Episode Report Card Sars: D | 5 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT Detention
By Sars | Season 1 | Episode 7 | Aired on 03.02.1998
In the library, Pacey -- clad in a highly unflattering peach sweatshirt -- reads a book; he has two black eyes and medical tape on his nose. Dawson and Jen round the corner, and Dawson says, "What are you doing here?" and Jen gasps, "Oh my God, Pacey, look at you," and Dawson asks grudgingly after Pacey's nose, and Jen continues to exclaim that "that must hurt" as Pacey grumbles, "Broken, thanks." Jen, sympathetically: "That really sucks." Pacey, shooting Dawson a pointed stare: "Tell me about it." Jen asks why Pacey got detention, Pacey says, "It's a long, long story" (one which, I suspect, involves his confession at the school-board meeting in the previous episode), and Dawson sighs, "We've got eight hours." Jen compares the prospect of detention -- the three of them hanging out and doing nothing -- to "every other Saturday." At that moment, we hear Abby whine, "It's just so punitive." On the one hand, I feel I should point out that the word "punitive" does not take a comparative adverb, because either a measure is punitive or it isn't, and you cannot describe something as "so punitive" or "more punitive," but then I remember that Abby winds up paying for her offenses against English usage with her life. Heh. Abby continues to protest ungrammatically as Pacey and Dawson groan and warn Jen about Abby, using phrases like "oh, no" and "from hell," and the mousy teacher assigned to monitor detention refers primly to "school policy," and when Abby spots Jen, Dawson, and Pacey, she gripes, "Oh, great. It's Howdy Doody time." More bellyaching from Abby, to which Mousy Teacher replies, "Abby? Shut up." Go Mousy Teacher. MT then announces that detention "is not about fun and games. Detention is about penance," and she drones on for a bit about how the inmates should think about what they did wrong and how they can improve their behavior, and Joey comes in late, and a surprised Dawson says, "Joey?" and Joey says, "Hey, everybody -- what is this, some sort of surprise party?" and Pacey mutters, "Break out the piñata." MT introduces herself as the school librarian (whatever) and says that if she has to come out of the AV room (whatever) and discipline them, they'll spend the rest of the day shelving books and sorting library cards, which I personally would prefer to sitting around and feeling my buttcheeks fall asleep all day, but anyhow, she adds that "after eight hours, you're gonna be like a family," which prompts more kvetching from Abby.
MT leaves. Abby offers Juicy Fruit to everyone, but when Dawson and Joey take her up on it, she snorts, "Yeah, right." Then she asks Pacey if he injured himself by getting into a car accident while picking his nose. Like, ha ha. Not. Pacey tells her what happened, and Abby says that "it can't look any worse than it did before." Abby deduces that Dawson landed in detention for that, and asks Pacey what he did, making a weak joke about "damaging school equipment with your face," and Pacey makes a "like, ha ha, not" face, and Dawson chimes in, "He's not telling." Abby cuts to the chase, circling Pacey's chair and asking if he made up "another cockamamie story about sleeping with a teacher." "Cockamamie"? Who wrote this episode, my father? Pacey says it's none of her business, and Abby keeps at him for a little while, then blows him off and moves on to Jen. Jen complains that, although she said the word "bitch" in class, she blames Mr. Pickering's "small-town mentality -- so many people here [have it]," to which Joey icily retorts, "Oh, I'm sorry, Jen, it must be so hard for you putting up with us simpletons." Jen says wearily, "That's not what I meant," and Joey goes on, "Must be a real bitch for ya." Get it? She said "bitch," just like Jen did! Like, ha ha! Oh, wait. Not. Anyhow, Abby smiles evilly and invokes the dread "catfight," and asks Joey what she did to get detention, adding that "incarceration does seem to run in your family." Joey -- who looks quite pretty in this scene, not least because the stylists managed to get all her hair into the braid this time -- tells Abby to go to hell. Jen, making yet another overture of friendship to Joey that will yet again go unthanked, pipes up, "I think you're the bitch, Abby," and Abby snorts, "Okay, Miss Big Apple. If you want to hang out with these backwater black sheep, don't let me stop you."