Previously on The O.C.: Julie Cooper. Currently on The O.C.: oval eggs toppling toward the floor in dramatic slo-mo. Aaaaaand that pretty much sums up where things are just at the moment.
Plink plink plinkety-plonk! The Plucked Strings Of Get Some New Music Cues, Show, ring out as morning has once again come to the Cohen manse. We pop in on Trey "The Second Becky Conner" Atwood, trying to look tough while cracking a farm-fresh egg on a very expensive bowl, but it's difficult to maintain the tough-kid ruse when you're surrounded by the latest finery from Restoration Pottery Pier And Barrel. Just ask his brother. Oh, look. You can ask him yourself. Ryan comes in just then and asks his brother, "What're you making? Mom's hangover special?" Trey asks, "What do you mean? A pack of smokes and a fresh cocktail?" Woohoo! Fun mom! Ryan tsk-tsks this obviously true statement, and I have to respect him for trying to deflect the blame from the generation, because I have a theory that you have to stop blaming your parents for how badly they fucked you up on the day of your twenty-fifth birthday, which for Ryan has now taken place some eight years hence. Instead, he goes for the coffee pot (which, again, is an automatic reflex for any thirty-three-year-old) as his brother lets him know that the recipe is something he "picked up in prison." We'll let Seth cover the snark for us on this one, as he enters the kitchen just then and notes that Trey must be referring to "the old scallion and shiv omelet." Seriously. If Trey wanted to show them what he really learned to make in prison, he'd be in there with his safety goggles down, soldering a license plate. Seth -- who is returning to first-season levels of attractiveness (because everything WAS better last year, I agree unironically) in a hideous grandpa sweater he actually makes work -- continues the banter: "I've seen Lock Up. Stallone's finest work since Over the Top." Stop! Or my mom will...agree. Except that Lock Up was actually his only work since Over the Top, with the exception of his fortieth Rambo sequel and an appearance on The Pyramid. Is that part of the joke? Trey proclaims himself "more of a Van Damme fan," which would be like saying, "Yeah, Coupling is okay, but it's no American Coupling." And Ryan introduces a third element into the trashy pop-culture action pantheon with the sentiment, "What, are you kidding me? Seagal, man!" Me, I'm more of a Rainier Wolfcastle guy. Look out, Fallout Boy!
Pulling matters back around to the topic at hand, Seth informs the brothers, "A divided house cannot eat." It's actually "a house divided against itself cannot, um, eat," but we'll let is slide for now, because Seth has a point: "We all gotta get together behind a single action hero." Just then, Sandy ambles into the kitchen, and I half-expect him to be all, "It's Peter Gallagher, and the non-dancing dance hero Jonathan Reeves he portrayed in Center Stage." Now that would be some meta I'd probably be able to get behind. But instead, Sandy throws his choice into the ring: "Steve McQueen," he says, prompting Seth to ask, "Steve Muh-who?" Sandy looks saddened, grabbing a bottle of water out of the fridge (and back in his stylish surfer jams) and complaining, "My own son doesn't know Steve McQueen." Trey shows his McQueen knowledge by naming two of his movies, prompting Sandy to note, "Cooks breakfast and a McQueen fan. I knew I liked you." I guess "McQueen" is what they called skinny-armed Trey during his dark days in the clink.
Ryan changes the subject, asking Sandy, "How was surfing?" and I half-expect Sandy to respond truthfully, "Off-camera as usual, thanks for asking." Trey expresses curiosity about Sandy's surfing, and Seth responds in kind, "He surfs. He sings. He technically fights crime. Maybe Sandy Cohen could be our action hero." This comic book I would read. Trey asks for a surf lesson sometime, perhaps unaware that those shorts are a required aspect of the surf ensemble, and Kirsten sashays in just then and informs Trey, "Better you than me. He's been trying to get me out there for years." Just then, a ringing phone takes over Kirsten's attention, and she notes the caller ID and informs the room, "Julie Cooper. This can't be good." That's what I say whenever the following characters show up on my caller ID: Zach. Kirsten takes the call and goes, leaving time for Seth to explain, "Julie is Marissa's mom." Trey puts the pieces together and refers to her as "Ryan's mother-in-law." Wow. Six minutes on the Cohen house and he's got the patter down. No time for him to be a bad guy; too much room for him to be bantering about the collected works of Steve McQueen. That house makes everyone talk the same! A writer's room not divided against itself cannot stand! Sandy hears this news and expresses surprise, but Seth assures him, "It's on." Sandy proclaims himself "always the last to know," which is usually how the matrix works when describing the intersection of "love life" and "father." I think it's pretty fair that's the last person I tell as well. Ryan promises that Sandy didn't know anything because "there's nothing to know," but Trey thinks otherwise. They all play one line of Banter Pong around the room, Ryan continuously protesting too much about his we-don't-like-it-either resurgence with Marissa. He finally stops the room dead, and after a pause even more pregnant than the Chino girlfriend we haven't seen in sixty-seven years, Ryan admits sheepishly, "We're taking it slow." The room erupts in applause, Sandy foreshadowing, "It's a good thing she's no longer your neighbor" at the exact moment Kirsten walks back into the kitchen with this news: "So, Caleb and Julie are off on their trip...her housekeeper got deported and there's no one to stay in the house with Marissa. So I told Julie that Marissa could stay here for the week." It is notable that Ryan is taking a sip of coffee during the delivery of this news, and it is to someone's eternal credit that a spit take did not accompany this epiphany. But the contrivance really is a bit too much to bear, isn't it? Seth smiles and notes, "That'll keep things at a snail's pace." Seth? You have no idea.
Opening credits: "It's as large as five New Jerseys and as versatile as a spork/ It's named after an older place somewhere/ The Empire State! New York!" Time for some other states to start getting their due, y'all, and it's not like there's ever been a song written about New York, right?
The sound of the crashing waves. The sound of the breezy soundtrack. The sound of Uta Hagen spinning deeper into her grave. All of these cues make for the perfect introduction of Marissa "Food For Thought, Hold The Food, And The Thought" Cooper. She's in one of the sixteen bathrooms at her palace, an exterior that -- considering its orange stucco, SoCal grandeur, and faux-Tex-Mex pretensions -- is starting to look less like a fancy-pants mansion and more like the world's biggest Taco Bell. Inside, we find Marissa packing her toiletries and explaining to Summer that, even though she's moving in with the Cohens, it's really only for a week. Of course it is, or else it might accidentally start to look like something resembling consistent plot development or coherent narrative continuity. My complaints, they are not new. Besides, Marissa explains, this way she can "keep an eye on [Summer's] boyfriend," because, left unchecked, he might feel tempted to be unfaithful with a videogame or a small pet horse. Summer retorts, "And yours," which leads Marissa to level the hilarious quip, "What? I'm not dating Seth." Look who's kicking it all wocka-wocka style this week! Unamused (join the club!), Summer narrows her eyes and is all, "Coop, you know who I mean." But Marissa -- apparently having accidentally contracted a sense of humor from a public swimming pool somewhere -- piles it mercilessly on, "No, I don't. 'Cause I don't have a boyfriend." Live from the Catskills, ladies and gentlemen. She's there all week. Try the veal. Lord knows she won't be eating it.
Aaaaaaanyway, Summer reminds Marissa that the mere fact that Ryan and Marissa shared a tent drove Alex out of town (for the love of god, Summer, we're still trying to forget the existence of that episode, and there's no need for you to keep bringing it up), so she can only imagine what will go down when they're under the same roof. Marissa doth protest too much and this recapper doth careth too little, so Summer drags out her "Exhibit A" of her argument for a Ryan/Marissa conjugal reunion, unearthing from Marissa's suitcase a frilly negligee of sorts. She holds it in front of her, sarcastically intoning, "Nothing will happen in this," and arguing that it's an outfit that says, "Take me down." Unless what Summer actually just said was "Take me back," I can't agree with everything she's saying here. Marissa goes on to argue that the middle of spring is too hot a time for heavy flannel pajamas, but nevertheless, she stomps over to her bureau and fishes the dowdiest, heaviest pair of pajamas she can find out of there. Good as a chastity belt, those are.
Inside her bed chamber, Kirsten is sipping coffee and talking on the phone, stage-directing the hell out of the bracketed word [flabbergasted]. She thanks the caller and hangs up, noticing that her husband has entered the room looking very business casual. She asks what he's up to, and he tells her that he'll be going into the office "to start work on the low-income housing initiative." Kirsten volleys back, "So you're free then?" Sandy's laughs, like, "Oh, those poors can take care of themselves, those dirty, heathen darlings," and asks Kirsten what she needs. To somehow blunt the force of her statement, she coughs it all out in one breath: "The O.C. charity yard sale that I was supposed to chair but can't because I'm working." Sandy -- working in the stead of the lead story editor -- asks the right question: "The O.C. has a charity yard sale?" Yes. It's the one Kirsten always seems to chair, and yet you've never heard of it even though you see each other every day. The one that has never happened before and will never happen again. Oh...THAT O.C. charity yard sale. Kirsten goes on to explain that it's only kind of for charity, because the donors get to keep half of the money, and it's not really a yard sale because it takes place in a ballroom of a country club. Sandy reconfigures the actual event: "So, a charity event where the donors keep half the profits and a yard sale with no yard." Yes, we understand. Though I have to say the concept in and of itself is funny as hell, had they not smashed us over the head with a donated frying pan in an attempt to explain it to us, and were its very existence not straining the edges of the overall context of, like, entire show. Other than that? Funny. Kirsten moves in on Sandy, all sweet voice and WASPy perfume in an ambush sure to charm any man (worked on me!), asking, "I was just wondering if you could do me a tiny little favor." Sandy all but backs out of the room, panicked, with a convinced "No way." But she chases him down the hall, explaining that the honorary chair is nothing more than "a figurehead position" and that he'd be "the master of ceremonies." Which means he would have a microphone. And a stage: "With an audience. A captive audience." Sandy closes his eyes and a hazy thought bubble cloud appears over his shoulder, in which he is decked out in a tuxedo and singing "Strangers in the Night" to a sea of panty-throwing Kim Delaneys. Sandy's inner monologue is weird! All he has to do today, Kirsten explains, is "go by the club and say hello." Sandy makes sure: "Just a figurehead?" Kirsten kisses him on the cheek and adds helpfully, "With a mic." Awwww. She's so cute when she's lying.
Back in the kitchen -- y'all, like, ninety seconds have gone by since this episode started. I've never seen TV go slower than real time -- Sandy finds the boys still in breakfast prep mode and learns them all real good, "I'm chairing the O.C. Pseudo-Charity Non-Yard Sale." Heh. Seth and Ryan try to not care and get the hell out of the house in a hurry, but Sandy isn't letting this go so easily: "I need your help." Seth luckily decides that he has to be at school. What a convenient and hacky excuse. Sandy turns his attention to Trey, asking what's on his plate. When Trey winces and says that he'll be "looking for a job," Sandy carnival-barks, "I got one for you. Me, you, and the Newpsies." Trey worriedly ask what that last word means. Ew. A friend of mine got a case of those in college. She's dead now, of course.
Oddly, Trey asks what a "Newpsie" is when they're in the kitchen, and Sandy doesn't seem to get around to answering him until they've completely changed locations and are walking onto the "backstage of the charity auction" set. What were they talking about that whole time? Why wouldn't Sandy just give Trey an answer in the kitchen? Anyway, as activity flurries around them and large parcels are carried hither and thither, Sandy explains the morphology therein: "They're like vultures. Except the Newpsies like to paint their talons. Actually, they'd rather have somebody else paint their talons." The Newpsies are transvestite dragons. Check. Just at this moment, we see a Newpsie in her natural habitat, as a pretty blonde and a brunette look very official because they're holding clipboards. Just like people with tasks! They make their way over to Sandy and compliment him for being right on time. They notice that he "brought a friend," and Sandy introduces Trey and says he came along in case they needed any help, though he can tell that things are humming right along. "We're gonna get out of your hair," he says, but he is quickly stopped in his tracks when Newpsie #1 (hell of a clever nickname, no? I have a plane to catch) snipes, "Actually, it's great that you're here." Newpsie #2 (plane to catch) elaborates, "The moving company we hired got a flat tire." Where were they driving in from, The Land That Donuts Forgot? A flat tire in a major metropolitan area in the age of cellular communication could hold up the van for a whole, like, fifteen minutes. Anyway, Newpsie #2 (plane to catch) says that they've been left with "no one to do the heavy lifting," and Trey reluctantly volunteers. Sandy tries to take his leave, but Newpsie #1 (plane to catch) grabs him by the arm and begs him to stay, letting him know, "The job of the chair is to choose table linens, flatware, centerpieces...you're the honorary chair. It's not just a figurehead position." Because of the...with the...yeah, I get it. Sandy gets a panicked look in his eyes. "It's not?"
Voluntary High School by day. Seth and Ryan stage-direct themselves to a plush leather couch in what looks like the middle of the hallway, Seth already talking about the wild sex times Ryan and Marissa are going to have under the roof of the Cohen manse. They meet by the fridge. They talk in soft tones. It's what happens in, like, six scenes from now. It's prefigured here in achingly transparent foreshadowing. It's not just a figurehead position. Seth gets a little too involved in his fantasy of Ryan and Marissa making out, and Marissa is soon to interrupt this, walking up behind a self-manipulating Ryan and asking, "What are you doing?" Seth gets up and gets the hell to class, and Marissa asks if Seth was talking about how awkward it's going to be when she moves in. It's going to be awkward no matter where you are, dear. Ryan feigns ignorance of the whole "Marissa moving in" b-story for some reason, and he promises her that it won't be awkward at all, pausing for an awkward moment and asking, "Is this awkward?" She tells him no, and he skulks off with a quick "Great, see you at home."
Tracking through school now, Ryan passes Seth at his locker, and without stopping, he slams Seth into it angrily. I'm not entirely sure how actions motivated that moment, but I'm not going to try and pretend Seth didn't have it coming for something he's done. As Dilton is climbing out of the locker he's been stuffed into and starts dusting himself off, Zach yaaaawns his way over and asks Seth if he knows what's coming out on DVD this weekend. I don't know the answer, but if I hear the words "The" or "Valley" in this response, heads will roll. Turns out the answer, bafflingly, is Elektra, which Seth says he didn't see in the theater on account of "the whole comic-book debacle," and the fact that he promised Summer to "dial it down." Zach commiserates that he's in "the same boat" (you mean like the boat Seth bought back that one episode that didn't have anything to do with how that episode shook out and then hasn't been heard from at all since? THAT boat?), and that his mom is making him donate his comic books for the yard sale. But Seth has an idea, suggesting that Seth donate five of his comic books, and then Zach can keep five of his. Someone's been honing his Mindtrap skills.
Trey does the heavy lifting. Back at the O.C. Pseudo-Charity Non-Yard Sale (OCPCNYS), Trey carries an ottoman across his back as one of the Newpsies tells him to be "careful with that," since it is worth "thousands of dollars." She must be right...the woman has a clipboard, for Chrissakes. Trey asks why no one would want it then, calling it a stool, and the Newpsie informs him that it's "hideous." Never try and explain foot furniture to the great unwashed who dwell below stairs. This is the worst deleted scene from Gosford Park ever. Trey, having picked up the ottoman from a totally arbitrary location, puts down the ottoman at a totally arbitrary location. On his way, he notices a large crystal egg, and he asks the Newpsie what it is. The Newpsie tells him that the donor was a muckety-muck at Warner Brothers, and that he donated this prop from "some Tom Cruise movie." The movie is 1983's Risky Business. Check the title of the episode. Listen to the music cue. Revel in a movie Seth Cohen might well never have heard of. I was seven when that movie came out, and all I remember is (a) the music, (b) the dancing in the living room, and (c) sex on a train, for some strange reason. Nevertheless, Trey proclaims this treasure "so cool," and notes that it must be worth a fortune. It is appraised, we learn, at $10,000. He tries to stare endlessly at it, but the Newpsie pulls him away with a patronizing "Come, Trey. Come."
The crystal egg fades right into a shot of the setting sun, because someone got some serious art up his ass about that transition.
Back at the Cohen manse, Kirsten welcomes the girl she knows her fake son totally wants to bang into her house, for some reason. Marissa thanks Kirsten for letting her stay, asking, "Where do you want me?" Working at Starbucks.
Seth sits on the floor of his room flipping through comic books, and Ryan asks him what exactly he's doing. Seth says that he's making a sacrifice for charity, and quickly turns the conversation back to Ryan, asking when Marissa is showing up. Ryan declines to answer, saying that he's going to go check if Trey is back. Ryan makes his way across the back yard to the pool house, where he immediately walks in on a topless Marissa. Why wouldn't anyone tell Ryan she had been relocated to the pool house? Why would she get to the pool house and immediately rip her clothes off? Ryan notes, "You're not Trey." He figured it out because her breasts are smaller. Seth walks up behind Ryan and immediately turns heel and leaves, and Ryan makes an awkward exit to find Seth standing at a fair distance away from him. Seth notes, "That didn't take long," adding, "Trey's inside. Wearing a shirt." Well, at least somebody is. Ryan turns back to note Marissa's nudie silhouette against the curtains, and he actually gulps.
Ryan shirtlessly lies in bed, his hands behind his head, his pecs threatening to grate cheese and then attack a whole city. Man, I never thought I'd have cause to revisit such a Max Evans-esque sentence. Ryan looks at a fancy space clock and finds that it is exactly 6 AM. He gets out of bed, steps over Trey (who is sleeping on the floor to him), and makes his way into the kitchen. Just like Seth The Oracle promised that he would!
In the pool house over, Marissa looks at her clock as it turns from 6:00 to 6:01. What a bitch that shot must have been to get, having to wait twenty-four hours if it wasn't captured perfectly on the first take. And, wow. This house really calibrates its clocks. If it cut over to my bedroom right now, it would be all, "5:54," and you'd wonder why we just flashed back six minutes. Marissa buttons the top button of her grandma pajamas and gets out of bed.
Back in the house, Ryan opens the refrigerator door, and as he takes out some milk (did he just take out some milk?), he notes Marissa walking through the door. Hey. Hey. Neither of them could sleep, because the emo music cue was just too loud. Ryan begins preparing some delicious Ambiguous Food Product, sarcastically complimenting Marissa's pajamas, because the scenes instructed him to notice them. He asks her how the pool house is, and she tells him it's "weird." Well, you're welcome. His hand toward hers. Her hand toward his. Aaaand...cock block! Sort of. Just then, the light flips on, and there's Trey in the kitchen, all, "Did I interrupt somethin'? Li'l ol' me?" Or something. Trey, the only person in this scene who accurately depicts an "I just woke up demeanor" or any kind, croaks in his best Iggy Pop voice, "Just gotta get a jump on the day. Apartment hunting." Marissa notes that she has a friend whom she drove out of town once her sweeps-induced lesbianism wore off, and that there's now an apartment just lying idle somewhere. Ryan can't go to look at it because it's his day to help Sandy with the OCPCNYS, so Marissa volunteers to accompany Trey to check it out, because, apparently, he's seven. Marissa takes a bowl of cereal out of the kitchen to go to the room and flush it down the toilet. Once alone, Ryan tells Trey he doesn't need to find another place, but Trey tells him that they're "too old to be sleeping in the same room. Besides, I think I'm gettin' in the way."
Seth takes Polaroids of numerous OCPCNYS products while Ryan moves the ottoman Trey didn't really finish taking care of. Seth wants some catch-up time concerning the inevitable massive sexual tension between Ryan and Marissa, but Ryan again promises that there's nothing going on. Seth puts the camera up to his face and announces, "All right, ottoman, work with me," further those quirky affectations that are impossibly cute on a television character but would probably make you want to find a new and inventive place for those flashbulbs to go if you ever met him in real life. Seth backs up, oblivious to the decreasing proximity between an expensive crystal egg and his ass. He bumps into the table holding the egg, and it starts to topple over in slo-mo. Ryan leaps for it -- good thing it's traveling so slowly -- and makes a last-second grab before it hits the floor. Ryan announces the price of the egg and its origin, because sometimes television viewers love to hear essential details twice.
Sandy makes his way into the main banquet hall, where set-up is going full steam. He finds a cluster of Newpsies, and tells them in no uncertain terms that their choice in centerpieces and tablecloths are awful, just awful. Kirsten approaches at this point, asking what has become of the husband. Well, he's been replaced by her new sidekick, one Carter Buck-something. Sandy hilariously continues to call the shots, calling the napkin rings something from a "mob wedding" and insisting that they not be used. Kirsten goes off to deal with business, and Sandy leads Carter over to a table filled with punch and male bonding. "So," Sandy starts, "you and Kirsten, spending a lot of time working together. Long hours. Late nights." Carter says that she's a great wife, and that from everything she says, it seems Sandy and Carter should be friends. They toast, with their flimsy plastic cups, to being friends, and each take a sip of their bug juice.
"Smells like fishcakes, if you know what I mean and I think you do," Trey's face seems to say as he makes his way through Alex's empty apartment. He asks Marissa, "This chick just split?" and we pan over to a portly, bald gentlemen who, if he lived in Brooklyn, would be involved in either "the trucking industry" or "the gambling arts," but here he's a seedy slumlord. Where's his "I Heart NASCAR" tattoo? He wants to know if Trey has made a decision, noting that he's got to get out of there and over to 6A, to handle some pipes that burst. Quite a sell on the structural integrity of the building overall. Trey digs it, but he has to fork over $3,000 for each of the first month of rent, the last, and a security deposit. Trey starts to flounder, so Marissa leaps in to suggest that, rather than pay for stuff, he work as the building guy who fixes things. The slumlord offers to call him tonight with an answer. If the anticipation doesn't kill us all first.
Zach shows up backstage at OCPCNYS and offers up his comic books for a brief visit with Seth and his patented brand of photohilarity. Carter makes his way into the area just then, asking Seth if he's Seth and finding out that Seth is, in fact, Seth. They meet, Carter noting that Kirsten had told him that Seth is "quite the comics fan." Seth corrects him: "Was. Zach and I here are actually moving on." Carter adds that he heard they had their own comic, and that it must be hard to walk away from once they took pains to create it and all. Carter asks how many issues he has, and everyone's all, "Man, does he have a lot of issues, which...oh. Issues of the comic book." Seth says that he has enough for twelve or thirteen stories, which Carter notes is just enough for a graphic novel. What a coincidence, as Seth replies that he's "always wanted to write the great American graphic novel." Zach says that that's exactly what they should do, then, but Seth says that it's not up to him, but instead to someone whose name "starts with an 's.'"
Quickie cut to Summer mucking around inside of her closet, Seth appearing behind her. I do not understand how much time has passed. He hugs her elaborately and she asks him what he wants. He tells her that he was at the yard sale and that he and Zach "got to talking" about their passions in life. Summer interrupts to note that it's good that Seth and Zach are able to put the past behind them. "About the past," Seth notes, and Summer cuts him off but quick, saying that if one of the passions he was talking about with Zach was the comic book, she'll "kill [them] both while [they] sleep."
Out back at the Cohen manse, Sandy and Kirsten prepare dinner, Kirsten fake-funny-fretting whether Sandy is going to critique the tablecloths she's using for dinner. He tells her his whole diva routine is just to make the Desperate Housewives -- er, I mean the Newpsies -- squirm. He quickly changes the subject to Carter, singing his praises grandly and telling Kirsten, "After Jimmy left, I thought I'd said goodbye to my last friend, but Carter? I think he's a keeper." This is going somewhere weird.
Ryan -- not that busy after all, it appears -- lies on the couch watching TV as Marissa and Trey arrive home, having apparently been out looking at this apartment for somewhere between nine and fourteen hours. The ghetto is far! Ryan and Trey immediately begin playing videogames, so dealing with the ringing phone is left as the woman's chore. Marissa answers it and calls Trey over to the phone, telling him, "It's the landlord." If they give him a name, does he get paid more than scale? Just name him. Here's a name: Joe. Trey grabs a phone, and Joe informs him from the other end: "Bad news. Your background didn't check out. I just can't risk making you the manager." However, Joe notes that Trey seems like "a good guy," so he offers to hold the place for twenty-four hours and see if Trey can come up with the money. A good guy? I guess you don't get to be the slumlord with any kind of judge of character. You only get to be the slumlord with an absolutely terrible judge of character. Trey terminates the call and returns the couch. Oh. And Marissa was listening on the other line, which is why they had to make Trey pick up a different phone rather than just walk to the one Marissa was trying to hand him. Ryan asks if everything is all right, and Ryan lies when he cries that Joe just wanted to know when Trey was moving into his house of lies. On the twelfth of Ju-LIE, is when.
Now that the focus of this episode has shifted from sexual tension to brotherly hijinks, Ryan can stop sleeping shirtless and put back on a damn wifebeater. He lies in bed at 6 AM again, this time rolling over to find his brother's floor bed empty. Trey, meanwhile, is making his way up the steps of the house, where Ryan is already waiting for him, asking all sinister, "Where you been?" Trey responds, "Don't worry about me, Mommy," and then discovers that Ryan isn't about to take "Don't worry about me, Mommy" for an answer. So he improvises: "I was over a the new place. Landlord wanted me to take down some drywall." Ryan fact checks this information by citing the time, and Trey counters that, apparently, the drywall elves only spackle at night or some such thing. It's hard to focus. It's 6 AM and everyone's home in their comfy, comfy beds. Ryan gives a noncommittal "okay" that totally means "what I bet you were doing was conspiring to steal a giant crystal egg," and goes back to bed.
Forty aerial establishing shots of beach and verdant golf courses dissolves us...fourteen feet away from where we just were. It's morning at the pool house now, and Trey walks in, holding a plate of food, to find Marissa making her bed. He offers her breakfast, which she declines (natch), and walks to a corner -- for no reason other than thatit's near a camera -- to look sad. Trey thanks her again for her help with the apartment, and she bursts out, "Look. I overheard your call. I know he didn't take the offer." But she's not going to tell Ryan, even though she just can't stand the lies when Ryan's trying so hard to believe in his brother. Marissa offers to help him, and Trey counters that he doesn't need any more help. Marissa volleys, "If you do anything stupid, it's really going to hurt Ryan." Like stealing a giant crystal slow-motion egg, for example. That would be risky and businesslike.
Back in Seth's bedroom, Zach and Seth are dressed like they're on their way to their older brother's Bar Mitzvah. And, hanging out in the bedroom? I don't think this is the type of closeness between the two of them Summer had been hoping for. Seth is showing off a stack of baseball cards and telling Zach that he's discovered their new hobby. He extols their manifold qualities, telling Zach, "They're really cool. They come with gum. And they're worth all sorts of different amounts. But each month they go up and down in value like the stock market!" Beat. Big smile. Pause. "They come with gum." Zach assumes that Seth has spoken to Summer, and Seth admits to having "dipped a toe in the comic book pool," and that he found it to be "icy." Zach gets all consternated that this means they've given up, complaining, "All that work and you're never gonna show anyone else?" Even though he was fine with it until, like, four scenes ago. Stupid Carter, always sticking his freaky-ass nose into other people's biz. But Seth counters, "She threatened to kill us both. While we sleep." The good news for Summer is that is looks like she'll only need to find her way to one room in order to complete the task. Gum is chewed.
Walking down the stairs, Zach holds up a card and asks Seth, "Who's Curt Shilling, anyway?" Fag. Buy a newspaper. The doorbell rings, and Seth opens it to reveal a suited Carter Buckley. Seth tells him that Kirsten already left for the OCPCNYS, but Carter says he's there to talk to Seth and Zach. Just by coincidence, it turns out, "My old assistant is the VP of Development at a graphic novel company. I arranged a meeting." At a graphic novel company? They're the best! Surely this is an offer Seth can't refuse. And yet refuse he does, as he runs past Carter and outside. Zach gives chase, stage-whispering that Carter is giving them a second chance and that they should go for it and that a graphic novel is different from a comic book so technically they're not doing anything wrong. Seth seems to get it. "They have nicer paper," he admits. They do? I don't even really know anything about graphic novels. But I know the hell out of Curt Shilling.
Summer walks through the Cooper house, screaming, "Coop?" Marissa finally responds, "I'm in the basement!" I guess some money opened up in the budget for a few new sets, because the set decorator is sparing no expense on never before seen cramped interiors this week. Summer walks down into a cavernous room to find Marissa sorting through a bunch of old crap. "I need money for Trey's security deposit," she explains. Don't worry, Summer. We don't really understand it either. Marissa throws a covering off of a silver tea set, and Summer asks, "Is that pure silver?" Summer looks at one piece of the set and explains that it was made in London in 1876, and a roomful of skeptical viewers scoffing, "When did she go to Antique Roadshow?" drowns out Marissa's line: "All that Antique Roadshow really paid off." Ack! Mind meld with Marissa! We're the same and we've become each other. Now why do I have the sudden and uncontrollable urge to wear all these horrible, horrible hats?
Ryan and Trey put on suits, and Ryan helps Trey with his tie, explaining, "It seems like I put one on every week." Trey tries to pretend he doesn't need Ryan's help, but it is quickly evident that this is not the case. Ryan says that these formal events usually seem like they're going to be pretty boring, but that "usually something crazy happens." Master of Ceremonies Sandy Cohen enters, impressed with what he sees, and asks, "You want to rip off some Newpsies?" I think enough time has gone by that I can ask you to stop calling them that, please.
The ballroom is full of Orange County's finest, wearing their finest. Marissa and Summer enter holding the tea set to find Kirsten. Marissa explains that she found in the basement with a lot of other junk and that she wants to enter it into the auction. Backstage, Seth and Ryan appraise some more junk, Seth still talking about the graphic novel. He says that it's "ten times cooler than the comic book ever was." Yes. And hundred times cooler? Anything else. Summer skulks behind them listening, finally pouncing and asking if they're bringing back the comic book. They both responds with pearl-clutching fervor, all, "Heavens, no!" Instead, Seth explains, it's a graphic novel and it's totally different. Summer wants to clarify how different: "There's no Kid Chino? No Cosmo Girl? No the two of you working together, ruining our friendship?" But when did the comic book become the thing that caused the problems? The problem was that Seth wanted Summer and Zach had Summer, but now Seth has Summer and Zach doesn't care, so it seems like that would rip any conflict right out of thing, no? Ah, nobody listens. Summer brandishes an expensive sword of some kind and makes them pinky-swear that everything will go smoothly. I think I just explained that it will.
Over in another corner of the room, Marissa brings the tea set to Ryan so that they can share a Moment. He thanks her again for helping Trey out, and Marissa gets all weird and skulks away in a hurry. So Ryan carries the tea set all alone to the back, and once there, notes a Polaroid of the crystal egg on an empty table. The egg? Where has it gone? This is now doubt this episode's riskiest business yet.
Outside on a lanai of some kind, Ryan finds Marissa and hands her the picture of the egg. He explains that it's "probably the most valuable thing here," and now it's gone. Marissa is all, "Trey didn't..." and then waits to be interrupted, which she is just a second too late. "Yeah," Ryan responds, sometime in the future, "I think he did." What he can't understand is why Trey would feel compelled to steal anything, what with things going so darn well. Marissa finally cops to the fact that Trey didn't clear the background check, and Ryan asks why she didn't tell him. "Because I told her not to," a suddenly-appearing Trey tells them both. Ryan asks why he stole the thing, sniping, "After everything the Cohens have done for you. After everything Marissa has done for you." Trey tries to protest, saying that he only did this for Ryan, so that he could be out of everybody's way, and Ryan responds by saying that it worked, because now Trey is going back to Chino. Dropping the Chino bomb scares Trey straight, and he pulls a wad of cash out of his lapel and says he can get the thing back. Ryan grabs the money and tells Trey, "You've done enough. I'll go."
"Good afternoon, Newport Beach!" Sandy barks out to the room from up at the podium. He welcomes everyone to the OCPCNYS, introduces Newport Living as the sponsor of the event (meaning that the Julie porno subplot could actually just as well not have existed, seeing as none of the ladies who lunch saw fit to ask the magazine to take back its sponsorship), and soaks in the sweet, sweet applause. Meanwhile, subterfuge is afoot! Marissa whisperingly asks Ryan what he's going to do, and Ryan says, basically, that he'll drive through a hole in the time-space continuum and get the egg back before it's time to auction it off. He takes flight from the venue, as Marissa grabs an unsuspecting Summer out of her seat and drags her on stage, explaining in a whisper, "We're stalling until Ryan gets back with the egg." And stall they do, popping up to Sandy and announcing themselves as his assistants. Sandy, surprised but always the natural performer, takes it in stride and asks for applause for his assistants. Slow clap, Marissa. Slow clap.
Outside, Ryan runs toward a car, any car (seriously, what car was he going to take?), and Seth follows like the puppy dog he is, begging to know what's going on. Ryan tries to shake him off, but Seth suggests that he'd be the perfect wingman because if Seth has gone along, it means Ryan isn't doing anything dangerous. Ryan throws Seth someone's keys, and Seth does not catch them.
Heeeeeeere's...montage! Sandy starts the bidding on a hideous statue as a Range Rover peels away from the ballroom. A ram's head goes for $550 as the car makes its way to the bad part of California. Kirsten bids $5,000 on the tea set and Sandy is surprised. If only it had been $6,000, then half of that would have been the entire payment for the apartment. What's wrong with you, show? Back in the bad part of town, Seth and Ryan pull up at a ramshackle...wait. How did Trey find a buyer so quickly? And why would these poors want a piece of movie memorabilia most of us didn't even remember existed until this movie started? Where are they? This seriously makes no sense.
"Who here is a Tom Cruise fan?" Sandy asks the assembled crowd. Marissa begs Summer to do something, and as Sandy gives the introduction, "Straight out of 1983," Summer rips off her footwear and yells, "My shoes! Which are vintage!" Marissa runs backstage to upbraid Trey about the fact that there's nothing left to auction off, as the shoes fetch $60 and make everyone judge the foot fetishist who bought them.
Back in Poor Town (I think that's Alex's apartment again, actually), Ryan stands at the front door of a house as Ryan makes his way around the back. A gruff-looking gentleman opens the door and Seth greets him a weirdly high-pitched voice, "Hello. Pleased to meet you. I'm Pippins McGee, and I'm from the Film Preservation Society." But he's sixteen, or so he's meant to appear. The guy is having none of it, and neither is another dude who is sitting on the couch watching, I don't know, Eyes Wide Shut, say, on a nearby TV. Pippins says that he understands these men are in possession of the egg from Risky Business and that they need it for a Tom Cruise retrospective, and then spots it sitting on a table right in the middle of the living room. How convenient for them! The second dude stands up and asks how they know about the egg, and while Seth -- er, "Pippins" -- serves up a congressional filibuster about how Tom Cruise had it outfitted with some kind of tracking device, Ryan sneaks in the back door and silently picks up the egg. Just then, the two gentlemen lose patience with Seth, and just as they descend on him to end his life, Ryan calls, "Hey!" and they spot him holding the egg. They give chase as Seth books toward the car, and Ryan calls for Seth to "go deep." Seth mutters that "this never worked in PE." Maybe that's because the football didn't travel in slo-mo, thus allowing you ample time to set yourself under it for an elegant catch. Which is what happens here, just as...
...back at the auction, Sandy is in the process of auctioning off Zach and Trey. So Newport's high society was once scandalized by the brother of a kid who went to jail, but no one's raising an eyebrow about the actual kid who went to jail? Sorry. No time to discuss it...MONTAGE! Seth catches the egg, Ryan punches out one of the dudes, Ryan throws the wad of cash on his chest, and they're off. The other dude gives chase to the car, practically raising his fist in egg-deprived fury.
Finally, Sandy says, it's time for the damn crystal egg. Ruzzah ruzzah, crowd noise crowd noise. Trying one more deflection, Marissa suggests to the crowd a "blind auction," whereby they big on the item without getting to see it. For some reason, this seems to work.
Meanwhile, the egg steams back from Chino or Chino-adjacent communities, entering the room just as it goes for $10,000. Everyone applauds and Sandy announces that "the bar is open." I'm so first. Meanwhile, those poor dudes who bought the egg fair and square? I guess it just sucks for them. Way to fight crime with crime, everyone.
Later. Sandy enters the Cohen kitchen to find Seth and Ryan, telling them, "I don't know what you kids are up to, but I bet it had something to do with Trey." Sandy says that they need to come talk to him, and leaves the room kind of upset.
Upstairs, Trey lies on someone's bed as Marissa enters. She hands him an envelope and tells him that she got him the money (she only got him $2500, y'all), and he tells her that he knows he screwed up. He worries that Ryan will never forgive him, and Marissa says that she'll talk to him.
Marissa returns downstairs to find Kirsten holding her new tea set, and she tells her that if she wanted the tea set, she would have just given it to her. But then she wouldn't have gotten the money to give to Trey. What a silly sentiment. Kirsten responds, "Well, my mom would have been proud to have her tea set auctioned for charity." Oops.
Outside now, Marissa finds Ryan sitting on a chaise lounge looking very contemplative. She tells him that she got Trey the money to move into Alex's apartment, and Ryan thanks her. She tells him she's cold, and he puts his suit jacket around her because he's very chivalrous. But their newly-burgeoning love is quick to be brought down by the ringing of Marissa's cell phone, where she finds her mother is the caller. We discover that Julie came home early and wants to pick Marissa up in a half-hour. Love is so hard in the long-distance relationship, of, like, two miles.