Episode Report Card Heathen: C+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT The Rager
By Heathen | Season 2 | Episode 19 | Aired on 04.13.2005
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.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. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
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.