What a dizzying, satisfying blur! For all the trampling over established plot, the bringing up old mythology only to mess with it, the retconning left and right of things established as recently as last week, somehow the pace and vigor of the performances made this one more than the sum of its parts.
In a smart bookending sequence, Serena and Dan want to make amends with everybody before they announce their romance, so they waddle on into everybody else's storylines with their usual blowsy, idle aplomb. Since she's cool with everybody at this point, S focuses on Blair, and fakes a photographic kiss with Steven to convince Sage (for the third time) to become the Waldorf It Girl.
Apparently the monarchy of UES prep schools has given way to Mob rule, as we learn when Sage summons the Dons of the five top schools and orders them to attend Blair's pop-up fashion debut. After a brief interim -- giving Serena and Blair just enough time to break up and then make up again -- Sage's anger at the ruse is trampled by the Girl Dons' authentic love of B's fashion, and even Nelly Yuki touts BxWaldorf as a success.
Dan's amends involve a trip to the Empire to apologize to Chuck and Nate, who send him on a fact-finding mission to DUMBO, where he confirms that Ivy has the Sudanese Documents while making amends with Rufus. Eventually -- after spotting her with a strange man -- Rufus kicks Ivy out and steals the documents for Lily (the woman who just last week explicitly called him a whore but now is like whatever) and, in the episode's most brutal scene, Lily destroys them in front of Chuck, ending the whole oil embargo caper (hopefully, for good) but also pulling the biggest Mom Switcheroo of a life chock full of Mom Switcheroos.
This, coupled with the fact that Bart has pulled the trigger on his Nate blackmail scheme, puts Chuck down a well of loneliness that only gets worse when he explains to Blair that their Powerful Women plan to be together will now never come to pass, because he was fated to be the failure all along. His only real mother and his only real boyfriend have betrayed him, the Feds think he's a joke, and he will be eating many worms in the days to come, so once again they have to break up FOREVER AND EVER. B runs off crying, can't enjoy her night's success, etc., but you know homegirl hangs onto that motherfucking ring.
And who is Ivy's mystery man? Why, William van der Woodsen, the only person I forgot to mention when listing her possible co-conspirators last week. Turns out she's in love with him and they're working together* -- at Lola's request -- to bring Lily down. Stupid girl doesn't realize he's still looking to get back together with Lily, and has no more interest in taking her down than Chuck does, but at least Ivy doesn't have to live with the shame of hanging around Rufus anymore.
*(...So I guess the whole Rufus thing is what you'd call a Long Con? Since it had no real goal until the Sudanese Embargo bullshit fell in their laps? The old "Help Rufus Open An Art Gallery For Like Six Months & Then Buy Some Art All Bitchy While Dressed Like Magenta From Rocky Horror Shanghai," as they called it back in the day. Kind of like how getting Aunt Carol control of Lola's trust fund involved developing multiple personalities and spookily transforming into Serena. But I mean, Poppy's big scam was about building space satellites for African children, so.)
There's a complicated bit where Ivy tries to pit Chuck and Bart against each other to see who can destroy Lily better, but you know Chuck wouldn't hurt Lily and there's no telling if Bart's even serious about divorcing her either. Ivy tries to manufacture a sex scandal -- making her the conquistadora of, count 'em, three of Lily's husbands -- but in the end a half-naked Bart Bass just threatens to beat her to death, so once those papers are destroyed this newest, grodiest couple of cons skip town. All I know is, playin' with Doc is how girls end up dead, in mental institutions, or dying of pretend cancer, so she better put on some damn clothes and run...
...Which brings us back to Dan and Serena, blithely comparing notes, completely blind to everyone else's misery: B's a hit but can't enjoy it, Nate and Chuck suffer in separate blind-drunk rages... But something about the way Dan hisses "I'm writing the Serena chapter" when Georgie calls makes me wonder if he doesn't have a few more tricks up his v-neck. I guess we'll see. My money is, reliably, on him being an asshole in some way. I'm gonna let that one ride.
Week: Having made amends, Dan and Serena assume everybody else is cool and they invite them to Thanksgiving (a couple weeks late). I'm assuming it doesn't go well -- Nate punches Dan, which will be nice to see -- but one wonders just how long Peepers and Doc will stay gone. Three episodes left, and apparently the finale's a doozy.
PREVIOUSLY
A high-stakes game of art auctioneering left Ivy with the Sudanese Documentation that will bring Bart Bass down once and for all, and we learned that her mysterious co-conspirator would be arriving soon. Nate fudged some revenue numbers to get a loan extension, which was secretly being cosigned by Bart anyway. Blair and Chuck were equally boned in their attempts to best their parents, or so it seemed, but at the last moment Blair's OCD and BPD formed a truce. Oh, and Dan and Serena and ugh. We accept the love we think we deserve, as the ubiquitous marketing for a teen emo movie recently mentioned, about a bajillion times, unceasingly and on every device in this entire house.
EMPIRE/PRADA
Old Farty Barty flips Chuck's sparsely decorated suite, which seems awfully basic for ones such as they, but whatever. Even Monkey is offended. On the upside, though, it doesn't take too long because all he has is like, that one safe that he keeps everything in all the time, which is like the only place I would even look, that couch by the window that he and Nate sometimes prop themselves up in of a morning, and a pool table for drunken billiards. And windows for abusing, of course.
Meanwhile, Dan and Serena are in her bedroom at home, having presumably just fucked or else that's just what is going on with their hair this week. This is the caliber of conversation we are dealing with:
Lonelyboy: "Wow, this is amazing. Really. And I'm not just talking about this espresso."
But we both know he's mainly talking about how amazing it is to have a place to sleep.
Lonelyboy: "I just wish we could go outside without all that attention I'm constantly begging for at all times."
Serena: "The ongoing nature of your face-heel turn where you keep screwing us all over and then wondering why everybody's mad at you is looking more and more like an extreme contrivance to isolate us both and get us together for the finale. Perhaps we should announce our love that everybody already knows about."
Lonelyboy: "But it's a secret! A secret everybody already knows about."
Serena: "Then let one more contrivance rear its head. You will spend the episode involving yourself in Chuck's storyline to no real purpose, and I will fuck with Blair's life all episode, and then we can meet back here and discuss how great things are for nobody except us."
Lonelyboy: "Yes. Amends, and then you will buy me things."
Chuck calls for maid service, I guess because of the non-mess his father has made of his empty scary apartment, but maybe it's a code? Because he goes, "On second thought, send all the maids you have!" like he's actually talking about guys with guns.
Bart: "Is it in that safe where you keep things? Because I guess you changed the combo from your mom's birthday, probably to your other mom's birthday. But you have so many of those we could be here all day."
Chuck: "Misplace your Viagra again? Or is this the Sudanese paperwork?"
Bart: "It's not even papers! It's some other form of documentation! Gotcha!"
At this point Ivy just wanders the fuck on in there.
Ivy: "Sorry to interrupt this riveting oedipal showdown, but I think I have what you're looking for. I couldn't help but overhear your entire conversation, thanks to the Lovecraftian chaos that is the acoustics on this show."
CENTRAL PARK
Nate tracks down that loan officer guy, who is also the business manager for every single business on this show. Or maybe they're both just running in the park, because that's mainly what Nate is about.
Nate: "You know how people always tell you to bet on yourself? Well, that's what I did, and I just need someone else to bet on me, too."
Boyer: "None of those things are true. People only said that to make you stop smoking pot and go to college. If any of the kids on this show were betting on themselves, they would be in school instead of doing literally everything else they can think of."
Nate: "Well, it's too late for that now. I just can't believe you'd think my newspaper or whatever it is would be a risk, after all that time I've spent driving it repeatedly into bankruptcy and getting bailed out by rapists and madams and leathery men from beyond the grave."
Boyer: "Fine. I'll call your investor and tell him it's time to start blackmailing you."
Nate: "You're so awesome, thanks."
ATELIER
Speaking of people who are constantly being handed amazing opportunities for them to poop on, Blair's latest thing is a pop-up shop for the "B" line that's being cosponsored by Barneys New York.
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Blair: "We are not friends! Oh my God, we have broken up in every single episode this season, you idiot!"
Serena: "Yeah, but like I'm really sorry this time."
Blair: "You deflowered my boyfriend on the bar at the Campbell Apartment and then set off to murder a man. This latest time, you taped yourself fucking my boyfriend on that exact same bar, and ran off to get your own self killed. At what point..."
Serena: "I said I was sorry, Blair. God! Look, I'm just going to sit here until you forgive me. It's the least I can do. Literally."
Nelly Yuki just wanders the fuck on in there and begins bitching at Blair practically in mid-sentence.
Nelly Yuki: "I am clearly Gossip Girl, and your fashion is for the birds."
Blair: "I believe in myself! And in my weirdly militaristic slut-student fashions!"
Serena: "I feel like this is really about me."
EMPIRE
Ivy: "The way all of you were shitting yourselves at that auction I ruined, I knew there had to be Sudanese documentation of some sort hidden in that painting, just like in that movie Traffic. And guess what, it was! It was a 'microfilm', like we're spies from the '80s over here."
Basses: "We will give you money! We will menace you!"
Ivy: "All I want is to ruin Lily's life, like she tried and failed to do me last year."
Basses: "Is that seriously your motivation for all this? That's ridiculous. Almost as ridiculous as your hip-cocked posture in this scene."
Ivy: "Like I have ever made sense. Anyway, whichever one of you helps me ruin Lily gets the 'microfilm'."
ELSEWHERE
Ivy: "I'll see your daddy issues and raise you a crazy, Serena."
William van der Woodsen: "Yes, we are lovers."
Ivy: "If only I had seen this show before, I would know that this is really about you getting Lily back, and you're totally playing me just like I'm playing Rufus."
Wm vdW: "Anybody who would think sleeping with Rufus is the way to win is too stupid for anyone to ever love."
ATELIER
Blair: "Oh my God, what if Nelly Yuki was right? What if I have no idea what I'm doing and this attempt to be cool with the cool kids is the least cool thing?"
Serena: "I told you, this is all about me. Let's make Sage be the Waldorf It Girl, for the seventh episode in a row."
Blair: "Yeah, but didn't her dad dump you for being such an epic whore?"
Serena: "Let's just fake it so it seems like I'm back together with her dad."
Blair: "Yes, then Sage will randomly show up here begging to be my It Girl! It makes total sense!"
DR WM VDW
Ivy: "You know, I played Hedda Gabler in high school, but acting like I'm into Rufus when I'm really in love with you is the hardest role of my life!"
Wm vdW: "Yes, it's very interesting!"
Ivy: "What's interesting is how I'm taking you at your word that both you and Lola hate Lily as much as I do, which is why she's bankrolling this operation."
"This bizarre operation where I 1) pretend to be poor and 2) open an art gallery with Rufus -- insert cheap 'waffle' joke -- just in case months later I 3) pissed Lily off enough to 4) auction a painting 5) containing secret documents that 6) none of us knew about."
Wm vdW: "The important thing is that Bart and Chuck will now fight to see who can destroy Lily more, even though they're the only two people that even like her on this show, and they hate everybody else. What could go wrong?"
Ivy: "Cool. Now, let's go make out in public where anybody can see us, on this show that is about all of us being under constant surveillance."
Wm vdW: "We are very good at secret plans that don't make any sense."
At what point do you just have to call it and say, "Ivy is officially the most pathetic person on this show"? And who's going to notify Vanessa Abrams?
PRADA
Lily: "Just sittin' here getting drunk in all of my jewelry, how 'bout you?"
Bart: "I wanted to tell you all about this 'microfilm' right now. Yeah, apparently it's 'microfilm' that was in the Tightly Clutched Envelope."
Lily: "And now Ivy has it? That's some bullshit. What does she want?"
Bart: "To fuck you over."
Lily: "Good think Charles loves me more than anyone else on earth, or we'd really be in trouble."
Bart: "Are you sure?"
Lily: "Yeah. Somewhat more dubiously, maybe I should call Rufus and ask him to steal the 'microfilm' from Ivy."
Bart: "Yeah, that sounds like a smart plan you should definitely try."
EMPIRE
Nate: "Come on. We all know you'd never hurt Lily."
Chuck: "Lily has sporked me in outrageous fashion every episode this season. Maybe there's a way to fuck her over that is not actually fucking her over, but at this point, she'll probably find a way to dick that up too."
Nate: "Oh great. The third wheel."
Lonelyboy: "Hey guys, sorry about ruining your various businesses and constantly saying horrible things about you and your loved ones. Bygones?"
Chuck: "Fine. Just go rooting through your dad's shit."
Lonelyboy: "Betraying the people who love me no matter how many times I promise not to do it? That's totally my main thing."
ATELIER
Blair: "Well, if it isn't the ugliest little child prostitute in all the Upper West Side. Now, go fuck yourself and also do me a favor."
Sage: "As you can see from the bonkers clothing I wear in every scene on this show, I am very hip to nonexistent trends that look very horrible on a person."
Blair: "It's true, you look like Blossom fucked Shannen Doherty most of the time. But right now, I need you to..."
Sage: "What, wear your clothes? Like I do every single week? And then every single week manage to burn you in the most obvious way possible? You're on."
Blair: "Okay, take off your Delia*s clothes from twenty years ago and go to hell and put these clothes on. Oh, and I need one other huge favor, you worthless little shit."
Sage: "Fine, I will summon the heretofore unmentioned-in-six-seasons Heads Of The Five Most Powerful Private Schools In Manhattan. That you created, on this show, and that has never once come up, on this show."
SOME PARK
Rufus: "Lily, I only came here to act scornful and shitty and judgmental as usual, so let's get to it. The fact that you actually called me a man-whore gives me actual ammo for once."
Lily: "So there's this 'microfilm'..."
Rufus: "Go fuck yourself! Humphrey out!"
Lily: "Well, that didn't take long."
WM VDW
Ivy: "That was some good breakfast! Now, let's make out in public before I go meet Chuck."
Wm vdW: "That sounds reasonable."
They make out in public, where just anybody could see them. Just anybody does.
Rufus: "Hey! That looks like Ivy, kissing an old man. Gross! ...Oh, wait."
SPECTATOR
Bart: "Hey, buddy!"
Nate: "Get the fuck out of here, you old goat! I am trying to ruin my company and go to jail!"
Bart: "Turns out that I am your mysterious lender, and I want you to help me win this race to the bottom that Ivy Dickens set up."
Nate: "How could I have seen this coming? Other than the fact that this exact same thing has already happened three or four times?"
A BEVY OF BITCHES
It's dumb and out of place, this conceit about the Dons of the Five Schools. This is the kind of thing we were just lamenting, that the show is no longer like this, so how weird is it that the show itself is like, "Remember when the show was like this?" Blair gives them a ton of shit and they look at her like the obnoxious old woman she is, and she calls herself Regina Emerita and it's all super annoying and there's all this made-up mythology about how it all works and whatever.
Like, they've traded from monarchy to styling themselves after the Mob, for no real reason, and this is to show the passage of time -- like when Jenny would do her punk rock nightmare princess stuff -- and it's old-school and whatever, but the show has been ruined for far too long for this to be cute now. It would have been really cool maybe even like three years ago, but now it's just... a mimeograph of a 'microfilm'.
In the end Sage -- who is the Queen of Constance, another thing that wasn't true until this episode decided it was -- gets like her one boon or something and all the Dons agree to attend the pop-up event, because ... somehow ... this will break up Serena and Steven.
Serena and Steven, whom she thinks are back together because she saw it on Gossip Girl, the website she doesn't read because she doesn't find it relevant.
SPECTATOR
Nate: "If the choice is between screwing over Nathaniel and keeping my magazine thing, you can have it. I don't even know what it is, or how to be the CEO of it."
Bart: "Ah ha, that's why I hypnotized you into faking those numbers by looking you in the eye and telling you to fake those numbers. Now you are in legal trouble and must do what I say, or risk being just like your father. He was, himself, hypnotized into doing just the same thing, only by coke instead of by me."
Nate: "We Archibalds are some bullshit."
Bart: "It's the Vanderbilts you need to watch out for. You don't want to embarrass them."
Nate: "That's true. After my father went to jail, and then Tripp faked that guy drowning that time, and then Tripp again with awful Maureen, and that time I dated Vanessa Abrams, and then Tripp and Serena and the wolves, and the time Juliet got my dad shanked in prison or whatever that deal was, and then the time Tripp tried to kill me and ended up driving Blair Waldorf insane, or how I keep punching my dad in public every time I see him, it just wouldn't do to make the Vanderbilts look bad. My mother couldn't handle it, she's still wandering the Hamptons grazing on ornamental shrubs and sneaking sips from perfume bottles as it is. We have a heritage to maintain."
Bart: "So we understand each other."
DUMBO &C.
Chuck: "All right, you donkey. Give me the 'microfilm' and I'll reverse-pickpocket it onto Lily's person at the pop-up fashion shoppe cosponsored by Barneys New York, where the Feds will find it on her."
Ivy: "That sounds just as likely as every other scheme this season. You're on."
Rufus: "Dan, why are you going through my shit? Don't we hate each other?"
Dan: "Yeah, I wanted to say I'm sorry for being a disgusting, worthless person."
Rufus: "Son, you do realize that when you apologize for something, you're implying you won't immediately do it again?"
Dan: "In six seasons I have not figured that out. And this season, it's the opposite of my every action. So no."
Rufus: "Well, as it turns out today is your lucky amnesty day. Can you believe that a hot blonde 20-year-old with a body like that was only using me?"
Dan: "Really? To what end? How on earth could her dating you since last season possibly have lead to this?"
Rufus: "Just work with me. I saw her kissing an old man who was not me, after Lily told me she stole some kind of 'microfilm' or some shit..."
Ivy: "Hi, honey! I'm home!"
Rufus: "You know how I love getting pissy with women and only women, because I am utterly impotent and devoid of masculinity?"
Ivy: "It is the Humphrey way. What's this all about?"
Rufus: "I saw you kissing an old man who was not me! Get the fuck out of my house! And take some but not all of your money with you! And leave all the things you bought me!"
Ivy: "This is my crying face. It is a lie."
Dan: "Is that the 'microfilm' sticking out of your purse? I could grab it, but I don't guess I feel like doing that right now. I'm just going to go."
POP-UP PERPLEXITIES
Blair: "Serena, you were right! Everything is about you. Let's get to that pop-up fashion shoppe cosponsored by Barneys New York so we can see whether or not this latest dumb plan of mine will work!"
Serena: "What else are best friends for?"
Sage: "Don Brearley, my father is miserable with heartache. I don't think he is really back together with Serena. So that means, somehow, that we are going to sabotage the pop-up fashion shoppe cosponsored by Barneys New York."
EMPIRE
Dan: "You know how I'm generally useless? Well, I didn't find any 'microfilm' in the loft. And then I saw it sticking out of Ivy's purse, and I just kind of let that slide and wandered back over here to Manhattan. On the other hand, things are going great with my dad!"
Chuck: "I'm glad to hear it, Daniel. Good thing you are not actually integral to my plan at all, and I'll be meeting Ivy at Blair's pop-up fashion shoppe consponsored by Barneys New York tonight, where she will give me the 'microfilm' to plant on Lily's person."
Dan: "Will Lily even be there? And would you ever do that?"
Chuck: "Absolutely not, I love that lady. Thanks for all your help, though. It completely rules out the 99 totally awful things you have done so far this season."
Dan: "Even though the latest in my lifelong series of love letters to you disguised as thinly veiled roman à clef was actually intended to ruin your relationship with Blair?"
Chuck: "Nothing you do matters. You are a poor person. Thanks for trying and failing to help, though."
WM VDW SUITE
Ivy: "Bart, you're calling too late. I have already struck a deal with your nemesis!"
Bart: "I know all about it, Ivy. I have an informant. And in fact, the whole reason he made you schlep all the way to the Empire and back to DUMBO again was so Dan would have time to search the loft."
Ivy: "What is the world coming to when you can't even trust Chuck Bass to calmly accept being extorted for nonsensical reasons? And who is your informant!?"
Nate: "It's me, Nathaniel Archibald? I think we dated, possibly."
Look, can I just take a minute to point out that literally none of this would be happening if Bart Bass hadn't once seen fit to commission an oil painting of a horse that he later murdered? I just want you to think about that. I cannot make heads or tails of this Ivy/Lola/William plan, or even who is involved or what they thought would happen.
I want to say maybe Lola is not even involved, except we have seen Ivy talking to her in vague terms about this mysterious agenda they have, so now you have three people who want to take down Lily: Ivy for risible but just-barely okay reasons, Lola for vague Humphrey reasons of hating the UES, and William who presumably just wants Lily to be his wife again and there is nobody left to inject with pretend cancer. None of these are great reasons, but it gives everybody something to focus on. Fine.
I mean, sure: Lily has become the nexus of the show mainly by marrying everybody on it, so it makes sense for her to be the Macguffin of all this hustle -- even though honestly the only person who should have a grudge against her is Serena, because Lily actually doesn't really do bad stuff -- and the main target can't be either of the two leads, because it's the last season and that would be unbalanced if it were all about Serena, like the Juliet thing, or all about Blair, like the ten billion years of Printh Louie. The major scheming this year had to be about Lily, I can accept that.
But so Will and his bastard daughter give Ivy an infinite number of funds -- which she does nothing with -- and she moves in with Rufus so she'll have access to Lily's secrets -- which she does nothing with -- and they open an art gallery, which Ivy pays for? (While making sure Rufus hates Lily enough not to pity her later, I'll grant that part of the plan works for all the players, even though it amounted to Ivy just calling her a bitch over and over until Rufus started to agree with her, like a brainwashing victim.) Then there's an art auction for reasons that have nothing to do with any of this, which results in a painting that was not supposed to be auctioned off but that happens to have 'microfilm' attached to it that nobody knew about, and also Will has been sleeping with Ivy this whole time, the better to keep her in play... I mean, what is any of this?
POP-UP FASHION SHOPPE COSPONSORED BY BARNEYS NEW YORK IN ASSOCIATION WITH WALDORF DESIGN'S NEW "B" IMPRINT FOR TEEN BITCHES WHO WANT TO LOOK LIKE SCARY OLD LADIES FROM A DYSTOPIA
Sage: "Blair, the good news is we showed up. The bad news is, we are going to hate your clothes, because we have even worse taste than you do and because Serena's laughably stupid plan was characteristic of Serena's every plan."
Nelly Yuki: "I have to go interview those mean teen girls from the five major prep schools at this goat rodeo of a fashion line that has been discredited at least three times in the last three weeks. That's the kind of thing WWD readers can't get enough of."
NASTY DEN OF IVY
Wm vdW: "How do you know he couldn't tell it was me?"
Ivy: "He wouldn't have left that out of his bitching, and also he is old and can't see so well. The good thing is that now I don't have to invent a reason for breaking up with him. Not that I would have to, because he is Rufus Humphrey and the uncountable reasons to not date him dwarf any possible reason you actually would."
Wm vdW: "Well, as long as he still hates Lily. If he takes her back once she hits bottom, it's all for naught! We need her at her absolute worst if I'm ever going to throw you over for her. If she gets back together with him -- if they are both that sad and desperate -- I'm screwed."
Ivy: "So what you're saying is, we are in true love."
Wm vdW: "Just don't fuck this up with Bart, okay?"
POP-UP SHOPPE
Feds: "Where's this Ivy girl with that 'microfilm'? Why are you dicking us around? We're leaving, Chuck."
Chuck: "Man, what is the world coming to when you can't even expect Ivy Dickens to wander into an obvious trap."
Blair: "Well, everything on my end is going shitty."
Chuck: "Yes, it's all about you."
Blair: "What I need is for Sage to be the It Girl for Waldorf Designs."
Chuck: "Isn't she like right over there? Or did she see through Serena's incredibly naïve and stupid ruse?"
Blair: "Yeah, I better go get Serena to help. She's always so competent and helpful all the time."
Chuck: "I have to go. Let's keep believing in each other and that love will triumph."
Blair: "Duh. Like I'm doing any of this in my own interest."
IVY DICKENS' DEN O' DICKIN'
Bart: "Fine, I'm divorcing Lily. Where is the 'microfilm'?"
Ivy: "Hang on while I take off all my clothes."
Bart: "Wait, what?"
Ivy: "I am full of surprises today. You're going to have to do better than just divorcing Lily, considering she's gotten divorced more times than she's gotten married."
POP-UP SHOPPE
Blair: "For no reason whatsoever, I am now going to scream at you for a million years and accuse you of sabotage!"
Serena: "You are fucking exhausting."
Blair: "I know, can you help me? You asshole?"
Serena: "No. But here are some platitudes about how you can do anything if you just believe, instead."
Blair: "Thanks, you're the best friend a lunatic could ever want. I especially like the way you are so oblivious that you don't even notice me constantly being truly awful to you in the grip of my medically relevant mood swings."
Dons: "...Actually we love these clothes!"
Sage: "But I thought we were going to fuck everything up here!"
Dons: "Sadly, no. This creepy fashion of the past is the fashion of our creepy future."
Nelly Yuki: "This is so newsworthy!"
Blair: "Even Nelly Yuki has randomly swung over to my side? Everything's comin' up dinner."
SOME BAR
Charles: "Nathaniel, I could really use your rent-boy charms right now, for I am super bummed out. So bummed out, in fact, that I have completely lost track of my storyline and am now just wandering around hotel bars instead of stopping Ivy from molesting my father for that 'microfilm.'"
Nathaniel: "Charles, I cannot muster more than a half-hearted dryhump. For you see, I have betrayed you to your father."
Charles: "Nathaniel, tell me from the beginning what has happened. I will sit quietly and listen to you puzzle it out from within your marijuana fog, while elsewhere my storyline in this episode is still going on."
FOR E.G.
Bart: "Fine, I'll fuck you. But I need that 'microfilm' first."
Ivy: "Oh, we're not actually going to have sex. Just pretend."
Bart: "What is your deal? Why are you like this? What are you even talking about right now?"
Ivy: "I want to take sexy pictures with you that make it look like we fucked, because I'm so unimaginative I think that making a checklist of Lily's husbands and fucking them will embarrass her. You'll be number three, so we're halfway there. Get undressed."
Bart: "You are a fucking idiot. Like anybody would care. Like any of this reflects poorly on Lily in any way. I can't believe you've spent this whole season thinking any of this matters. Give me the 'microfilm' and you have a deal. Because whatever, this whole thing is stupid, but at least I won't have to kill you today."
Chuck: "-- Ivy, don't do this! Don't have sex with my dad!"
Bart: "Too late, we already did. You should see your face right now."
PRADA
Lily: "Rufus? What the fuck are you doing here? Pull up some floor, I'm having a 'wine picnic' on the floor. Well, it didn't start out on the floor, but..."
Rufus: "Lily, I have some 'microfilm' here for you. Turns out the only thing I love more than hating you is yelling at women and giving them their just desserts."
DICKENS
Ivy: "Oh my God, you guys. This is so weird, you're gonna laugh, but the 'microfilm' is like totally gone. The Envelope is empty."
Bart: "You know that I will actually murder you, right?"
Chuck: "He will. Maybe I will too."
Ivy: "Yeah, all right. Let me think of who might have stolen it. I'm completely irrelevant to everybody else's life on this entire show except for Rufus, so it's gonna be a short list."
PRADA
Rufus, verbatim: "Since when did you start spiking your chamomile?"
Lily, verbatim: "Oh, it's been a rough day."
These two. I tell ya.
Lily: "So what was it that tipped you off that Ivy was untrustworthy? Was it the way she was dressed at that auction? Because that was some Sage-level bullshit. Or maybe it was the time she impersonated our daughter's sister/cousin and made our son fingerbang her on Queller's desk while hollering Serena's name. Or maybe it was the time she popped out from behind my mother's casket and threw us both out on the street. Or maybe it was the time she let you get an ulcer about money while sitting on infinite funds and wearing leg warmers with shorts. Or the four times she has conspired to steal the Rhodes fortune, or the time she tricked Serena into buying her a house, or the time her boyfriend tried to kill everybody, or the time she dyed her hair and went undercover as my mother's nurse, or the time..."
Rufus: "Did you really never catch on to the fact that I'm into young girls?"
Lily: "The important thing is that we are family. And I am drunk. And we are best friends. And we have eleven children, including a secret one. And you brought me this 'microfilm' and I am drunk, also."
Dan: "Oh, shit. Are you guys back together? And what does this say about my relationship with Serena? And will I still be able to live here? Mostly the last one."
Rufus: "I was just bringing Lily something Ivy stole from her. It is called my dick."
THE STANDOFF
Bart: "Who is this loser that isn't calling you back?"
Ivy: "It's really not, like, that mysterious. Think about it."
(Lonelyboy: "Dear Charles, please come to PRADA where Lily has your documents. Love, Daniel.")
Chuck: "Fuck this, I'm out."
Bart: "Oh, gotta go take care of more of Blair's problems and act against your own interests like I'm always saying you do, but in fact you never do? And she always does?"
Chuck: "Yeah, whatever."
Bart: "I am literally going to kill you. How do you not understand this?"
Ivy: "Let's just stand here in our underwear for like a few more hours. I'm kind of at a loss."
POP-UP SHOPPE
Blair: "I am triumphant! My clothing has sold out, to teens! I sure hope this show doesn't kick me in the box like it always, always does whenever anything nice happens."
Serena: "Hang on while I give you the longest speech about how great you are, even though you've been a complete monster to me all episode and pretty much my entire life."
Blair: "You know what, I am sorry. I totally get why you didn't want me hogging all the guys, and why Dair was a huge problem even though it's the best thing that has happened in the last three or four seasons. I mean, if you'd ever made the circle complete and fucked Chuck, I would have gone ten times as crazy as has ever happened."
Serena: "First of all, I would never. He is disgusting. What am I, Jenny Humphrey that I am going to sleep with my attempted rapist? And second of all, obviously I know that. Obviously, I know that I get dibs on Dan and you were just being an asshole about it."
Keep in mind during this part that Serena is wearing possibly her worst outfit of all time. It's like a sequin-covered black bandage bondage sheer dress that is fine from the boobs down, maybe a weird length but I would assume those legs are hard to dress in that way, but everything north of there is just like, Big Top Trapeze Icecapades. I don't even have words.
Blair: "You know, really this is your success too. The line was inspired by both of us, ruling Constance together. Actually, mostly by you, because you actually did cool stuff with your uniform instead of just tailoring it and jacking up a headband on top."
Serena: "That's so sweet of yo..."
Blair: "Anyway, enough about us. Let's get back to what's really important, which is how my entire life depends on my relationship with a man who treats me like shit most of the time. What is personal success or self-worth even for, without someone else providing you with a mind and personality and purpose?"
Serena: "You're right. It's all I've ever wanted for you, too. I'm so happy you may one day be worthy of his attention in any way."
Blair: "And I hope one day you have a boyfriend."
Serena: "Hee hee! Me too! It's a secret!"
PRADA
Chuck: "Lily, just give me that 'microfilm' and stop protecting him."
Lily: "He's my husband! He's the only one that ever looks out for me..."
Chuck: "Lady, all I do is look out for you. Literally that is what I am doing right now."
Lily: "I don't think you're hearing me. If you send him to jail, I won't have a rich husband anymore. It's kind of my main thing."
Chuck: "Fine. I just saw him half-naked with Ivy Dickens. Deal with that!"
Lily's response is to throw the 'microfilm' into the fireplace, which makes just as much sense as anything else. But it's in her words, what really matters here, as we swing back around to what the story should always have been about: "I'm not gonna let you, or anyone else, threaten our family ever again!"
"Our." It's that "our" that breaks him. "Our" family. There has not been a moment on this show, in six years, where the only safe place on the Upper East Side was anywhere but in the affection between Lily and her Charles. It started so early, I was thinking about this the other day, there was that early episode where she found him drunk in the courtyard of her building and was just like, "You're a funny drunk just like my daughter, you old so-and-so! You're like a little grownup!" and hauled him back inside, and it was like, "Of course they are the only people who can trust each other. They don't owe each other anything, and everybody else gets on their nerves." And this was before all the stuff about Chuck's moms, which is when the Lily thing really started to matter.
So you have a situation where we've been led to assume that, once again, Blair would lose and Chuck would win, and she'd crawl back up his ass like usual, and in fact it's going the opposite way. Very cool. But also this season has set it up to be about Chuck's daddy issues, with Bart coming back from the dead -- and it's the Mommy Thing, which I guess was inevitable, that's actually going to drive him crazy.
Isn't that neat? I like that. He fights his dad because his dad fights him, but that means that anything Lily does, he's unprepared for, because all he ever did was need her. And all she ever did was love him, in a way she couldn't spare for a single one of her other children. In its way, it's as dramatic a violation of the rules of the show as Blair taking Dan from Serena. Another nuke. And all she ever had to do is what a Rhodes Woman does best: That cold look that says I don't love you anymore. Devastating, every time.
WM VDW SUITE
I guess Ivy escaped from Bart's clutches, which is good because Will can't even bother to pretend to give a shit that she was just naked in mortal danger for like half the episode.
Ivy: "I'm doing okay, though. Mostly I'm pissed because Rufus took that 'microfilm' out of my purse, so our whole pretend scheme you don't even care about..."
Wm vdW: "-- Shut up. So Lily's still with Bart?"
Ivy: "Yeah, and I think he is going to kill me!"
Wm vdW: "Let's focus on shit that actually matters."
Ivy: "Look, I know we told Lola we'd destroy Lily..."
Wm vdW: "Yes, that was the plan all along."
Ivy: "But it's just too hot right now! Take it from a professional con woman from the hard streets of Florida, we gotta bug out. We gotta take the money and run and regroup! We'll be islands in the stream!"
Wm vdW: "I suppose I can pretend I don't want to throttle you for a little longer, sure."
He stares off into space as they embrace, thinking about throttling her.
SPECTATOR
Bart: "I just dropped by to point in your face and laugh all evil. Since Ivy slipped my grasp and Lily burned up all that 'microfilm' I don't really have a shitload else to do."
Nate: "(Quite the high-minded outrage, for a number-fudger.)"
Bart: "Oh, did you think I was done blackmailing you? I'm just getting started. Don't forget I also have a nefarious scheme we don't know anything about, which will ultimately prove Chuck's vindication. Until then, your ass is mine."
Nate: "My ass is always somebody's, I guess."
THAT BAR
Blair: "I won! I won fashion! Let's have a fête at the atelier!"
Chuck: "As insufferable and ill-deserved as that sounds, I'm afraid I can't ever be with you because Lily broke my heart and now I will never be a Powerful Woman like you."
Blair: "Uh, that works out, actually. Since your obsession with Bart was the only reason you wouldn't marry me to begin with. Can't we just say fuck it?"
Chuck: "Stop lying to yourself. I am a failure! Please. Just go. Do not look upon my monstrous visage! We are NEVER EVER EVER GETTING BACK TOGETHER."
She takes that ring the hell away from such pronouncements and runs off to cry and not be any fun at her party. But one wonders if she gets any comfort from the fact that they all say this exact thing to each other so very often that they're now having conversations about how they all say this to each other all the time. If it were me, I would think about that to the exclusion of all else. "On the one hand, quite a setback. On the other hand, if it walks like a dubious cliché and talks like a dubious cliché..."
BACK IN BED
Serena: "Whoo! Good thing we're oblivious to the misery of literally everyone else on this show, even though we were party to it. I'm a lot happier being here back in bed with you, having apologized eleven times to people who don't really deserve it."
Dan: "I'm just happy Nate and Chuck aren't mad at me anymore. Or my dad."
Serena: "Oh, do they count? Because they weren't even mad at me. How funny, we started this relationship thinking everybody was mad at both of us, but really I had just been dumped and my best friend is a volatile hag. Really the only person everybody is mad at is you, and for totally valid reasons."
Dan: "Go get me some champagne and try not to think too hard about reasons everybody including you should hate me forever and ever."
She does.
Georgina: "Dan, why do you keep disappearing on me?"
Dan: "I am writing the Serena chapter. Maybe for real and I am even worse than has been made previously clear, or maybe I'm just saying that and we're really back together. Maybe both, and when they publish the Serena chapter it'll hurt her even worse and I can act like that's weird, like I've been doing literally all season."
And so that's our status quo: Ivy is out of town at the moment, Nate and Chuck are at odds and Nate is still under Bart's thumb, Lily maybe finally broke Chuck forever, and Dan may or may not be playing Serena. All I know is, if Lily goes back to Rufus it would be better for Ivy to engineer her death.
WEEK
Thanksgiving, the traditional day of thanks, comes to the UES weeks late and a dollar short, as Dan and Serena decide to bring all these people who hate each other together for pie, recriminations, shocks, face punching, and maybe some Imogen Heap? Is that still a thing on this show?
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps Gossip Girl, The Good Wife and Homeland 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, his novel The Urges, and a novelette, "The Commonplace Book," appeared this fall on Tor.com.