Did Maia and Dylan break up on I Love LA? Season 1 ending explained

HBO’s I Love LA Season 1 finale is titled I Love NY. It dropped on December 21, 2025.

Rachel Sennott’s comedy wrapped its first season with a cliffhanger, leaving fans scrambling for more. Viewers are stuck on the same question: Are Maia and Dylan actually over, or is there hope? Short answer: lol, it’s a mess. And the long answer is way messier.

The finale of I Love LA didn’t just leave their relationship over a cliff; it lit the rope on fire. We thought we had these two figured out, but no. Both Maia and Dylan decided to take their “break” and go in the worst possible direction. They both hooked up with other people, but the real betrayal is who those people are.

This is not Ross Geller’s “we were on a break!” discourse. This is betrayal with a capital B. The trust issues and jealousy that have been simmering all season exploded.

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Did Maia and Dylan break up on I Love LA?

To get what went down in the I Love LA finale, you have jump back to Episode 7. That’s where the wheels came off. Dylan says, “The bigger your life is getting, the smaller I’m getting.” That’s the breakup in a nutshell, without any need for yelling or whatever.

Thing is, this wasn’t a random blowup. The whole season, Maia has been chasing her career like it’s the only thing that matters, plus hanging onto toxic Tallulah friendship like it’s her emotional support animal. And Dylan gets pushed further and further into the background.

Additionally, Maia blanks on dinner with Dylan’s parents, and then, when she is in the ER getting stitches, she still can’t even be bothered to call the guy. Throughout all this, Dylan has been a saint: Supportive, patient, always there, even when Maia is treating him like an afterthought.

But then he reached a boiling point. So, Dylan finally asks for space after Maia blows him off one too many times, and they both end up missing each other way more than they expected. The whole point of the break was to figure out what they really want. Just seven days, no texts, no calls, nothing. Instead, all that distance brings out the absolute worst in both of them.

In fact, creator Rachel Sennott revealed in an interview with TV Insider that this dissatisfaction was inspired by her own life during the pandemic. She got into a relationship during COVID and then started wondering about the carefree phase.

“I felt like I settled down into a relationship, and then all of a sudden, you’re like, wait a second. I feel like I missed out on a lot of time to be free and slutty and whatever, and playing the field. And then all of a sudden you’re like, wait a second, but I’m almost 30, so am I getting married? Do I need to be single? That’s where Maia’s feelings came from.”

The finale episode of I Love LA discloses two shocking affairs that will follow as shadows over both Maia and Dylan in Season 2.

First up, Maia and Ben. He is her former boss from New York. Ben is sleazy, married, and the human version of a red flag. For the whole season of I Love LA, Maia has been flirting with disaster, texting him, sneaking around, acting like she is considering a job offer or “networking.” By the finale, Maia is ready to cheat on Dylan and hook up with Ben in his hotel room. Except, it’s gross.

Ben humiliates her on purpose, turning everything into a twisted power game. He wants to watch her get herself off, using his spit, and he gives nothing back. Zero intimacy, zero respect. He is just flexing control, like she is his plaything.

Maia is wearing one of Tallulah’s outfits, trying to impress, and Ben just isn’t having it. He is not into her, he is not offering her a real job, and he is not even pretending this is about anything but his own ego. He wanted to see if he could still pull her strings, and he could.

Meanwhile, it’s a wake-up call for her. She has been chasing a toxic guy, thinking he is her ticket to something bigger, and all she gets is humiliation. But this betrayal is not just about that one night. Maia has been meeting Ben in secret, plotting a possible jump from Alyssa180 for weeks. She risked her relationship with Dylan aside to chase power and stroke her own ego. She put her own ambition (and her pride) way ahead of trust or loyalty, and now she has got a mess that’s not going away anytime soon.

And then there’s Dylan and Claire. While Maia is getting humiliated in New York, Dylan is out in LA making a disaster of his own. He sleeps with Claire, the teacher Maia was skeptical about in I Love LA Episode 6. At that time, Dylan swore up and down he wasn’t into her. This one stings even worse because Dylan had literally looked Maia in the eye and promised nothing was going on.

All season long, Dylan has been the poster child for a supportive boyfriend. He is practically a rom-com lead: sweet, thoughtful, cares about social issues, never forgets a birthday, blah blah blah. But then, the I Love LA finale shatters this image. We are watching Dylan and Claire tangled up in bed. If it were a random rebound, maybe you could squint and forgive it. But he specifically told Maia she was imagining things about Claire. So, that’s a different level of betrayal.

And the timing of all this is wow. Charlie shows up at Dylan’s place and finds him arranging a spice cabinet, blasting metal, looking like he is about to spiral. Charlie turns into his emergency therapist, talking Dylan through his emotional confusion and even playing out a little improv session to help him figure out his feelings.

For a second, it actually seems like Dylan is going to get his act together and patch things up with Maia. However, a single phone call during which she is concentrating on her job is more than enough to flip Dylan’s decision, and he goes to bed with the very person Maia had felt insecure about.

Sennott tells TV Insider:

“Neither of them [is] necessarily the bad guy because they were on a break.”

Actor Josh Hutcherson (Dylan) tells TV Insider:

“Maia and Dylan just don’t communicate and they haven’t for a while, and I think that Dylan is drawn towards her ambition and her big dreams because he’s happy holding down the fort, but they haven’t been communicating, and she’s been getting further away and they haven’t been talking about it and then they end up where they do.”

Maia wanting more out of life is totally fair. Why shouldn’t she reach for something bigger? Ambition is not a crime, and let’s not forget, Dylan used to say he loved that about her, until, well, he didn’t. Sennott additionally told TV Insider that you start seeing someone, they are all about your drive and hustle, but give it a minute, and suddenly your ambition is “too much.” It’s almost like a rite of passage for ambitious women: what drew them in now just gets under their skin.

But even Dylan is not a villain. Wanting to feel like you matter is a fundamental aspect of any relationship. Maia bails on dinner with his family, ghosts him when she is in the hospital, and then spends a whole day chasing her fashion week dreams while he is just sitting there, waiting for a crumb of attention. That’s not asking for the moon; that’s just showing up. Relationships need a little maintenance; otherwise, what’s the point?

I Love LA has been renewed for Season 2.

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Also Read: I Love LA finale recap and ending explained: Ambition vs. broken bonds