Episode Report Card Wing Chun: D | 2 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Parental Discretion Advised
By Wing Chun | Season 2 | Episode 22 | Aired on 05.25.1999
I feel I must interrupt here and ask, um, what Mr. Pothead is being arrested for? It can't be possession, because the cocaine presumably burned in the fire. It can't be trafficking, because they have no evidence that he sold any of what he had, except for the word of his drug-selling competitors (perhaps not the most trustworthy of witnesses) and of a taped confession obtained by his daughter, a minor, which probably wouldn't hold up in court given that they're related. As far as I can tell -- and I'm not a lawyer, but I watch Law and Order a lot -- the case against Mr. Pothead is very circumstantial and probably wouldn't go very far if this were real life. Which I know it is not. I'm just saying.
Anyway, as the cop cars pull away, Bessie holds Alexander closer and walks up to the house. At the steps, she stops and looks silently at Joey for a moment, then goes inside. Joey looks down the path and sees Dawson standing at the end of it, hands in his pockets, looking fairly unconcerned. Joey rolls her eyes, and they walk toward each other while the Tinkling Piano of Great Melancholy twitters on the soundtrack. Dawson aims the emotional switch at "Concerned" but can only get as far as "Constipated." Joey trains her thousand-yard stare at a point somewhere over his right shoulder. "How are you feeling?" Dawson asks, very sensitively. Except for the "sensitive" part. Joey stares down his ignorant ass and says, "Like hell." Like, DUH. Dawson tried his wounded puppy tone and asks, "Is there anything I can do?" Joey's dead eyes bore through him; "No thank you," she growls. Dawson says, "You did the right thing, Joey." MY GOD! What the hell is his problem? With palpable disgust, Joey says, "No, Dawson. You did the right thing. What I did, 'right' doesn't even come close to." Neither picking up on any of Joey's physical cues, nor on the words coming out of her mouth, Dawson chooses not to leave badly enough alone and assures her, "We both did what we had to do." The camera swoops in for a tight close-up on Joey's face, the better to broadcast her naked contempt as she says, "What I have to say, you're not going to like, so I'll say it quickly. I hope one day that I will be able to forgive my father for all this. And I don't know if I'll ever be able to forgive myself. But I know that I will never forgive you. You see, Dawson, there are certain circumstances that love cannot overcome, and from now on, I don't want to know you." Walking a lot straighter since the installment of her new spine, Joey goes back to the house, leaving Dawson to ponder her remarks. Yet even after such a scathing shutdown, Dawson is still physically incapable of letting someone else have the last word, and whispers: "See you, Joey." The camera pulls back, and he lets his head fall in a gesture of defeat. As much as I enjoyed watching, and transcribing, Joey's unambiguous dismissal of Dawson, it's somewhat tainted by my absolute certainty that they'll be back together before the snow doesn't fall on Capeside next Christmas, and I dread the ludicrous plot contrivance the writers will come up with to make it happen.