Serena -- drunk on the thought one of her schemes may actually work, sick with the thought that Cousin Lola may be eclipsing her -- sinks the latter's audition with Lars Von Trier in such a hamfisted, contrived way that Lola instantly figures out that Serena is Gossip Girl, and runs to tell Nate. Nate Archibald, that is. Nate, who only dates crazy girls. Crazy girls who make up stories.
So Nate tells Lola to stop being crazy and/or talking out of her stupid mouth, because he's too busy dealing with Diana Payne's creepy come-ons, dying of loneliness, and freaking out about Chuck. Who is in turn freaking out about learning that none of his mothers are actually his mothers, and that in fact he wasn't born at all: Somebody left a bunch of hair and a whiskey-soaked rag in a bucket full of sex, and then a month later Chuck Bass just appeared.
Lily and Rufus are on the verge of making up, but he still takes time out of his day to horrifically and needlessly harrass his son Dan about what a mistake it is to date Blair, because these UES bitches just make you their bitch. Being a Humphrey goddamn through and through, Dan runs with this concept, stonewalling Blair about all kinds of shit for no reason and generally being a walking advertisement for why people never date him for all that long.
Lily charms Rufus back into Manhattan by schlepping all the way to Brooklyn with a covered dish. Of salad. Which she did not make. But then the second their dumb old asses are back home, Lily finds out that Rufus has been keeping Ivy Dickens in the SoHo Grand so she won't be homeless. Because Lily literally wants to see Ivy eaten by dogs, for no real reason, she throws Rufus one of these: "With my money?" And although he doesn't quite say, "Our money," you know he was thinking it. Probably he just didn't want to see the goon hand.
So now Rufus is BACK out the house, AND she totally closed his bank accounts. Lily is on a motherfucking tear, I tell ya. Which is great! But still not as satisfying as Rufus admitting what a limp little houseboy he was born to be. If only he would stop getting his mess all over my shiny new Dair, I could be excited. Remember the chokers? God, what I'd give for a choker and some Lincoln Hawke right now. Just go for it, bro.
Thanks to the evergreen shittiness of Rufus -- plus a run-in with some deeply creepy Real Life New Yorkers I've decided I don't care to know more about -- Dan and Blair decide to host a salon, in the grand tradition of Gertrude Stein and people like that, people with original and incisive thoughts, but because what they actually are is children, an empty hipster and a mental case to be precise, it's sort of a vomitous nightmare from the second they start talking about it, first the things that sound like smart people might have thoughts about, and then building entire nonsense conversations about these subjects, and the vomitous "Did you read?" freshman year nightmare of their love just never, ever stops. And we're all invited!
So into this hot mess rush Chuck, Nate, Lola and Serena -- none of whom were invited by the brainy couple, because in this episode we're pretending some of the people on this show are more retarded than other ones -- so that Lola, in her Vanessa Abrams way, can by trying to out Serena as Gossip Girl, accidentally/finally outs Diana Payne as Chuck's mother.
(How's Chuck doing with all of this? Well, imagine masturbating to the sound of your boyfriend, fucking your mom, feet away, in the same apartment.)
What's funny is that first of all, Serena figured it out on her own -- by overhearing things, because have you seen this show -- and then, Diana was only there at the salon to work some kind of angle on her, because GG wrote to blackmail her about making Serena give her the site back. Which was a cool way to go with it, especially since at the end of the episode GG texts again to say that Chuck's not even Diana's actual Big Secret, so now she and Serena will have to have a rematch.
In the end, Nate dumps Lola, who quits the UES (until her big van der Secret comes out), Ivy is probably homeless again, Serena admits that she has become a pathetic blogger version of her former self but stays the course, Chuck actually gets to add more things to his sexual dysfunction list, and Dan and Blair can be pretty fucking gross sometimes.
The rest was just Elizabeth Hurley trying to make sense of Chuck's storylines over the last five years, like, you can see her actually burning calories trying to put it all together and make sense as she's saying it. Girl, we feel ya. We xoxo ya.
PREVIOUSLY
Being Gossip Girl has corrupted Serena into going after her rival slash cousin slash sister, who basically deserves it anyway. Gossip Girl 1.0 wants the site back, but I guess cannot crack master haxx0r Serena's password, "totesrelevant." Dan and Blair have fallen in love over their mutual love of being big smartypantses. Lily's horrible behavior caused Ivy to get thrown out of PRADA and Rufus to stay in DUMBO, but at least she still has wine. And Chuck's five moms were just a house of cards. And boobs.
GOING DOWN?
A neat shot of falling from a great height brings us to street level, where everybody is losing out: Lily's sad and alone and drinking at breakfast, Rufus is playing "I'm Still Your Fag" to himself back in Brooklyn surrounded by waffles, and -- to the cheery sounds of Grouplove's "Tongue Tied" -- Dan and Blair make love to each other's huge throbbing brains over breakfast.
Blair: "-- I just wish people would at least try to discern the difference between Meister Eckhardt and Eckhart Tolle, I mean it's not even a minor..."
Dan: "-- I think it's about the fact that Ira Glass is selling the idea of authenticity itself, so you can always just jump up a level to..."
Blair: "-- I can read Latin. Fluently."
Dan: "I was very nearly a National Merit Scholar."
Blair: "I have memorized pi."
Dan: "I can move objects with my mind."
GGHQ
But all is not rosy pseudointellectual one-upmanship on the Upper East Side, no. Upstairs, beneath a haunted shaking tree and just past the cawing of bloody-eyed ravens, there is a ramble path that leads through the girls' shared bathroom to a cave, and in that cave there is a cauldron, and stirring that cauldron is a beautiful witch named Serena. And what she sees with her scrying eyes is the clamor of a world for one creature, one solitary It, with hair as gold as wheat in summer and crossed eyes as blue as Santorini's waters and lips as pursed as Vanessa Abrams on her dumbest day.
"Who is the Ittest in all the land?" asks the witch, Serena, and begins to shrivel and wrinkle and age as the face, turned up to her, cracks a grin and speaks and then is gone:
Though we're all wet in our underwear, at some point along the path
What's hard-won's least loved in an aging queen's wrath
Betake you from your best friend's house
They loved you then, but don't love you now
The web you've spun now ill tidings bodes
For your relevance is threatened by Miss Lola Rhodes.
"And so I am urged, ever onward, to an existential madness!"
She dashes the cauldron into a thrall's face; cruelly, the witch Serena grinds a single gold-wrapped truffle beneath one well-trod heel. And all the Its and queens and witches she's deposed in her time gather in the ether, to watch and wait and listen.
EMPIRE
Lola: "Sorry, did I wake you?"
Nate: "It's nine in the morning! I need rest before my very important job starts around noon!"
Lola: "Right, I keep assuming you're an adult. Listen, you know how I am incredibly judgmental about gossip blogs, even though you own one?"
Nate: "I always thought it was at least partly because I own one. You are Aunt Carol's daughter and the new Vanessa, after all."
Lola: "Well, call me a hypocrite..."
Nate: "-- You are most certainly that."
Lola: "-- Ahem. But I certainly do enjoy the attention of being the new It."
Nate: "Just come over. I have one of those weird morning boners where it's like maybe/maybe not."
Lola: "I cannot! For I have an audition with Lars von Trier today and I need to get a Brazilian. I'm assuming there will be ass-rape, and I really want to sparkle."
Nate: "You should talk to Serena, she's the most Lars von Trier person on this show."
Lola: "She kind of hates me for some reason. It's almost like she tried to engineer me into being the new It Girl, immediately regretted her choice, and now wants to take me out with her witchy goblin powers."
Nate: "Cry me a river, my cousin tried to kill me. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to experiment with my body for a while and then get baked before my grown-up job."
DAIR
Blair: "Allow me to detail my totally cray-cray plan for today."
Dorota: "But first, Lonely Lord Fauntleroy needs his unbelievably fussy breakfast."
Dan: "No homo, but my busy day of doing nothing really needs jams of four fruits to get started."
Blair: "Okay, I'm off to be fine-tuned by an army of tacticians and stylists that rivals that of Panem's Capitol. You should probably take a shower one of these days. You smell like a Williamsburg bad idea."
Dan: "Which is exactly what I am. Pick me up later so I can do whatever you tell me to do and not worry about it."
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WALDORF
Lola: "... It's called Dancer In The Dark. It's a grand guignol about a mentally impaired blind girl getting her ass raped for five hours and singing dumb songs about it while it's happening, and everybody pretends it's art."
Serena: "Good thing you came to me, since that's my storyline this season. Now, it's very important that you get a Brazilian, first off. But remember too, you're not just dressing for the horrors you're about to live through: It's also about the paparazzi that will be reporting on the fact you're going to an audition."
Lola: "A person auditioning for a play in New York City is an historic event."
Serena: "Funny, isn't it, that Gossip Girl doesn't seem to care about you?"
Lola: "Nobody cares about Gossip Girl anymore, or I would have heard of it before now."
Serena: "Gossip Girl is the crown jewel of New York gossip blogs, Charlotte."
Lola: "Firstly, that sentence doesn't pass muster. And second of all, only to dinosaurs like you. The hipsters won't admit to reading it, the young folks don't care about it, and your cohort's mutual obsession with it and each other is sadder than Rufus talking about the Magnetic Fields. It's an echo chamber within the echo chamber that is already New York society."
Serena: "Gossip Girl is eternal! Much like celebutantes you barely remember from last year, or anything they talk about in Vanity Fair."
Lola: "No, that was when you were in high school. But you're a washed up old bitch now, and so is she."
Serena: "Careful, young woman. She could be listening in as we speak. She could be standing in this very cave with us, ghostly and topical as ever."
Lola: "The whole thing just seems really irrelevant."
Serena: "That word! It annihilates my very reason!"
Lola: "This is the biggest audition of my life, I'm not going to waste time worrying about some pathetic blogger in a dark cave, recapping my exploits and calling out my logical failures or saying I've jumped the..."
Serena: "-- Silence! We'll speak of this no more."
S makes a very scary face that becomes very sad. A David Simon, LemonLyman, Sons of Anarchy kind of sad face.
Lola: "Anyway, thanks for your incredibly creepy advice, but I'm not worried. Directors think they're God anyway, it's not going to change my method of approach."
Serena: "Break a fucking leg, sweetheart."
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DUMBO
Dan: "...And here you are, still in my home. Rebuilding an office chair from 1956. Wow, you really assimilated back into Brooklyn quickly."
Rufus: "Why are you wearing a necktie? Get that thing off you before your soul is lost to the war of attrition the UES is waging on us all."
Dan: "How about you go back to PRADA and stop trying to fuck up my life?"
Rufus: "On the contrary, I am going to work you so hard you'll engineer your own breakup without even knowing it."
Dan: "What do you mean? Explain further."
Once there was a man, a prince among men, whose dalliances with a Rhodes witch planted a seed within him that -- after two children and a marriage to a common harridan -- finally bloomed into a malignant flower the day Serena van der Woodsen returned to Grand Central Station. Though he fought against it, shoring up art galleries and cat-butt coffee houses in defense, there was no escaping that yearning, grasping gravity. It began with neckties, oh yes. And then came tuxedos. And thence it was purloined scarves, jitneys, VITAMIN WATER, a third child left to the river in a basket made of rushes, a convenient car accident, and before you knew it he'd been sunk. Well and truly, nothing but a hollow shell of his former choker-necked self, no better than a wife. Dust on his guitar.
Dan: "Go. Back. To. Lily."
Rufus: "Not before I'm sure you are full enough of Humphrey Bullshit to destroy your own relationship. Not before she brings me salad. Not one second sooner."
Dan: "I don't care about any of this. Just get out of my house."
Rufus runs his hands along the necktie of the damned, staring forcefully into his second-born son's eyes.
"This necktie is a choker of another kind, son. You'll see."
SPECTATOR
Diana: "Good morning! Are you late because of Lola? Trouble in Paradise? Hope it's not my fault."
Nate: "Why on earth would..."
Diana: "-- j/k I totally hope it's my fault!"
Cute...
Diana: "Was that a smile I saw? Careful, you'll give me ideas!"
...Not cute. Suddenly it's like getting stalked by a charming/aggressive well-preserved old gay dude. Which is kind of how Diana Payne's always come off, if you think about it. Party house in LA that she pretended wasn't hers, backroom deals to preserve access to Nate's admittedly rockin' bod, perverse obsession with his innocence, relentless pursuit of youth and beauty. Not to mention just how much it would explain about Chuck Bass, if his mom turned out to be an old gay creeper. It's in the blood!
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Nate: "I just have a lot going on. Mysterious boners, loneliness. Serena hates me for firing her, which for some reason both of us still actually remember happening. Lola is a piece of work. I haven't seen Daniel in two whole episodes. And Chuck is about to land himself in a world of..."
Diana, scared: "Chuck Bass? Is on a mission? To what, perchance?"
Nate: "Let's just say I've never had much luck reconnecting with family members, and leave it at that."
Diana: "Uh, gotta bounce."
2 FT AWAY
Call: "Jack, it's me. We have to stop Chuck snooping around."
Text: "Diana, it's the real GG. Listen, Serena is holding my site hostage. If you don't get it back for me, I'll tell everybody the secret that made you afraid of me in the first place."
Nice!
AUDITION
Lola: "It is I, Lola Rhodes! Here for my ass rape!"
Casting: "Cancelled."
Lola: "But I am the It!"
Casting: "We here at Breaking The Dogville Theatre Troupe take Gossip Girl very seriously, I'm afraid."
Lola: "That's ... counterintuitive."
LOLA IS A DIVA! Wannabe actress Lola Rhodes told only one other person on this show that "Everybody knows the star's the thing -- real actors don't take direction, some are just better at pretending they do."
Lola: "Um, isn't von Trier's whole thing about abusing women before they get too big for their britches? He should hire me after this, not..."
Casting: "Look, first of all it's descriptive, not prescriptive. To document misogyny and political oppression is not to celebrate it..."
Lola: "Doesn't mean I have to watch it. Art isn't just about confrontation, it's about connection..."
Casting: "...And second of all, stop staring crazily at me with your head cocked like Michael Myers and just get out of here."
Lola: "That is just my face."
GGHQ
Like Ursula the Sea Witch, Serena barely notices herself cramming her face with the anemone-like souls of the damned as she watches the responses roll in across her cauldron -- because as anybody knows, the obsessive creepy commenters on blogs have very important opinions that are always well-reasoned and grammatically free of error -- and with every cry of "Diva!" or "Bitch!" or "So over her!" the youth and the Itness cascade through her: Her ever more lustrous hair, her plumping breasts, her fading crows-feet, the nimbleness of her blogwitch fingers. An eldritch light begins to rise in the cave, like an unseen moon going red; soft booming across the water, coming ever closer.
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Lily: "I brought you a covered dish. It is salad, I made too much salad so I schlepped it over."
Rufus: "Lily?"
Lily: "Okay, I had it delivered."
Rufus: "Lily?"
Lily: "What, it's a generous serving. I found myself in the neighborhood."
Rufus: "Lilllly?"
Lily: "...Sorry!"
Rufus: "Lily, did you order that salad to be delivered to your apartment on the Upper East Side and then bring it all the way here in a towncar just to make sure I don't get scurvy?"
Lily: "No, I also came because I am drunk. Drinking alone makes me morose and being morose makes me think of you, and now I am here."
Rufus: "You need to apologize for what you did to that girl. Not to her, of course. I need a personal apology, because it hurt my tender feelings."
Lily: "How about I sell the apartment -- the one that is tied up in a probate case and now another civil one, but whatever -- and we get a home that makes sense for us both? It can have a shoe closet and necklace gallery of huge necklaces... But also a room for jam sessions, and sad old dreams."
Rufus: "Sold! Literally and figuratively."
GGHQ
Serena: "Let me clear some of these dead leaves and unidentifiable bones so you can sit down and tell me all about your audition!"
Lola: "Here's the thing. Gossip Girl hasn't said anything about me since I became It, but now on my biggest day? And with a warped quote of something I only said once, to you, an hour ago?"
Serena: "Guess she's not so 'irrelevant' after all, huh?"
Lola's Face: "Bitch, are you for real right now?"
Serena: "Well, I sure hope she doesn't come after your future dreams. And my condolences on this and any future crushing disappointments she may engineer."
Lola's Face: "Come on, are you kidding me with this shit?"
Serena: "It is a generous serving, I'll admit."
Lola leaves, Serena sits there thinking she was actually subtle just now, and then Diana Payne simply walks into Waldorf, up the stairs, and into Serena's salon.
Diana: "Serena! I can't believe I just illegally entered the home... Of the infamous Gossip Girl herself!"
Yes!
DAIR
Blair: "So about our plans today..."
Dan: "-- McSweeney's is covering a tree-planting door in a community garden! Do you know what that means?"
Lola leaves, Serena sits there thinking she was actually subtle just now, and then Diana Payne simply walks into Waldorf, up the stairs, and into Serena's salon.
Diana: "Serena! I can't believe I just illegally entered the home... Of the infamous Gossip Girl herself!"
Yes!
DAIR
Blair: "So about our plans today..."
Dan: "-- McSweeney's is covering a tree-planting door in a community garden! Do you know what that means?"
Blair: "...That you're more confused about what McSweeney's is than Nate is about what newspapers are?"
Dan: "No! That I can gleefully stonewall and cockblock you for no reason other than the fact that my father is the worst person alive!"
Blair: "What I don't get is how Rufus made all these sacrifices to put you two through the hell that was Constance/St. Jude's, presumably to give you certain advantages, and then whenever you come close to getting anything you want, he takes out his unhappiness all over you to bring you down again."
Dan: "We're talking about a man who was so threatened by his teenage daughter's artistic success that he kicked her out of the house."
("Poor Little Orphan Jenny looks like she needs a Daddy Warbucks but Daddy Warbucks don't grow on trees at least on a tree that grows in Brooklyn."
Never Forget, bitches. XOXO.)
Dan: "I know your cray-cray plan was about our Coming Out to society as a couple, but this way we can come out in two boroughs in the same day."
Blair: "Nobody comes out in Brooklyn except about their provisional bisexuality or the fact they liked the Girls pilot. Get crucial."
Dan: "I stand steadfast for no reason. We will plant a tree, so help me God. We will plant trees like we're the Jews this show has always lacked."
Blair: "You never get a second chance to make a first impression. And I won't appear in our first picture standing in manure like some kind of fuckin' Vanessa Abrams."
Dan: "...Okay, that was a good one."
Blair: "I get that you are still stuck on getting somehow sucked into this world you actually inhabit, just like the past five years, but how about you think about this from my perspective for one second. Last they heard, I was playing Marie Antoinette to Prince Possessive. I'm not going from Hapsburg to Williamsburg in one move."
Dan: "Another good one, but no. I am playing the Humphrey Card: Drawing an utterly random, futile line in the sand just to feel some pathetic sense of control."
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Blair: "Well, Waldorf? You wanted it, you hit it, you knew you'd end up paying for it. I guess this is it. Our Waterloo."
Dan: "You think this is the only time I'm going to pull this bullshit? I am just getting started. God, look at what I did to Serena."
Creepy Strangers: "We're just like you!"
Creepy Stranger #1: "He's gay..."
Creepy Stranger #2: "She's stilted..."
Creepy Strangers: "...And we're both incredibly impressed with ourselves!"
It is, shall we say, a generous serving.
Dair: "It's you, you off-putting real-life people! We live in New York, so we give a fuck about you. At least for the month."
New Yorkers: Are 100 percent adorable.
NOLA/GGHQ
Nate: "Sorry about your failed audition. Kiss kiss."
Lola: "Did you ever wonder who Gossip Girl is?"
Nate: "Listen, the braintrust that is me and my friends have been over this a million times. Many have tried to find out."
Lola: "Tried and failed?"
Nate: "Tried and died."
Lola: "Well, have I got a generous serving of scoop for you."
Diana: "Don't even try to deny it, van der Woodsen. And what's more, I know the real one is after you."
Serena: "OMG, I totally forgot that storyline."
Diana: "But, in grand Diana Payne tradition, surprise! I want to team up with you for reasons that will only ever be semi-clear."
Nate: "Come on. Gossip Girl is always up Serena's ass. It's her main thing."
Lola: "That's what makes it so incredibl... Look, I haven't figured that part out yet, but trust me. Imagine Serena's idea of what constitutes clothing, that's how subtle she was being."
Diana: "You know that I have a history with Gossip Girl..."
Serena: "Meaning you have something to hide."
Diana: "A woman who has truly lived has plenty to hide. You stay Gossip Girl, and we both win."
Serena: "Where's my takeaway? How do we 'both' win?"
Diana: "I mean, because you get to stay Gossip Gi... Are you really this dumb? I always thought it was an act."
Nate: "Stop being a quirky actress and get your shit together."
Lola: "Fine, I'll prove it. And now if you'll excuse me, I have an ass-rape to reschedule."
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Diana: "I can make GG 3.0 the most popular website in town!"
Serena: "Look, I'm a woman with values. Maybe you've not heard, but I don't approve of people using Gossip Girl to destroy people. In fact, I was already about to give it back, once I finish using it to destroy my sister-cousin."
Diana: "Meet me at my office after lunch. I'll be the woman having an explosive conversation, in full view, out in the middle of the hallway, right outside Nate's office, where anybody can hear me."
THAT AWFUL ANEMIC COUPLE BEING CREEPS SOME MORE
Plus those dorks Dan and Blair are talking to. Zing!
Creeps: "We thought, what better way to show we're the new intelligensia than to invite similar a-holes to our house and then lecture them on whatever thing we last heard about on NPR as though we are experts."
Dair: "And they willingly sit still for this?"
Creeps: "They come in droves, it's a real racket. Turns out everybody likes to feel smart without actually doing anything to further their own knowledge."
Dan: "Might we involve a tightly structured PowerPoint presentation as part of this unending nightmare?"
Blair: "How au courant!"
Creeps: "Now you're getting it!"
Dan: "Wow, they really are the same as us. I feel good about that."
Blair: "I guess we're holding a salon. I guess that's actually happening."
SPECTATOR
Serena: "Nate."
Nate: "Serena. Are we fighting?"
Serena: "I can't remember."
Nate: "Let's say... No."
Serena: "Great! Good talking to you, friend."
Nate: "Wait, I needed to exposit to you that Lola thinks you're Gossip Girl."
Serena: "How perfectly insipid. I guess she's just insecure. And irrelevant."
SIX CENTIMETRES AWAY
Diana: "Jack, it's Diana. Payne? From that time I was mysteriously at the hospital after Chuck and Blair fled her engagement and ended up in a car accident and miscarriage, which sent Blair into a mental fugue state from which she is only now recovering... Yes, that's me. Listen..."
Serena: "So much information going in my earhole. Such a generous serving. Must sit down and process. And then possibly fuck things up for everybody like always."
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DAIR
Dair: "What flowers will we have for our salon? What's the smartest flower?"
Dair: "What kind of glasses should we drink out of? What's the most inanely annoying place setting?"
Dair: "What kind of French wines should we pour in there?"
Dair: "What should be the theme? What is, like, the deepest theme of a salon?"
Dair: "We like Daphne Du Maurier and TS Eliot and Radiohead. Our theme should just be 'British Shit.'"
Blair: "I love British pub food -- secretly, as I love most food I love -- but especially when it's made with fois."
Fois, she says. Simply, fois. This is a generous serving indeed. A generous serving of Not At All How I Saw This Going.
Dan: "Should we invite Serena?"
Blair: "Not if we want to have fun."
Dan: "Not that we do, but okay. How about Nate?"
Blair: "That bitch can't read. Come on."
Dan: "That's... Literally all of our friends."
Blair: "What about that creepy Oracle Club couple? Surely they're desperate for human contact. And we can invite Diana Payne!"
Dan: "Wherefore?"
Blair: "The plot, silly! Of this TV show we're on?"
WALDORF
Lola: "Hey, I just wandered in here for the third time today."
Dorota: "Get your ass up stairs and to fix Serena. She locked in cave like blonde Unibomber."
TWO FT AWAY
Blair: "At least Gossip Girl won't be at our salon. And you can read from your second book, to all the glitterati and literati!"
Lola: "My incomprehensible plan is arranging itself with no effort from me!"
She quickly texts GG from Dorota's phone about how Dan's going to be reading from the Inside sequel tonight at Dair's salon, just knowing that ... Either GG or Serena could give a shit about that somehow?
PRADA
Vanya: "I bring Rufus baggage. Bozhe moi he has a generous serving."
Lily: "You're tellin' me, sister."
Vanya: "He keep talking to me about Magnetic Field..."
Lily: "Yeah, I don't... He heard about them on NPR and somehow got confused and he thinks Stephin Merrit's this great new discovery he made and he keeps trying to turn people onto him and it's just so embarrassing. Everybody's being really nice about it, but I wonder if I shouldn't just gently say something."
SoHo Grand: "Is Rufus Humphrey there? I need to verify his credit card information."
Lily: "For what, pray tell?"
SoHo Grand: "He's putting up a young woman here in this hotel, and I haven't gotten to the part in our company handbook yet about not telling people's wives when they do that. An Ivy Dickens?"
Lily: "Oh hell no."
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SOHO
Ivy Dickens, for the fourth time in as many days, lands right on her ass outside another skyscraper.
Ivy: "This is gettin' to be a regular occurrence! Better not lose my pep!"
HOSPITAL
Serena: "You there! Nurse who takes HIPAA seriously!"
Nurse: "That's me. Did you want me to step away from my computer, or..."
Serena: "Do you recognize this blurry picture of a woman?"
Nurse: "It was months ago but I remember it like it was yesterday. She swept in here, donated blood, and then disappeared before Chuck Bass awoke. I remember that, because it was a very important moment in my day."
Serena: "Diana Payne, please."
Admin: "She's off doing things."
Serena: "Because I am a stranger who sounds unhinged and I want to tell her something weird and crazy."
Admin: "Well then, stranger. She's going to a salon at Dan Humphrey's loft in Brooklyn tonight, you can accost her there. Do you need the address, or are you familiar with it as a nexus point of post-millennial intellectualism?"
Serena: "I know where it is, but you should probably give me directions if you want me to get there in a timely manner. I have this problem with how to Be Places and..."
EMPIRE
Nate: "Either prove that Serena is Gossip Girl, or shut your stupid mouth up about it. Why is every woman in my life either autistic or crazy? I think it goes back to my mom, who is both."
Lola: "Come to this salon at Daniel Humphrey's house in Brooklyn."
Nate: "That sounds like a generous serving. Of fun!"
Lola: "For real? Nate, do you know what a salon is?"
Nate: "I absolutely do not!"
SALON
Set dressing, admittedly, is spectacular. Amazing pop art pictures of the Queen, a portrait of a dog in a dress, all kinds of remixed Britishnalia, sort of Jenny Humphrey style in its off-kilter coolness. Gives you something to look at, to avoid what's about to happen.
Blair: "Thanks to these creepy people, and to some chef of the moment who will be cheffing it up."
Dan: "We'll be introducing a new topic with each course, in case you thought your brains were capable of independent thought."
Salonistas: "This is such an enjoyable way to spend our time! Tell us what to talk about first! And what we should say!"
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Serena: "Sorry I'm late!"
Blair: "The fuck are you doing here?"
Serena: "...Uh, making myself at home, asshole?"
Lola: "Sorry I'm late!"
Salonista: "I'm wearing you! As underwear!"
Blair: "I don't even know who you are."
Blair: "How can I Keep Calm & Carry On with the van der Sisters here?"
Dan: "Who cares? This is so intellectually stimulating!"
Blair: "No. Serena's just going to judge us the whole time for our childish sham of sophistication -- rightly so, and with a boozy air -- while Lola's just here for the PR."
Dan: "Or they came all the way to Brooklyn because they love us."
Blair: "Pshyeah."
Lola: "I wonder if Gossip Girl will repeat her success tonight! What with her scoop about Inside, whenever that happened."
Serena: "She probably will, but she doesn't need to physically be here to do that. Have you still not figured out the Internet?"
Lola: "I just hope she blogs about it. To stay relevant, I mean."
Serena: "Oh my God, look. I get that as a broke-ass Florida transplant you may find Gossip Girl fascinating. I remember my first beer, too. But I just don't find her that interesting."
Lola: "How is it that neither of us has noticed this is the exact same conversation we had earlier, but in reverse?"
Serena: "Because then this episode would make zero sense. And because that speech I just handed you was so awesome I wish it were the truth."
Chuck & Nate: "Sorry we're late!"
Blair: "Oh, for fuck's sake."
Lola: "I invited them! To the party to which I was not invited!"
Blair: "Keep it comin', sister. You'll get yours. A real generous serving."
Lola: "I really invited you to prove that Serena is Gossip Girl."
Nate: "I... Know that."
Lola: "Just wanted to make sure you still knew that. You know, sometimes I think you're on board and then..."
Nate: "Anybody here could send Gossip Girl a tip. Jesus, you still don't get how...?"
Lola: "-- No, there's more to it! I have an incomprehensible plan!"
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PRADA
Rufus: "Anyway Vanya, did you check out the Magnetic Fields like I suggested?
Vanya: "Yes, Mr. Humphrey."
Rufus: "They are the big thing, I mean it."
Vanya: "Yes, Mr. Humphrey. So you've said, Mr. Humphrey."
Rufus: "By that stomping and glaring, Lily, I presume I have offended?"
Lily: "How fucking dare you show kindness to the only person my mother ever loved?"
Rufus: "Oh, we're playing a self-righteousness game? I am a master. Bring it."
Lily: "She's a thief!"
Rufus: "She's a little girl! I felt responsible for her homelessness because of how we are to blame."
Lily: "Behind my back."
Rufus: "Deploying the Humphrey Card... Now. I did the Right Thing."
Lily: "Yeah, bitch. With my money."
Oh, see. Dammit, Lily. Because now Rufus is not only in the right, but you also played a card you're not allowed to play. Maybe the most unplayable card in the entire deck. So even if he were wrong, somehow, you'd still have just lost this one.
Rufus: "...And so I'm your whore. Okay, good. Glad that's finally on the table."
Lily: "As if it comes as a shock. Give me a fucking break and pick up your face."
It's not like I can even stretch to be on Lily's side with this like usual, because she's acting like the evil barker at a haunted carnival with the Ivy thing, but for real. Anybody ever said that to me? Whoo boy. I wouldn't even call Suze Orman first: Just go into full Angela Bassett mode, set that motherfucker on fire.
"Oh, 'your money'? I shit on your money. Your insurance settlement, how 'bout?"
SALON
Chef: "[Chef Talk]".
That One Gay Extra Who Is At Every Single Party On This Show: "Hey."
This Guy Who's Like PC Petersen Plus A Beard!: "I am delectable."
Dan: "[Something about ice? They need ice. It's Brooklyn.]"
Blair: "WWDPD? What Would Dorothy Parker Do?"
Dan: "Be interesting or fun or clever in some way? Actually have conversations at a party about conversations?"
Blair: "You're right. We have to get them drunk so they don't notice this whole ice-getting debacle."
Dair: "Let's call this what it is: A big ass-sniffing game of Who Is The Smartest Guy In The Room?"
A Generous Serving: Raises hands. But they can't all be right.
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Lola: "Why talk about famous authors, when we have a failed one right here?"
Dair: "What are you talking about."
Lola: "Talk about your book, the sequel to Inside!"
Serena slips out to chat with Diana, leaving her phone on the table to Lola for no reason I can see. My notes:
so Lola steals it and
what is even going on tonight
GGHQ, DUMBO BUREAU
Lola thinks she's videotaping their conversation with Serena's magic phone, but she's actually streaming it to the Gossip Girl site. Oh, I see. She was merely going to record Serena admitting to Diana that she's GG 3.0, and then show it to Nate. How she missed the glaring GOSSIP GIRL UPLINK shortcut she was clicking, or the LIVE STREAMING VIDEO button she clicked thereafter, I will chalk up to eagerness I suppose.
Serena: "We can talk about how I'm Gossip Girl..."
(Lola: "Yes!")
Serena: "...But first I want you to know that I know what you are. Who you are. Where you were the night Blair went shithouse crazy. What you donated while you were there. Who it was transfused into. What his blood type is."
Wait, but then later nobody will know that S is GG, which means somehow whilst this was happening the phone just started transmitting. Maybe it took a second to establish its satellite link or something? I'm not too familiar on how the nonsensical, imaginary technology would work here.
Diana: "Bitch, what are you asking me?"
Everybody picks up their phones at that familiar ping, because -- much like the crown heads of Europe at Blair's wedding -- the literati and glitterati can't help needing to know, immediately, what is going on with Serena van der Woodsen.
Serena: "I know who you are. I know what day Chuck was born, do you? I know where you were that day, do you?"
Diana: "Oh my God this is painful. Yeah, I'm Chuck's mother. Yeah, I'm lying about it. Yeah, I saved his life. Yeah, I fucked his best friend practically in front of him. Anything to make you stop throwing me ellipses like you're Inspector Clouseau."
Lola: "Oh shit. Erase erase erase... Live uplink? The hell?"
Gossip Girl 1.0: "Run Lola Run, because Chuck is lookin' scary."
PANDEMONIUM
Everybody: Flipping out.
Serena & Diane: "Hey guys. Um, what's up?"
Chuck: Smolder.
Diane: "Charles."
Chuck: Smolder.
Diane: "...Okay, fine. Sorry."
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Chuck gets his best scene all year -- probably to do with the fact that it's not delivered to that one window in the Empire suite -- as he explains that he's been going totally nuts this whole time, ever since Elizabeth Fischer was running around in a graveyard for no reason, and meanwhile Diana's been acting like Nate's sugar daddy, and posing around his apartment in the altogether, and generally just turning each and every one of his sexual issues up another five notches.
Serena: "I feel yucky."
Lola: "Rejoice! I was right!"
Serena: "You ruined a party. And a life."
Creepy Couple: "This is too hipster psuedointellectual for us. We have to go back to the Oracle Club for some well-deserved discussion of some barely esoteric shit."
Blair: "Well, that was a disaster. Neither uptown nor downtown. Just a bloody mess."
Dan: "It was neither smart nor interesting. The opposite of us."
Blair: "We tried to create a world that was for both of us, but it failed miserably."
Dan: "I hope you are miserable. That was my plan all along."
Blair: "Then I guess we give up. Your ludicrous boundary issues make for some unassumable shapes, for both of us."
Dan: "No, mostly for you. Farewell."
LATER
Lola: "Look, I'm sorry for hurting Chuck. But not you, Serena."
Nate: "I am giving both of you a generous serving of the stinkeye."
Lola: "Where are you going?"
Nate: "Uh, Chuck is torn apart and in need of comfort. Did you not see him? He was closer to tears than he's been since his dad died, and I plan to benefit from it. This Maybe just turned into a Sure Thing."
Lola: "But I'm torn apart too! I am in need of comfort too!"
Nate: "For what, pulling a Vanessa? It was annoying enough when you were going after S, but I fail to see why you did this Chuck thing. Explain it to me, indicting Serena as Gossip Girl."
Lola: "...No, I can't. That would be three things."
Nate: "Then farewell."
Serena: "Thanks."
Everybody leaves, and Lola's just standing in the loft alone. Even Dan's cleaning up around her -- that Garden State blur that so eloquently evokes loneliness-in-action -- with this hilarious look like, "Bitch, why are you still here?"
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EMPIRE
Nate: "Diana. Why are you here?"
Diana: "I need to talk to you guys."
Nate: "[Standing up for his friend.]"
Chuck: "[Appears, decides to take it like a man.]"
Nate: "I guess I'll go, then. Instead of staying and being supportive like I probably should."
Chuck: "And I guess I'll smolder some more."
Diana: "Whilst I assume a variety of decorative poses, all containing a measure of regret."
WALDORF
Dan: "I brought a rucksack of my valuables. I see you're in your pajamas."
Blair: "Are you running away? Joining the Army? Escaping with some kind of traveling show?"
Dan: "No, I just want to sleep here."
Blair: "That constitutes entering my world."
Dan: "Our relationship is our world. That's a healthy sentiment."
Blair: "I agree, that's a very healthy viewpoint you've shared. But tonight was, admittedly, a disaster."
Dan: "But not the first, and God willing it won't be the last. I'll make sure of it. I can't believe I spent all this time judging Serena for living on the UES, when it was really you I was judging all along."
EMPIRE
Diana: "So I met Bart when he was married to Elizabeth, and we had an affair, but he dumped me when I got pregnant, but then it turned out Elizabeth couldn't have children..."
Chuck: "That's amusing, because she died in childbirth. It was the basis of my relationship with Bart for three seasons on this show."
Diana: "...Okay, but then Elizabeth faked her death..."
Chuck: "While she was pretending to give birth? To her husband's mistress's baby?"
Diana: "...Yeah, okay, but... Wait, I lost it. Fast forward. So then I heard that she was dead, and I came back to Bart, but he said it would be too weird..."
Chuck: "That's the part he thought was weird?"
Diana: "Yeah but okay the point is, I became Nate's sugardaddy in front of you last year in California because I wanted to watch over you. Invite you to parties, pose around your house in my underwear. Just make sure you were okay."
Chuck: "You mean mentally, or...?"
Diana: "Not so much that. Clearly your mental health is a foregone conclusion. I just wanted to figure you out. Anyway, I better go."
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Chuck, alone: "I am giving such face tonight. A very generous serving indeed."
GGHQ
Serena: "Hell are you doing here?"
Lola: "Returning your dress. And you're welcome, by the way."
Serena: "Yeah, about that. Why not tell Nate? If only because he broke up with you because of it."
Lola: "You and Chuck are his best friends. I'm not going after him on multiple fronts in one night, sorry. We've already done so many sneaky, sleazy things to each other."
Lola: "Before I go, though. Why did you come after my ass so aggro? It was really weird, you being my supportive friend and acting all in love with me, but then also secretly setting me up for failure over and over."
Serena: "Rufus Humphrey has taught me a lot."
Lola: "How about you ignore my question, then, and answer an unrelated one that's really just more talking about yourself."
Serena: "I haven't been Gossip Girl for very long. But right now, it's the only thing I have. This witch's cave has some cobwebs, let me tell you, and don't even get me started on the separate trainwrecks that are my professional and academic lives. Since my shit is permanently out of control, I thought at least I could play God on the Internet."
Lola: "But that's literally what she's been doing to you for five years."
Serena: "What can I say? Life's a bitch, and sometimes character serves plot. But in some ways, a generous serving of adversity can make you stronger. Stronger and stronger and stronger, until you become an asshole. You'll see."
Lola: "No, I won't. I'm going back to Juilliard. You can have the UES."
Amazing: "You're the only It Girl that matters anyway. You see to that yourself."
Nice. Well done, Charlie/Lola. You have become my favorite and my best for this week. She leaves Serena standing there, mouth-breathing, as she tries to figure out how that was a burn.
RUFUS
Barkeep: "Rufus Humphrey? Your card has been declined."
Rufus: "Uh, no. I am one of the highest-paid hookers in Manhattan. Run that shit again."
Barkeep: "I ran it four times, actually."
Lily: "Yeah I fuckin' did."
Rufus: "Then I guess I will pay you with my last cash."
Barkeep: "Daddy Warbucks don't grow on trees -- at least on a tree that grows in Brooklyn. Remember that."
Rufus: "That's what's so ironic is that I threw my own daughter out of the house when she was a child, but now I'm losing it over some grifter I barely know -- and ended up homeless myself! Guess I was Pretty Reckless."
Barkeep: "I hear ya, sister. Just stay away from teen models and teen drug pushers. The last girl who was in here, Jenny Humphrey, well... Let's just say it didn't end well."
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AFTERMATH
S: Posting about how Lola is over. Grimly, now, like she's hacking through saplings. B&D: In bed, still yammering about fucking Damian Hirst and whatever. Jesus Christ with those two. Chuck: Still smoldering. When did he get so hot? With Nate cleaning up around him, in that same blur. Their life, taking place around him. Nate hands him a drink and they will, one presumes, somehow deal.
LOLA
Lola: "Mom Aunt Carol, you were right. These people are toxic and I should have stayed away. Thank God I don't have anything else tying me to the Rhodes, Bass, Humphrey or Archibald clans."
Wm vdW: "You forgot to say van der Woodsen! No takebacks!"
PAYNE
GG Text: "Girl, we both know that wasn't the secret I was talking about."
WEEK
Nate goes digging through Liz Hurley's stuff for her financials, finally takes off his shirt again, and inevitably Chuck will walk in on them fucking. Serena, Diana and GG will enter Round IV of the War Of The Passwords. Dan and Blair will crawl right into each other's ear canals to see which one of them is more precious, resulting in a vapid two-headed donkey creature that just roams from Pub Trivia to Pub Trivia every night, desperately trying to prove something they should already know, to a world that doesn't even care.
JACOB "LEFT EYE" CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps Gossip Girl, The Good Wife, and The Killing for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, on Twitter, and on Facebook.
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