Monsters of Television

“Police and parents. Of course that’s your plan, Humphrey”

This week’s episode felt like an old mystery novel. Two reluctant enemies team up to solve a crime. An old foe reappears and aids in the search. Unlikely alliances are made and old ones crumble. Questions are answered, reveals are divulged, and the criminal isn’t who you think it was all along. When every conceivable cat was brought forth from the big bag of shit that is the Humphrey/van der Woodsen’s lives, it was Lily who was the enemy. And she would have gotten away with it too if it weren’t for those meddling kids. And that dog, Serena, too.

While I still despise her, I did find myself feeling bad for Serena.  So many of her mistakes are her own, but this one (and a huge one at that) was entirely on Lily. And it’s not just Serena who got screwed over. Poor Chuck is now scrambling to save Bass Industries from being sold. Hos desperation is at maximum levels as he’s turning to Jack for aid. Season 4 is the season of unlikely alliances indeed.

So Juliet’s brother is the other teacher Serena had an affair with. Answers! But they weren’t having an affair; they spent a lot of time together in tutoring. Damien (a classmate of Serena’s at the time) saw them once, thought they were having an affair, but as much as Serena wanted it (of course she did) it never happened. Ben did love Serena, but was able to tell her no. This explains why he thought Juliet was taking her revenge plot too far. But that didn’t stop the rumor mill. It also didn’t stop Lily from going into “damage control” mode and framing Ben for the affair to “protect” Serena’s image.

This continues an idea from a discussion on last week’s episode: Lily is a terrible parent. This isn’t new, we’ve known she’s judgmental and vain and a whole slew of other less than maternal characteristics. Putting a man in jail to protect Serena’s reputation and quietly selling Bass Industries without telling Chuck don’t seem to be in anyone else’s best interest but her own. She claims to have thought she was helping but like Rufus I don’t even know if I believe her.

There’s only one thing I don’t like about this whole Lily is pure evil and the source of all anguish deal and that’s that it seems to try and offer reasons for why Serena sucks. Sure, what Lily did was awful, but as I stated before, Serena has made many bad decision on her own. Lily didn’t make Serena sleep with Nate while he was still with Blair. Lily didn’t make her do cocaine. Lily didn’t make her have an affair with a professor. Serena is still a bad person all on her own. Sure, in this instance it was actually not her fault, unless you subscribe to the belief that none of this would have happened if she hadn’t put herself in that position with Ben in the first place.

With the blame placed on Lily, Juliet is now off the hook. Is this last we’ll see of her? I hope not. Not only did they just kind of phase her out in the end but come on, she has been the best character this season. Easily. I’d love to see her stick around now that all is in the open and forgiven. She can try and make amends within the group, try to get back together with Nate, join forces with Blair against some sure to be coming common enemy. There’s great potential for her as a character and adding her to the main cast should be an option that The CW should seriously consider. Some new blood would do the show good.

Gossip Girl herself made an impression in this episode. She makes her “living” reporting, exploiting, and in some ways destroying the lives of our main characters. But it seems when someone messes with her puppets, she makes sure they find the one trying to tug on the strings. Dan and Blair get a tip from good ol GG including an aggressive “Find the bitch”. Guess it was personal for her too.

Speaking of Dan and Blair, it didn’t take long for people to start theorizing that they’ll get together now. Sure they shared an adventure that stemmed from a common love for Serena, but I just can’t say them together. Maybe it’s cause I don’t want to. Hatred leading to sexual tension and commonality leading to found feelings makes sense, but I reiterate: I don’t want it. This feels too Rachel and Joey to me. It’s the revolving door of main characters dating main characters and this is a combo that hasn’t been done yet so the darts must have struck those two names on the board. Again, most of this comes from fan speculation. Sure there’s some seed planting at the end of the episode but it may not produce any fruit. Although the two of them together would surely sit sour with quite a few of the other characters. Could make for some interesting shakeups.

Final Thoughts:

• Love usage of Matt & Kim in the beginning. Makes up for the Eminem.
• Appreciate the mirroring of Serena visiting Eric in the hospital from season 1. Really shows how Eric has grown, learned to accept himself, take responsibility while Serena continues to spiral downward. The much wiser younger sibling and the bumbling, failure of an older one.
• “Naw but for real…” sounded weird coming out of Blair’s mouth.
• I like the use of Soulja Boy as a time marker. Remember where/who you were when that song came out?
• Love how Damien used to be this little geek that followed Serena around and did her homework for her.