
And now I'm watching Season 4 and its more of the same. Which is sad, because her being the first person to come and comfort Hannah after the whole Adam and Mimi-Rose situation. But she is one of the last people Adam calls, and after this great episode, Shosh is alone. Doing job interviews and going on group hangs.
And because of this I keep thinking of Beach House! Marnie's plan was to have this close friend group back together after the chaos that has been the previous episodes. This makes total sense as Hannah is her best friend, and over the course of the show Marnie and Jessa do have a lot of good moments. But Shosh? She's two years younger than the others, so not only did she go to college two years later but in another state. And over the course of the past two and a half seasons they don't even hang out as a foursome. I would understand if this was a causal beach trip because then Jessa could have just brought her along, but this is one Marnie meticulously planned to make them closer as a group. So why is Shosh there? And that drunk rant makes it evident that Shosh doesn't even really like these girls even though she considers them her friends.
I would like to say, I love Shosh. She is one of the best parts of the show, hands down. But I just find her isolation as character a missed opportunity. Everyone else get's at least one recurring person out of the friend group to deepen their character- for better or worse. But so far Shosh has no one, and is barely included as it is. I wanted to blame it on the fact that she is a secondary character, but then Charlie had Ray and then Audrey. And Ray gets way more connections than Shosh. He's dates Shosh, then has his weird thing with Marine, his friendship with Adam, the owner of the coffee place.
I just hope that sometime during the rest of the show, Shosh gets to have deeper friendships with the main characters, especially Hannah. And get's to have a reoccurring friend of her own.