A newspaper simply called Register -- which we can extrapolate to imagine the entire title of which is The Orange County Food Lion Supermarket Coupon Circular That They Throw In Your Bag For Free At The Register -- screams the headline "Newport's Man of the Year Behind Bars," below which is written the further explanatory "Millionaire Developer Embroiled in Scandal." Other headlines in this local daily rag include "Julie Cooper Now Entirely The Color Of A Tangelo" and the meta-media column, "O.C. Second Season Ratings Not Nearly As Bad As The Media Is Making Them Out To Be, Biased Sources Say."
The newspaper drops down and we discover that the hands holding it belong to Ryan "Chino? I Say Chin-yes!" Atwood, who is sitting in the pool house, reading the newspaper, just like all kids do before school. In walks Seth "Of Fresh Air" Cohen, who immediately makes his way to a mirror -- which, face it, if you were him, you'd do that exact same thing -- and asks Ryan, "Do you think I did the right thing? Cutting my hair?" Ryan points out The Register and tries to call Seth's attention away from the part about himself called all of himself, noting about Caleb, "He's in big trouble." Seth somewhat unsympathetically defines his grandfather's precarious situation as being "the creek with the no paddle," and then immediately returns to preening over his Jewfro gone terribly, terribly wrong. Because this week Seth is selfish and feels about his grandfather as most people of his generation feel about their grandparents -- that is, that they spin yarns of Depression-era morality and carry around dusty Velamints that they pull from their pockets and offer to your friends at totally the most inopportune times ever -- he actively shows zero interest in Caleb's plight, continuing on about the newspaper cover, "I was in that photo. I got cut out of it. Probably because of my hairdo." Because Ryan has upgraded to the smart kids room, he has also taken a crash course in slacker sarcasm, rolling his eyes and snarking, "I'm sorry to see you're so upset."
Seth, hilariously, continues to think this conversation revolves around his hair, prompting Ryan to note, "Looks like someone was way off the base, accusing you of making everything about you." But it looks like Seth Cohen is ready to take a heavy dose of conscience along with his Flintstone vitamins as part of this pre-school ritual, as he registers a concerned, dawning look and realizes, "My god. She is right." He goes on and on about how he was going on and on about his haircut, and all the while "[his] grandfather's in the cooler." He continues, "I'm like a monster. I'm all I think about. And not in a good way." He stands up and walks tantalizingly close to Ryan, requesting, "Talk to me about anything other than me." Ryan obliges, mentioning that this is his first day of AP Physics and that he's "actually kind of nervous," but Seth, see, reminds Ryan of the larger problem here, and asks if he really is that self-obsessed and generally insufferable. And I mean, to a certain extent it is true. He is adorable. But I'm glad I only know him on the TV. Ryan's silence provides as much of an answer as Seth needs, and he asks Ryan, "Why didn't you just tell me, then?" Ryan tries to explain that it's hard to get a word in edgewise, but, hilariously, is cut off in the process as Seth decides he has to be less selfish. "Less take, more give. Less pitching, more catching." And though we'd love to know who is pitching and who is catching in this relationship, Cohen, it's really none of our business. But let's just say I don't exactly see Ryan letting Seth do that much pitching to begin with. And he never lets him steal second. Because that would totally fuck up the metaphor. Ryan promises that he's used to Seth, and that Seth doesn't have to change just for Ryan, but Seth says he's only in it for "the greater good of man." Ryan accuses him of a secret agenda by which he's only playing selfless to get Summer back, but Seth promises, "Dude, I don't even want Summer back. Unless that is what she wants. In which case, that's not about me. That's about me supporting her." Ryan makes Seth admit that he just wants her back, but New Seth (which came after Crystal Seth, which did not look or taste anything like what the extensive marketing plan told us it would) tells Ryan to "wrap [his] head around the new Seth Cohen." Oh, Ryan will. And maybe he'll figure out exactly what "stealing second" means in this process. Ryan points out that Seth is taking about himself in the third person, and Seth responds as we might imagine he would: "How is Seth's hair right now?"
Opening Credits: Shut the living fuck up, Schwartzman. And, while we're at it, Brautbar, Farrar, Greenwald, and Robinson.
Sandy "Take My Wife...Please! But Also Remember That I Will Do Anything To Protect This Family Because I Love You All Very Much" Cohen drives and drives. He tells his passenger, Caleb "" Nichol that there's no need to thank him, and Caleb responds, "Mreh! I'm old! In my day, we didn't have prisons! We were hog-tied to the back of a moving vehicle and dragged around for twenty-five years to life while we thought about what we did and that's the way it was and we liked it!" I'm paraphrasing. Caleb rants on about the most "vile" and "inhuman" night he just spent in jail, and Sandy can't resist taking a non-sequitur swipe, "Coming from the guy who married Julie Cooper, that's saying something." Truly, that is a hilarious one-liner, and the script wants us to remind us of that through the power of Caleb's reply: "Aside from coming up with your hilarious one-liners, what's our move?" Yell at contractor, yell at wife, apologize to wife, eat bagel, overpronounce the word "shmear," care deeply for family. Because you've been indisposed, Caleb, for you I give you Sandy's six moves. No need to thank me, you dementia-ridden old coot. Sandy says that he needs to meet with "the partners" about Sandy's taking Caleb on as a client, as if he needs to approach some Evil Board Of Shadowy Figures for permission to proceed. Caleb reminds Sandy that he is rich and powerful, wondering why he wouldn't make the perfect candidate for representation, but Sandy reminds Caleb that besides being those things, he's also "guilty." Sandy drives a little faster because the alternative fuel source his hippie car runs on is misbegotten idealism.
Rather than sit in the passenger seat and quietly mutter and read billboards out loud and say the words "You asked for it, you got it, Toyota" over and over and over and over again like any self-respecting old grandpa should, Caleb backseat drives, telling Sandy, "You missed the turn." Sandy responds that they're not going to the office, and that Kirsten is meeting them at the house. When Caleb snarks that he has some business to take care of, Sandy exposits, "We both know that, with the exception of the underhanded stuff, Kirsten does everything anyway." Careful, Sandy! It must be awfully tricky to drive with all the sun glare that comes as a result of the afternoon foreshadows. "Step down," Sandy advises. "Put Kirsten in charge. That's your move." This is the story of a wealthy family who lost everything, and the one son who had no choice but to keep them all together. It's the Arrested Development/O.C. crossover episode, the greatest pitch in the history of television. Which will be preempted for the month and be replaced by episodes of My Big Fat Obnoxious Taxidermist or some such terrible thing.
Poor little poor girl alert! It's morning time at O.C.H.S., and into an empty parking spot pulls a dirty white hatchback that might even be from way back in the shine-less, fashion-free '90s. Perched between the shiny, rich people cars whose sheen may only be besmirched by bumper stickers reading "My money and my child go to X University" or, perhaps, "Bush/Cheney '04," this first New Kid has a car that's a bit less of those and a bit more "I Phish At Gamehendge." A red-headed girl who is actually Lindsay Lohan's non-union counterpart, Lind Z. Lohern, steps out of the car and asks two passing cheerleader types if it's all right if she parks in this spot. "Sure," Heather #1 responds, "if you're not embarrassed." She lights a thousand-dollar bill just to see watch Grover Cleveland burn (Heather #1, why on earth do you so hate on Grover Cleveland?) and turns to walk away, while Ms. Lohern stands and looks sheepish. As she walks away from her car, we notice that it is, in fact, festooned with bumper stickers purchased at her local dilettante activism store, as she represents values encompassing the freeing of Tibet, the supporting of PETA, and the voting for of someone named "Kerry Edwards." Silly bumper sticker. Girls can't be President!
Inside the Starbucks that the school seems to have been fully franchised into at this point, Seth offers to let Ryan order his coffee first, and after Ryan hesitates, Seth orders first and excuses his behavior thusly: "I didn't want to keep him waiting. That would be selfish." I hope the barista asks him if he wants to leave room for repetitive jokes, because he's going to need to put them somewhere. On the countertop, a big pile of pink flyers labeled "This Episode's A Story: Please Take One!" leads Seth to read that The Walkmen will be playing at a new club at the pier called "The Peach Pit." I mean "The Bait Shop." Gosh, I hope I totally don't spend the entire rest of the season totally accidentally doing that. Seth excitedly asks, "You know who loves The Walkmen?" People with no imagination who never heard it done better when the band was called Joy Division? Oh, that's not what you were going to say? Weird. ["I'll tell you who doesn't like them: people who enjoyed that song from the VW ad and then bought the CD and discovered that every other song on it suuuuuucked. That happened to a friend of mine." -- Wing Chun] Actually, the person who loves them is Summer, and Seth proposes that he buy tickets for Summer and her new beau Zach, in the spirit of friendship and selfishness. Ryan instead suggests that this might just be a ploy to get Summer back, but Seth pretends he can't hear Ryan and takes off to tell The Walkmen that they'll never really break through if they go to the same Kinkos Seth goes to for his comic book league flyers.
There's simply nothing I hate more than the expression "meet cute," except for how much I hate it when people, like, do it. Playing on a television archetype that has never existed in real life I'll refer simply to as "I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you I...[they kiss passionately]," Ryan grabs his coffee (an iced predictable-uccino) and turns around, sailing headlong into Ms. Lohern and spilling coffee all over her sensible blouse, procured from the sales rack at the Basment Filene's. And because we've all seen this scenario fourteen thousand times in 13,999 Nora Ephron movies and at least one Archie Comic Digest, I'll instead include a far more interesting scene about the possible ramifications of people spilling coffee on one another from the works of one of the great masters.
Monica! The Musical, Act I, sc. iii
(GEORGE returns to the exterior of the Oval Office. Standing in his way is MONICA LEWINSKY. She is holding a giant clunky briefcase and two cups of coffee in a container. Her tomato-red dress is very prom-like, and is accentuated by a confounding amount of frills and extremely conspicuous shoulder pads. GEORGE bumps into her. Coffee spills on his suit.)
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
(angrily)
What the...?
MONICA:
Oh, my God, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, Mr. Stephanopoulos. I didn't mean to...
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
(still angry)
Who are you and why are you lurking outside of the Oval Office spilling things on people's Armani suits? Do you know what this cost? How would you like it if I stained your dress?
MONICA
(almost in tears now)
Oh, I'll pay to have it cleaned, I will!
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
And how come you’re not out there with the other girls?
MONICA
Because they hate me.
(she sticks out her hand)
Hi. I'm Monica Lewinsky. I'm here to interview for one of the intern positions. Don't be mad. It's just that I read an article in the Post about how much you love mochaccino, and I thought it would be like, you know, cool to stop and get you one.
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
(still hasn't taken her hand)
Ms. Labinsky...
MONICA
Lewinsky. I'm a huge fan of yours! You're so brilliant and handsome and...oh, gosh, did I just say handsome? That slipped out. I was thinking handsome but I didn't mean to say it out loud. Oh, my God, Monica, shut up!
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
Ms. Lewinsky, I'm...
(repressing a look of repulsion)
flattered. But there are certain rules of decorum between a high-ranking White House official and...well...whatever you are. While I appreciate the gesture, I can't allow it to happen again. Are we clear on this?
MONICA
(dejected)
You think I'm ugly and fat!
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
No, dear, it isn't that. It's just that we can't allow this type of relationship to happen. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to change my shirt before my press conference.
MONICA
God, Monica. You are so stupid! And fat. And lost. Sigh. I thought that things would be different here. I guess I was wrong.
And then the best song ever. And, well, I think we can all imagine where things end up going from there. To Broadway, that's where!
Ryan apologizes for his spillage, and when he turns around to get napkins, he elbows Ms. Lohern right smack across her face. Oh, my nose! Her purse goes flying and the contents of it (food stamps and despair) fly all over the floor, and Ryan's continued apologies are met with Lohern telling Ryan, "I have to get a rhinoplasty, but now I'll look like all the other girls here." Even in the middle of personal suffering, some trenchant social commentary! ["Andrea Zuckerman much?" -- Wing Chun] Now that is a downer who should steer clear of unless you want your first date to go from the Move On house party to the raw food bar to a fight about you being a dude even though it's totally not your fault that you were just completely born that way to you totally not getting any even though she doesn't wear a bra. Nevertheless, Ryan gives it the old college try because someone of his actual age would have graduated from that selfsame institution of higher learning by now, trying to help by pick up her dropped possessions. She warns, "You can leave my tampons where they are," and since girly parts are inherently hee-larious to boys, he leaps away because he's afraid it will make him have a baby and mentally recounts a series of very enjoyable jokes that include the words "not-so-fresh feeling."
Caleb sits in the Cohen house listening to Kirsten explain that they have to "think about the future." Flying cars! Robots doing household chores! Ninety minutes from New York to Paris. The future rules. Sandy paces in a lawyerly fashion because the script directs that he "pace in a lawyerly fashion," adding, "The only way a company is going to survive a crisis like this is for the CEO to step down," advising, "It's time to get your Martha Stewart on." Not as funny as if he'd found a way to deliver that current events treatise by somehow incorporating the phrase "Ken Lay and the boys," but still pretty good.
Ding-dong! Kirsten wearily makes her way over to the front door, wondering who she will find on the other side. Lawyers? Reporters? Angry stockholders? Or the dogs? Or the killer bees? Or the dogs that shoot killer bees from their mouths? Turns out it's a little bit of all of those things, as Kirsten opens the door to find Julie "That's Right, A Tangelo" Cooper on the other side. Julie enters looking all concerned and finds Caleb, telling him, "As soon as I read the paper, I walked right out of my seaweed wrap and came right here." Kirsten and Sandy take their leave of the room because awkward, and when they've taken their leave, Julie tells her husband that she hasn't been there for him but that she doesn't want a repeat of her marriage with Jimmy. "Put me to work," she insists. Caleb says that Kirsten is really taking care of everything, but Julie begs to be important because this marriage is half hers and scheming underhanded scheme la la la lee lee loo. Caleb can think of one thing she can be involved with: "Food." Guh? "Since I'm gonna be working from home, I'm gonna need some water, some coffee. Some of those pumpkin muffins I like so much." Caleb rises just then and calls Kirsten and Sandy "back to business," while a totally faced Julie sits alone on the couch looking kind of craft service-y. Get some string cheese also. No one ever thinks to ask for them, but once they're there everybody wants them. It's literally the weirdest thing.
CuteZach (tm Pamie, minus "Dean" and plus "Zach" in a delicious game called "math") stands in the hallway of O.C.H.S., chatting with friends and looking generally somewhat resistible. He is 11% resistible. Which is pretty good. Marissa "Crypt Keeper" Cooper and "Project" Summer Roberts stand and stare at him from afar, as Marissa sounds out the cue cards affixed to the inside of her locker and asks, "Is it just me or is Zach perfect?" It's you. The last 11% are always the hardest. However, Summer does reel off a few applicable fun facts about her new man friend, recounting, "He's good-looking but not into himself, smart but not a showoff, athletic but sensitive, a politician's son." He's Mary Cheney! Or, as Summer quantifies him, "He's like Newport's Prince William." Which would make Seth its Joe Lieberman. Which is no good, because it means that he's almost entirely out of his patented brand of Joementum.
Marissa and Summer depart from their lockers, Summer on her way to her Sociology Of Casual Plot Development class (she's running a firm C-) with her clunky continuance, "Did I tell you how stoked my dad is that I'm dating a Congressman's son? He is, like, dying to have lunch with Zach." Marissa asks if Summer's going to take her father up on the offer and, when Summer says no, accuses her of worrying that her father might actually like Zach and that would mean that Zach and Summer could live happily ever after with nothing in their way. Summer hems and haws and talks about vibrating at an extremely high level because people also write girl fan fic also and there's no reason a story called Summer and the Pocket Rocket shouldn't exist somewhere on the internet at this exact moment. Marissa then supposes that Summer's hesitation about not wanting to commit to having her boyfriend meet her father derives from the fact that Summer's not really that into Zach, or maybe she's just kind of still into Seth. But such chatter is interrupted when Zach walks up to Summer and Marissa. He starts off by telling Marissa how sorry he was to read about her stepfather in the paper, which is very, very selfless of him. Summer asks almost incredulously, "You read the paper?" Zach responds, "Just the New York Times, the L.A. Times, the Orange County Register, and the Wall Street Journal." Who is he, Citizen Chromosome, the world's most autistic newspaper magnate? No reasonable person reads four newspapers every day. I used to have to read four newspapers cover to cover every morning for a job I had, and let me tell you...you can only synthesize the story behind Janet Jackson's boob from so many ideological angles. After a while, it's all just dots. Nevertheless, Summer seems to take well to this information, chirping happily, "What are you doing this weekend?" I'm recapping. Thanks for asking.
Lind Z. Lohern sits peacefully at a desk in a classroom. Ryan walks in, because one day he and Lind Z. are fated to put aside their petty differences and realize that they only fight because they love! But who knew that it would actually happen in, y'know, one day? He looks down at Lind Z., and she looks around desperately. He's in her class! to her! As her lab partner! Stop it, show! He walks past her toward his seat, and on his journey his book bag makes contact with her head. She asks him, "Why do you hate me so much?" He apologizes for the accidental nature of his trying to inflict major head trauma on her, and they banter like Bogie and Bacall until their runty teacher makes his way into the classroom and introduces himself as "your favorite Physics teacher!" He starts to take attendance, which comes out sounding like Janeane Garofalo doing cafeteria roll call in Wet Hot American Summer ("Saul Zimmer...stein...David Ben-Gurion..."), all of which in intended to give us time to think about new lab partners. Specifically, Ryan's new lab partner. Specifically, Lind Z., who is Ryan's new lab partner, and whose name is actually Lindsay. Ryan's lab partner Lindsay, that is. No! Instead of no, I say yes.
Seth and Ryan ride their bike/skateboard combo down the pier toward The Bait Shop, which Seth proclaims "very un-CBGS." I guess that means you'll be able to see the floor and there are no rats in the pretzel bowls because the hanta virus is so effing punk rock. Ryan has no idea what he's talking about, so Seth asks, "The only music they had in Chino was the sound of gunshots and helicopters?" And let me tell you about the sixty-seven games of Grand Theft Auto I played last night, and how someone should have told Ryan that you only get to hear a song after you steal a car. See? This is what Ryan lost from not being one of the really bad kids back in Chino: a sense of music's rich cultural history.
Bait Shop, baby! Seth and Ryan walk into a scrappy concert venue, repeatedly calling, "Hello?" Overlooking a balcony, they spy a blonde woman sitting at a computer wearing headphones, because she's got her iTunes on party mix and you never, ever, ever know what song is going to play . Though on mine, it's almost always, mysteriously, something by They Might Be Giants. My iPod effing loves that band and I have no idea why. ["If it's anything like mine -- and I think it is -- then it's probably because you have eight thousand They Might Be Giants songs on it, from all of the band's ninety-four albums." -- Wing Chun] Seth and Ryan walk downstairs and stand behind the woman, Seth asking into the ether where and how he can get tickets. Try a box office. Or a website. Or try getting a job at the concert venue just so you can get concert tickets for your ex-girlfriend in an episode-long ploy to get her back. It doesn't make any objective sense at all, but it sure sucks up a hell of a lot more screen time.
The woman is so deep in thought with her computer and her headphones that it's possible she's me sitting at a coffee shop recapping this show, and when Seth lays a hand on her shoulder, she grabs it with her other hand and spins him around in a very Bond-girl- with-one- kung-fu-move kind of way. She keeps Seth in the grip of what I believe the back-of-the-school-bus tormentors use to refer to as a "full nelson," and threatens him with physical pain if he ever touches her again. She takes off the headphones and brusquely asks what they want, and Ryan will launch right in: "Tickets to Friday's show?" She tells him that the show is sold out, and Ryan gives Seth a "so, nu?" shrug he's adopted from his JewDad. But Seth can't be deterred so easily, not when there's so much plot that's got so much in its future. Just at this moment, the woman -- a tough blonde you just know has been hurt -- hands a passing man an envelope and tells him, conveniently, "Here are your tickets. And I threw in a couple of extras." Seth asks why this gentleman should be the beneficiary of such tickets, and she lets him know it's because the guy works there. And, as contrivance would have it, Seth at this moment notes a "Help Wanted" sign and asks what would happen if he worked there as well. Well, first, where's your résumé. And second, I would probably tell him that he was only going to work there to get these concert tickets for a concert that's this weekend, and then I would suggest that he work for, like, a month or six weeks before he start asking for perks. And then I wouldn't hire him anyway, because he talks too much. Seth references the Help Wanted sign and tells the blonde to sign him up for the job, whatever it is. She guesses that he might first want to know the pay or the hours or the actual job description, and he tells her he's fairly well not interested in any of that. She tells him anyway: "Minimum wage, long, taking tickets, washing toilets, and the light preparation of fried foods." Seth tells her that he'll be sure to wash his hands between the last two, and he's hired instantly. She's Alex and she hands him a mop, telling him he'll be starting right away. Ryan tells Seth he's really changed, and Seth responds that he's "changing urinal cakes," gets hilariously lost trying to find the bathroom, and even The Walkmen are like, "Dude, we wouldn't do that for The Walkmen."
"Check out the new Ryan Atwood," Sandy says at his kitchen table, and it really sounds like the opening sentence of a commercial describing the new Ryan Atwood burger, available for a limited time at a Carl's Jr. near you. He's impressed with Ryan's continued commitment to education, and commends him for "studying at the breakfast table." Which at dinner is the dinner table. And which now doesn't seem to feature any breakfast. So, really, it's the "studying table." Sandy heart to hears about how Physics is going, and Ryan says that his main trouble is with the students. Nay! A student. But before he can explain further, Seth enters the kitchen, all, "Ow, my back," and adds for the comical funniness of hilarity, "Personal growth is so painful." Sandy can't stop being the Greek Chorus of the Cohen kitchen, as he now notes, "My son! Doing manual labor! I never thought I'd live to see the day." And because it's all in the family, Kirsten is into the room, as she enters in a tizzy holding numerous blueprints that look like the plans Mr. Brady left on the roller coaster. Seth tries to engage his mother in the "ironic twist of events" that is his wacky switcheroo with Ryan (Ryan is a nerd! Seth is working on the chain gang or whatever), but she acts all tired and embattled and coffee-wanting, assuring Seth without listening to what he had to say at all, "Don't worry. Your grandfather's situation is very serious, but your father and I are handling it." Seth starts to tell her that he hadn't even taken a second to think about what's going on in the not-him corners of the world, but Ryan turns around from his chair at the turn-around- from-his-chair table and gives Seth a reproachful look. Seth takes this in stride and gets all faux-gravitas about it before his mother has a chance to notice otherwise. Seth asks what would happen if he had to go to some white-collar prison, and Kirsten assures him, "It wouldn't affect you." Ryan asks if he would lose the company, and Kirsten tells him no. "Or the house?" Seth asks, and he's obviously squarely seated at the touching-a-nerve table, because Sandy snaps, "Son. That's crazy talk." But the askew glances and morose musical strains suggest otherwise, so askew and morose they are.
Up at the protected land mass known as Fort Cooperton, Julie sits in Marissa's room palace and assures her that everything is going to be fine, just fine. Marissa tells her mother that she's really not worried at all, and tries to leave the room as fast as her brittle, splintering little toothpicks will carry her. But Julie stands her ground, promising that, no matter how much uncertainty they're experiencing right now, Marissa is not to worry because "Caleb is not going to jail." Marissa picks up her textbooks -- and right there on top is Introduction To Television Acting, which is dog-eared to page...oh, wait, the spine hasn't even been broken yet -- and emotes crazily, "That's a shame. 'Cause if Caleb did go to jail, then you'd be out on the street and I could go back to living with Dad." On a boat. With her father. And his liquor. And his beard. It would be like moving out of a palace because you decided to run away with a pirate.
O.C.H.S. Ryan walks into AP Physics, which he has first, second, fourth, and eight period. Whenever it's convenient for the script. And also to obscure the fact that, yes, he is the only person in this entire high school who seems to have to attend any classes. Life's not fair for the AP kids. Ryan walks into class, and Lind Z. immediately gets up from her chair, all so he's doesn't box her ears or accidentally shave a devil worship insignia into her head, thereby causing vast physical strain and socially ostracizing her even further. Though her green sweater totally isn't going to help on that score at all. He walks behind her and reaches his seat with vast success, and once he's there he asks if they should exchange numbers to work on their lab reports. But alas, Lind Z. has already completed the report and handed it in for both of them. He looks at her with growing concern, and she assures him, "Don't worry. You'll get an A." With which forty-seven as-yet-unbuilt structures around the country that were brought to you by the good people at Atwood Architecture LLC spontaneously collapse due to total structural failure. Lind Z.? Let the man do his job. His job is going to be important. Ryan seems to feel the same way, and he gets all bothered and starts to protest. But she'll take the explanation for this in his stead, thanks: "The only reason why I transferred to Harbor was so I could load up on AP courses, get accepted into Yale early, and never have to look at another cheerleader or water polo player ever again. No offense." Well, good luck at Yale, honey. There's certainly no class system there, and you'll never be made to feel bad about yourself for having less money or access to power than other people, just as long as you're a pure scholar who is pursuing your education there for the strict goal of becoming a more well-rounded citizen of the global village. And, in other news, BAH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA! Have a good college education, Lind Z. And good luck getting into the right senior society without any sort of legacy attached to your name. See you in hell, Poor-y Povich.
Ryan tries to tell Lind Z. that she's got the wrong idea about him and that it seems she believes he's stupid, which Ryan doesn't exactly agree with. But she continues on: "God doesn't give with both hands." Hey, she called him hot! But in a totally mean way. Chicks can do that kind of stuff real easy, like. She tells him to consider that "A" a gift and to enjoy it, but apparently Ryan would rather just enjoy heaven instead, because he gets up and marches himself up to the Professor Littleman (I don't know his name and this seems like one that's as good as any), informing him that he had nothing to do with the project his future love interest just handed in. He returns to his desk with the haughty look of the third-grade hall monitor apple polishing teacher's pet pissant who just crowed the words, "But teacher, you forgot to give us our homework!" Lind Z. rips a piece pf paper out of her notebook, writes one of those fake 555 numbers that's supposed to keep stalkers and Chino-dwellers away, hands it off to a smug Ryan, and sneers, "Oh, yeah. You're not stupid at all." She says it in anger, but she dotted her "i" with the periodic symbol for boron. Because they're going to fall very much in love.
Seth has a job, and jobs are for sport and pleasure. He sits at a table polishing shot glasses, not noticing that tough blonde Alex is in trouble carrying lots and lots of glasses. She begs for help and mumbles something about getting a hernia, causing Seth to dreamily reminisce, "I had a hernia when I was little once. I had to have an operation." Hey, me too! Not that I mean to sound so proud of it, but I totally did when I was twelve. And I was supposed to start Little League that week and I couldn't, so instead I listened to an old LP of the cast recording of West Side Story over and over and over again, and that's how we ended up where we are today and moms, seriously, let your kids play sports. Seth notices in the nick of time that Alex could use a little help, so he leaps to her assistance and helps her to get the glasses onto the table. She thanks him by reminding him how out of his element he is, and he reminds her that he's only in this for the tickets and that he'll do anything to get them. Working for, like, three days after school is not that big a sacrifice. Knowing when tickets to a concert go on sale and remembering to buy them before they're sold out is the sacrifice. But damn the logic of this selfless and totally nonsensical act; Alex is touched by the fact that Seth is doing this for the love of a woman. After all, it looks like Alex might also once have been one of those. "That's sweet, but pathetic," she announces, and then attends to her flashing cell phone, which might as well have the words "Backstory Calling" flashing on the LCD display. She grabs it and fields the following call: "What? No. Mom. I don't know, maybe. I love you, too. Say hi to Daddy." She terminates the call and Seth asks her how old she is, and barks out a shocked "What?" upon finding out that she's seventeen. He's surprised because it means that he's eleven. He asks her if she goes to school, but basically she doesn't because she's too BAD! She got kicked out. Of a buncha places. She looks like she's wearing a purple rolling pin in her hair and like she's from thse future. She takes this moment to deflect attention back away from her, handing Seth an envelope with tickets in them and informing him, "You barely earned these." In fact, he did not earn them at all. "As a girl," she continues, as if there's one around during this scene, even though I do not detect its delicate presence, "this whole little game you're planning? She's gonna see right through it." Oh, School of Hard Knocks. Is there anything you CAN'T learn us?
Kirsten is at the office being very, very professional. She assures someone on the other end of the line, "I assure you that my father is innocent." A knock on the door reveals Sandy, who has come to deliver the happy news that he's been fired from Fancy, Shmancy, and Pantsy because he's representing Caleb: "They said as long as I was representing him, I wasn't working for them." Whoa. Those people really hate Velamints.
Summer lies on her bed watching The Valley. A knock on her bedroom door forces her to snipe, "It's Thursday night. No knocking until 9 PM." Hey, that wasn't The Valley's timeslot last season. It's almost as if we're supposed to think this primetime soap opera is loosely based on another show featuring vaguely similar themes and almost the same name. Too bad The Valley's ratings have been slipping ever since it's gone up against the elimination-based reality television show, Keeper Aliver. Anyway, Seth lets himself in to Summer's room. He promises not to stay long, and she promises him he won't be staying at all, telling him not to interrupt her during her stories. She says she has something for him, and she assumes that unless it's a "plutonium-fueled car to take me back to last year so I can never date you, I'm not interested," he's basically free to go. But, dude, is it? Because I know you've also been changing the urinal cakes at the your local Delorean dealership, so it would be kind of awesome if it were, and it might cause the ratings to go up at least 1.21 jigowatts. But instead, it's just lame tickets to a lame band at a fake venue, and Summer responds by telling Seth that she wouldn't go to a concert with him anyway, adding for good measure, "ass." But he promises her that the tickets are for her. And Zach. He leaves and closes the door in an awkward, Seth Cohen-y way as The Valley plays on in the background and I cleverly sidestep transcribing so much as one line of dialogue from it.
Shut up, Marissa. Jimmy "A One World Tate As Human Freight" Donovan lounges on his boat while Marissa thanks him for letting her stay over, and compliments him on his French Toast cooking acumen. He tells her he's happy to have the company, and she commiserates, explaining, "My stepfather blackmailed me into living with my mom, my mom shipped my little sister off to boarding school, and my boyfriend spent the entire summer with a girl who may or may not have been pregnant with his child, and now that he's back he still won't talk to me, thanks to D.J." Tate wants to know who D.J. is and Tate can just go here here, because that subplot is a dirty, diversionary, and slightly racist dead end and we just don't feel like talking about it anymore. Cue Julie Cooper. And there she is, climbing onto the boat and asking Marissa if she's ready to go. Marissa retires to get her "stuff," but all she brought with her were sit-ups and gum. While she's gone, Jimmy takes an opportunity to ask after Caleb, and Julie worries that he's facing prison. Jimmy asks if she's going to divorce him and take his kids, because he's all this happened to a friend of mine. Julie keeps it all about her, fretting that Caleb isn't being thankful for her commitment to her husband during his time of need, and that he only listens to Kirsten and Sandy. Jimmy says that the Julie he knows wouldn't stand for that, adding, "Nobody puts Julie Cooper in the corner." No! Not that line! That line of all lines. If you're going to go the Dirty Dancing route, you have to try and find some bit of originality, something that hasn't been totally mined over a billion times. When Marissa does not resurface holding a giant watermelon, I become certain that this originality will never be achieved.
Ryan and Lind Z. sit in what I'll imagine is the library, Ryan talking out his Physics problems out loud because THEY ARE A MISMATCHED PAIR OF LAB PARTNERS, and the all-caps really wanted you to know that. Lind Z. hands him a copy of the finished assignment, telling him, "I'm sorry, but if you flunk out of Harbor, you can just spend the rest of your life floating in your parents' infinity pool. I'm on academic scholarship, so..." Man, it must be really hard to carry your books and stuff with that cross sp firmly affixed to your back. Quick show of hands from the people reading this who had some sort of financial aid in their education. Yep. That's everyone. Hands down. Ryan tries for some common ground, saying that he transferred in from Chino. But Lind Z.'s not interested in his lower middle-class bonding overtures, saying she's not there to make friends. "Well, mission accomplished," Ryan says, and they agree that this working together thing isn't going to work out. They decide to split the assignment and come back to each other when they're good and IN LOVE, which means they'll have to get together over the weekend to go over it. Ryan says he thinks it will be the "perfect way to spend the weekend," but somehow I don't think he means it.
"The Bait Shop? Where is that exactly?" Exactly. Zach sits in Summer's room, staring at the concert tickets suspiciously. She cops to the fact that Seth gave them to her, but she swallows his party line that he's doing it because he wants the three of them to be friends. Zach doesn't buy it, supposing that maybe, just maybe, this could all be part of a larger ploy on Seth's part to win her back. Summer tries to insist it's not true, but Zach out-logics her to death, saying, "Let's say Seth really is changing. Would that mean you'd want to get back together with him?" She can't answer, and she tells him to go to the concert alone. She tries to protest, but he insists that she needs to work this out first before she and Zach can be together. Summer tells Zach that he's "such an adult" in his ability to not be jealous or generally, like, a guy about it. He reminds her what a good time they had over break, "but if that's all it was supposed to be and we've taken this as far as possible, just let me know." He is not an adult at all, but has in fact found the best passive-aggressive breakup strategy ever. Cowards of the world? Get a pen.
Sandy and Kirsten, Caleb and Julie. Sandy pours champagne and says they have a lot to celebrate, what with the quitting or the getting fired or whatever it was. What Sandy calls independence Caleb corrects as unemployment. Kirsten promises him that this means he'll have oodles of time to work on Caleb's case, and Caleb says he'll just be "padding around the house in his black socks and his robe," adding, "I can't wait." Which, actually, is exactly what he'll be doing. Julie asks Caleb if he has a toast he wants to make as well, and after a briefly snappish hesitation, Caleb tells all: "Tomorrow morning I'm calling a press conference to announce that I'll be stepping down from the Newport Group and appointing a new CEO." Sandy celebrates that Caleb listened to reason. But the voice of reason was clouded a sickly shade of raw umber, as we learn through a conniving clearing of Julie's throat who Caleb's replacement at the top will be. Take it, Cal: "As of tomorrow morning, Julie will be the new Chief Executive Officer of the Newport Group." Julie smiles alone and asks, "Who needs more champagne?" The evil French villain laugh and the sinister twirling of the moustache must have ended up getting cut in post.
The Walkmen! Suck! I'm sorry, but they kind of do. I like a lot of bands they feature on this show and I wear a lot of Seth's hoodies and stuff, but I just can't cotton to them and I don't really know why and STOP WHINING, WALKMEN. Anyway, it's concert time, finally, and The Walkmen are very, very excited about being them. Seth -- who is quite literally wearing the same sweatshirt that I am right now (American Eagle, $40, blue. Thanks again, Wing! ["It's what I do." -- Wing Chun]) -- stands in the back of the venue, talking in a totally normal indoor speaking voice to Ryan. You know what I like to do when I go to a concert of a band I really like? I often enjoy actually watching the concert. But instead, Seth will stand guard at the back, which he does until Summer walks in without Seth 2.0. This detail clearly catches Seth's attention first, and he asks where Zach is. She just says that he couldn't make it, and after a wholly insincere "too bad!," Seth abandons Ryan and says he's going to show Summer to her seat. Dude, you are the shittiest worker ever.
Ryan is an enemy of music, so he walks outside of The Bait Shop to have his fourteenth consecutive identical fight with Marissa. He finds her sitting on a bench alone, staring into the ocean. He offers a perfectly equanimous "hey," and she tells him, "I wasn't planning on coming here tonight." But she was walking in the front door of her house, and a light breeze picked her up and she didn't stop blowing until she was standing right in that spot. Here. Let me make you a muffin. Ryan sits down to Marissa, and they muse about whether Seth and Summer are star-crossed lovers or destined to be together. "Time will tell," Ryan notes, and Marissa agrees, "I guess." Is it possible that they're also talking about themselves? Ryan stands again and asks Marissa if she wants to go in, and when she asks him if he likes this band, I think he actually says the words, "I like Journey." Word.
You know what word I never find myself having cause to use in my recaps? Upbraid. It's such an interesting word. I'm going to use it now. Accompanying him to the front door, Sandy upbraids (there it was!) Caleb about his horrible, horrible decision, reminding him that Kirsten is the only good thing he has in his life and it was awfully crappy of him to do that to her. Caleb says that he has to think about his marriage, and Sandy points out that Julie might not have that much experience in the old CEO-ing game, really. Caleb says that it's a figurehead position anyway and that Kirsten will continue to run the show, but Sandy doesn't seem that optimistic about Kirsten's continuing to work with Julie as her boss. Sandy suggests that he find a way to make it up to her, "unless you want Julie to be your lawyer, too." Ah, the adventures of The Orange D.A. Now that is the spin-off I've secretly been waiting for.
Shut up, The Walkmen. Seth and Summer sit at a strangely-positioned table steps from the stage, speaking in a perfectly normal indoor speaking voice as if there totally isn't a concert going on steps away from where they're currently sitting. Seth asks Summer eleven times if she's having a hard time seeing until she has to volunteer that, thanks, she's having a hard time hearing, but she recants moments later and thanks Seth for hooking her up with the tickets. She starts to tell him that they need to "really talk," but just at that moment, Alex sails out of nowhere and informs Seth, "Some guy just puked all over an amplifier." Seth promises that he's on it and Alex takes her leave, but once she's gone, Summer asks, "Why did that tattooed girl just tell you about vomit?" Heh. Seth tells her that he works there now, although, from all current, non-vomit-oriented appearances, he doesn't really seem to work there any more than, say, I do. Summer asks him why he would do such a thing, and he selfishly does not bear his burden silently, telling her he got her the tickets to prove he can think about other people. Summer tells him that what he did was "sweet," a moment Seth misinterprets horribly and goes for the lean-in. It is an awkward kiss, but it drowns out The Walkmen.
Summer flees in frustration and busts out of the venue without getting her hand stamped, so good luck trying to get back in. Especially because there's no way Seth still works there. He finds her standing alone by a railing, and she reminds him that he just wanted to be friends, so, basically, what the eff? She asks if this whole night was just a big blah blah blah to get her back, and he categorically promises her it was not, unwisely adding, "Unless maybe that's what you want." She storms off, and he begs her one more time to come back, wondering if maybe he doesn't know how to be friends with her. Summer suggests that that might mean the end of their relationship, and storms off. This scene is perhaps not Summer's finest hair moment of all time.
It's AM wrap-up time in the poolhouse, and Seth is heartbroken about his general adventures in predictability last night at the concert. He tells Ryan that he didn't sleep at all, that he knows he handled everything badly, and that he could have done, like, one thing differently. But Ryan doesn't have time for these idle shenanigans, because he's late for a poor people meeting. Seth again cautions Ryan that he's getting way out of control with the dork routine, saying he needs Ryan to stay so that Seth can talk about himself "for several more hours at least." Ryan responds that he thought Seth didn't do that anymore, but Seth has returned gladly to form: "That was the new Seth Cohen. I'm back, Ryan. Cohen Classic." But Ryan leaves anyway and promises he won't be gone long. Insert joke about Mr. Pibb.
Kirsten's maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad. She sits in the back yard in her bathrobe, staring aimlessly at what went wrong. Sandy comes to join her, asking if the light of dawn made any of this easier. She admits that it's "harder, actually," and Sandy asks her what she plans to do about it all. Kirsten says that she's not going back to the office, and that she simply will not suffer Julie as her boss. Sandy reasons that this means they're both unemployed come Monday, and what he calls "liberating" as a notion she says is just scary. She worries that she can't be unemployed, adding that she "can't even take a vacation for more than a week without freaking out." She's sad that she's worked so hard there with nothing to show for it, and she comes to a conclusion: "Can't quit. Can't go back there." Sandy doesn't know what to tell her, other than this: "I'm not the one you should be telling this to."
High noon at the Cooper Manse. Marissa lies on top of her bed thinking about how Kashi has exactly zero points on Weight Watchers. A knock on the door reveals Seth Cohen, who is going bedroom to bedroom checking in on the emotional state of the cast this evening. He's like the Patch Adams of The O.C. He comments on the ridiculous hugeness of the house, then launches in to his reason for coming: "When I have a problem, Marissa, I like to talk about it incessantly." Pause. Pause. Pause. "No, that's it. I just think I burned out anyone else who will listen." Awww. Last resort. That should be a perfume named after Marissa, as a reminder of her irrelevance in Seth's life and all of ours. She tells him to sit down on the bed, and he launches in that he thinks he really blew it with Summer. Marissa agrees that he totally, totally did that, and suggest that he start by apologizing. Didn't he do that sixteen times last night? Seth, who really only came to bilk Marissa out of useful information, asks where Summer is at the moment, and we learn that she's "at the club" having lunch with her father. Seth takes his leave quickly, but Marissa tries to caution him away from going there now. Because of the foreshadowing. Speaking of which, Marissa wants to know where Ryan is, and Seth volunteers that he's at school working on his Physics homework and falling very, very much in love.
No robes and no black socks later, Kirsten is still outside on the porch, this time reading a magazine and still doing a very strong imitation of someone who's completely obsessed with her work. Show don't tell, show. Sandy accompanies Caleb out on the back porch, setting prison-y ground rules ahead of the actual prison: "She's agreed to supervised visitation. Twenty minutes, max." NO TOUCHING! God, I wish I were watching Arrested Development right now. ["Yet here you are. You've made a huge mistake." -- Wing Chun] Caleb says he doesn't need visitation with his own daughter, and Sandy cleverly points out, "I'm supervising her. I'm afraid she might kill you." Caleb makes his way over to the table and sits down, immediately apologizing for his decision, but telling Kirsten he's going to stand by it. He tells her he needs to save his marriage, and she asks who is going to save the company. The answer may surprise you. But, y'know, probably not: "You." He tells her that he's appointing her CFO, because "we all know whoever controls the money controls the company." Kirsten asks if Julie knows, and Caleb cautions, "She'll find out." This solves nothing.
Physics lab, very much in love. Ryan and Lind Z. review each other's work and compliment it very noncommittally. She then tells him that she owes him an apology, and pauses for a moment until Ryan informs her, "You have to actually say the words." Jerk. Lind Z.: "I would like to extend to you a formal acknowledgement that I may have unintentionally...I'm sorry." So is he. That he tried to kill her a bunch of times and stuff. She tells him she's glad to discover that her lab partner is not intellectually challenged, but goes on to flirtingly complain about his penmanship, just at the exact moment Marissa is walking into the school to find her luhvuh. She watches Ryan and Lind Z. get along exceedingly well, as Ryan throws it back in her face that "canceling is not spelled with two Ls." ["Maybe Lind Z. is from the poor part of California called Canada." -- Wing Chun] When the living hell is the word "canceling" part of a Physics equation? Marissa leaves the school in slow motion.
Seth finds Summer having lunch at the club with her father and Zach. Seth's tie was way too skinny for lunch at the club anyway. He looks like he's late for the jazz band concert.
The detritus of Orange County, Marissa and Seth, meet at the bench back on the pier, Seth sitting down to her and saying, "If someone would have [sic] told me last year that you and I would be the two loneliest people in Newport, I wouldn't have believed it. Well, at least not the you part." Crane shot. Ocean. week off. Turkey. Yum.