Episode Report Card 1 USERS: C+ YOU GRADE IT The Valentine's Day Massacre
By Sars | Season 3 | Episode 14 | Aired on 02.01.2000
Joey turns to glare at Dawson: "You kissed her?" Dawson rolls his eyes as Kate says that Dawson started to kiss her, but she upchucked before he had the chance. "What were you thinking?" Joey asks Dawson accusingly. Um, maybe that this doesn’t concern you, Sister Christian? Jesus, take a pill already. Dawson says that for a moment there, he wasn’t thinking, and it felt good. "To take advantage of a girl who was drunk, vulnerable, and clearly on the rebound?" Joey scoffs, because everyone knows that girls can’t take care of themselves or take responsibility for their own actions, ever. Shut. Up. Joey. Pacey stares at Joey dully as she trots out the "this isn’t you" chestnut for the umpteenth time, and Dawson cuts her off and says it’s not the Dawson she’s used to, maybe, but she has to let him "make some mistakes." Well, you’re off to a good start mistake-wise with that hair, D-man. Still, the man’s got a point. Pacey intones in a Casey Kasem voice, "Here we go again, kiddies, for the 476th time this hour, our number-one Billboard chart topper, ‘The Ballad Of Dawson And Joey.’" Dawson and Joey both turn to look at Pacey as he continues to drone about the will-they-won’t-they getting-back-together nonsense the two of them put the rest of the gang through. Kate giggles. Joey angrily tells Pacey to stay out of it as Dawson puts his hand over his eyes. Pacey apologizes in a tone of weary sarcasm for treading "on the sanctity of the Dawson-and-Joey dynamic," and goes on to say that he finds the way Joey treats Dawson "fascinating." Crap is fascinating? Joey snarls, "And how is that, Dr. Witter?" "Like he’s some weird, neutered little virginal creature," Pacey says contemptuously, and Dawson asks him, "What’s your problem?"
As Andie shoots him a worried look, Pacey says he doesn’t have a problem; he’s just the Greek chorus, "here to observe and interpret." Joey stands up and asks when Pacey got a mean streak. Pacey tells her to chill, that they’ve always argued, but Joey makes pouty reference to how he never made it "pointed" and "hurtful" before; Pacey says she shouldn’t take it so seriously, and Joey asks why she wouldn’t take it seriously, and says he’s said one nasty thing after another to her tonight. All of them deserved, in my opinion, but Little Miss Sour Grapes wants to know what she did to let herself in for such abuse. Pacey can’t believe she doesn’t get it, so he shrugs and says she didn’t do anything, adding, "The drunken lout in the corner just pleads sheer frustration," and he goes on to point out how tiring it is to have to watch Dawson and Joey do their non-dance all the time. Warming to his topic, Pacey bitches that one week they’re soulmates and the next they’re giving each other up "for the greater good," and that he’d really like them to make up their minds, please, and he busts on "the reverence that you two treat this little saga of yours with, it’s enough to make a guy wanna puke," and as Joey and Dawson give him confused "whatever" looks, Pacey pretty much summarizes every gripe I’ve ever had with their inextricable intertwinement, and then he makes good on his word by speeyacking into the sink. Dawson closes his eyes, exhausted, and Joey sits down and sulks and pouts some more.