Previously on Popular: Coach Peretti shouts at Mr. Vincent, Sam shouts at Brooke, Smug Bitch shouts at everyone, Brooke's dad and Sam's mom get engaged, and mighty snits are had by all.
This episode opens with Sam's mom saying, "Good morning," to Sam, and not too cheerily. Sam is dressed all in black and looks like a wayward member of the Charmed cast. Mom goes to look at herself in the mirror (I can't figure out the layout of their house, and why are they always in the same closets and mirrors?), only to find a photo of Sam's dad taped right at eye level. Ouch. "What is this, Sam?" Sam shoots back, "A photo of my dad, your late husband, remember him?" Sam lays into her mom for falling in love with someone else, especially Brooke McQueen's dad. When Sam's mom asks her what the problem is with Brooke, the camera starts cutting back and forth between Sam and Brooke, each telling her respective parent how "heinous" the other is. Apparently, the problem is that both the girls are self-absorbed, manipulative prima donnas who have been allowed to run wild by their parents. Or something.
Now come the Glamour Shots credits. I hate Little Big Head's hair in the credits. Actually, I hate everyone in the credits. Go figure.
I also hate these Finesse shampoo commercials. The only thing that horse-faced woman's hair "motivates" me to do is think about ways to set it on fire.
Cut to biology class before school. The teacher, henceforth known as Bio, is being really mean to Little Big Head about her frog-dissection protest. How can a teacher this pugnacious remain employed, especially in these litigation-fraught times? You'd think someone like Smug Bitch would've sued her for bad fashion and general meanness by now. (Oooooh! Maybe Smug Bitch is really Bio's test-tube baby, sold at market to the highest bidder! That would explain why they're both so monotonously hateful.) After Bio bullies Little Big Head for what seems like an eternity, LBH "respectfully refuses" to dissect the frog. Ennio Morricone's theme to The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly starts to play in the background. Bio gets a diabolically smug look on her face and produces a clear plastic totebag, filled with clear fluid and a single floating frog. She tells LBH that nobody has made it past week two of a dissection protest, and then tells her that "your moral beliefs clash with my teaching style," so she's going to make LBH carry the frog around for the remainder of the amphibian anatomy lesson -- approximately two more weeks. Maybe nobody's made it past two weeks because they've been subjected to bizarre punishments devised by a sexually frustrated fugitive from the scientific elite of the Hitler regime.
Cut to a pair of black hooker boots walking down the hall. Follow them down the hall for a while, then see the edge of a fur coat swirling above them. Who could it be? Josh? Sugar Daddy? Mr. Vincent? Oh! It's Mary Cherry! She's a better drag queen than any of those guys. Right Said Fred's song about catwalks cranks up, and (WARNING: wackiness ahead. Proceed with caution) all the students turn into paparazzi, smiling and waving at Mary Cherry. She puts on her sunglasses with a beatific smile and waves like a true celebrity. Hey, Mary Cherry and I have the same sunglasses. Weird. Alas, the spell is broken when Ms. Cherry runs smack into Little Big Head and Harrison. Can you see what's coming? Can you guess? That's right. Little Big Head freaks out about Mary Cherry's fur coat and lambastes her with gruesome fur facts. You know, Little Big Head, the best way to get people to listen to you is to deliver boring, unpleasant diatribes in the shrillest voice you can muster. Not. Mary Cherry blows her off, makes a crack about LBH's frog purse, and snits away. I wonder why LBH doesn't just put the frog in her locker until biology class. Harrison asks if she's named the frog yet, and of course LBH has. Jehovah. Because he's her "witness against conformity." Only the fact that LBH delivers the line in a Mary Cherry super-Southern accent keeps me from leaping through the television and killing her. Close call, LBH. Count your blessings. LBH then wonders aloud why people are staring at her, and not at Mary Cherry's fur coat. Harrison points out that she's carrying a dead frog in a sack. LBH spits out another self-righteous comment about how gladly she'll endure "piercing stares like arrows" if she can save "just one tadpole." I have a vision of LBH tied to a stake like Saint Sebastian, with Geena Davis using her as target practice for the Olympics. Harrison looks super-dorky, but still precious, with a blue stripe of hair mascara. Strangely, nobody makes of fun of this blue stripe, or even mentions it, for the entire show. He reports that Sam and Brooke are going to have a "family dinner" on Thursday, at Brooke's house, and that "Sam is freaking out!"
Cut to Sam and Brooke in humanities class. The humanities teacher is wearing a VINYL dress. Even Mary Cherry has better taste than that. The teacher barks weird orders to the class, commanding them to fold up a piece of paper and then tear it into squares. Of course Smug Bitch cuts out paper dolls, instead. The teacher tells them not to stare like a bunch of . . . retardos. What? Who says that? Is that even a real word? Then, after they cut out the squares, she walks around with the trash can and throws them all away. How clever! This must mean that she's a really good teacher, the kind that will make a difference. Not. After she throws away their squares, she nukes them for letting her talk to them like such a bitch: "I know I'm intimidating because I have such impeccable fashion sense." Oh, she can go straight to hell for that one. Nobody in her right mind, never mind with "impeccable fashion sense," would wear a vinyl sheath before eight o'clock at night, if ever. Cut to the entire class, all staring at her with awe and amazement as she preaches the virtues of individuality. "What is this fish doing on my dress?" she asks, pointing to the embossed school of fish swimming across her tacky-ass dress. I don't know -- maybe wishing it were on someone else's dress, someone with better taste, maybe? The answer is, of course, "swimming to individuality!" Uh, ma'am? Those fish are swimming in a (pardon the obvious pun) SCHOOL. Together. In the same direction. "Listen to your own voice. It is the most important voice you will ever hear," the teacher says Little Big Head looks at her frog. Perhaps she is remembering that time, last episode, when the frog spoke to her in biology class. That seems like a pretty important voice, too, since it indicates potential mental instability. The teacher makes them turn their desks towards one another in pairs, so they can practice listening and communicating for the minute remaining before the bell rings. Sam and Brooke face each other, and proceed to be really snotty and hateful. Brooke implies that Sam's mom is a desperate gold-digger, while Sam implies that Brooke's dad is a creepy Casanova. The bell rings, and the teacher congratulates everyone on their good work.
Cut to the Principal Hall saying, "Nice to smell you all this morning," as if addressing a rack of fresh-baked pies. Coach Peretti, Josh Ford, and Mr. Vincent sit in a row in front of her desk. Mr. Vincent, it seems, has called the meeting because he thinks the coach is "torturing Josh in inhumane ways" to force him to quit the musical. The coach vehemently denies this accusation. The principal asks Josh if the coach gave him the watch he has on. Before Josh can answer, Coach Peretti breaks in and says that is it his own watch, on loan to Josh. Mr. Vincent snaps that nobody can afford a Rolex on a teacher's salary. He further accuses the coach of "moving money around" in a secret alumni fund, and of having his "jock alumni cronies bow to [his] every secret whim." The principal nods sagely, then asks Josh which he would like to do, be in the musical or be on the football team. Josh says that he loves football, but he also loves to sing, and he'd like to do both. The principal says that this is just fine with her, and asks him to leave the room. After he leaves, she tears Mr. Vincent a new one, telling him to stop whining like an adolescent every time he doesn't get his own way. She commands the two men to work it out, turning a fierce gaze from one to the other to make sure they understand. Oh yeah. She's blind. I forgot. I think she did, too.
Cut to a shot of Smug Bitch slathering on lip gloss like a porn star. Carmen stares enviously from the "misfit" table. Brooke's team and Sam's team stare balefully at one another, and the camera cuts from one table to the other while the kids all say mean things about one another. Mary Cherry remarks that Sam's group is just jealous of her plastic surgery. Her whole table stares at her in horror. "What? I just had one little ol' rib removed. It's no big deal." BWA HA HA HA HA! Everyone looks really uncomfortable and pretends that they didn't just hear what MC just said. She puts on her sunglasses and ignores the fact that she just freaked all of her friends way out. Fortunately, Sugar Daddy approaches with Josh in tow. He tells Brooke and Josh to make up. Brooke smiles warmly and announces that she's going to have to miss the upcoming away game because she'll be attending Josh's opening night: "I bought out the front row!" Josh is surprised and pleased. The rest of the group chimes in, each person also declaring support for Josh. They all gaze at each other with love and affection, even Smug Bitch. Aw. That's really sweet. Those crazy kids, they're not so bad after all.
Biology class. A cell phone starts ringing, and everyone checks their pants and backpacks. "It's mine," says Sam, pulling out a conspicuously Nokia cell phone. "Hello?" Mr. Vincent's voice whispers melodramatically that if she'd like the story of her life, she'll meet him in some random parking garage. "Who is this?" says nitwit Sam. "Call me Deep Throat," the drama teacher stage-whispers. This is a family show, Mr. Vincent! I can't help but wonder how Mr. V got Sam's cell phone number, not to mention why our favorite mouth-breather has a cell phone in the first place.
Cut to a dank, dark parking garage. Sam is skulking around in a beret and trench coat like an escapee from the holodeck. Mr. Vincent creeps up to her. "Mr. Vincent?" No, dumb-ass, it's Ru Paul. Jeez. He proceeds to circle her like a Solid Gold dancer, whispering creepily about how much he admires her writing. He hands her a file folder, telling her to pay special attention to the cheerleading budget on page five. Sam asks, "Why don't you take this to Principal Hall directly?" Because Principal Hall can't read, stupid; she's blind, remember? Mr. Vincent sneers, "Because nobody listens when they think you have an agenda, do they?" Eww -- Mr. Vincent is disturbing in this scene. It doesn't seem fair to make the only gay character on the show such a creep. After a few more passes by her ear, Mr. Vincent darts away, leaving Sam standing in the spooky garage with her mouth hanging wide open.
Okay, if you have a problem with screwball antics, just skip this paragraph. We find Sam sitting in her bedroom, wearing a Jimmy Stewart fedora and crowing over the tell-all file that Mr. Vincent Black Shadow mysteriously procured for her. As she reads -- get ready, now -- a series of newspaper headlines spin by, each announcing some aspect of the upcoming scandal. Then, we move into a phone-conversation montage, with black and white footage of forties cheerleaders running in the background. You with me? There are two windows, one in each corner of the screen. First Brooke is in one window and Smug Bitch is in the other, talking to each other on the phone and wearing what appear to be mud masks. Then Harrison is in one window and Little Big Head is in the other, and so on, until we see all of the major cast members talking to one another. The really funny thing about this sequence is that they are all talking on Nokia phones, and all wearing mud masks that match the color of the cell phones. Sam's is yellow, Mary Cherry's is pink, Little Big Head's is red, etc. It seems to be a jab at that annoying Nokia commercial. Could the producers possibly be not-so-subtly mocking one of their sponsors? In the midst of all this wackiness, it's revealed that the cheerleaders have a Prada allowance, that Sam used Carmen's recent cheerleading trauma as an example of how wicked the cheerleaders really are, and that Carmen is pissed off about that.
Cut to Mary Cherry, blissfully free from her hot-pink mud mask. The cheerleaders are talking about how great the girls' bathroom is. The girls' bathroom is a lavish dressing room, complete with moody, flattering light, plush benches, and photographs on the wall. Apparently, Kim Novak donated it to the school as a gift in the '60s. All anyone ever donated to my high school was canned goods at Christmas. Must be nice to get interior decorating instead. In comes Sam. The cheerleaders turn on her like rabid dogs, demanding to know her secret source of information. Sam swears that she'll never tell. Smug Bitch backs Sam right out into the hall, and is about to punch her in her big ol' fly-catcher when Mr. Grant intervenes: "Nicole, Miss McPherson just printed the truth." Smug Bitch, bless her heart, says, "There are two sides to every story, Mr. Grant. Or didn't they teach you that in community college?" The cheerleaders snit away, and Sam gratefully sucks up to Mr. Grant. While they are talking, SB stands at the end of the hall where Sam can see her, and rips a copy of the school paper into pieces. Then she throws the pieces of paper into the air in slow motion, to teach Sam to listen to her inner voice like a little vinyl fish. Wait -- that was what the humanities teacher meant. I think SB means something more menacing with her pieces of paper. I wonder what?
Cut to the teachers' lounge. Coach Peretti threatens Mr. Vincent with a baseball bat for breaking into his private files. Principal Hall shouts at them, just missing the door to the lounge. She backs up, makes it in the door, and starts shouting again. The coach falls silent. She says, "I know you're in here, Coach Peretti -- I smell Brut!" Hee hee. She tells him that she's cut his budget in half and given the other half to the drama department. Can principals do that? I thought budgets got voted upon by the members of the school board, in a time-consuming bureaucratic process, but I guess they do things differently in California. Principal Hall stomps out, leaving Mr. Vincent smirking like a smug cat. Coach drops his head into his hands, and Bio cracks her knuckles nervously for no reason at all. Mr. Vincent, not content with this triumph, rubs salt in the wound by announcing that he's rescheduled the opening night of the play to correspond with homecoming weekend so that Josh will miss the game. Queens can be so mean sometimes. Coach says, "I'll get you for this!" just like a character from Scooby Doo.
In biology class, all the students are wearing Red Lobster bibs to dissect their frogs. Brooke and Sam bicker quietly until Bio snaps, "Ginger, Marianne, shut up and get to dicing!" She then turns on Little Big Head, telling her again how horribly she's going to fail the class if she doesn't dissect the frog. LBH "again, respectfully refuses" to dissect the frog, and says she prefers to daydream and ignore the carnage which surrounds her. Bio finally leaves her alone. LBH voice-over says, "I wish I was Pam Greer," and we drift into another completely off-the-wall fantasy sequence in which LBH pictures herself as Coffy. I am a huge fan of blaxploitation films, and I shrieked with laughter through the whole sequence. They put Harrison in a giant white-boy 'fro (they even included his blue hair-mascara stripe) and Carmen in a super-slutty dress that made her look great. Little Big Head wore a pink bodysuit and had a huge 'fro of her own, thus rendering her head large enough to merit its own gravitational field. LBH fantasizes about the three of them kicking Bio's ass in a perfect series of blaxploitation trailer vignettes. After an extended bout of these hijinks, the bell rings and brings us safely back to reality. Phew!
After class, Sam bounces up to Little Big Head and asks her what she thought of the controversial editorial. LBH says (duh) she wishes Sam had run the animal-rights article like she had planned. Sam makes a crack about how the frog tote is starting to smell, then tells LBH that she should just cut the frog and get it over with. Nice one, Sam. Buckle your seatbelt and get ready for an earsplitting soapbox sermon. LBH freaks out. She starts shouting at the top of her tiny little lungs, calling Sam an unprincipled, selfish brat with no interest in anything but herself. Sam spends the whole speech looking around nervously to make sure that no one is listening, proving herself even more self-absorbed and lame. I love it when Sam's friends yell at her because they are always right on. After she wears herself out with self-righteous anger, LBH snits away, leaving Sam (as usual) standing in the hall with a serious case of sinus congestion.
Cut to a steamy boys' locker room. Two naked, hunky young men are lathering up and posing like the latest Abercrombie & Fitch eugenics successes. Brooke and Smug Bitch sit slack-jawed on a bench in front of a row of lockers. Apparently Coach Peretti asked to meet them there. Wow, he's even dumber than Mr. Grant; he's just begging for a sexual harassment suit. That song by Yello, the "Oh Yeah" one from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, is playing in the background throughout the scene. A naked hottie walks up to the girls and asks them if the cheerleaders are now handing out towels after practice. Pardon me, but since when did teenage boys have that much moxie? SB smiles sweetly and grabs a stack of towels to hand out to all the nude boys. Coach Peretti comes in, looking very self-satisfied. He dumps over a basket of dirty jock straps and sits on it. The camera focuses inexplicably on the pile of jocks while the coach tells the ladies that he's had to cut the cheerleading squad because of Sam's editorial. (There's that crazy California funding thing again.) They act appropriately horrified, and offer to do anything in their power to help. He looks thoughtful for a second, then leans forward in another classic Scooby Doo moment, "Well, there is one thing . . . " Brooke and SB lean in conspiratorially, and we cut to a commercial break.
The scene opens with Sugar Daddy telling Josh to "spice it up" and to "dip her and slip her the tongue." Um, gross! Thankfully, Brooke approaches, and SD cuts his Kama Sutra clinic short and takes off, leaving Josh to notice that Brooke is, as usual, upset about something: "You look upset, Brooke." Brooke wails, "I am, Josh. Coach Peretti just forced me to spend part of my lunch hour in a steamy locker room, checking out the latest crop of super-beings from Bio's genetics experiments." Oops, I meant to say that Brooke tells Josh that Coach Peretti cut the cheerleading team. Josh offers to do many nice things to cheer her up, including a back-rub, but she just looks more and more nauseated at each suggestion. At first I think it's because she might have eaten her first solid food in a couple of weeks, and might be having trouble holding it down, but she eventually blurts out that she wants him to quit the musical and play the homecoming game. Evidently, the coach told her that if enough people attend the game, then they might get the cheerleading funding back. "God," she exclaims, "I hate asking you this!" Right. Sure you do, Brooke. Josh slams her for making a big deal of supporting him in front of everyone in the lunchroom, then turning around and asking him to quit in private: "You're the one who should be the actor here, Brooke, not me." He snits off. Brooke looks tortured and hungry, but I can't really care that much, because she is wearing Barbie-blue eyeshadow that is the exact same shade as her shirt.
Cut to Sam sadly studying a yellowed newspaper clipping. The headline reads, "McPherson Named Reporter of the Year." Must be about her dad. Harrison creeps up and tells her to be careful or the picture will fade. "He's already fading," Sam exclaims, and starts to bawl. She sobs that her dad would understand about her editorial. Harrison takes it pretty well, and -- I can't pay attention to what he's saying, because his gigantic left ear is as beautifully backlit as a pane of stained glass. The upshot of his speech is that he very kindly, very tenderly tells Sam that she is full of shit, and that she was working with a glaringly obvious hidden agenda, namely to defame Brooke. She tearfully says, "Whose side are you on, anyway?" And away she snits.
Cut to the courtyard outside the lunchroom. Harrison walks by Smug Bitch, who calls out, "Hey, Stridex called to tell you to stop using their product so they don't get sued for false advertising." She is so snide! He ignores her like a good boy, and she goes and sits down by Brooke. Brooke is mopey because she can't believe how many calories are in the air she's breathing. But of course she can't say that, and instead tells SB that they never should've listened to Coach Peretti. SB says, "Well, we know who's to blame, don't we? McBitch McPherson." Brooke agrees that Sam is the devil, and gives a lame little speech about how Sam is bringing everybody down, maaaan. The few lines of dialogue are so cryptic that I'm just going to write them down.
SB: Maybe.
Brooke: I can't do that, Nic.
SB: You don't have to, baby. This is a role I was born to play.
Swear to God, that's it. If anyone can tell me how those few syllables translate into, "Hey, let's frame Mr. Grant for sexual harassment just to fuck with Sam McPherson," I'll give you a twenty dollar bill and my favorite sterling-silver Texas Rangers belt buckle.
Cut to Principal Hall's office. The principal tells SB that she is making a very serious accusation, which, if the principal finds out SB's lying, could get her expelled from school. Smug Bitch spins a thread of bullshit so insincere that even my dog wouldn't believe it, telling the principal that she couldn't make it up if she tried, and that she can't bear to watch the hidden shame of a "tender petal-fresh friend of mine, who's too confused to come forward herself." For a woman with a supernatural sense of smell, Principal Hall really falls down on the job this time, saying, "Well, then, I have no choice but to act." Smug Bitch makes faces at Principal Hall the whole time in yet another act of tedious hatefulness.
Mr. Grant and Sam sit on the bleachers. Mr. Grant says, "Sam, every good journalist feels like she's going through a war alone at some point in her career." BWA HA HA! Oh, jeez! You're killing me, Mr. Grant! Sam looks at him all goopily and tells him he's the only one she can talk to. He nods sympathetically, and is on the verge of delivering another zinger when his pager goes off. He looks at it for a moment, then looks at her with a weird expression on his face. Ominous music swells. "What?" asks Sam.
Cut to the principal's office, AGAIN. She is reading what is presumably, the school's sexual harassment code, out of a big Braille book: "The student often has mixed feelings about reporting sexual misconduct. If the teacher is popular, she may fear repercussions." Sam and Mr. Grant sit side by side in front of her desk. Mr. Grant tells the principal that he would never stoop to such behavior, and declares the entire thing to be an "athletics-department witch hunt." Sam looks at him quickly, mouth open. Is she supposed to be upset? Insulted? Stuffed up? It's hard to tell. Principal Hall tells him that eighty-nine percent of sexual harassment accusations in schools are proven false Sam busts into the conversation in a typical genius move: "Mr. Grant is a great teacher! He would never hurt me! We only went out to dinner one time!" Smooth move, Ex-Lax. Dead silence falls in the office. Principal Hall asks Mr. Grant if he has a parental permission slip on record for the fateful dinner. He says quietly that no, he does not. I cackle in triumph, because I could have predicted this turn of events weeks ago. In fact, I did.
Cut to Mr. Grant snitting down the stairs, with Sam trailing behind him. When they get to the bottom of the stairs, she says that she is sorry. He says that he is sorry, too. He stomps off. Smug Bitch slithers by and hisses, "Stop the press!" Then she slides away again. Sam turns to leave, then sees Brooke at her locker. The two of them stare at each other for a long minute. They both look super-congested. Poor girls. Something must be going around. I wonder if the school nurse has been alerted.
Cut to another craaazy sequence. This time it's Brooke, making dinner in fast motion like a mad marionette. BUT when she goes to light the candles on the table, she whips out a lighter with the flame turned up way too high, and the motion turns mysteriously, dramatically slow. For. No. Apparent. Reason.
And then the candles have burned halfway down, and dinner is almost over. Sam's mom gives Brooke a very nice compliment on the pork chops. Sam rolls her eyes. Brooke's dad (henceforth known as Dad) says to Sam's mom (yep, now called Mom), "You have a little something on your mouth." She stares at him blankly. Everything turns awkward. "I'll get it," he says, and walks over to her and gives her a big ol' tongue kiss. Man! That is the sweetest thing. Brooke and Sam both turn away in disgust. After returning to his seat, Dad says, "This is a nice family-style dinner in the kitchen. A guy could get used to this." Brooke agrees that it was nice, then says it reminds her of a show like The Brady Bunch or Diff'rent Strokes, or one of those other "families in turmoil thrown together" shows. (Ha ha. Very post-modern, guys. Now quit it.) "But," Brooke continues, "those shows always got cancelled because one of the kids robbed a dry-cleaner's to pay for his drug habit." Sam smirks at this. Both parents gulp their wine and press forward bravely. Mom asks Brooke which of the girls Brooke identifies with. Sam butts in and says that Brooke is obviously a Marcia. I think that this a nice thing to say; I loved Marcia. But Brooke seems insulted, declaring herself a Jan. Dad asks Sam which girl she most identifies with. Brooke takes the reins on this one and says, "Judging by your outfit, I'd say you were Alice." Ouch! Score one for Brooke. Strangely enough, Sam also declares herself a Jan. Could it be that these ladies are secretly just alike? I dare not believe it. ("Anvil alert!" -- Sars) Dad announces that he's going to bus the dishes, and remarks on the fact that Sam hardly touched anything on her plate. Sam says it's because she's a vegetarian. Mom asks her when she started being a veggie, and she says, "Since I took my first bite of those pork chops." The girls glare daggers. Night on Bald Mountain plays for the rest of the scene. Mom says Brooke's dessert smells terrific, and Brooke says pointedly that it was her mother's recipe. Then Dad asks Sam how school was today. Sam says it was fine, except for the part when she found out that her journalism teacher was being framed for sex with a student, "That student being me." Mom spits out her wine in surprise. Sam clarifies, "But I'm innocent, as is Mr. Grant. Nothing happened. Brooke here just decided to get back at me for writing my editorial and made the whole thing up." Brooke tells Sam that Sam is only looking for scapegoats for her own problems, and that she needs therapy. Dad, in an awkward attempt to normalize this freaky situation, asks Sam if she's having some problems at school that she'd like to discuss. Oh, right, Dad. Sam snaps that it's none of his business. Mom says Sam needs to take a more respectful tone. Sam excuses herself from the table and runs off to wander the halls of the McQueen mansion. The parents look at each other in rank dismay, and I breathe a sigh of relief that this tense scene is over.
This scene has a cringe factor of at least eight, if not higher. Cut to Sam, snooping around in Brooke's bedroom. She opens Brooke's closet, takes out one of Brooke's dresses, and holds it up in front of her. What an idiot! I bet Mom is one of those hippie moms who didn't teach her any sense of boundaries or manners. Brooke busts her (duh) and snatches the dress out of her hands. She re-hangs it in the closet, asking, "What are you doing, Sam? Spying on me? Looking for more filthy dirt for your editorials?" Sam has the lame come-back that she was just looking at Brooke's nice things and thinking of all the people at school who have nothing but their pride: "Every day you chip away at that, Brooke." I am so embarrassed for Sam right now -- she is such an asshole! Brooke doesn't buy it and tells Sam to put away her mental tape measure, because neither of the McPherson women are moving into her house. Sam says that her dad died, and that her mother loved him very much. She asks if Brooke's mom died, too. When Brooke replies that her mother left, Sam observes that "with a daughter like you, it's easy to see why." Brooke bitch-slaps Sam, and then they both stand there crying. Since almost every scene ends with someone running out of the room, I am all ready for Sam to take off. But, strangely, Brooke is the lucky snitter here, even though it's her bedroom. As usual, Sam is left standing with her stupid pie-hole hanging wide open.
Cut to the lunchroom at school. The girls go to their respective tables. Both look completely ragged. Sam flops down at her table and says, "I suck. I have vendettas. I'm a bad person." Harrison stares at her in surprise: "Dinner was that bad, huh?" He looks really bad in that color green. All the "misfit" kids take turns apologizing to Sam for not supporting her muckraking editorial. This is very frustrating, since they were completely right the whole time. Then they all say how sorry they are that her dad died.
At the blonde table, Smug Bitch tries to cheer Brooke up by asking everyone what fun thing they plan to do tonight. Josh says quietly that he's not going out with them tonight, because "I've had these voices in my head all week, coach, dad, mom, girlfriend." He says he needs some time alone to hear his own voice. What a buzzkill. He walks away, perhaps to talk to that irritating humanities teacher. SB glares at him, but Brooke says, "No, I deserve it. I deserve it." She speaks with such deep self-loathing that I get a lump in my throat. Sometimes the characterization on this show isn't half bad.
Back in Principal Hall's office, Mr. Vincent is watching a video surveillance tape of himself breaking into Coach Peretti's office. The principal makes him describe everything that's happening on the tape, including a lovely moment when he dances around in a number from Cats. Somehow it's determined that stealing a file out of someone's office is a felony offense, which is a complete surprise to me. The scene closes with a shot of Mr. Vincent looking utterly ashamed of himself.
Cut to the teachers' lounge. Principal Hall tells a picture of John F. Kennedy that Mr. Vincent has resigned, effective immediately. A faculty member tells her to do a 180. She thanks the faculty member graciously for the navigational advice, then asks Bio about Little Big Head's score on her amphibian anatomy test. Bio reports that LBH scored a 98. Principal Hall smiles, then orders Bio to cease her "frog purse torture." She reminds Bio that her job is to "encourage students, not abuse them." Obviously, Principal Hall doesn't know about Bio's nude-male eugenics lab. The humanities teacher makes a galling reference to Van Halen's classic "Hot for Teacher" as a roundabout way of asking for dirt on Mr. Grant. Coach says he heard that the principal caught Sam and Mr. G "in the act." The principal says that she is certain things will turn out well for Mr. G. She scolds the coach for using Josh as a "personal yo-yo." Duly chastised and informed, the faculty is now in order.
Meanwhile, Sam is standing in the Kim Novak bathroom, wearing an ugly yellow vest. Brooke comes out of a stall. She apologizes for slapping Sam. Sam admits that she deserved it. (Damn right you did!) The girls exchange bummed-out-parents stories awkwardly, and come to the conclusion that their parents must really love each other. Brooke says, "And then there's you and me -- two people who really don't like each other. This ought to be interesting." The scene ends with a deeply symbolic (snicker) shot of them standing on opposite sides of a big, round, plush bench.
Cut to a shot of the American flag, fluttering in the breeze. The camera pans down the flagpole to Little Big Head, who is burying her (obviously rubber) frog. She's even drawn a cross on its belly in red lipstick. As she's saying the eulogy, Josh approaches and starts to talk. She asks for a moment of silence for the dearly departed squeeze toy. Josh tells LBH that he respects her for not caving in to the pressure to dissect the frog, then says that it's tough for him to stand up to all of the assholes who want him to quit the musical. LBH tells him to stay true to himself. When he says that he doesn't know if he can make it, LBH gets the most ungodly self-satisfied look on her face and says, "It's the only way to make it." Ugh. She's going on my Christmas death-wish list for sure, now. They both pick up handfuls of dirt and drop them on the bath toy -- I mean, "frog" -- as they say their final goodbyes. Dirt falls on the camera, and another episode draws to a close.