Date of airing: January 6, 2005 (FOX)
Nielsen ratings information: 7.65 million viewers, 4.8/7 in Households, 3.3/9 with Adults 18-49
written by: Drew Z. Greenberg, Josh Schwartz
directed by: Lesli Glatter
There have been reviews of this season that did not speak complimentary words about Mischa Barton’s acting abilities on THE O.C. I concur that she is not the greatest actress in the world (however, she was great in LOST AND DELIRIOUS), and she lost some market value when she decided to become a diva and ride on her fame that was built on THE O.C. before quickly falling off that horse and destroying her stardom, but so far she has not made a very negative move here, and that is especially noticeable in this episode. It turns out that after seven episodes of season two, Barton was, in fact, a pretty good actress – her breakdown at the pool in front of Julie in the season premiere (which is still used as a GIF by me whenever I need to display my rage over my emotions), and now her cry-in-the-shoulder moment with Jimmy in this episode were both excellent moments with Barton as Marissa Cooper, as she goes deeper into the emotional weight her character is forced to carry. She has certain styles that are questionable (like, always showcasing her smile, because maybe she thinks her smile is the selling point), but so far, would not know why critics saw her as a problem in this season.
This episode was good enough, although I would not have bothered with the weird thing between Ryan and Lindsay so much. I guess you can think that it might be an issue when those two date, considering they are part of the same family, but it is a fact that Ryan is not. I do not think the word ‘adoption’ has ever been put in anyone’s mouth (except in Caleb’s, during his first appearance way back when in "The Girlfriend"), which makes me think that Ryan has not been adopted in the legal sense of the word, and instead just got new guardianship in the form of the Cohens. For this to be a whole adoption, Ryan’s mother must have given up her parental rights, and while she sort of did that when walking out of his life at the end of the episode “The Gamble,” I cannot think why she would do that in a legal sense. So, here I am, thinking that Ryan is not fully adopted, which means he is not legally a member of the Cohen family, so he should have no trouble dating Lindsay, and neither should Kirsten.
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| A hug from the ex-wife... |
The thing that crumbled my cookie me in Ryan and Lindsay’s (love) story though is that
they were constantly talking about it, while not at all talking about
just risking it or maybe moving forward with the romance without having
to run into the Kirsten wall every time they are close with each other. I
understand why it is a problem for the two, but it was too big a
problem for me.
At least they had fun kissing each other, so there is that. Turns out the two are made for each other and can be in a relationship, and should Kirsten be having a bad opinion about that? Because if she has a problem with it, she would be a bad sister to Lindsay, and she would be a bad kinda-mother to Ryan. Especially in these circumstances, right after the big family secret has been revealed, which is when the family needs a few happy moments, and that is something Kirsten should not even be allowed to ruin.
Meanwhile, Seth goes out of character for a girl who is out of his league, voluntarily drinks, and steals a car without his heart beating out of his chest. I had to laugh when Caleb learned his car got stolen, and one second later there is Seth with a stolen car (everyone probably thought for a second that it was Marissa who stole the car after that monstrous conflict she had with Julie and Jimmy), but in hindsight, I found that story absurd. Even after 34 episodes, most of Seth’s stories are still being used for comedic purposes, yet here is Seth, going all in to become the bad boy, by getting drunk and stealing a car, which should be a huge problem for him and his future in the Cohen family. And Seth could not have just taken Ryan’s car instead? Was this entire mission executed, just so Seth can stand in front of Alex as a bad boy with a car that was probably driven by James Bond at some point?
Summer’s story was boring, but at least it felt like the first real attempt at making her part of the show without having her be part of the Seth Cohen show. She is still part of the Seth Cohen show though, as his name still gets mentioned in her and Zach's relationship. As Zach said, they had their first fight, and it was not about Cohen, which, by the way, was not true at all, making me wonder how much the writers were smoking during the writing of this episode. First, they turn Seth into a caricature of himself, and then they write a line about a fight not being about Seth when it was clearly about Seth. But hey, it is great to see that Summer can do something else than be around Cohen all the time.
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| ... and a hug from the daughter give Jimmy a lot of heartbreak. |
And finally, there is the goodbye man. With Hailey’s move to Japan for business reasons (and we have not heard from or about her since), it has become apparent that Jimmy became uninteresting, boring, and useless, so the affair with his ex-wife was written into the show, which was also uninteresting, boring, and useless, even if it happened to emotionally destroy Marissa for this episode. And because the affair could also not be for eternity, Jimmy was shown the door in general, so away he goes to Maui to sell yachts – to rich people, most likely (and let me tell you, he will make a loss because all the ocean wildlife will destroy those billionaire yachts).
I do not know if I am going to miss Jimmy as a character, but it is a fact he has not gotten much to do this season, so it only seemed natural that the writers would say goodbye to him, let him move on, and maybe have Marissa follow up on her promise and see herself go into Crazyland. Now that the only calm constant has left her life, she should go straight into alcohol abuse and troubles, making her mother wish she had transferred her to a mental institution more than a year ago. This could be the origin episode of Marissa’s bad side.
