Episode Report Card Sars: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT That's what friends aren't for
By Sars | Season 4 | Episode 23 | Aired on 05.22.2001
Anyway, they both flop back on the bed, and Joey says in a worried tone that she knows they "always joke about this," but she feels like she's never going to see him again. "That's crazy talk, Jo," Dawson says with a hint of impatience, and Joey says she knows, and she'll see him at the holidays, but he'll "be different." "I will?" He'll have a tan, for one thing, and he'll also have an "incredibly pretty" girlfriend whom Joey will hate on sight, and "deep down" she'll know that the girlfriend is as great as Dawson says, just because he likes her. Oh, yuck. Shut up, Joey. Dawson can see that she's given it some thought, and she smirks that he can't keep it a secret forever. Keep what a secret? "How incredible you are." Oh. My. God. Shut. Up. Joey. They gaze at each other for a moment, but Joey wimps out and sits up, and they start playing Answer Fast. Dawson's favorite movie is Jaws. Joey's favorite song is "Daydream Believer." Sars's favorite phrase is "shut up, Joey." Dawson's most embarrassing moment is getting caught making out with Eve; Joey snorts that that "did wonders for [his] street cred." No, it most certainly did not, and shut UP, Joey! Dawson turns it back around on her, and she says it's when she offered herself to him and he turned her down flat. Dawson gets the save by asking if they can introduce "an all-time biggest regret category," because that's his. Heh. Joey's "would be…lying to [Dawson] about sleeping with Pacey." Shut up, Joey. Shut up now. Shut up a lot. Dawson starts spluttering with laughter, and Joey's all, "Not funny, asshole," but Dawson hitches forward to sit next to her and starts going on about how he's the only one who hasn't done the do, and he "didn't plan on graduating a virgin -- what -- what happened?" Well, gee -- you consistently look, and act, like a titanic anus. Does that answer your question, Big Head Tard? Joey tries to jolly him out of it, and there's more ooky talk about "the last American virgin" which I refuse to transcribe because it's irrelevant and nauseating. Awkward pause. Dawson asks about Joey's all-time most life-altering moment. She does not choose the death of her mother, or either of her father's imprisonments, or having sex, or getting into college, or any other logical thing. No, she does not. She chooses kissing Dawson. OF COURSE. Because "it changed everything." Dawson smiles, remembering, as Joey muses, "It's a pretty powerful thing when you get your biggest wish in one moment." Especially when that wish is totally inexplicable, and sucky.
Joey can feel herself starting to cry again, so she quickly changes the subject to the Turn Away, My Shite poster on Dawson's wall, which he has to pack. He gets up to take it down, and Joey thinks for a long moment, accompanied by The Flute Of Impending Reunion, before getting up and telling him hesitantly that she wants him to stay. Dawson turns around, frowning: "What?" Joey repeats it, adding, "There, I said it." Dawson pulls a really funny face and grumbles, "You don't think you could have maybe said something before I packed?" Hee! Joey then tells him to forget she said it, and Dawson is quite rightly like, "Nice try, but how can I forget that?" and Joey says that she doesn't really expect him to stay; she just wanted him to know that she wanted him to, and had thought about it, and she'd considered just keeping her mouth shut, but that's not her, blah blah blah "Merchant-Ivory movie" blah blah blah "suffer in silence" blah blah blah "impressed by their restraint" blah blah blah blah BLAH. Finally she winds it up: "Sorry, but screw that." Dawson's nostrils flare a little, and he stares at the floor. Joey quavers through the promo, namely that her best friend is leaving the next day and a big part of her wants him to stay. "So I hope you don't hate me," she adds lamely. He could never hate her, "and not for lack of trying, either." Wow, he's getting some good lines tonight. I guess the Beek's agent stormed the writers' room with an Uzi. Joey heaves a sigh and sits down, talking about the "one big soap opera" of the last couple of years, and she wouldn't take any of it back, but she's glad it's over. As she talks, Dawson's face is working, as though he can't decide what to do. Joey says she likes "the way things are now," and it's part of the cruel joke of her life -- oh, woe is Poor Little Joey Potter From The Wrong Side Of The Creek -- that "now that things are so nice -- [he's] leaving." Dawson is still trying to figure out a plan, and he comes to sit in front of her and tells her that he'd stay if he thought "for one second it was the right thing to do." Joey's face crumples. Dawson says that he has to go; he has to "get out of this room" (word), and she has to figure out who she is "without [them]." Tears roll down Joey's face. "This chapter's over, Jo. I can feel it." She nods sadly, then abruptly asks if he believes in magic. When he looks confused, she explains that she never used to believe in magic, what with her mother's death and her father's drug deals and so on, and she'd hope for magic but it would never come, and the magic with Pacey ran out, but then there's Dawson: "There's proof that someone out there is thinking of me -- my friend who is with me always." Crappy writing, but Katie almost sells it. Dawson looks stricken as Joey finishes, "It's pure magic." Well, it's "pure" something. Something like…"horseshit." Joey sighs and says that it's just "a long-winded way" of telling him she'll miss him. Staring at her like she's water in the desert, Dawson says he'll miss her too. Joey's face collapses, but she fights it, sniffling that it's getting late, so she should get going.
She gets up and puts on her jean jacket, going for the gallows humor by saying she misses the ladder, which would let her "make a classy exit, you know? Disappear out the window, into the night?" Dawson gets up too and goes to stand by her at the window. Ohhhhhh no. "A lot more cinematic," Dawson grunts. Cue "Daydream Bel-ovary" again. Joey struggles to maintain her composure, and Dawson faces her and sighs, "Wow. I guess this is, uh…this is really it, huh?" Joey presses her lips together and leans in to hug him, whispering, "See ya, Dawson." Over her shoulder, Dawson thinks frantically again, then manages to force out, "I'll see ya, Joey." Cut to over Dawson's shoulder, where Joey is still fighting the tears, and losing; she asks, valiantly trying to keep it light, "So what was yours, by the way?" Cut back to over Joey's shoulder, where Dawson has his eyes screwed closed, trying to lock in the moment: "What was my what?" Joey pulls away: "Your all-time most life-altering moment." Dawson stares at her, dumbfounded, before saying intensely, "For all I know it could be this one right now. Saying goodbye to you," and the Beek actually gets a catch into his voice on that line. Nice job. Joey's lip twitches as the tears start coming again. Cut to a longer shot of them sloooooowly moving towards each other, then back in on a tighter shot as we go to slo-mo and they both close their eyes, and then even closer in for the kiss itself, which looks like just about the worst kiss in the history of television. Seriously. I think I saw a string of drool. But they keep kissing 'cause it's in the script, and we go to an outside shot of their silhouettes against the curtain, kissing, and then a longer shot through the trees as they keep right on kissing, despite the fact that it's pretty much the worst idea the writers have ever had, and that Joey practically just broke up with Pacey, and that Dawson is a cat's behind, but I don't have to deal with the repercussions until September, so -- kiss away, kids. Sars has left the building.