Ryan remains frosty toward Trey until Seth convinces him not to ignore his big brother's birthday -- but of course, when they arrive at Trey's, a mysterious car comes to pick him up at that exact moment. What ensues is a typical TV show misunderstanding: The Brothers Dim follow Trey to a darkened alley and think he's scoring drugs, so Ryan angrily confronts him, and is roundly put in his place when Trey tells him that he was actually with his parole officer, giving cash to an old pal from prison who'd resurfaced on the streets. Okay, sure. Ryan suddenly decides to forgive his now-hurt brother, so Marissa continues her efforts to reunite the two by throwing a surprise birthday bash for Trey at her place. Ryan and Trey hug, because it's just that easy, folks. But then the party spirals out of control: jocks show up and push Seth around, kids drink (no!) and dance closely (gasp!) and have sex in Marissa's bed (ew!). Trey picks up a blonde ho who offers him her crotch as a birthday present; mere hours later, she turns up in the swimming pool, floating lifelessly -- a reveal that interrupts Ryan and Marissa as they are about to make out. The cops show up and determine that Blondie popped Ecstasy, and begin to arrest Marissa, as the closest thing to the homeowner that they can find. Trey steps up and takes the blame for the crime, so he's carted off in a cop car as Ryan broods.
Subplots: Julie returns and pulls a gun on Lance, and he turns to jelly. She firesâ¦and it's empty, which she knew; she was trying to scare the life out of him. It sort of worked. But then he sends her a copy of a film and a cryptic note, so she leaves Marissa to her own devices -- since when is that a good idea? -- and meets Lance at a seedy bar. There, Lance forks over all Julie's films at no cost and busts Caleb on beating the crap out of him, so Julie becomes strangely sympathetic to her blackmailer. Uh-huh. They get drunk, Julie admits Caleb treats her like dirt now and will doubtlessly want to divorce, and Lance purrs that he feels just so guilty about all that's happened to Julie -- and how it's his fault, yada yada -- that he'd merrily get rid of Caleb if that would fix everything for her and her kids' futures. All for her, you see. Lance is a giver. Sandy sets up Carter with a hot surfer chick he knows, and Kirsten acts all jealous, to the point where she uses a private moment with said surfer chick to drop vague and troubled comments about Carter's grisly divorce and his emotional wounds. Even she looks sort of galled by herself, but hey, too late, lady. Seth and Zach meet their rep with the "graphic-novel company," and it turns out she's a hot twenty-three-year-old. This of course sends Seth atwitter, and he immediately tries to hide from Summer the gender of his new partner. The lady is impressed with Seth, but REALLY likes Zach, which of course turns Seth into a jealous idiot just like his mother. But despite his bumbling lunacy, the woman is still drawn to Zach and -- get this -- actually goes to Marissa's party with him. Seth is jealous; he and Zach argue. Then Summer meets the woman in the bathroom and learns her identity, reams Seth for his lie -- or at least, his withholding of the truth -- and then leaves him at the party alone. Which means she misses all the drugs, cops, and arrests. That'll teach her to leave a party.
I guess most people know this by now, but Djb…well, he had to flee to Europe for a while after an unfortunate incident involving a movie he made when he was but a babe, and needed the money. I can't be too specific, but let's just say that no one at his office ordered pizza again until after he left. Until he gets back from Europe with revenge on his mind, I'll be subbing.
Sandy Cohen guzzles coffee in his kitchen while his latest pound puppy, Trey, tries to escape quietly. Trey should know better than to think he can fly under the radar of a man whose eyebrows could stare down a raging bull. Trey and Sandy dance the exposition tango so that everyone's clear that today is moving day, and Trey will soon be away from his brother. Sandy offers to help Trey move, but Trey demurs, insisting that the Cohens have done more than enough simply by putting him up and putting up with him. "Well, you're Ryan's brother. We're happy to help," Sandy smiles. Trey is impressed that the Cohens would be so nice to an ex-con. What Trey doesn't know is that if he'd shown up a month or so ago, he might've been able to stash himself in Sandy's office with a fugitive in dire need of some sexercise to lessen those jowls. The love fest concludes with Sandy telling Trey that he's officially part of the family. Before Trey can panic too much about whether Cohen DNA can be transmitted through contact, Sandy asks him if Ryan knows that he's leaving. Trey insists all is fine. "I don't know what happened with you guys," Sandy says. "I don't want to know. It doesn't matter who was wrong, but someone's going to have to be the first to reach out."
On cue, Ryan shuffles into the kitchen, mid-pout. Apparently the shaggy hair was a pretty effective minimizer: Ryan's newly trimmed coif has the strange effect of making his nose -- big but not intrusive, until now -- look larger than life. If this principle applies to other body parts, then we can expect a dramatic hour of Cohen family crotch-waxing. Sandy whistles at how incredible the timing is in this crazy household, because the show can't stand not being self-referential for five seconds. Then Sandy leaves them alone, at which point Trey walks awkwardly up to Ryan. "I appreciate everything you and the Cohens have done for me," Trey says. "Funny way of showing it," Ryan says, stepping on Trey's line a tad too much -- to the point where I'm surprised no one wrote a line of dialogue for Trey that said, "Dude, if this were a show, you'd be stepping on my lines." Trey reminds us all that, yes, he messed up, and Seth, Marissa, and Ryan had to cover for his misbehavior. Apparently, he finds fault with Summer and Zach's participation in the festivities, because he doesn't acknowledge their help. Trey begs Ryan to accept his apology, and holds out a paw for Ryan to shake. Ryan ignores this and goes to get his java fix, leaving Trey to execute a slow, rueful exit with one last backward glance -- staged so that the kitchen island stands between them. Ryan gazes out the window, blissfully unaware of this symbolic blocking.
It's sunny and idyllic in Newport Beach -- as if you thought pretty people ever really have to endure bad weather. Marissa bounces through the school in her thin white shirt, which through the magic of TV manages not to be transparent the way it would be on a normal person. She greets Ryan and Seth at the lockers and cheerfully asks if Trey moved into his new place today. "Yeah," grunts Ryan. Ignoring his tone, Marissa suggests that they go by and give Trey a housewarming present. "He doesn't need anything," Ryan says, moving books in and out of his locker in an epileptic way that only a heavily edited high-schooler can achieve. "Are you sure?" Seth asks. "He doesn't exactly seem overburdened with possessions. Unless that bag of his is like Mary Poppins'…" Here, Ryan glares at Seth, even though clearly, that was an awesome thing to say. "I wish I'd never made that reference," Seth immediately says, trailing off. Don't be ashamed, Seth. You're right to think that everything in life comes back to Julie Andrews one way or another. Ryan snaps that they all need to learn to let go of Trey, A Drop Of Golden Sun, and isn't receptive to Seth and Marissa's joint insistence that it might be time to forgive Trey for his transgressions by singing about a few of their favorite things. "[He stole] only because he wanted to be near you," Marissa says, healthily twisting the kind of logic that's kept battered women in abusive homes since the dawn of time. "He's my brother. Leave him alone," Ryan growls. He stomps off. Far off. It's a long, long way to run, or so the rumor goes. You know, I get that Trey screwed up again, but I also feel like Ryan's rocky relationship with Caleb ought to make him a little more careful about being inflexible.
At the Newport Group, Kirsten sits at her desk doing vague stage business until Carter swans in to congratulate her: "As of this morning, you are a bona fide magazine publisher." Kirsten's reply is a painfully clumsy explanation, for the uninitiated, that their first issue of Newport Living hit news stands that day. I get that exposition is necessary, but I also think that it's such a huge pitfall for writers who are feeling lazy. Either overdo it with a wink -- like on Passions, when Fox told Ethan, "You know, half-brother, your real father, Police Chief Sam Bennett, seems like a standup guy" -- or be crafty with it, but don't make characters barf it out willy-nilly. Anyway, Carter wasn't congratulating her on their pulpy newborn, but rather on a libel suit that's already been slapped on the magazine. It seems that a local politician, Nick Morton, thinks he was profiled to look like a sleaze. Kirsten gasps that Carter himself wrote it. "I know. I made him look sleazy," Carter grins. Kirsten doesn't know what to do. Here's a thought: legwork. Because if you're publishing a magazine without an understanding of slander and libel law, and you don't have a consultant to help you with this, then congratulations, Kiki -- you're officially as dim as that nickname makes you sound. Carter furthers my opinion on this matter by wondering if he should talk to Sandy about this. They don't have attorneys for this company? And they are publishing things? Whatever. Kirsten shoots Carter a tight smile as she remarks on what good buds Carter and Sandy have become. Someone should teach her about sharing. Then she changes the subject to one Julie Cooper, sharing that Julie is coming back from Europe and doesn't yet know she's not gracing the cover of the first issue. "Maybe she's become an unmaterialistic, humble, sweet person," Carter says, but he can't keep a straight face. Kirsten looks adoringly at him, but has no sense of humor, because she reminds him, "Carter, we're talking about Julie…"
And enter the queen bee. Kirsten shoots up out of her chair and bumbles through a lie about how glad they are she's back. "Cal's still in Rome for some business thingy, but scandal or no scandal, I had to be back for our first issue!" Julie beams. Kirsten gulps. "After the whole…" she falters. "Porno debacle," Julie grins. "You can say it." Kirsten winces and confesses that, when advertisers threatened to pull out faster than one of Julie's former co-stars, they made the decision to yank her from the cover. Julie stares at her, and for a second, you think her eyes are narrowing in what promises to be a stellar display of her fury. Instead, she avers, "You did the right thing," and assures a stunned Kirsten that she shouldn't think twice about it. "It's good to see you. I really missed you!" she says lightly, sailing out of the room. Melinda Clarke is so good. Kirsten's mouth falls open and she turns to Cooper, presumably in shock, but likely not without a faint hope that he'll suddenly think of something to put in it.
It's Zach and Seth's turn for some screen time. We learn they have a meeting with one Reed Carlson, who is Carter's old assistant, now a star at Some Graphic Novel Company. Zach delicately wonders if he should do the talking this time; Seth swears he's calm and rested and totally collected. "And Reed's already read the pages and he loves them. He's driving down from L.A. just to meet us," Seth points out. He's geeked that they have their own graphic novel. I wish, by "graphic novel," he meant something of the Harlequin variety. I would love to watch Seth Cohen try to write the torrid tale of a burly Scottish laird and the peasant girl he first violates, then loves. He and Zach could bicker endlessly about whether it's his "throbbing manhood" that knocks her up in Chapter 30, or his "pulsing meat sword." Speaking of meat swords and the women who rule them, Summer appears in the middle of Seth and Zach's conversation; since she apparently Bobbitted both of them in a swift off-camera emasculation, they stop talking about anything that might cause her to hack away at anything else. "I just can't believe it's 2005. Weren't we supposed to have personal jet packs by now?" Seth attempts. Summer plops down between them and very astutely notes that she knows they're talking about their comic. "It's a…graphic novel…" Seth mutters nervously. Summer glares at him. Then, there is silence. Why does Zach put up with this? What exactly does she add to his life? He must be realizing the same thing, because suddenly he bolts up from the couch and goes to class. Summer is still giving Seth the stink-eye, so he apologizes. "I know I promised it wouldn't be weird, but I'm telling you, from here on out, full disclosure," he says. "I'll tell you everything…" Summer interrupts: "No." She hates that they're working together, so as far as she's concerned, it's not happening and there is no comic book. Seth tries to correct her ("Graphic novel…") as she flounces away, but she's already nose-deep in Lonely Planet's guide to Egypt. Way to support your boyfriend, Summer, even if it is an unrealistic plot. And Seth, way to sit there and take it like a chump.
Sandy is being handy, screwing legs into a surfboard. Carter enters as Sandy flips it over to show that it's a coffee table, and as he makes fun of it, I am thinking that it looks kind of kick-ass. Apparently, Sandy has some time on his hands, because he's "between cases." He's impressed to learn that Newport Living has already attracted a libel suit, mostly because he thought it was more of a Polo shirt-and-slacks kind of magazine. They banter about Nick Morton, Invisible Sleazebag, and Sandy gleefully accepts the case because he thinks it will be so easy to defend. Carter promises that all the quotes are verbatim and says he'll cough up the tapes. Then Sandy discovers that Carter used to surf, and the fire in his loins is rekindled. He goads Carter into ditching work and going surfing with him, on the pretense that they'll discuss the case while they're hanging ten.
Marissa shows up at Trey's place with a lava lamp, which she proffers as a housewarming gift to spruce up the apartment. "Ryan wanted to come, but he had this thing after school," she lies. Trey knows it. He invites her inside to look at the apartment she used to live in, which now contains one yellow beanbag and almost nothing else. "It's a stupid first thing to buy," Trey says, embarrassed. "But I've always wanted one." It's kind of a sweet thing, although I'd never have pegged him as a yellow kind of guy. Maybe he's a Lance Armstrong fan. Trey adds that the bag is an early birthday present to himself; the anniversary of Ma Atwood's labor pains is Saturday. "The big two-one," he grins. "But after being in prison, being able to buy beer is a little anticlimactic." And if anyone knows from climaxes, it's a former inmate. (Rimshot! … In a very literal, sticky sense.) Trey offers Marissa a glass of something, but she's slummed it as much as she can take for today and bids him a very rapid adieu. Trey stares after her. If she's not careful, he's going to assume she's wearing panties that say, "Vacancy! Enquire within."
Seth and Zach enter a restaurant and search for Reed. They spy a put-together brunette studying their portfolio, and Seth immediately freaks out, because his vast experience with the three women who've ever spoken to him dictates that chicks and comics don't mix. "It's going to be all, 'Oh, make the outfits cuter…'" he mimics. Seth? Please shut your face. (But, you know, if the outfits need to be cuter…) Zach, being the more mature of the two, wonders if they should give Reed the benefit of the doubt, and not assume that the hole between her legs equates to a hole in her brain. They approach. "You must be my two wunderkinds," Reed says smoothly, shaking their hands and introducing herself as Reed Carlson from Bad Science Comics. Uh, Reed? That's "graphic novel," actually. Nonetheless, Seth's piehole remains closed, because Reed is busy telling them how stoked she is about their work. "You've tapped into something real and compelling. Your characters are vivid and engaging," she gushes. I feel like Josh Schwartz cut this speech out of the script and has it hanging, framed, on his office wall. Reed goes on to extol The Ironist in particular: "He's smart, funny, hip, and unlike anyone else in comics." Seth is too flattered to double-check that Reed, as a chick, didn't interpret "Ironist" to mean "A Guy Who Irons." He gushes about how amazing it is to meet a woman who likes comics, and points out that they could easily expand The Ironist's role. Reed doesn't care, though, because she wants to slip between Zach's spreadsheets for a while. His business plan, she coos, is "amazing…I'm in awe. You're like Doogie Howser meets Gordon Gecko, but with dimples." Suddenly, Reed's phone rings, so she puts down the knife she was using to spread it on so thickly and gets up to take a call. "Oh, hey, Genius Boy," she says. Clever! I can see why she's in comics. Zach and Seth both swivel in their seats. "Zach, right?" she says. Seth's face falls. "Could you order me an iced tea?" she asks. Zach glows. As a jealous Seth fumes, Zach beams that it's just so wicked cool that Reed loved his business plan. By the way, why do they need a business plan? Isn't that the province of Graphic Novel Company?
Marissa shows up at Casa Cohen to talk to Ryan. There's a weird jump cut from the front door to the two of them walking into the kitchen. Marissa nervously asks Ryan about whether they could/should throw Trey a birthday bash, and offers up her house and pool for the big event. Ryan blinks. Marissa, by now fluent in Quiet Loner, understands that this means Ryan forgot Trey's birthday. He tries to deny it, but can't, and is forced to reconsider whether he has earned the halo he's given himself. But then he snaps back into defensive mode and blows up at Marissa for not leaving well enough alone. Marissa says that she only went over there to give Trey a lava lamp. "He's your brother," she offers lamely. "Exactly. He's my brother," Ryan spits. "And if everyone had let me handle it from the beginning, then none of this would have happened." Ryan's new superhero character: The Delusionist. Marissa doesn't like being told to butt out, especially because it reminds her that she has no ass of which to speak, and so she storms off in a complete tizzy. Except instead of heading to the front door, she appears to stomp straight down the hall. We fade to black on Ryan's seething face as he wonders where Marissa gets off going to the Cohens' bedroom to cry.
After the break, Seth waves a hot cup of coffee under Ryan's nose, which is…kind of creepy, actually. Ryan needs to learn the power of deadbolts, or else he's going to open his eyes one morning to see Seth in a skirt-apron making Eggs Benedict and trying to juice an orange on his own biceps. Within two seconds Seth swings the conversation over to Reed, coughing that he's kind of concerned about Zach drooling all over her. Ryan sees right through that and straight to a Seth Cohen crush. "I love Summer. Reed is just a colleague," Seth swears, before admitting he simply doesn't want her to prefer Zach to him. If that was all, I'd find that kind of reasonable. It's a perfectly human thought. The way Seth is written in this Reed thing, though, goes so far beyond just wanting to be liked and shoots straight to immature douche. It doesn't help the character in general that most of what Ryan does these days is act incredibly annoyed with and superior to Seth. I love the idea of their relationship but it needs a little TLC. Seth casually mentions Marissa's name, which causes Ryan to snap and forces him to relay his fight with her, and how she proceeded to leave the house by walking through the dining room and out a window. Seth likes Marissa's birthday party idea, though: "Sometimes it takes an event -- like a birthday, or a wake -- to bring a family together," he preaches. As he describes a toasty-warm vision of Trey blowing out candles with the sole wish of reuniting with his compact and stocky brother, Ryan leaves the room. "Pretty nice moment," Seth calls out.
Before that line gets any time to breathe, we zip over to Julie Cooper's House of Ill-Repute, where the mistress of the domain sails into Marissa's room with a happy greeting. "It feels so good to be home," she says. Marissa smiles, suddenly very polite to Julie. Did her lesbian phase make her cuddly? Marissa asks if everything is okay with Caleb. "Of course," Julie says, her façade slipping a little. "I needed to come home for the magazine, and…I missed you!" She seems sincere, which is almost more hilarious than when they hate each other. Julie turns away to take a phone call, and an immediate dark cloud settles over her. "Do you have an address?" she barks. Then, with distaste: "I should have known." She snaps the phone shut and, with a blinding smile, excuses herself by making dinner plans with Marissa -- who agrees contentedly to the quality time. What? Shouldn't she be drunk out by the pool, hurling things? Whatever happened to all that summer damage?
Downstairs, Julie unlocks a wooden case way more carefully and slowly than anyone with no witnesses actually would. She lifts out a shiny silver pistol and all but caresses it.
Carter and Sandy have finished surfing. "Aw, you're just out of practice," Sandy says. "Everybody hits themselves in the face with their boards." Carter grins wryly, "Three times in one wave?" I think. Although "day" would make a bit more sense. Either way, Carter's first torrid Newport Beach affair was with a piece of waxed fiberglass. Suddenly, a toothy brunette in a bikini greets Sandy and announces that she's catching some waves before she goes on rounds. Sandy introduces Carter to the girl, Erin, and talks up the magazine and Carter's lawsuit-baiting profile on Nick Morton. "Erin's an orthopedist," Sandy says. "And an excellent surfer." Carter repeats his crack about smacking himself with the surfboard, and I have to say, Billy Campbell is hot. He was hot when he played Steven Carrington's gay boyfriend on Dynasty and uttered the words "clumsiest clod in the class" with a straight face and an untangled tongue, and he's smokin' now. Mostly because he's not wearing khaki slacks pulled up to his armpits anymore. Erin tells Carter that any time he craves the motion of the ocean, she'll happily join him for a ride. Then she walks away so that Carter can stare at her ass. Sandy notices this.
At school, it's Marissa's turn to recap the Ryan fight, this time for Summer. Marissa is wearing one of those fugly one-piece sundresses where the skirt has a tight elastic waist and a peasant cut, and the top part is an overly billowy tank top that, if it caught the right wind, would make her mighty seaworthy. Marissa observes that Trey's presence has been hard for Ryan, and she just doesn't want Ryan to shut down now and then regret it in two years, when it's too late. Summer, with her bangs clipped up in a way that really doesn't work with her forehead, coos over what a supportive non-girlfriend Marissa is. "You know if something important was happening in Seth's life, you'd be there for him," Marissa says nonchalantly. Summer's face falls, because that's totally not true and she knows it, and if Seth had any nuts he'd have mentioned this to her already.
Across the hall, Seth and Zach gush about how awesome Reed is, because she loves comics and is cute. "It's like finding a unicorn, Zach," Seth says, enlightenment dawning on his face. "It's like finding a really hot unicorn." Seth really won't be happy until he dates himself. Zach needles Seth about what a shame it is that he has a girlfriend. Seth interrupts, "See, and I was thinking you could ask her out, but there's that whole professional ethics thing." Zach wears a slightly triumphant smile as he casually asks how Summer reacted to news of Reed's gender. Nice that Zach isn't such a dishrag that he won't throw Seth's lunacy back at him. Seth shrugs that Summer doesn't want to know anything about their enterprise, so lo and behold, he couldn't tell her. Zach nods with a snicker just as Summer appears. "We were just talking about Reed," Zach says pointedly. "Who's Reed?" Summer chirps. "Seth will tell you," Zach grins, bolting. Seth tries to hide behind Summer's silence clause, but she insists she wants to be supportive now and hear absolutely everything. "Everything," he nods slowly. "Yeah," she says.
And in another lightning fast cut, we leave almost before Summer gets out that word. So strange. Now, we're in Lance's seedy motel room, where Julie Cooper arrives unexpectedly and charges past him into the dingy room. Wasting no time, she draws the silver gun and aims it at him with a shaky hand and those blue eyes cold as ice. "What the hell is that?" Lance gawks. "It's a gun, genius," she spits. "You use it to shoot people you want to kill." Lance begins to shit himself a nice brick coffin. "You humiliated me in front of my friends and family," she begins. "I've been kicked out of every organization and club that I belong to" -- what? Off-camera? Come ON -- "my own magazine has taken me off the cover, and at home, I have a teenage daughter who sooner or later will find out that her mother was a pornographer." That lost me. There's no way in hell that Marissa wouldn't already know about this. Wouldn't some local rag have made mention of the scandal, if Julie and Caleb are such bigwigs? And the parents of random Harbor students would be whispering about it to their kids, who in turn would definitely rag on Marissa at school, although you could argue that they ignore her as a general rule because she's such a lean streak of misery. Lance begs Julie to be reasonable, a condescending tack that's not always the wisest when a pissed-off person already wants to plug you. "In one night, you destroyed a life I spent almost twenty years building," she chokes. "So I'm here to kill you." Lance sputters, "Wait…" By now he's crapped enough material to build himself a crypt. Julie pulls the trigger; the gun clicks. It was empty. The suspense, all wild twenty seconds of it, is over. Lance is trembling, his pants likely as wet as his moistening eyes. "No bullets," he gulps. "No, unfortunately," she says morosely, gazing at the pistol. "But for just a second, I wanted you to feel like your life was being taken away."
Seth wanders into the pool house, where Ryan is studying. Couldn't he have been doing push-ups? Come on, give us some arm porn! Seth is on his way out to get Thai food, and he happens to be passing the shanty of one Trey Atwood, who could use birthday salutations from his brother right about now. Ryan isn't interested. "People who don't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it," he trites. "I've learned." I hope those words smelled appetizing, because he's going to be choking them down later without the benefit of condiments. Seth points out that a victory in this case is hollow, because it comes without a brother named for something you put up in front of the TV so you can eat your dinner and still watch primetime soaps. "I'm not talking about moving in, or helping him find a job," Seth says. "I meant, literally, 'Happy Birthday.' Four syllables." And in a really cute, almost lost moment, Seth pauses and checks his math. We cut back to Ryan before any mugging ruins the subtlety. Well executed. "That's it," Ryan says flatly, considering it.
Kirsten sits on the edge of her bed, taking off her jewelry. TV blocking always amuses me so much when it differs from my own habits. I know people probably do what she's doing -- come home, sit on the bed, start dismantling things -- but me, I either take off my earrings in the living room, or I wander into the bathroom and remove them in front of a mirror before checking to see if my skin is doing anything covert and unfriendly. Sandy enters and kisses her with obvious delight. "Just get home?" he asks. "Yeah, I sent Seth out for Thai," she says listlessly. Sandy excitedly tells her all about introducing Carter and Erin, and how he wants to have them over for dinner so he can ply them with liquor and then release them into the world as fuckbuddies. Kirsten cocks her head. "Wait, you're serious," she says to the idea of a dinner party, clearly unhappy at the idea of pimping out her work boyfriend. "Fine, sure," she eventually says. Sandy bolts out of the room to make the appropriate phone calls, leaving a shocked Kirsten alone to deal with the fact that she's a miserable shell of a person.
Seth and Ryan pull up to Trey's apartment, with Ryan still naysaying the whole idea and insisting that his brother will never change. Ryan, we get it. He stole. But you know how much you hate being the bad boy whom no one will cut a break? Right. So take off your shirt and CAN IT. I am allergic to your self-righteousness. Before they get out of the car, Trey exits his apartment. "Relax, he's just going to buy cigarettes!" Seth insists. "Or…getting into a suspicious-looking Camaro, with a guy who looks like Lou Reed." We see Trey doing all that, and driving away, never once turning his head the few degrees it would require to notice Seth and Ryan watching him. Seth steals a look at Ryan, who is brooding and pouting so furiously that his squinty face is almost a Renee Zellweger clone. He grudgingly backs up and follows the Camaro.
As they drive, Seth offers up as many excuses as he can for why Trey would be pulling over in a dark alley and handing money to a guy who lives in a dumpster. But you can hear he doesn't believe that it's all totally innocent, and Ryan seems gutted by the display. We fade to black wondering why nobody in that alley notices that a Land Rover is idling nearby.
Clearly, Trey's love den's not a-rockin', because someone's a-knockin'. Trey opens the door and sees that it's Ryan. "What's up, man?" he asks. The answer is Ryan's hackles. He charges at Trey and pins him roughly against the wall. Trey momentarily wonders why Marissa never tries this when she comes to visit. "You're unbelievable," Ryan hisses. "I saw you last night. What did you buy, coke? Speed? … I'm an IDIOT for ever believing in you." Trey breaks free and goes all wounded angel on Ryan, saying the guy driving the car was his parole officer. He whips out a business card to prove it. I didn't know parole officers carried cards. I also didn't know they were unable to spot someone tailing them through town. Trey whines that a buddy of his from prison got out and then disappeared, so Trey asked his parole officer to track down the guy. I didn't know parole officers had time to do that, either. I can't find one of my favorite t-shirts, nor my car keys. Where is a parole officer when I need one?! Ryan is deflated but still tries to mutter something about cash. "He asked me for five bucks. Am I supposed to say no? He lives in a trash can," Trey sneers. So does Oscar, but you don't see him begging for cash. Ryan, though, is totally chagrined. Trey is a hero, he's perfect, he's rehabilitated, and Ryan has egg on his face, because he botched the landing on his Jump To Conclusions mat and slid into Trey's open fridge. Once again I'm compelled to ask if these people ever watch TV, because if they did, I feel like Seth and Ryan each would have been able to play along with Spot The Obvious Misunderstanding. I deeply, deeply hope that Trey turns out to be lying, because that's less typical, but for now Trey rubs it in like lotion: "It's funny, 'cause when I saw you, I thought to myself, 'My brother's come over to take me out to breakfast for my birthday.'" Which cracks me up, because Trey didn't have long enough to think anything before Ryan drove him against the wall. As Ryan exits, Trey tastes the sweet air of moral superiority, and breathes, "You know, maybe I'm the idiot for believing." Aw, come on, kids, every time someone says they don't believe in an Atwood, one of them loses muscle tone. So clap! For the love of God, clap if you believe in Atwoods! As Ryan turns to face Trey, Trey slams the door in his face. Ha.
Marissa lies on the bed with her Care Bear, pretending to read a book with no pictures. Ryan appears at her door. I love this show for the fact that nobody is ever called down to greet a visitor; rather, the visitors just wander upstairs and surprise people at their bedroom doors (see also: Summer and Seth). Ryan closes the door, and I think Mischa Barton plays this by sitting up a little straighter in anticipation, as if she's hoping he's there to ravage her. A good choice. Ryan apologizes for their argument. "Trey's your brother. I should've respected that," Marissa says. Ryan knows he was taking out his emotions on her and that she didn't deserve it, except that she was being kind of nosy, so he shouldn't be completely sorry. Marissa carefully asks if Ryan is considering giving Trey a second chance. "If he's willing to give me one," sighs Ryan. He explains what happened, and how they followed Trey to a strange alley and saw him hand money to a suspicious character. I would have liked that scene maybe a bit more if Ryan had been like, "Fine, I WILL call your parole officer, smartass." Marissa affectionately rolls her eyes. "You went and accused him," she realizes. "Pretty much," Ryan sighs, then adds, "He was helping out a homeless guy." Marissa goes, "Ouch." Then she laughs and says he's come to the right place if he wants help mending the rift.
Over coffee, Reed compliments Seth on "the new pages," which are not story pages at all -- they're just sketches that take up a full page. Seth gobbles up the compliment. "I owe Carter big," Reed says. "You and Zach are a find." Seth smiles that they're a good team: "I come up with the stories, write, draw the page, and Zach handles the late-night coffee. Seriously, if you need a bone-dry cappuccino, he's the go-to guy." Reed's like, whatever, scrawny. She asks where Zach is. Seth shrugs that he's probably off getting a haircut because he's obsessed with grooming. "Did you get a slight gay vibe from him?" he says innocently. Reed again seems sort of like, "Whaa…" And then Seth's phone rings to shut him up temporarily. "Hey, what's up, girl…girl…girlfriend," he stammers uncomfortably. Good delivery as usual from Adam Brody, but Jesus, Seth, you're such a moron. Summer wants help with something; Seth blubbers that he's in a meeting with Reed. "Oh, okay, well when you're done with him, meet me at Marissa's," Summer says. Through the phone, she hears Reed's voice complimenting Little Miss Vixen and furrows her brow. Seth lies that it's the waitress talking. They hang up and he pretends it was his mother. "You call your Mom 'girlfriend'?" Reed smirks. Seth nods. GOD. I can't figure out who the show thinks Seth is right now -- is he the dorky misfit still? Does he hate himself or think he's the shit? If some of his jealousy over being liked better than Zach, I can see normal self-esteem issues, because this comic stuff has been his territory and suddenly there's a hot jock who knows just as much, and is getting more attention. But the layers of sabotage and jealousy are over the top. Seth has been a good character before, but now he's just a nadless wonder who has learned nothing from anything. Memo to the show: Even geeks grow up. Seth can too, without losing his Sethness.
Julie accepts delivery of a big package -- just like in her movies. Coincidentally, that's what the envelope contains, except it's packaged in a large box, like it's the Nintendo version or something. Super Mario Orgy. She reads a note.
Across town, Marissa shows up at Trey's and cheerfully drags him out for a birthday celebration. She leads him back to her place under the pretense that she forgot her wallet; once inside, she surprises him with a party. Although, given that it's just Seth, Summer, and Ryan, it's really more of a wan gathering. Ryan nervously walks forward and holds out his hand; everyone watches expectantly as Trey's hamster gets off its beanbag chair and starts trotting on the wheel. After a long moment, Trey rejects the hand…because he wants a hug. Ryan's subsequent apology is heartfelt, eloquent, and completely befitting a guy who almost beat up his brother over an accusation he couldn't prove: "Sorry, bro." Stirring words from the world's foremost verbal economist. Seth immediately gets excited about eating the food, which in a very strange twist he has apparently already grilled. He's got cold grilled corn, lukewarm grilled vegetables, and hot dogs and burgers and kielbasa that are at about room temperature. "I found something in Marissa's fridge; I grilled it," he says proudly. Hooray! Grilled vodka and Slim Fast! Trey looks thrilled; the party moves outside. Julie pops up and tells Marissa that she has to leave, so she hopes she can trust that this won't get out of control. "I don't want to come home and find out I'm living in Delta House," Julie says. Then she looks outside appraisingly. "Is that Ryan's brother?" she asks. Melinda Clarke made sure to put the hint of a lascivious twinkle in her eye, which is genius. But then she switches tacks: "Okay, well, since he's twenty-one, I guess it would be okay if he had a beer. But just one." Then she smiles winningly. "See? I can be a cool mom, too!" Outstanding. Patting a flummoxed Marissa on the shoulder, she gives her a kiss and leaves, while Marissa looks hilariously confused and shakes her head as if it's beyond her intellect to divine why her mother is suddenly Suzy Sweetpea.
Carter has arrived for The Great Pimping of 2005. He and Kirsten are overly cordial in greeting each other. Kelly Rowan is doing a good job with her unlikable character -- the way she plays her, it's like Kirsten is constantly moping and out of it, and can't arrange her features into the appropriate expression until she's let out a deep, steadying breath, as if to imply, "Okay, time to play the role…" So here, she sort of sighs before looking up and giving a false smile. "You look nice," she says politely. Sandy goes to answer the door, and Carter takes this moment to deliver a semi-urgent apology to Kirsten: "I hope this isn't strange." Kirsten lies, "No, it's not. It's fun." Carter swears this wasn’t his idea, but he can't say anything else that suggests he secretly wants to nail Kirsten, because Sandy has returned with Erin in tow. It's here that I noticed the actress's ninehead, which rivals that of Miss Tyra Banks, Queen of Cranial Acreage herself. Indeed, her whole head shape is like someone grabbed her hair and her chin and pulled in opposite directions. Sandy invites Erin to surf with them sometime, and then ushers everyone outside on the patio for a sunset. "I'll bring the wine," Kirsten says. Alone, she pours a glass and guzzles it, accompanied by an empty, lost gaze into middle distance.
Julie enters a seedy bar and marches right up to a back booth, where Lance is sitting. Lance hands her the bag, which contains all the movies she ever made, and may I say that DAMN, it is a big bag. But why have her meet him? If he can send her one tape, why not just go to Mailboxes Etc. and ship them all at once? I'm suspicious of Lance. Clearly he wanted to get her in person, but whether it's for manipulation, I don't know. He pats himself on the back for refusing an $8500 offer to sell the tapes (see? If people are trying to buy them, there is NO WAY Marissa would know NOTHING about this). Julie sniffs that she's so very proud of him for turning down chump change when he's already half a million dollars richer. Lance takes this opportunity to bust Caleb, revealing that he never got paid a cent, and instead got the beating of a lifetime. "Guess he didn't tell you that," sneers Lance. Julie sits down slowly. "No," she exhales. Lance shrugs that he thought Caleb would pay up and leave him alone. "I guess Caleb Nichol doesn't mind taking chances," he says. "Yeah, when it's my reputation he's gambling," she says, still shocked. Lance then pours it on, saying he never meant to hurt Julie really, but after Caleb betrayed him, "Well, you know what I'm like when I think I'm being cheated." Lance is very sincere-sounding, but I don't trust him. Lance then claims if he had the money, he'd pay it all back, but he doesn't. He has nothing. Julie gulps. "Got enough to buy me a drink?" she asks.
Cut to an overhead of the Fab Four standing on a landing outside. People have gathered downstairs. Ryan asks how many people Marissa invited. "Four," she says, amused. Summer concurs. "I don't even know four other people," Seth says. That I buy, but it gets old that these four don't have ANY other friends, even tangentially. No regular hangers-on. Where is their Tony Who Has An Eternal Crush On Brenda? Where is their Muntz? Their David Silver and Poor Dead Scott? I like Zach, but he's no Steve Sanders. Whither Andrea Zuckerman? We need tertiary characters here. Hell, some lasting secondary characters would do. Anyhoo, Trey appears and deadpans, "Looks like word spread." Then he eagerly joins the party. Summer idly looks up and notices Zach with a hot date, whom Seth is horrified to realize is Reed. He hustles Summer away before they cross paths.
Ryan and Marissa weave through a crowd in her living room. Ryan worries she'll get in trouble, because he is so sanitized now. "Nah. It's not like we're throwing a rager," says Marissa, because she is so sanitized now. Her pants look like she yanked them down to squeeze her hipbones out. That does not complement the cropped, glittery white shrug she's wearing. Marissa goes to answer the door, and a girl we've never seen before asks if there is a party going on there. "Yeah," Marissa says. The girl turns around and screams, "This is it!" And behind her, a crowd of twenty or thirty extras pours into the house, all of whom are at home watching this on their TiVos in slow motion. "I think the word has spread," Ryan shouts to Marissa. We fade to black seriously confused as to why she didn't just tell the girl she had the wrong house, and close the front door. Even if it looks like just one person, just STOP ANSWERING THE DOOR if you think the party's full of people you don't know. She is dumb.
When we return, people in bikinis are dancing and grinding, because it's just so warm in Newport in April that people go to a pool party after dark and wear stringy spandex. Seth looks uneasy. He taps a jock on the shoulder. "I'm sorry to interrupt your drinking, but I'm looking for Zach," he says. The jock offers up a classic "Are you talking to me, geek?" Seth suggests that maybe they are way past the "kill the comic book lover" stage in life, but the jock decides to choke the bitch out anyway. "Whoa, your hand goes all the way around," Seth stammers. "Kind of…hard to breathe…" Enter Trey, who fells and pins the jock with some stellar moves he probably learned in the prison showers. "Stop it, man," whines the jock. "I got a game tomorrow." Ha. Trey stands up and pats Seth, who muses that the whole "saved by an Atwood" thing is very familiar. A steamy-eyed blonde watches with sex dripping from her smile. She slithers up and husks that Trey was amazing. "I'm Jessica," she purrs. He looks right down at the skin peeking between her shirt and her pants. "Nice tattoo," he says. "Thanks. It's a Buddha smoking a joint," she says. she's going to get Jesus snorting coke off Mary Magdalene's ass. She offers to take him somewhere private to show him the rest of her tat, and he follows obediently.
Seth tracks down Zach, who is busy being popular. Which we've never really seen evidence of before, but okay. Seth wants an explanation for Reed being there, and quite frankly, so would I. No one her age would be like, "A high-school party? ROCK ON!" ["Even in high school I don't recall being all 'ROCK ON' about high-school parties." -- Sars] Much less attend with a 17-year-old guy with whom you're trying to forge something resembling a professional relationship. This whole thing is ludicrous. Seth pretends his concern is ethical, but Zach points out accurately that Seth can't really be mad at him for being unprofessional when he deliberately didn't tell Zach about a meeting and then implied that he is gay. Zach then calls him out on the "dry cappuccino" gibberish and waves off his idiot cohort so that they don't get into this right now. Good for you, Zach. Let him have it, because he's being an ass, and you've been NOTHING but nice and supportive of him even as he drooled over your girlfriend and then stole her back.
Jessica leads Trey into what I think is Marissa's bedroom, and shuts the door with her butt. "You don't go to Harbor, do you?" she asks. Great opening gambit. Trey hits her with the fact that he just moved there from prison. "Did you kill someone?" she pants. "No, I stole a car," he says. She can't figure out what a nice ex-con is doing at a rager like this, so he reveals it's his birthday party. She kisses him before hopping over to the bed and ordering him to open his birthday present, which is apparently her legs. Trey stares at her lying there on the bed, and walks out of frame toward her.
Julie and Lance are drinking and reminiscing about their shared past, laughing merrily. Whitesnake's "Here I Go Again" comes on the jukebox, and Julie gets all excited about memories of attending the concert. I knew I liked Julie. This leads to a pause in the conversation that Julie decides is her cue to leave. "Don't go yet -- one more drink," Lance says. "For Whitesnake." Julie naturally can't resist this.
Summer squeezes through the crush of drunk teenagers and into a bathroom that looks oddly like it belongs in a restaurant and not a home. You can also see through her tight white skirt -- the contours of Rachel Bilson's ass are staring us all in the face. She turns to the girl to her, who is…Reed. "Aren't you here with Zach?" Summer asks curiously. "Yeah, just as a friend," Reed replies. Like that excuses your presence. Summer, with a noticeable twinge, points out how great Zach is. "Oh my god, so sweet. And cute," Reed twinkles. "I can't believe he doesn't have a girlfriend." Summer bites her lip and mutters that some girls can be really stupid. Oh dear. Reed studies Summer for a second and then says, "This may sound crazy, but…have you heard of Little Miss Vixen?" She's lucky she's right, because otherwise, that does sound crazy. Summer of course bristles and is like, "Do you know Seth?" That's when Reed lowers the boom and introduces herself.
Outside, Seth is staring at the crowd when Summer walks up and punches him in the back. "He's a SHE," Summer roars. "Reed's a girl!" Seth can't own up to anything, so of course he tries to hedge, claiming he only omitted that detail because he knew she'd get the wrong idea. Great, blame Summer. This relationship is just so solid. Summer snits that she can't believe he thinks she wouldn't want to know that her boyfriend is working with a hot twenty-three-year-old (as if Reed would ever hit on Seth) who loves comics and "thinks he's the Brian Bendis." Seth is momentarily caught off-guard by the compliment and wants to know more. "OH MY GOD," Summer groans, stalking past him. She yells up at Zach to see if she can get a ride home, and he nods with a smile that shows he's enjoying watching Seth get what's coming to him. Seth tries to explain himself, poorly, and Summer whirls and spits, "Cohen, SHUT UP. Even when you're not lying, you're lying." Seth looks sad. Sigh. He's not Peter Pan, people -- can he PLEASE grow up even a LITTLE bit? Just a semblance of sense, and some rocks. That's all.
Poison's "Every Rose Has Its Thorn" is on at the seedy bar, and Julie is slow-dancing with Lance. Every time I hear this song I think of middle-school dances, and how romantic it seemed just because it was slow -- one of those songs you wanted to dance to with dreamy Andrew Taft, regardless of the depressing lyrics. Julie sings along drunkenly, sounding a lot like the last time my friends and I sang this at a bar, and does a shot to punctuate the part where the guitar kicks in strong. "Poison ROCKED," she slurs. They hug-dance. "Baby, I think it's time to get you home," he says. Julie blubbers that Caleb's totally going to divorce her, because even though he pretended to be understanding, he couldn't even look at her without seeming repulsed. Lance finds that impossible to believe. And here, he doesn't sound like he's scheming.
Julie confesses that she came home early because she couldn't take it, and now she's facing getting dumped on her ass and having no money for her daughters. Lance hugs her and growls into her ear, "What if something was to happen to Caleb?" Julie is confused by this. Lance lays it on thick by telling her how dead his life has been without her, and how amazing it is to be with her now; then he insists on taking the blame for Julie's wreck of a life. "If getting rid of Caleb means you and your daughters would be taken care of, I'll do it," he whispers hotly into her ear. My mind is changed again. I'm so curious and confused about Lance's intentions here -- was he orchestrating things to get to the point that he could say this, make the offer, and have an excuse and a fall guy for roughing up Caleb as revenge? Or was this totally organic? They dance around a bit so we can see the thought percolating in Julie's eyes. Verrrry interesting. I like the way they motivate Julie -- yes, she's selfish, but sometimes when you hear her talk about leaving something for her daughters, you believe her, and that makes this an interesting quandary for her.
More young asses, more dancing, and then I SWEAR we see a shot of someone coming up from snorting coke off a glass table. I rewound it and that's totally what it looked like, which is VERY ballsy of this show in its early time slot. Ryan passes and bumps into Marissa. "You're drinking water," he notes. "Someone's got to be responsible," she replies. Yeah, and it would NEVER be you. These kids are so freakin' boring, especially with Marissa's Incredible Vanishing Rage And Booze Issues. More people pour through the front door, and rather than actually do anything about it, Marissa copes by dragging Ryan upstairs for some quiet.
As they enter her room, they gasp at what they're seeing on the bed. We expect it to be Trey and Jessica, but it's a guy with two blondes freaking him. "This is my room!" squawks Marissa, grossed out. "Oh, you want in?" drawls the guy. "GET OUT," she sputters. They climb out of bed and scamper away, and Marissa and Ryan proceed to flop down on the bed IN WHICH A THREESOME WAS HAPPENING NOT FIVE SECONDS AGO. Ryan sighs. "Your mom would understand, right? If she came home right now?" Ryan jokes. "Definitely. I mean, she did say Trey could have a beer," Marissa replies. A sense of humor? Wow. Ryan sincerely thanks her for all her efforts on his behalf. She stares into his eyes and slowly explains that she knows what it's like to have someone believe in you when the world refuses to follow suit. Then, they slowly lean in, rather than just attacking each other, and sure enough a piercing scream interrupts them before their lips touch.
Marissa and Ryan run out onto the balcony. "Oh my GOD," Marissa freaks. We see that a body is floating in her pool. Cut to Seth fishing out the girl, who we quickly see is Jessica. They don't know if she's breathing. But they do know her shirt is kind of ugly.
At the Cohen House double date, everyone is fluffing Carter some more by talking about Revolutions and all the lawsuits he fearlessly fought off with his rigorous, ahead-of-his-time reporting. We get it -- he's a legend. . Erin asks if Carter would ever consider holding back and playing it safe. He leans in. "At the risk of sounding pompous" -- correct -- "if you're not going to tell the truth, what's the point?" he says. Sandy leaves to take a cell phone call, leaving a disinterested Kirsten to fake her way through saying how happy she is they could both make it to dinner. Sandy returns and announces that he has to leave, because a girl at Trey's party took drugs and passed out into the pool. "Are Seth and Ryan okay?" Kirsten asks. "All the kids are okay," Sandy assures her. Carter gets up to move his car so that Sandy can leave, and Erin offers to help clear up. She says she thinks Carter seems like a great guy. "Just be careful," Kirsten says. Oh, you rat. Erin takes the bait. "His divorce was hard on him," Kirsten says, and Erin takes a deep breath, apparently not entirely happy that The Second Coming of Dan Rather has a past of any kind. "And he's not over her yet, right?" Erin asks. "I think he is," Kirsten allows. "It's just that the wounds are still raw." Erin looks sad. So Kirsten brightens on cue and says, "But he's a great guy. I just thought you should know." Erin says with a trace of regret that she appreciates hearing it, and goes back outside. Kirsten privately looks like she can't believe she just sabotaged Carter, and as if she doesn't understand why.
The paramedics load Jessica into the ambulance as Trey appears, from God knows where. He stares at her with recognition, and Ryan notices that. Before he can pursue it, Sandy arrives and asks if Jessica is all right; they don't know yet. I guess the paramedics aren't being forthcoming with information like "she is breathing" and "she's not dead." A puffed-up cop strides into the scene and asks who lives at the manse. "I do," Marissa says, looking sick. "My Mom's out; I tried calling her cell but she's not answering." So the cops decide to arrest her, as the closest thing to a homeowner they can find. Apparently they found ecstasy and they think Jessica took some. No, wait, correction -- they think "someone gave it to that girl," as if she's not capable of buying it and bringing it to the party herself, because a young lady would never do that. Trey sees Marissa about to get cuffed, and announces that he's the one who provided the drugs. Sandy is shocked. "I'm sorry," Trey says. "I'll meet you at the jail," Sandy promises. They cuff Trey and load him into the cop car with nary a Miranda right within earshot. Everyone looks horrified; Ryan stares into Trey's eyes through the cop-car window before looking away.
up: Ryan somehow believes Trey is fronting. Don't front, man. Keep it real.