Previously On The O.C.:
Sandy and Caleb discussing the case. DJ and Marissa fighting over the state of their relationship. Summer ending things for good with Seth.
After getting a quick recap we are teased with aerial shots of a golf course and the Pacific shoreline. Man I need a vacation to some place warm.
At the Cohen household Seth tells Ryan he needs help to get a girlfriend now that Summer and Zach are officially dating. Sandy and Kirsten talk about how Sandy is happy to be working by himself. The Cohen men have declared a “new era.” Ryan and Kirsten try to talk Seth out of getting into another relationship so quickly. Sandy however supports Set’s decision to find a new girlfriend. Seth decides the best way to find a girl is to go “shopping” for girls from the yearbook.
After the introduction and some commercials we are zipped over to school. Set’s first choice for a new girlfriend didn’t work out. It turns out she laughed at him. Ryan does his best to help Seth out by pointing out girls to which Seth says yes or no to. Lindsay shows up and meets Seth for the first time. She realizes what the boys are up to and ranks them both as “No” to if she would date them. (Yeah right you LOVE Ryan). Seth is immediately smitten with Lindsay and asks Ryan to “make it happen.”
Marissa declares to Summer that this is a “new era” of not dating boys (cough bu#@s%$t cough). She is looking like a wannabee Parisian tonight. Summer looks hot with the kilt. Zach offers to set Marissa up with some of his friends.
Meanwhile in some fancy restaurant Caleb and Sandy discuss the start of their “new era” of working together. Ugh enough already with this new era crap. Sandy tries to talk about the case and some secret trust fund that is managed by a city assistant with Caleb. Caleb however is more interested in Frittatas. I think he would get along well with Lou from The Simpsons.
Over in science class with Ryan and Lindsay. He goes over to her and awkwardly asks her out on a date. She says yes. Everyone watching at home knows that she thought he was asking her out. After she says yes though she realizes Ryan is asking he for to go on date with Seth. She does her best to cover up that she knew this and didn’t think Ryan was asking her out. Ryan is dense and doesn’t figure out she wants some Chino loving.
Over at the offices of The Newport Group new CEO Julie drops in and brings Kirsten a tree. So what has more substance a tree or Julie? Kirsten is high strung because the company is in dire straits (and now they are not involved in planning some reunion tour of the band dire straits, even though that would be a good plot line.) Kirsten tells Julie that there is an important presentation she is trying to get ready for. Julie decides that she should be involved in the presentation.
Marissa is feeling lonely and decides to go see DJ. He is reluctant to talk to her as he is still upset about Marissa ditching him for Ryan. Marissa asks him to go see a band “The Killers” at the Bait Shop. He is non-committal (which means he will be there but will find some excuse as to why he ended up there, other then going to see her.)
Ryan shows up at The Bait Shop where Seth is working. Seth is surprised Lindsay said yes to the date. He now seems reluctant about the date now that it’s an actual possibility. Alex walks by and Seth gets the idea that Ryan should go out with her to make it a double date. Seth does his best to convince Alex to go with Ryan to the concert tomorrow night.
After a brief interlude of commercials Kirsten is giving a presentation when Julie shows up late and declares herself in charge. The investors begin to ask questions about Caleb’s indictment. Julie stars treating Kirsten like a secretary and eventually asks her to leave. Kirsten gladly departs. The investors begin to grill Julie who seems stumped for answers.
Another day of school and the boys are discussing the double date. Summer shows up and says hi. In a moment almost as painful as watching Mikey (Jon Favreau) in Swingers leave umpteenth messages on a girl’s answering machine whom he had just met that night. Seth announces to Summer that he has a date. Summer takes the curve ball that didn’t curve and hits it out of the park by pretty much making him look like the big fool he is. After this sad display Marissa asks Ryan if he is free tonight. He is reluctant to answer. She correctly guesses that he has a date. Ryan asks about DJ, she tells him that nothing is going on between her and DJ.
Now that Seth is a total dork with dubious sexuality I am declaring Jimmy to be my new favourite on the show. On that note we are shown Jimmy fixing his yacht when Julie drops by. She brings him his favourite sandwich. Jimmy knows there must be something up for her to be so nice to him. She tells Jimmy that she needs help with work. Jimmy gives her a boost of confidence, “If there is on thing you are good at it is getting money from rich old men.” Oh Jimmy, you should be a high school guidance counsellor with that sagelike advice. I can just imagine it, “Britney your grades and SAT marks are awful but honey you have a great body and a decent face. Use what you got and go look for jobs at strip bars, heck you already have a perfect stage name.”
Seth and Ryan show up at The Bait Ship for the concert. Lindsay is already there and is not looking happy. Ryan goes over to say hi to Lindsay as Seth is nervous and runs away to find Alex. Lindsay is none to happy with Ryan. Meanwhile Seth has found Alex who says Ryan is cute but that she says Seth is cuter, prefaced with “when he is not talking.” The four finally get all together in one group and… awkward silence. Seth does his best to break the ice by joking about the awkwardness.
Back at the Cohen homestead Sandy is reliving his twenties. He is chilling on the recliner eating Cheetos and watching Dr. Phil?? Ok well put on some sports and he would be in reliving his twenties or at least my twenties, more precisely my now. Sandy has decided to slack off because he assumes Caleb’s case is completely lost as Caleb refuses to help him. Sandy wants to just give up. He should go join Jimmy on the yacht. Kirsten tells Sandy that her dad must be hiding something. Right then the doorbell rings and Julie shows up with caterers in tow. She announces they are having a party, right now.
Back at the concert. We are shown a prolonged segment promoting the band, whom I will refuse to name from this point on. What is this crap? I tuned in to watch hot chicks, mildly humourous sarcasm and to vicariously live through people who live in a much better climate then I do. I did not tune in to watch a music video.
Alex asks Ryan if he likes live music, he doesn’t, Alex tells him it’s her passion. Well there goes that hook up. The two boys talk away from the girls and declare they have hit rock bottom. They quickly realize that things are gonna get worse as they spot Summer and Marissa.
On that note we head to more commercials. So far the episode is blah. I think the show needs to add more violence. A Julie-Kirsten cat fight would be cool.
After “the man” tries to sell me more products I am bombared with another advertisement via music video of this never to be named band. I don’t know if they are good band or not but out of spite I will not even illegally download a song from them.
While the boys have hooked up a double date, the girls and Zach are just a threesome. This group date runs into the other group date. Is there only one club in Orange County? After the awkward conversation between Seth-Summer and Ryan-Marissa, Lindsay realizes that these girls were the boys respective ex’s.
Now that I have grown tired of The Bait Shop we head back to the impromptu party planned by Julie. Kirsten is talking to Jimmy, who no doubt is talking advantage of the free booze. He tells Kirsten not to worry about Julie, that she will be able to handle things.
Back at the Bait Shop Summer is spying on Seth who is talking to Lindsay. An annoyed Zach wants to watch the band instead of Seth and claims that Summer is obsessing about Seth. We get to see what Seth is talking to Lindsay about and of course it is about his break up with Summer. Unlike the nice Vegas waitresses in Swingers, Lindsay does not give a crap about Set’s dating problems.
Sandy has bailed out of the party to do some spying of his own. He spots Caleb who is having some sort of covert meeting with an unknown woman. Sandy goes into the bar Caleb is currently drinking his troubles away and plops himself down beside Caleb. He asks about the woman he was meeting with. Sandy deduces that the woman is Renee Wheeler, who is the connection to the bribery case. Caleb tells him to leave it alone, that it’s not an affair but that whatever secret the two of them are hiding could bring down the family.
On that dramatic note we go back to the Bait Shop. The concert has ended. Lindsay is anxious to leave and get away from Seth. Seth decides to tell Summer he is fine about not talking to her. Oh man I just want to smack some sense into this boy at this point. He needs Trent!! Ok enough Swingers references. Marissa notices that DJ has shown up at the concert. He acts like he didn’t come to see her. Alex tells Ryan he should tell Lindsay he likes her. Alex says she isn’t offended and does not feel any spark between herself and Ryan.
Summer is defending to Zach her talking about Seth all night. Zach is mad and tells her that is gonna walk off a pier. Ok this is the moment when I make my decision about this guy. I was on the fence, now I am off it. I don’t like him. Summer runs after Zach and they reconcile.
Back in the bar Ryan goes to talk to Lindsay. She is running out of the bar as fast as she can. She tells Ryan that she had the worst evening of her life, overdramatic a wee bit? She doesn’t want to talk to Ryan and she leaves before he let her know that how he feels.
On that sappy note, more commercials.
I never thought I would say this but if it wasn’t for Julie I would be bored to death in this episode. Speaking of Julie she is taken advantage of the drunk old men, who no doubt want to take advantage of her.
Ryan leaves the club and runs into Seth. The boys pull the switchero with their dates. Seth decides to go see Alex. He laments her how he got dumped twice in one night and apologizes for the set up. Alex tries to make him feel better with some compliments mixed in with insults. Alex has the best line of the night as she pulls out the G.I. Joe Motto, “Knowing is half the battle.” Seth asks her to go get some ice cream. Instead of saying yes she kisses him. Ok now I have some hope. Alex may be able to turn Seth around through vigorous sexual intercourse.
Cut to DJ driving around. He sees Marissa’s car and decides to pull over. She is sitting on a life guard post acting all lonely and such. He goes to find her. They talk, he is SUCH a bad actor he makes her look good. They start to kiss, wow that was an awkward kiss. It looks like a mix of a kiss between relatives and someone trying to bite off someone’s lip.
Ryan is also driving around. He spots Lindsay at the bus stop. Ryan offers her a lift but she refuses. He parks the car and gets out. She fesses up and tells Ryan that she thought he was asking her out. She was saying yes to him asking her out not saying yes to Seth. He confesses that he wanted to ask her out but didn’t think she would say yes. Ugh I’m gonna vomit.
Back at the Cohen house Kirsten is getting ready for bed. She tells Sandy that that the deal is back on. Julie worked her mojo to get the investors to sign on. Note: I took all of 3 weeks of law in my last year of high school, before dropping the class, but the one thing I learned is that for a contract to be legal the people signing it must be sober. The investors were rather drunk. Sandy tells Kirsten about his night and that her dad is guilty of something, he is just not sure of what. Then the happy couple start to get romantic.
Quick flip over to Zach and Summer getting close and watching The Valley on DVD.
Then over to Marissa and DJ cuddling on the life guard post. Followed by”¦Alex and Seth eating ice cream and Ryan and Lindsay sitting on bench talking. Oh isn’t that nice everyone is happy. Now the writers have officially set up the couples for this season. Ok I am sure these couples will intertwine, break up, get back together, break up again and so on until the season ends in May. But for now things are settled. However having things settled is boring, just like this episode.
Next week on:
It’s the winter dance. How can they have the winter dance? They don’t even have winter in Malibu. DJ and Marissa get caught making out by Julie. What looks like Zach punching out Seth. (All right, that’s more like it). Then Ryan and Marissa awkwardly dancing at the winter dance.
That is all for now folks. Let me know where you think things should go with the show.
