The O.C. – Episode 4-11 – “The Dream Lover”
Ryan battles to tell Taylor how he really feels about her. Does he L-O-V-E her or not? Taylor wants to be with someone that can tell her how he really feels about. So Ryan may lose Taylor to Henri-Michel, since Henri tells Taylor how much he loves her and all of that. More on the battle of Henri and Ryan later.
Seth and Summer have their own issues. Summer thinks Seth is now heart-broken since she basically told him that they can’t get married right now. Ryan tries to tell Seth that Summer still loves him, but Seth says he would rather that they had broken up after Summer said no to marriage than to stay together and not get married.
Summer does all she can to lift Seth’s spirits. But only one person can help Seth now. His spirit is broken and only CHE? can help Seth now. Yes, this somehow leads to an odd outdoor adventure for Che and Seth. Che drags Seth to the woods to find his “animus”. That’s apparently the form of animal your spirit takes. They must find this animal and make it happy. This was very odd, but pretty funny. Not as funny as it might have been on paper, but still amusing. Eventually Seth finds out that the “otter” is his “animus”. His spirit animal is healed and he is ready to tell Summer that everything is okay with them. More on otters later.
Julie is back to her devious ways to get Kirsten to talk to her again. This time she has Spencer tell Kirsten that one of the guys from the “mating service” has a sexually transmitted disease. Since Spencer is out of the country AND Kirsten fired Julie the other day, Kirsten has to clean up Julie’s mess. Of course, this was just a ploy to get Julie to call Kirsten and give them the chance to talk. Pretty devious, but smart in a Julie way. Kirstens ends up seeing that for all of the “evil” that Julie does, she is still her best friend.
Kaitlin battles it out with some band girl named Lucy. It turns out that she has been in love with Will for forever. She thinks that Kaitlin has changed Will for the worse. EVentually, Kaitlin sees that she and Will are too different. She seems to have broken things off with him. They are better as friends and that’s it.
Meanwhile, Henri-Michel and Ryan battle it out for Taylor’s love. Henri-Michel buys Taylor a house that they are going to live in. Ryan gives her a stuffed bear with a mug of gummy bears that he bought at the local gas station for under 10 dollars! To Taylor, that doesn’t seem equal, but once Summer tells Taylor that Ryan buying Taylor a stuffed bear is one of the sweetest gifts he has ever gotten anyone, it makes her rethink things. I could mention that Ryan set up a nice beach house retreat for Marissa back in season 2 or 3, which was dangerous and nice at the same time, but I won’t. This is something he bought and I don’t remember him doing that much for Marissa.
Back to the war, though. It finally looks like it comes down to a poem. Yes, a poem. Actually, it took Sandy again to tell Ryan to tell Taylor how he feels, even if it’s not love. Henri-Michel recites a heartfelt poem that makes the ladies swoon. It just so happens that Ryan shows up AND he has a poem as well. It goes something like this…
Ryan: “A sonnet, I don’t know how to write. A haiku, 5-7-5 seems too tight. (looks around at the crowd) I’m sorry I think this is a bad idea.”
Taylor: (Takes poem away from Ryan and finishes it) “Then there are three little words that I can’t say. But Taylor this is what I can tell you today. Though, I can’t say those words to you tonight, please stick with me because some day I feel I might.”
That seems to make Taylor happy and ready to move on with Ryan. That is until Taylor notices that Henri has left. She runs back to find out that he has gone back to France. He says that he loves her, but he loves “love” more. Basically, he saw that Ryan really cares about Taylor wants her to be happy. Too bad she has other thoughts.
Taylor: “When Henri-Michel would tell me he loved me, it was like the whole world melted away. Those words just have more power over me than anything. It’s scary how much I want… how much I need to hear them.”
Ryan: “Well, if that’s important to you…”
Taylor: “I would never ask you to be able to say that yet, and even if you could, I don’t think I’m ready to hear it.”
Ryan: “So, what are you saying?”
Taylor: “Until I can be stronger on my own, I don’t think I should be with anyone, including you. I’m sorry.”
So Ryan and Taylor break up, but really it’s for the better right now. Taylor has to love herself before she can love anyone else. And Ryan isn’t ready to love anyone else right now anyways. He still cares for her and I believe she still cares about him, but they are basically hitting the pause button for a little bit.
We finally end things on an odd note. Che had a dream and says his spirit animal, the frog, is in love with an otter. His soulmate is an otter. Seth’s animal is an otter, so basically Che thinks that Seth is his soulmate. Um, yeah, a little crazy but that’s Che. We’ll see how that turns out in the next episode. Until then…
