Date of airing: March 3, 1998 (WB)
Nielsen ratings information: 7.52 million viewers, 5.2/8 in Households
There was an effort to turn an episode of DAWSON’S CREEK into a television remake of THE BREAKFAST CLUB, but this can’t be true, can it? Wouldn’t it be too obvious for this show that it would merge its pop culture references regarding movies with homages to actual movies? Is it a little too predictable that the series would also start imitating other movies of its genre, just because one of its characters is a movie buff? And what can there be said about a teen drama series that uses the premises of movies to develop its teen characters while they talk about the movies they live in? Here is to hoping that THE BREAKFAST CLUB is the only obvious “homage” to Hollywood movies in Capeside, Massachusetts, because for some reason I’m not quite in the mood for this show copying movies. Especially when this is the only way for the writers to move the characters forward and have them experience emotions and sex for the first time – by emulating kids from John Hughes movies.
Still, this episode kind of worked. It may be a little too close to comfort to not being a full-blown ripoff of THE BREAKFAST CLUB, but it did at least serve the characters nicely by having them face their hidden truths and hopefully deal with them in the next episode. It’s about time for Joey to tell the whole world that she is in love with Dawson (even though I don’t get it – he could not have been more of an aggressive douche on the basketball court) and it’s about time for something to happen to Pacey’s life after he has been the Peter Parker-type character throughout the past six episodes, who always had a joke on his mind, although it may just be his way of coping with the knowledge he doesn’t possess about women or sex. It’s about time for Dawson to be thrown in between two girls, and it’s about time for Jen to be more than just the sweet girl next door who possibly lied about being attracted to Dawson, making me question why she is with him in the first place. It can’t just be about the simplicity of dating a boy who’s not into sex and drugs that much, can it?
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| When you make fun of Dawson and expect his wrath, you peace out of this conversation. |
And boy, was I excited about Jen finally realizing that she for real stepped into something between Dawson and Joey during the pilot episode. I don’t know if life gets any harder for the threesome from here on (I would like to see that, simply for the teen soap drama of it all), but with Jen’s knowledge about what she messed up with her arrival in Capeside, and Joey’s realization that she can’t move on with her teenage life until she told someone about her feelings, yet can’t tell anyone about her feelings because she wouldn’t be able to handle the fallout, this episode certainly upped the ante for the characters for the remainder of the season when it comes to telling and finding out the truth. Joey could believe in her feelings and just blurt them out, no matter if she loses a few of her friendships in the process, while Jen’s relationship with Dawson, and most likely the only reason she is staying sane in Capeside after her doped-out and X-rated adventures in New York, could be on a breaking point, which means there might be a version of Jen coming up that we haven’t seen before, since she has kind of always been in Dawson’s own story. With the potential break-up that has been seeded in this episode, Jen could become her own character. Quite a way to fill an episodic remake of a famous 1980s movie while also keeping the budget of the show down a little bit by having half of the credited cast not appear at all during this hour.
I loved how the episode began. It was about time for Dawson and Pacey to have an issue with one another that they needed to resolve, and I was kind of amused by the lucky shot of the basketball, which ricocheted off of Pacey’s face and into the camera lens before flying away (was that an accident or a planned shot?). Together with Pacey’s comment about the Mighty Ducks movies with Emilio Estevez, that must have been one of the funnier moments during production of this episode. Although I did have fun when Joey beat up Grant in the lunch hall. The boy had it coming when he interrupted Joey’s presentation and continued to be a sexist prick afterward, creating the potential of becoming a sex abuser in his adult life, and I very much loved the notion that Joey can kick the crap out of an asshole, although it sort of goes against her fear of facing her emotions. I would consider this an inconsistency in her character arc, but who am I to know the feelings of a fictional girl who punches up assholes, but still finds out that she loves the one asshole who is not a sexist prick (and yes, I am talking about Dawson). After all, defending her honor and everyone else’s by beating down a dick who will probably live up to be a Louis C.K.-type man, pulling his junk out in front of unsuspecting women, is much different from her persona that is dealing with her love for Dawson.
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| This is all of today's audience for the basketball match. |
The detention itself had a nice character plot device with Abby, who came in and conquered the story, most likely never to be seen again because all she was supposed to do was get the central characters to open up about their feelings. One can only hope this wasn’t Abby’s one and only episode, since you could use her attitude-ish nature to liven up some more episodes and character moments. Why waste such an antagonistic character as a plot device in this episode only when you just created the chance to have a villain present in your show, which the show previously did not have? Nothing is better than having a villain in your show – every teen drama on TV should know that.
The game of Truth Or Dare was lame, however. Instead of daring Pacey
to tell the truth about why he’s gotten detention, the dare had to be a
kiss, as if this game was truly played by children. But ever since I
watched the movie TRUTH OR DARE, and the supernatural evil presence
dared a character to tell the truth, that’s all I can think of when
hearing about the game. After all, forcing someone to tell the truth is
also a dare. And kissing in a truth or dare game is kind of boring,
although I am speaking as a mid-thirtysomething who hasn’t played the
game since ... forever. I never had any friends to play this game with.
