| All Gossip Girl Has to Eat are Olives and Hallucinogenic Mushrooms |
 |
 |
| Written by April Yorke |
| Tuesday, 10 May 2011 15:26 |
|
Single White Serena So you know how we’ve all been taking bets on what kind of crazy Charlie is? It’s even better than you thought. Charlie goes off her meds by dumping them out in a garbage can in the living room of PRADA MAFIA, like no one will notice that, and decides that she needs to give Dan a little push to get him in the sack. First she strokes his ego by comparing his writing to Fitz-freaking-Gerald (that’s right, that’s how it’s spelled), but, when Serena reminisces about cotillion and Dan in a dreamy way (she even has that picture in her room, which is odd, but I guess it is her old room and not her current quarters), Charlie decides there’s another golden opportunity to play damsel in distress to Dan’s white knight complex. And you know the best place for that? The Party that Everyone Ends Up At. Basically, Serena gives Charlie permission to date Dan and even tries to help her out by hooking her up with her Rhodes trust fund and giving her fashion advice, and Charlie is going to use that against her so hardcore it will blow your mind. Three things to note: 1) Charlie’s breakfast seduction includes ring pops, so I’ve got to give her props for that one. 2) “Sourpatch kids were pretty much my best friends. That and books.” It’s so amazingly obvious and the worst segue, so of course Dan wouldn’t notice. 3) Charlie thinks leggings are pants. If you ever doubted her crazy, surely it is thus confirmed. Why Be Sorry If It All Works Out? Eleanor and Cyrus are back to throw Blair an engagement party/negotiate Louis’ way back into the line of succession. Also, Vitamin Water is still a thing on this show. “I’ll have a Vitamin Water” is one of the greatest lines in history, so who can blame them? Serena’s on her way out when Eleanor asks after the never-seen Lily (which is nice) (the Eleanor asking bit, not the not-seeing Lily) and the last season maxi dresses she sent over (which is weird. I guess Lily wouldn’t care about being behind the times if she’s not going out). Then Cyrus is all, “See you at the party, Blair’s best friend!” And Blair’s all, “Or not, back stabber!” And Serena is just so hilarious. She’s honestly like, “Sorry I did that thing that time, but you got what you wanted, so we cool.” You can imagine that Blair does not go along with this. At PRADA MAFIA, Rufus tells Serena just to go to Blair’s engagement party anyway since they love each other the mostest. I don’t know why Rufus cares, but it’s still valid. Empire. Chuck has decided to open another hotel, this time in Brooklyn, because those unwashed hipsters need a little luxury. He’s calling it Charles to distance himself from the Bass name, which I love, since the person who calls him Charles loves him unconditionally. Also, Chuck appears to have sobered up. Too bad Nate’s all, I’m leaving you for Raina. And Chuck does that thing that I swear no one does in real life: without turning around to look at Nate, he yells, “If you walk out, don’t come back.” Nate: “I’m already gone.” So they break up. Princess Sofia, Louis, and Blair are strolling three abreast on the sidewalk because they are entitled bitches (what, that really bugs me) when Blair spies Jack Bass getting into a cab and naturally wigs. She lies that she needs to get a dress altered and splits, so Sofia immediately pours the poison in about how Blair ran to Chuck the first chance she got the night she and Louis got engaged. Louis decides he needs to follow Blair because that’s pretty much the only thing anyone can think to do on this show. Over at the under-construction Charles Place* (which I am going to start calling Chuckie’s in order to not get it confused with darling Charles. Having another Charlie is confusing enough) (okay, Chuckie’s is kind of mean. I’ll call it CP), Blair shows up on the roof to tell Chuck about Jack. And I realize that these people never call, but really? Just call him. Or text. But you know why she doesn’t? So we can have a really pointless scene in which Chuck once again overplays his hand re: Chair AND he expresses something in the general direction of an apology without ever apologizing. Neither of these things is okay with Blair or me, so Blair hops in a cab. Too bad Louis is spying. Louis decides that this is the moment to confront Chuck, who says a bunch of gross stuff about, well, how he and Blair belong together and Blair will never go through with their marriage, but the most notable is this: “Blair is nothing without her secrets.” And while I wouldn’t say “nothing” (not by a long shot), it lands exactly as it should. Party that Everyone Ends Up At, Engagement Edition Get ready for how this show is going to roll tonight: this is only THE FIRST Party Everyone Ends Up At. There are two! C’est magnifique, non? At Blair and Louis’ engagement party, Eleanor tries to play it classy by inviting Princess Sofia (lovely in lavender) to their “tasteful and appropriate home,” but Cyrus knows better. He goes in for the hug (not enough!) and proceeds to charm the pants off the Princess by essentially pretending that he, too, loves birds. He manages to make Blair’s feeding of the ducks seem like a Nobel Prize worthy effort in the process. Before you know it, she’s ready to put running-late Louis back in the line of succession. Well played, Cyrus! Also, Blair is wearing a glorious dress with an intricate bodice that recalls Cate Blanchett at the Oscars. Serena also shows up, and it turns out that Blair really did want her there. Serena will be her maid of honour, naturally. Dan and Serena are chatting while waiting for Charlie, and she shows up – no word of a lie – in Serena’s cotillion dress, styled exactly as Serena was on that night. Dan, oblivious, tells Charlie that she looks great, and Serena agrees, remarking that if Charlie wanted to borrow a dress, she should have asked first. And this is where it all unravels for Serena because Charlie’s such an evil genius (and also crazy). Charlie takes the tack of deny, deny, deny, and Serena gets increasingly angry, full on demanding that Charlie take off the dress, so Serena can prove it’s the one-of-a-kind created especially for Miss Van der Woodsen. So just when Serena is looking like the crazy one, Charlie gets in an extra dig about Serena just being jealous. Because Dan’s ego cannot be denied, he leaves with Charlie after essentially calling Serena a jealous fool. Louis pulls Blair up into her room for a little talk, and we need a new subject heading to deal with this. This Show’s Icky Sexual Politics Rears Its Ugly Head Once Again So Blair’s carrying around a pressed powder compact and checking the scratch on her face every five seconds to make sure it’s covered up. You know the one that she got when Chuck attacked her last episode? That one. Up in Blair’s room, Louis lays it out thusly: he has put two and two together re: Chuck’s hand and Blair’s face and wants to know why Blair would protect him. Louis further posits that Blair kept this and her secret visits from him because she, too, has a dark side. Oh, wow. Remember that time that the song where Rihanna gets off on Eminem beating her played over a Chuck/Blair scene earlier this season? Apparently Louis took that shit literally. What’s next, “S&M”? Not that there aren’t people who are into S&M and not that there aren’t people who are into rape fantasies, but what the hell is the matter with Louis that he would jump to that conclusion? Louis obviously knows nothing about abuse victims, so we need to have a little chat. Abuse victims cover up (yes, sometimes with makeup) or otherwise don’t report their abuse for a variety of reasons, including any or all of the following: because they think it’s a one-time only thing, because they think they deserved the abuse, because they are ashamed, because denying it makes it not real. I could go on, but you get the idea. Yet NONE of these things occurs to Louis. He honestly thinks that Blair didn’t tell because she gets off on it, and that is not acceptable to me. Give her the benefit out the doubt and try to show a little sympathy, SHOW. Also, since we’re here, we should probably talk about this again: is Chuck a rapist? He was at least an attempted one in the pilot, then we dropped that shit hardcore, then Chuck got serious character development points when he stopped Jack from raping Lily, then it came up again because Chuck apologized to Jenny and later had completely consensual sex with her (Serena, his other victim, does not care at all). Then we forgot all about it all over again, only to have Chuck attack Blair. Things got scary. To the best of our knowledge, Chuck has raped exactly zero people, and the thing that I don’t get, the number question that this show is too afraid to even ask is, “How far would Chuck take it?” Rape isn’t about getting laid. It’s about control and dominance, and Chuck definitely wanted to exert those things over Blair in that scene. But he didn’t. We need to know if he would. We need to know because this show is going to keep pulling Chuck the Rapist out of its damn hat like the worst magic trick in history for poorly executed melodramatic reasons instead of real, believable character ones. And you know what the worst of it is? If Blair ends up with Chuck before he gets his act together (say, for example, in next week’s season finale), the show will be confirming that Blair does, indeed, get off on the abuse. Party that Everyone Ends Up At, Engagement Edition, Partie Deux Ahem. Up in Blair’s room, she insists that she had to warn Chuck because Jack is the devil (truth), and Louis says what might be the first reasonable thing either of them as ever said about their relationship. If Blair and Louis are really going to make a go of it, then she has to show him who she is, dark side and all. They share an actually hot kiss (for once), and Louis tells her to meet him at the other Party Everyone Ends Up At for their official first appearance as a royal couple if she’s ready to be honest. After Louis leaves, Blair finds Cyrus downstairs having a nosh and fills him in on the dark side ultimatum. She says that Chuck was the only one who ever loved her dark sides, but he never really loved the parts of her that sparkle. I don’t really agree, but I can see how it would look that way, so wash. As a man in love with a Waldorf woman, Cyrus encourages Blair to come clean. Any man who can’t love all that she is isn’t worthy of her. Agreed. Unless We're close to the End of This Sob Story, I'm Going to Order Room Service Oh, Jack Bass, I love you all over again. Remember when Raina called Jack and invited him to America for revenge? Well, Jack heard the feelings in Raina’s voice and immediately ran for Big Bad Russell’s sweet embrace (and cash. Loads of cold hard cash). Jack tells Russell that his nephew is “on the edge of a precipe once again” (who talks like that? Jack!), having lost Blair, and all he needs is a little nudge to go over the edge. Jack, naturally, is that nudge. Russell would like, among other things, the key to the penthouse at Empire to retrieve Avery’s love letters and the like that are currently in Chuck’s possession. After Nate broke up with him and Louis made him feel low, Chuck’s recently discovered sobriety disappears, and Jack shows up to get his nudge on. Chuck’s stumbling around day drunk, and Jack goads him about any number of things until Chuck punches him in his damn fine face (what? Jack is looking better this ep than he has in a while). That’s apparently enough for the men in white coats to drag him off to rehab, and even Nate shows up for the tiny intervention. As Chuck “Don’t touch the suit” Bass is carted away, Jack nods up to Russell (who is watching from another level? Oh, spatial relations) that he’s got Chuck’s all access pass. Russell’s finished searching at Empire and located the security footage Chuck watched in silence the other week. Just as he’s about to leave, Jack, Chuck, and Nate walk in. Ooo, double cross! Seems Russell’s “love letters” comment didn’t sit right with Jack, and Chuck, spying the tape, realizes that there must be something on it Russell doesn’t want anyone to see. After all, what’s the point of hanging on to evidence that implicates a dead man? Russell tries to sneak out, all, “I’ll take my story to the press,” but there are two henchmen waiting in the elevator to stop him. I can’t wait! Oh, nicely played, show! Russell, not Bart, locked Avery inside that building to burn alive. Well, he thought he was locking Bart in, and Avery thought she was meeting Russell to tell him to his face that she was leaving him for Bart, but none of that worked out. The best part is that during this teary confession, Jack insists that they continue this over food (“All you have to eat are olives and hallucinogenic mushrooms”), then grabs the menu (“Unless we're close to the end of this sob story, I'm going to order room service”), and finally grabs the phone to call the police himself (“I can't choose an entree with Hallmark Hall of Fame playing in the background. I'm calling the cops”). Russell offers Chuck literally anything in exchange for not telling Raina, so Chuck extends his bandaged hand and gives Russell the same deal his father did: leave New York and never come back. In the afterglow of another successful takedown, Chuck thanks Jack for “using [his] evil powers for good.” Jack and Chuck agree that dysfunction is best kept in the family. Furthermore, Jack tells Chuck that it would “embarrassing” for Chuck to lose Blair to “titled circus performers.” That’s all the pep talk Chuck needs, it would seem. Party that Everyone Ends Up at, High School Throw Back Edition Over at the Constance-St. Jude’s fundraiser for something or other, Charlie is asking about Dan’s high school experience, and Dan admits that being back there makes him still feel like an outsider. Our beloved Kati and Iz reappear just long enough to pointedly ignore him, confirming that notion. Oh, girls, you have been missed. Outside the head mistress’ office, Charlie asks Dan if he ever did anything bad, and he’s like, “Oh, no, straight arrow, me!” instead of, I don’t know, “I totally banged a teacher in a costume closet!” He does, however, make a reference to a “swimming pool incident” that makes me laugh. Inside the office, Charlie whips off her dress and informs Dan that he really missed the boat on the ultra-important high school experience of sex on a desk. Uh, there are plenty of desks waiting for you out there in the working world, Charlie. Things are headed in that direction until Charlie whispers – and this is so gross I can’t wait to tell you – “Call me Serena.” Call me Serena! That’s what she says! Out loud! Before Dan even gets his pants undone! Dan, being Dan, puts a stop to that with a quickness. It’s kind of nice in that he doesn’t call attention to what Charlie just said. He just mumbles the usual along the lines of “maybe we shouldn’t” and “moved to fast,” etc. Unfortunately, Dan then bolts, leaving Charlie to stew in her crazy. At least she gets a text (!) telling her that her Rhodes trust fund has been activated, so she can take her crazy international. Wait, what? How did she buy that dress before? Did she just show up with an empty bag intending to steal Serena’s dress? But that was before we saw the photo . . . continuity, I call you into question. Out in the insane staircase that I absolutely do not recognize from their high school days, Blair is looking for Louis, ready to bring her dark side to the fore, but instead she gets a call telling her that Chuck is in serious trouble. She bolts but not before telling “Serena’s cousin” to tell Louis that she was there and will be back soon. It does not bode well when Chuck appears on the insane staircase in a simple black tux with lavender bowtie and small pink rose pinned on his lapel. Neo-Blair and Neo-Serena accost him, specifically in that Neo-Blair is pissed that Chuck lost Blair to the Prince, but Chuck only asks if they know where “real Blair” is. Also, she’s not married yet. Attaboy, Charles. The girls giggle because they love Chuck. Nate and Raina never make it to either Party that Everyone Ends Up At because Nate blurts out the truth to Raina about her dad, and she tells her dad that he’s as dead to her as her mother. Hence . . . Blair busts out onto the roof of what I think is CP. She tells the man in shadow that she got a call that Chuck was up on the roof ready to jump and asking for her. Deftly played, Big Bad Russell! Also, I spent the rest of the viewing time gasping and occasionally muttering “oh no” over and over again. Not that I think Blair will die (because durr) but because we can’t be sure how bad it will get before Chuck saves her. In other news:
Next time: Russell makes ready to burn down CP with Blair inside, and Chuck says, “You deserve your fairy tale ending” in a tinny way that sounds like it’s over the phone or in a voicemail and makes me think that upon rescuing her, Chuck decides to give Blair up in true Bruce Wayne-fashion. Also, I think we all know who you can’t have a season finale without.
Bookmark
Email this
Comments (1)
 |
| Last Updated on Friday, 13 May 2011 06:44 |
Oh, Gossip Girl, when you deliver an episode like, “Shattered Bass,” I don’t know how to love you more. Everything blows up (but not in the way you’d think), everyone looks amazing, and Blair’s love of the ducks finally pays off. PLUS Jack Bass has never been better. It’s basically a dream.
Subscribe to this comment's feed
