What a fun and wild ride! Everybody all working together, some truly hilarious turns from the Charlies, and then some really sweet scenes at the end. It all ends in bloody disaster, but there was just so much of it, and so many schemes actually working out for once, that it felt a million awesome years long.
The story with Bart is that his accident was not an accident: A connected businessman named Mason Nevins was after him (as well as Chuck and Lily), so once Bart woke up in the hospital, he arranged a ruse with his infinite funds to make everybody think he was dead. Then he called up his old friend India/Diana, who has been merrily schlepping him all over the world on her sex-club tour -- but had to bring him into the country when Chuck had his own accident, which is why everybody found out about him.
Fearing that his father will abandon him once again, turning him into even more of a rapist, Chuck asks Andrew Tyler to help find out more about Nevins. Tyler's protestations are a dead giveaway that he's involved, but Chuck's too blinded by hope to realize it. Of course, it is only a matter of time before he's got Blair, Nate, Serena -- even Diana and Lola, even Ivy Dickens -- involved in a plot to bring Mason Nevins to judgement and return Bart to the world of the living.
And oh, such a plan it is. Offering Diana a new UK magazine to play with, he gets blackmail info on Nevins -- he's a client, he's into twins -- and starts to form a plan... Which goes south once Lola (and Nate) take their revenge on Diana by selling her story to the New York Times, pissing her off and leaving Chuck without any leads. Blair arrives, sends Nate off to stall Diana, and decides to use Ivy and Lola as the prostitutes to entrap old Nevins and get him off Bart's back forever.
Problem #1: Although Dan is hyped about the Rome program, despite Blair's lukewarm interest in going with him, they still have to get through an alum interview to prove that Blair is not crazy. (Problem #2. Problem #3 is his motherfucking hair. My God.) But she's so resistant to the idea, and so enjoying this game to save Chuck's father, that she sends Serena to impersonate her. This results in an eye-opening (and far too short) scenario in which, most tellingly, Serena describes herself as the Jennifer Aniston of Dair.
Eventually Eleanor brings out the truth -- that Blair's not been out buying gelato for six hours but is in fact scheming with Chuck -- but even still, Serena is incredibly supportive of her friends and their relationship. (Also complicating things is the fact that at some point Dan told Blair that he loved her, and she didn't say it back, and I don't even remember when because it's such a boring trite thing to happen.)
Ivy and Lola, awesomely, try to do their best as hookers -- but it's Andrew Tyler, not Mason Nevins, that comes to pick them up. And just when you think we're going to have a couple of dead Charlies on our hands, the real kicker occurs: Chuck, along with Blair and Bart, storm the hideout and get Tyler to confess the whole thing, including how he helped set up Bart's "murder" in the first place. With Tyler's statement as proof, then, the cops can go after Nevins and Bart can return to the world. What this means for Lily and Rufus, I know not. I do know that Nate letting Diana off scot-free was a very moving little side-note, because they are awesome at being friends. As are Blair and Serena, who have some of the sweetest conversations they've ever had.
Dan and Blair have a frank talk about feelings in which she agrees authentically to go to Rome for the summer, but still avoids saying those three words... Which is a shame, because Gossip Girl's first act upon returning to her throne is the mother of all nukes: A page from Blair's diary in which she admits she still has feelings for "somebody that clearly isn't Dan" -- and which were given to GG in a moment of pique by one Serena van der Woodsen herself.
week: The whole Dan/Serena/Blair thing goes haywire, we revisit/bookend the Shepherd Wedding with new players, Serena possibly kills some more dudes like last time, and Blair comes after her with both barrels. I have some thoughts on the Serena/Blair war, but they can wait until the recap -- I'll just say that yes, pitting your two female leads against each other is a "bitches be fighting" cop-out, sure, but TV shows are about conflict between characters, and that trope is only a problem because it's usually fighting about men. I don't see any of those here. Considering that Serena and Blair are the show's undisputed OTP, and the show's been warning us about this triangle going nuclear since way back when it started, during Juliet... Didn't this need to happen sometime? Don't Jacob and the Man In Black generally fight at this point? I mean, does it really have anything to do with Dan at all?
PREVIOUSLY
Dan was invited to Rome, and lied to Blair to punish her for being supportive of his success when he turned it down, the better to spy on her like every other man she dates. Nate once again tried, and once again failed, to blackmail Diana Payne -- this time for being the mysterious traveling sex-club operator known only as India. More successful was his plan with Lola to steal Gossip Girl away from Serena so that she will stop being an insane person, which at least half of that plan worked. Bart Bass turned up alive, rendering Lily's marriage and most of the last three seasons pretty much pointless.
FLASHBACK!
Chuck fully stood there and watched his father die. The entire cast was there, watching the dude die. It took like an hour. Chuck barfed in a hallway. It was unbelievably tragic and powerful.
AND THEN!
Ghost Bart showed up and said crazy things like "Do horrible fucked-up shit! Rape not a single person! Sell nobody for a hotel! Domestically abuse a window if you feel like it! You'll be held accountable, for these things I'm telling you not to do that you didn't ever do, but we'll know it's just because of a ghost." And he avoided doing most of those things, just as the ghost had asked. But the internet went quite mad anyway, and suddenly he retroactively did all of them. But I always knew it was because of the ghost. So what now.
NOW!
Bart: "Okay, here's the deal. I had a bad guy after me, and so when he engineered that car accident I realized that he wasn't kidding around about coming after me -- and you, and Lily -- so I decided to fake my death."
Chuck: "Two problems. Number one, the fuck you say. Number two, we stood there watching you die, so well done on that front. You really fooled us. Question, and this may well be relevant down the line, What did we bury in that coffin?"
Bart: "Mainly hopes and dreams. A good deal of your sanity. And a burnt chicken tikka that bore a surprising resemblance to my ruined ostrich-leather face."
Chuck: "You smelled delicious, father."
Bart: "You always did have a taste for a nice curry. Got that from one of your six moms."
HUMPHREY RESIDENCE
Whilst texting a worried note to Chuck, Blair gets a call on the house line.
Blair: "Humphrey residence, Blair Waldorf speaking!"
Alessandra: "I know you think that's a joke, but you're not actually reconstructed enough yet to make that joke, so it's just kind of weird."
Blair: "And what message shall I give him?"
Alessandra: "Tell him to reconsider the Rome program, please."
Blair: "You bet your ass I will."
Dan gets out of the shower wearing a fright wig that makes him look like Oleg Popov. J/K, that is his hair now.
Blair: "First of all, fix that mess. You look unbelievably idiotic. And second of all, turns out you lied to me about the summer program?"
Dan, to his credit: "Yeah, I just didn't want you to have all summer to backslide into the Empire. I'm incredibly suspicious and paranoid about women in general, but especially you, w/r/t Chuck Bass."
Blair: "It's always something with you fuckers. I'm done discussing that, it demeans us both. But look, I'm wildly wealthy. Rome is just a couple glasses of Chardonnay away."
Nice. That was a good one, Waldorf. Promising start to the episode.
SPECTATOR
Diana: "I assure you, Senator, it was a fake raid on the whorehouse and there was never any danger. Rest assured I've got your pandering needs well in hand..."
Nate: "Diana! I am here to tell you to get out of here!"
Diana: "The cutest thing is happening, I'll call you back."
Diana: "Nate, what is it this week?"
Nate: "I am going to expose you as a whoremaster! Get out of my business!"
Diana: "Okay, well, first of all I am your main financial backer. Problem one. Problem two, we've had tons of sex..."
Nate: "Don't threaten me with a good time!"
Diana: "...And thirdly, I am saying this from the bottom of my heart, please don't do this to me. I have gone through hell to make 'Diana Payne' a valid concept. I really am trying to be legit. And I have done a lot for you in that pursuit. Look, we make good friends and even better partners. Just chill out, please."
Nate: "Maybe. Maybe I just will."
VAN DER WALDORF
Blair: "Serena Goddamn van der Woodsen, have I got something to say to you!"
Serena: "Yeah, sorry. I was gonna tell you..."
Blair: "Dan Humphrey loves me too much! He turned down a Rome program out of loving me! And assuming I'll get back together with Chuck, of course."
Serena: "Can't blame him there. But yeah, Dan's trust issues and general Humphrey hatred of all women? I can speak about those subjects with fair expertise. Let's get coffee and you can tell me all about how the love of my life is ruining himself over you. That sounds awesome."
Blair: "No, you were about to tell me something else. And don't bother lying, come on."
Serena: "Okay, well, I have been Gossip Girl for the past couple months."
Blair: "No wonder she was being so nice to me. And so generally inept. How did this occur?"
Serena: "Well, Georgina gave me this lapt..."
Blair: "-- Gotcha."
Serena: "Anyway, I really wanted to tell you, but it seemed important for plot purposes that I keep it a huge secret."
Blair: "I am mad at you. Not because you kept a secret -- I don't really care that much about other people's lives -- but I am mad because I could have helped you! Then it wouldn't have sucked so much, and I would have had power over mortals, and we could have been here in your witch-cave going Grey Gardens crazy together, which is clearly going to happen eventually anyway."
Serena: "...Huh. That went well. Let's go shopping? I guess?"
Blair: "Not really! But nice talk."
BART BASS HIDEOUT & EXPOSITION HIDEAWAY
Bart: "So anyway, Diana's other personality as a traveling sex gypsy meant she could move me around the globe at a moment's notice, going from safehouse to safehouse and sex party to sexy party. Until your own, unrelated car accident, when she smuggled me back into the country to donate blood to you."
Chuck: "Thanks for that, by the way."
Bart: "No problem."
Chuck: "I have... A lot of questions. Big ones, like my genetics or who my parents are at this point, but also small ones, like, why is your face like that? It's like you've been doing pushups. With your face."
Bart: "This one expression I'm always making is pretty much like doing pushups with my face. But the rest of it, you'll never know the answer. Because my mysterious enemy -- or one of my mysterious enemies, I should say, since this is the exact same Thorpe storyline from last year -- could still come after you. Or more importantly me."
Thugs in tuxes arrive, of course, to take Chuck away. He does not go gently, because I don't know if you know this but Chuck has some abandonment stuff. Mostly it's due to his mother dying and his father hating him and then dying and then his molester uncle kept coming back to ruin his life in creative ways and abandon him and then his mother came back to life and fucked up his life in other ways and then she wasn't his mother and then she went to Tibet and abandoned him then his other mother fucked his best friend and then his other father was his uncle and then his first mother went back to being his mother and then his first father came back from the dead and then abandoned him. Also because of Blair probably.
PRIVATE INVESTIGATIONS
Chuck: "Andrew Tyler, the only private investigator in the entire state of New York, once again I must call on you for help."
Tyler: "Oh my God, what now? You kids have so much drama all the time."
Chuck: "You know how everybody was always trying to kill my dad? There's another one that was also doing that."
Tyler: "Seriously? This again?"
Chuck: "Just do what I tell you."
Tyler: "No, it's too stupid. This is too stupid to waste my time on it. Me, the only private investigator in North America. Or alternately, I am lying and working for somebody else."
Chuck: "If you won't help me, I'll find someone else who can."
Tyler: "I'm guessing Blair Waldorf. Since I am the only private investigator that has ever existed in the entire Milky Way galaxy."
WALDORF/BASS
Dan: "Hey, Serena. Nice to see you wearing your version of clothes again. Listen, is Blair here? I want to tell her some news."
Serena: "No, she's shopping without me. I was just going to microwave some nachos and stare at Tumblr for seventeen hours straight if you wanna..."
Dan: "No, I don't like your company very much either."
Blair: "Oh man, Chuck. I can't hang out today, because Dan Humphrey is a tampon, but how are you doing?"
Chuck: "[Bart stuff, while looking gorgeous.]"
Blair: "Oh, snap. Let's go talk about it."
Serena: "Blair, what's up? I haven't talked to you in like five minutes, and Dan is here."
Blair: "Ugh, that guy. Listen, I'm with Chuck..."
Serena: "The fuck? You get back here. You are going to ruin this relationship."
Blair: "I know, but it's important. I have to do secret things with Chuck right now."
Serena: "No. Come home."
Blair: "Fine, you're right."
SPECTATOR
Secretary: "Sorry about that wait, but being Diana Payne is a full-time job. Leaning up against things, acting super weird..."
Blair: "Chuck, I have to go listen to whatever ponderous self-important thing Dan absolutely must tell me in person. We good here?"
Chuck: "Yeah. I'm good. Thanks for waiting with me."
Diana: "Hey, Chuck. Here to thank me?"
Chuck: "For what, keeping Bart a secret? Pretending to be my mom? Fucking Nate?"
Diana: "Well, keeping Bart alive. And pretending to be your mother to protect him. And Nate... Well, I guess I can thank you for that one."
Chuck: "Look, I'm not here to hug it out. I just want to know who my dad's afraid of, so I can wade into that scenario half-cocked and get myself shot in the abdomen again."
Diana: "Fine, I'm cool with letting you do whatever you want. But you're going to owe me bigtime."
EMPIRE
Chuck: "Offers to which they cannot say no, fast turnaround, scheming scheming money money."
Serena: "Hey, I just walked in here off the street like any random person can. Are you hungry?"
Chuck: "Yes, for liquor."
Serena: "Blair asked me to come check up on you. Or so the story goes."
Chuck: "That was nice of her, but since I'm a sociopath it's just irritating that she didn't come herself."
Diana: "Hey! I am also here."
Serena: "What?"
WALDORF
Blair: "Sorry you had to wait so long for me to answer your summons, but I have a kind of life. Or I mean, I'm trying to create one. That isn't all about a guy."
Dan: "No problem! Listen, about that. How would you like to abandon your world and the life you're creating, and come live in Rome as my personal pet?"
Blair: "That sounds tremendously unappealing, but maybe?"
Dan: "The only thing is we have to get you vetted today."
Blair: "When I fuck it up, then, the question is whether I'll know I'm doing it..."
Dan: "...And whether I'll figure that out. Yes."
EMPIRE
Nate: "You are everywhere! Chuck, why is Diana here?"
Diana: "Hey, little guy! Aren't you tough."
Chuck: "Nathaniel, a word?"
Chuck: "So I am going to set Diana up with a newspaper in the UK that's looking to be revitalized, like how she has done to The Spectator in nine out of ten storylines."
Nate: "But what about when I expose her as a procuress?"
Chuck: "You won't. That's part of the deal."
Nate: "But what about justice!?"
Chuck: "Just let it go, babe. You wanted her out, I got her out."
Nate: "But Lola and I are working on a scheme!"
Chuck: "And I'm sure it was a good one. But this way actually has a chance of working, so..."
WALDORF
Serena: "B, everything is crazy here! Nate's yelling at Diana, Diana's posing all over the place! It's so mysterious, it's drivin' me nuts!"
Blair: "Well, I can't tell you what's going on yet, but please tell me Chuck's mood when Diana leaves. That way I'll know if I'm needed."
Serena: "Okay, I guess. Hey, what was Humphrey's big news?"
Blair: "He wants me to go to Rome all summer. He doesn't want to breathe or live without me."
Serena: "Yeah, that sounds... terrible..."
Blair: "Yeah, but I spent last summer as Louis's sidekick. I just kinda..."
Serena: "A summer in Rome? That's my dream scenario! Henry James wrote a whole novel about it! Cybill Shepherd played me in the movie!"
Blair: "Yeah, but like it's going to be full of tourists."
Serena: "So? I am a tourist of everything. That's like my main thing you're jealous of. Are you sure this isn't about Chuck?"
Blair: "It's like the more sane I get, the less you fuckers want to hear it. No, it's not about Chuck!"
Serena: "But you have secrets with him, though. I do hate being out of the loop. It makes me feel irrelevant. And you know how Momma gets when that happens."
Blair: "It is a limited amount of time we have to keep this secret, I promise."
Serena: "If I had even the slightest concept of time, lots of things would be different."
EMPIRE
Lola: "Ugh, I see Diana's here. Is she going to take the offer?"
Nate: "Yes! And she's not being humiliated or anything!"
Lola: "Well, as long as there aren't other storylines we don't know about making that a necessity, I guess we can scheme against her some more."
Nate: "No, I have the sense that Chuck needs this to go down."
Lola: "Fine, but it wouldn't technically be breaking the agreement if it were me that fucked over this woman who hasn't ever really done anything wrong to either of us."
Nate: "You're right, Vanessa! Technically that wouldn't make me a bad person. And like, you already suck, so this pointlessly vengeful act doesn't really count against you either."
Lola: "Hey, being an expendable plot device has its advantages. And you know Rhodes Women are born soulless. Don't give it a second thought."
Nate: "I didn't give it a first one, to be honest. I'm still kind of stuck on that word justice. Isn't it weird? Justice. Justice. Justisssss. So weird!"
WALDORF
Dan: "So? Is this the part where you disappoint me and I go full-on hipster pussy right in front of you?"
Blair: "...I guess we're going to Rome."
Dan: "That's exciting! I love getting what I want. I'll just arrange everything."
Blair: "Yeah, you do that."
EMPIRE
Diana: "His name is -- get this -- Mason Nevins. He went to Hogwarts with your father, but then turned to the Mob so now he's a Mobster. He likes to fuck twins, also. Which is relevant because I am his whoremaster, so I can tell you when he's going to be meeting my hos, in secret, and you can blackmail him."
Chuck: "I guess you work with what you're working with."
Diana: "Hang on, I have somebody calling from the New York Times. Probably about my op-ed in the Spectator about how A.O. Scott is the worst fucking human alive."
NOLA: Lurking in Nate's bedroom, smug as fucking bugs in a rug.
Diana: "Marlene! Darling! Is this about A. O.? Because it's a fact, not an opini... Oh, you don't say. That's a weird thing to accuse me of, running an international traveling whorehouse, considering I'm just three years of age. Hang on?"
She snatches the ho appointment info out of poor Chuck's little hands and tells him he'll never use her ladies in his schemes again. Her feelings seem really hurt! Also her chances for building a legitimate life during this all-important toddler period of her new life.
Chuck: "What's up, dicks?"
NOLA: "Ummmm. Uhhhhh."
Chuck: "No, for real. What the hell?"
Serena: "Seriously, I really feel left out."
Nate: "She had to suffer consequences!"
Serena: "You guys, somebody better tell me what's going on."
Lola: "Sorry about your little 'business deal,' but this was personal."
Chuck: "I'll say. She's been protecting my father. She was helping me save his life."
Serena: "You mean Jack?"
Chuck: "I mean Bart. He faked his death, it's this whole thing."
Nate: "Oh, dude. My bad."
Serena: "Wait, Bart's alive? Nobody ever tells me goddamn anything!"
WALDORF
Blair: (Acting insane about the interviewer for the Rome program, but in a recognizably Blair way. Abusing Dorota, screaming about bone china, the usual.)
Dan: "See, I think it's just a formality to make sure neither of us are crazy?"
Blair, acting crazy: "And?"
Dan: "And you're acting crazy? Salman Rushdie broke up with Padma Lakshmi over there one year, it got pretty bad."
Blair: "I bet one thing they didn't do is use the term 'dating fatwa' at any point."
She's distracted by a 911 text from Serena about the many ways in which things at the Empire have gotten untenable, so she runs out of there with some obvious lies -- about how she needs to get gelato because of how it's Rome -- and one very important truth: Nobody likes pistachios. If you say you do, you're lying and you need to come clean. You're only as sick as your secrets.
EMPIRE
Serena: "So like, he didn't even tell Lily, obviously."
Chuck: "She was in the process of divorcing him anyway. Listen, this is all about how Lola is a meddling mean little urchin who has cost me my father."
Nate: "Hey, ease up! That is a completely accurate characterization of recent events!"
Chuck: "I just wish I knew some prostitutes, so I could still trap him. But I guess in the episode I don't."
Blair, appearing out of thin air: "Yes you do! Lola! We'll just tell her it's an acting job. Meanwhile, Nate, you go do the most complicated part of my plan, which is to convince Diana not to cancel that guy's ho appointment yet. Somehow."
Over at Spectator Of The Other Woman: A Pop Culture Blogazine, Nate overhears Diana planning on leaving town with Bart, and texts Chuck, who tells him to stall her. But, the question remains, how? What shiny thing can he dangle before the old cougar's eyes this time? Which of the sundry tools in his toolbox will he use? What on earth will he be whipping out of his repertoire?
SHIT GETS REAL
Lola: "Hey, I brought Ivy. Because of that conceit on this show where we look alike."
Ivy: "Hey guys. I just came because I am desperation personified."
Blair: "Cool. We still hate you, though."
Ivy: "Ain't gonna screw my pluck, no sirree! I like to pretend we're all friends!"
Serena: "No, I'll do it. We're actually related, so the twin thing would make some kind of sense. And Jesus knows I still despise Ivy for no reason. And besides, Blair, you need to get back to that 'thing' I don't want to mention in front of Chuck."
Blair: "The Rome thing? Ugh, but this is actually fun. Oh, you know what? Ivy, you can stay. Serena, I need you for a separate acting job. Trust me, you know the part quite well."
WALDORF
Italian Alumnus: "I too have been fooled into thinking you have talent."
Dan: "My uncontrollable awkwardness is making me tell you this whole story about how Blair went out to buy gelato and has not returned yet."
Dorota: "I also will be mugging and doing jazz hands to make everything weirder."
Italian Alumnus: "Americans make me tired. Also Dorotas."
Serena, sans gelato but wearing a headband (!): "Honey, sorry I'm so late! xo! Hello, I'm Blair Waldorf..."
Dan & Dorota: "Okay, we can work with that."
Gossip Girl: "Looks like S is BSing as B!"
Italian Alumnus: "Credit where it's due? That was a pretty good one, Extradiagetic Gossip Girl. In any case, where is my gelato?"
Well, that's marvelous. Also, potentially very sad. Also, I do not see this deviating from the "Serena loses her goddamn mind" vector at all. But yeah, this is good. Good stuff.
Cuddly Serena: "I wasn't hugely into Dan at first -- he's from Brooklyn -- and just couldn't stand him. For years! But now we are madly in love!"
Dan: "Not madly. Sedately. Intellectually. After the literary fashion."
Serena: "It's like a movie! We're like Brad and Angelina. After they got rid of lonely, miserable old Jennifer Aniston, I mean."
Dan: "There wasn't so much a Jennifer Aniston in this scenario..."
Serena: "The fuck there wasn't, my darling."
The Alumnus gets an urgent phone call and, after noting that Serena is a crazy person, leaves the room.
Dan: "Hey, crazy! What are you doing?"
Serena: "Blair was busy, she sent me. It's no big deal."
Dan: "She's with Chuck, isn't she."
Serena: "This part of you, I do not miss. But 'no'! Nothing could be 'further' from the truth! Let's say... Eleanor is here from Paris, I guess, so how about she's with her?"
Dan: "Well, tone it down."
Serena, acting nuts: "This is me toning it down. I'm only chewing on my hair, not ripping it out in flaxen fistfuls."
THE NEVINS GAMBIT
Blair: "Okay, sluts! I've got hooker dresses, I've got lacy rompers, I've got see-through undies, I've got handcuffs of course, every Good Girl has multiple pairs of those..."
Charlies: "Uh, you came prepared."
Blair: "Please, like this is the first time I've entrapped someone with prostitutes. As long as nobody tells you he's a high-ranking mobster you should be fine."
Charlies: "What if touches us? Our bodies?"
Blair: "Slap his hand away and say no! Treat him like the dog he is and he'll follow you anywhere."
Charlies: "You have strange ideas about men and women."
Blair: "You work with what you're working with. But they're pretty on target. Now, after you feel fully gross about yourselves, Chuck is going to burst in and get everybody murdered. So just wait for that, and you'll be fine. Got it? Just remember to get the clothes off before you cuff him. Trust."
SPECTATOR
Nate: "I came to bid a proper goodbye..."
Diana: "To my butt?"
Nate: "No, using words. Also, that Times lady is on her way and I'm going to explain your datebook code to her."
Diana: "Look, kid. This was my shot at being legit. I love this media concern, and I loved hanging out with you. I can honestly say I've never been happier. Not when I was a whorehouse madam, not when I was hiding ol' chicken-skin. Just running this company, doing whatever we do here, chilling with my little buddy."
Nate: "I don't believe you!"
Diana: "One thing I have never done is lie about how much I like you. And I am not lying here when I say I'm desperate to keep my new life that I'm just now starting to understand. Basically, you're keeping me here to humiliate me and take that away again."
Nate: "When you put it that way, how horrible!"
WALDORF
Alumnus: "Okay, you guys are cleared. I mean, this was just a formality frankly. Although it was nice talking to you."
Serena: "Yay! I knew you'd like me! Dan can't read people at all."
Dan: "Anyway, thanks for everything."
Eleanor arrives at the very elevator outside which they are hopping on their legs.
Alumnus: "You have a wonderful daughter! And I see where Blair gets her looks..."
Eleanor: "Well, thanks! Hello, Dan. Hello, Serena. I love how my house is this boomarang hobo camp in my absence. You guys are doing great things with your lives, huh."
Dorota: "Hello! Serena here!"
Eleanor's confused, but doesn't really care that much, and the whole thing nearly goes off without a hitch... Except Dan thinks Blair was with her mom, so of course he asks where she went, and Eleanor's like, "Um, I haven't seen her yet? But stop givin' a girl the third degree." So then it's less hitch-free, because the only thing better than judging one girlfriend is judging two of them, and nothing is better on this planet than getting up Serena's ass about something.
CHARLIES, ANGELS
Ivy and Lola have this amazing scene in the Nevins suite where they are trying out all these improvs of like, what would hookers do? Ivy does a "sexy" pose on the bed, and Lola stretches up against a column in the corner, and it's so cute and so funny, and finally they just crack up and start talking about when they were in acting classes together, back in Florida, and this is where they ended up. Lola throws Ivy an invisible orange and she fumbles the imaginary catch, I mean, it's the cutest thing. The suite is all glass, windows from here to there, so it's not only the lightest scene of the season, but also the lightest. It is pleasing in every way.
Knock-knock. They fluff their hair and take deep breaths.
Lola: "Okay. Break a leg or whatever."
But who walks in is... Andrew Tyler. Andrew Tyler, who is working for somebody else this week and can't help Chuck find Mason Nevins. Andrew Tyler, who is wearing the most thug suit of all time. Andrew Tyler, who makes me think all the Charlies are going to end up in shallow graves quite soon.
Tyler: "Are you Diana's girls?"
Lola: "Strip down to your underwear and get on the bed."
Tyler: "Uhhh..."
Ivy brandishes handcuffs and starts yelling about safewords, Lola's over here having some kind of a sex fit, and the whole time they're swaying like Robert Palmer girls, and Andrew Tyler is like What.
Tyler: "No, Chuck sent me. Mason is onto us and we're all in dreadful danger, so we gotta get you out of here! You can ride in my trunk, come on."
DOWNSTAIRS
Blair: "Chuck, why didn't you tell me you called off our scheme?"
Chuck: "I haven't talked to Andrew Tyler since he pretty much told me he was working for Mason Nevins at the beginning of the episode..."
Blair: "We got Charlies up there, man!"
Blair and Chuck run up to the suite, and of course it's empty. I don't know if they realize yet that they have just murdered all the Charlies.
WALDORF
Dan: "So Blair leaves for gelato, and then you say she's with Eleanor... What's really going on?"
Serena: "She's with Chuck. Obviously. This whole time."
Dan: "The thing is that she doesn't love me. That's why she doesn't want to go to Rome."
Serena: "I mean, she sent me here to make sure she could go, so I assume she has tender feelings toward you."
Dan: "I told her I loved her."
Serena: "Tell me more! Let's talk about this for a long, long time!"
Dan: "She didn't tell me it back. I've been tightening the thumbscrews ever since."
I am ashamed to say that I don't remember that happening. Probably it has to do with his hair. I was probably staring at the hair, and totally missed this particular cliché happening onscreen. How crazy is that? When did this happen?
Serena: "Do you not remember the horror of her and Chuck dicking around about that word? And then she went the other way and committed to Louis too soon? What do you think all that gaywad 'I've given my heart to someone' stuff means? She says that crap constantly."
Dan: "I just need her to say exactly the words I want her to say, at the precise moment I want her to say them, and without telling her what I'm thinking."
Serena: "You are your own antidote, my friend. I could not be happier for you two right now. In any case, this is a particularly important thing going on. Like, life or death. So don't pull the Chuck card yet, or you will make it come true."
Dan: "You fucking Upper East Siders with your hyperbole."
Serena: "I know you mean 'women,' but whatever. This is literal. Bart Bass is alive."
Dan: "Huh?"
Serena: "Yeah. I officially have two of the worst stepfathers ever created."
HIDEOUT PLACE
Charlies: "Where's Chuck?"
Tyler: "I guess they're not here. I guess we should just hang out until we get killed."
Somebody's coming up the stairs and for a second I thought it was Mason Nevins, but it turns out to be Blair and Chuck, with those two heavies in tow, as well as Bart. Long story short, it was Andrew Tyler that helped set up Bart's accident; not because he is Mason Nevins, but just because he was gathering intel for Bart and Nevins figured it out, and threatened his family to turn him. Tyler explains all of this, and then Lily's cops jump out from behind the couch and drag him away.
Chuck: "So the cops know you're alive, huh? You're officially not dead?"
Bart: "Here is your first hug of your whole life."
SPECTATOR
Secretary: "Hey, is Diana around? The Times lady is here..."
Nate: "Aw, they just missed her. Not sure what that's about, but probably not because she is a traveling bard of hookers."
You're a good man, Nathaniel Archibald. You screw around and waste incredible amounts of everybody's time, and something dire is going on with your face, but other than that, I find you to be tops.
VAN DER WALDORF
Serena: "Man, this tea is good. Because it is straight liquor."
Blair: "Hey, just sitting around drinking I see."
Serena: "Yeah, until one of you bastards takes that away from me too."
Blair: "Anyway, sitrep. Bart Bass is officially alive, so that'll be weird."
Serena: "I guess I should ask if Ivy and Lola are okay."
Blair: "They did a great job, you'd be proud. If you didn't hate them both."
Serena: "Yeah, they'll live."
Blair: "Oh, and I guess you got me into the Rome program. So I hope they like my version of myself as much as they liked yours."
Serena: "I also volunteered you to teach English."
Blair: "That's fine. I love you, Serena."
Serena: "I love you too, Blair."
Whew. Thanks. Cheers for that.
Serena: "Speaking of which, though, how about that Dan, huh?"
Blair: "Ugh. I'm not ready. I want the time I say that to be the last time. We are something like twenty, after all, so it's understandable that I would think that."
Serena: "Are we? Time flies when you're me."
HIDEOUT PLACE
Chuck: "Are you coming home? Is it going to be like when the Captain would pay Xbox with us in his underwear all day and smoke pot?"
Bart: "With Tyler's confession I'll be able to show my pork cracklins serial killer face again."
Chuck: "Why would you want that?"
Bart: "I gotta say, I'm proud of how you took control and fixed my whole problem in like four hours. You've bested me on the field of manhood and earned my approval."
Chuck: "It's possible I'll never rape anybody again, now that you've said that. I'm a simple soul. Hey, what about your bigamist wife?"
Bart: "When I fake-died, a lot of shit was going on."
Chuck: "Maybe instead of fake dying, we could try therapy time?"
Bart: "We are new money, after all."
EMPIRE
Lola: "So hey, where did Diana go? Out the window, or what?"
Nate: "No idea. But now we can just chill and kick rocks or whatever."
Diana text: "Thx again, love."
Aww.
DUMBO
Blair: "Okay, so there are like five hotels we have to stay at while we're in Rome..."
Dan: "Validate me one more time. Because I know that Chuck's whole life just got flip-turned upside down again, and..."
Blair: "His. Not mine. This is mine."
Dan: "I need you to confirm for me, in words of your choosing, that I'm not passive-aggressively forcing you to agree to this Rome trip."
She actually holds onto the sides of his face at this point.
Blair: "I, Blair Waldorf, being of sharp mind and rockin' body, do solemnly swear that -- just this once -- you're not emo-torturing me into doing whatever you say. I want to go to Rome. I want to spend the summer by your side. I want to create a spreadsheet of restaurants, because 30 days times three months times three meals is 270 restaurants. This is how I maintain control of myself."
They kiss for a second, and it's great, but then suddenly he remembers that his father is married to a widow who is not a widow. Blair opts out of going -- Where is Rufus these days, even? Somewhere drunkenly offering to tell people his thoughts on the Magnetic Fields if they buy him a microbrew -- on that little field trip, but everybody is very happy, and very beautiful. Even Humphrey's hair has lost a lot of the Pennywise factor.
VAN DER WALDORF
Dorota: "Miss Serena you seem no crazy no more."
Serena: "I guess the intervention worked. I forgot how great this show is when Blair and I are actually interacting. I'm on cloud nine right now, little lady."
Gossip Girl: "Oh, is that right?"
Oh wow, this is nasty. So Gossip Girl -- in long-promised retaliation, of course, as well as amid complaints that she's been too nice to S and B lately -- uploads an artfully censored page from Blair's diary about how she knew Dan was about to give her the three words, and she was freaked out about it. Right, but the kicker is that she claims they were sent by one Serena van der Woodsen, which would have happened right around that time that made no impact on me where he said those three words.
I'm glad it's almost finale, or I'd go Blair on myself trying to figure out when this all went down, but as it is: Right around the time Serena started going crazy, I'd imagine, Blair started getting the wet-eyes from Dan, and Serena took time off from destroying Lola to go after B a little bit. Thanks revoked. But, admittedly, this is good in a different way: The part under black bars, it would seem, includes the information about whom Blair really is in love with... And it's not Dan, I don't think. Blair stares at her computer, and Serena sits at the bottom of the Waldorf stairs, in a beautifully composed shot, feeling like hell. The end.
WEEK
Chuck gets his ring back from Harry Winston, because Blair is still in love with him. Dan spins out into crazy, and there's a reprise of the Shepherd Wedding Scenario -- we can only hope Serena kills somebody else afterwards -- which causes Blair to come gunning for Serena directly.
On the one hand, their friendship is more important than running through another BS war. But on the other hand, Dan was always going to be the Kryptonite, and this has all been a lovely respite from a very scary storm that I feel like we'd just gotten lulled into thinking would never come. The threats and warnings about this triangle have been going on since the whole Juliet/Damian thing, I mean, it's not a shock.
But it's also not, necessarily, a bad thing. Whether this war takes all season, or gets wrapped up in the finale a few days from now, I know it's going to feel just as good either way when it ends, because they're the OTP and because they've never fought about this actual thing. They've fought about a lot of shit in their time, but it's never actually been about how much they love each other -- not since Season One, which was just a way of introducing everybody anyway -- which kind of makes this the one storyline the show actually needed to do at some point, I think.
I mean, I can see my way to complaining about the show pitting its two female leads against each other, because bitches always be fighting or whatever, but that stupid idea is exactly as real as you want it to be, and this show -- any drama -- is about solving conflicts. So let them solve this conflict. It's not really about Dan, anyway. It never was.
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps Gossip Girl, The Good Wife, Pretty Little Liars and True Blood for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, on Twitter, and on Facebook. IRL work appears in BenBella's SmartPop series of anthologies, most recently A Friday Night Lights Companion and Fringe Science.