Episode Report Card Sars: C+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Chemical sisters
By Sars | Season 4 | Episode 6 | Aired on 11.07.2000
Ryan Home. Andie says they have to go, it's time to pick up Jack; Jen can't find directions to the "map point"; exposition of the map point as "a buffer zone for undesirables" where rave-goers get directions to the actual location; yeah, yeah, we all saw the "I want to buy…an egg" scene on 90210, back when a rave plotline might have had something resembling relevance. More bitter grumbling from Jen about "grooving to the point of exhaustion" and "disenfranchised youth." Andie feels guilty for making Jen come with her. Jen reassures her that she wants to celebrate with Andie. Andie says she thinks they need to have some fun, and goes to pee. Jen digs into her underwear drawer and gets out the E-Tarts and strokes them. The Piano Of Peer-Pressure Conflict plays. Andie comes back in to get her lip gloss and spots the party favors. "We're not talking aspirin, are we?" she asks Jen, concerned. Jen bites her lip and looks guilty.
The Levi's corduroy-badger-mating-dance commercial cracks me up.
Foreheadmobile. Gretchen reminisces about the last time they all spent in a car together, six years ago. Dawson smiles tolerantly; in the back seat, Pacey glowers, and Joey watches the interplay between Dawson and Gretchen with a bemused eyebrow-arch. Dawson tucks a lank lock behind his ear and looks smug.
Playground, somewhere in Capeside. "Ecstasy, wow," Andie says, and asks if Jen's done a lot of it. "Yeah, in New York," Jen says wearily. "I never went to a rave without it, and I went to a lot of raves." Right. A lot of raves. That we never heard about. Until now. Because, according to the writers, we all have amnesia. Whatever -- I won't start, because I'd never stop. Andie speculates that Jen must have liked what E did for her, or she wouldn't have kept taking it, and Jen expounds that "the first few times, it's amazing. It's hard not to love 'the X effect.'" "Which is…what, exactly?" Andie wants to know. Jen wonders what's with all the questions. Andie shrugs too-nonchalantly that she's "just curious," and it's a way to pass the time until Jack gets out of his meeting. Jen buys this, and they sit down on a swing-set so that Jen can hold forth on the subject of designer drugging: "The first time you do X, it's really good. You get this feeling of loving everybody and everything, and everybody loves you, and that can be really powerful. X just made me really happy…it provided a pleasant vacation from my usual spot under the bell jar." Oh, please. Andie says that, if it makes you happy, "it doesn't sound so bad," and Jen says that "it's not, at first," but after six hours, it wears off and leaves you more depressed than before. Jen goes on to PSA that X, like "any drug," makes you lose your inhibitions, and that's why she stopped: "I just didn't know who I was anymore." Andie asks to see the X, saying again that she's just curious and wants to know what they look like. Well, Andie, X looks nothing like what Jen's got, but whatever. Jen hands over the box and says, "Andie, you're way too interested." Andie says sheepishly that she's "just interested in feeling happy." Jen asks if Andie didn't just get into Harvard, and Andie holds the X up to her nose and sniffs at it (?), confessing that she's not having the "moment of sheer joy" she'd anticipated. Jen asks if she wants to talk about it, but Andie doesn't; she just wants to have fun and deal with her problems later. Jen smiles all world-wearily at Andie's enthusiasm. Andie thinks it's just a delayed reaction, and she'll feel happy about it soon. Jen nods in agreement and holds out her hand to take the box back, but Jack appears just then, so Andie hides the box in her armpit, and they make small talk with Jack, saying "girl talk" all shiftily when he asks if he interrupted something. Jen shoots Andie a bunch of really obvious nervous glances, and when they get up to go to the car, Jen hisses at Andie to give her the box back, but Andie says "not here," Jack will suspect something. Kind of a dumb scene, but both actresses did a good job given the thankless lines they got saddled with.
The Foreheadmobile at the map point. Gretchen and Dawson go to get the directions. Pacey watches Dawson hold out a hand to help Gretchen over a chain-link fence, and wonders when the two of them became "going-out-together buddies." "I believe this is the inaugural event," Joey shrugs. Pacey asks if it bothers Joey that, out of all the guys in Capeside "who want to befriend" Gretchen, she picked Dawson. Yeah, no kidding, although it's not like we've seen a single one of the aforementioned guys, but whatever. Joey shrugs again that Dawson's the only person working at the restaurant who's close to Gretchen's age, so it's "natural" that they'd become friends. Pacey reminds her that he didn't ask her that; he asked her if it bothered her. No, it doesn't. Yes, it does. No, it doesn't: "It [Joey smooches him] bothers you. You just want it to bother me, too." What's bothering Joey, then? "You," Joey mock-snorts, then grins brightly and pushes Pacey's lips up in a smile with her fingers. He laughs. Heh.