Episode Report Card Jessica: C | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Rock Bottom
By Jessica | Season 6 | Episode 13 | Aired on 01.28.2003
The next day? Three hours later? I don't know. Joey's in her room, hurrying to get to class. Oliver knocks on the door. "What do you want?" Joey asks. Her hair looks horrible. It's dark brown from the crown to about Katie Holmes's ears, at which point it turns bright orange. It's really ghastly. Have the hair and make-up people already moved on to their next gig? Because there's no excuse for how horrible everyone looks in this episode, especially Katie Holmes. Oliver tells her that he's come to say goodbye. "Really? Because that's not really your style, is it?" Joey spits. Haven't we already been through this? Last week? With the bitter "I love you"s and all that? Oliver tells Joey that he's thought a lot about what she said to him about not giving up, about taking chances. "You were right about everything, Joey," he says, which is, I presume, Joey's favorite sentence in the entire world. "I was afraid," he admits. But, he tells her, he's going to California, where he'll live with his sister and her family. He's going to enter that writer's program. "That's great," Joey says. Oliver shrugs that he doesn't know if anything will come of it, but he's taking the chance anyway. "Good for you," Joey says flatly, and asks when he's leaving. Oliver tells her that his car is packed and ready. He's hitting the road tonight. He just wanted to come by and thank her. "I owe you big time, Joey Potter," he says. Because, of course, Joey brings only goodness and light, success and opportunity into the lives of everyone around her. Even -- nay, especially -- people who hate her. Oliver says that he knows she "hates [his] guts," but he'd like to give her a hug. And so they embrace. Oliver smells Joey's hair, while she looks conflicted over his shoulder. Her phone rings, and she tears herself from his embrace to answer it. It's Audrey mom, and, not surprisingly, Audrey never got on the plane. Joey hangs up, looking perturbed. "What is it?" Oliver asks, concerned. "You know how you said you owe me big time? I might be collecting sooner than you thought," Joey tells him.
Over on the west coast, Dawson's trying to direct the reshoots of The Worst Movie Ever Made. He's not having a lot of luck; the crew is sassy and truculent and resents him. They are my people. Natasha is even worse: she comes up to Dawson and asks him why the scene they're working on "sucks so much." She hates it. "Who wrote it?" she asks. Dawson admits that he did. "Oh. Well, could you find a way to say some of it smarter?" Natasha asks. Natasha, after the film wraps, is coming to work here at TWoP Towers. But we're giving her the desk in the copy room. Dawson says nothing, just looks put upon. He opens his mouth to tell Natasha something -- something that's probably not very witty, considering the source -- but his phone rings, stopping him in his tracks. It's Gale, calling to see if he's eating right. He tells her he'll call her back, and turns to Natasha. "Now, where were we?" he asks. "We were talking about how much I suck, right?" Hee. Okay, fine: I like self-deprecating, big fat failure, in over his head, giant loser Dawson. Natasha informs him that she's not doing this scene. "I don't do nudity," she says. Dawson promises that it's going to be really tastefully shot. Natasha doesn't care. She's not doing it. She stomps off. Dawson flares his nostrils. Dude, if she's not doing nudity, it should already be in her contract. Call the lawyer. Or something. Oh, wait: I don't care about Natasha.
Back to Boston. Grams (Grams is alive! She doesn't appear to be dead at all! "Unless she's one of the walking dead," the Mulder suggests. Writers: Take a note. Walking dead = entertaining TV.) climbs out of a car, slamming the door. "The nerve!" she hisses, before running into Jen on the walkway in front of their house. Jen's hair is just so bad. She looks like the little Dutch Boy, if the little Dutch Boy had cut his own hair. And was blind. "I think Clifton Smalls and I have just broken up," Grams announces. Jen asks why, and interprets Grams's non-specific half-answer as meaning that Clifton wanted Grams to do something kinky and inappropriate in the sack. Grams assures Jen that everything was fine as far as their sex life went. "Any reference to Mr. Smalls's surname is a misnomer, let's leave it at that," she says. "Oh," Jen says. "Ew," I say. Honestly, I don't want to think about Grams's sex life. I love her, but I don't want anyone else to, you know, love her. Grams explains that Clifton Smalls wanted her to convert to Judaism. But, wait! Didn't Grams meet Clifton Smalls at choir practice? Or were they just telling Jen that they were practicing for choir together when they were actually having sex? Yeah, let's just back away from this topic, shall we? Anyway, Grams didn't want to convert, and they broke up. "I can't turn my back on my faith," she says. "Big Baby Jesus would have a fit," Jen agrees. Seriously, guys, is Jen on drugs? Who says that to their grandmother? Or, really, at all? Wu Tang Klan jokes are so 1998. Jen covers, and tells Grams that she deserves much better than Clifton Smalls. "He's a freak," she yips. Grams shakes her head and tells Jennifah that, whatever Clifton Smalls is, he is not a freak. "He's a wonderful man." She sighs.