Previously: Sandy and his eyebrows take over The Newport Group.
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The Perfect Storm
Katherine: I really wanted to pretend that I have totally been keeping up with the show since recapping The Telanovela, but there is literally nothing happening before my mind is already blown. It wasn’t THAT long ago that Kirsten was bragging about her specialty of taking food out of take out containers and now she’s apparently cooked a full gourmet breakfast!? Was the drinking really that bad?
Wait, Seth and Ryan are looking very confused by this exuberant breakfast before school (they’re all still so awake in the morning, it’s weird) so it must not be a regular thing. In typical teenage-boy fashion, they just want their cereal and bagels. Sandy comes in and wants the same, apparently this is bizarro Kirsten.
It seems there’s a college fair at school tonight and Principal Dr. Kim has called to talk to Sandy about it. I still don’t understand this morning phone call stuff. Is this a thing that is actually done by people? (M: Not anyone who is my friend or wants to remain my friend.) Anyway, Ryan can tell that even though Dr. Kim has said that it’s a public event, his presence isn’t super welcome at the college fair.
The boys leave and it’s time for serious parent talk. The school’s dean of discipline has doled out the ultimate punishment by making a note on Ryan’s transcript about his pathologically violent behavior. Now he’s poison to any reputable school, which of course means that your life is over when you live in Newport Beach.
After the opening screamsinging, Marisa and Summer are both getting ready for school and having to share the mirror, forcing comments about how Marisa is always there, but it’s nice because she’s not going to Harbor anymore.
Marines: Whatever on this BS. I grew up in a crap neighborhood with working class parents and we had more than one mirror in the entire house. And if this mansion doesn’t have a guest room, my entire understanding of rich people is off.
Katherine: Summer thinks the newly homeless, going to public school, totally broke Marisa should join her at the college fair tonight, which is the perfect time for Julie to call from beside the pool at some outrageous location to check in. Apparently she’s got a lead on a new place, until of course the conversation ends and we pan out to see Julie being ridiculous by the side of a cheap motel pool while a cop is arresting someone.
Seriously, what’s with the morning stuff and being awake, people?
Marines: Additionally, Julie, girl. You live BY A BEACH. That thing is FREE. Abandon your motel pool and go sit by the ocean.
Katherine: Some chick I don’t know is texting and Summer is not liking it at all. I’m guessing this chick did something to Marisa, right? Because if nothing else, Summer is a loyal friend. Time to go on recon to figure out if this chick, who is apparently named Taylor and might be sleeping with the Dean or something. But oh! Shockingly, Taylor finds her out and confronts her. Summer’s got a trick or two up those cap sleeves of hers though, and tests Taylor with a story about the dean and a teacher. I’m not sure yet if Taylor’s shock is just about the gossip, or if there’s jealousy there as well. I suppose we’ll find out!
Kirsten legitimately is helping Julie find a new place! Not that Julie Cooper is excited about the idea of a condo, but who can say no to Kirsten, right? Luckily, Julie doesn’t have to say much when Charlotte drops by and she can make a quick, vague-ish exit. This is also a great time for Kirsten to fill Charlotte in on just enough information about Julie that Charlotte gets plotty-face.
Mari: Charlotte is awful but Kirsten is making this rather easy, what with her dishing all this key information.
Katherine: After trying to guilt Marisa into coming to the college fair one last time, Summer joins the Cohen clan at Harbor in possibly the only dress she owns that I’d ever wear. She also notices that all the colleges that Seth seems to be looking at are in the Northeast, making a comment about winter, but I have the feeling that a talk about distance isn’t too far off in their future. Don’t worry though, Cohen, Taylor and Dean Hess have been spotted having what Summer is sure is a couple’s spat, but Seth remains unconvinced. Stubborn Summer is stubborn though and determined to find some evidence.
Oh no! Whether it was a lovers’ spat or totally appropriate conversation for a student to be having with a Dean, it’s over and Dean Hess has spotted his arch nemesis in the building. (M: A STUDENT. Get you some hobbies, Dean, and quit making them students.) (K: I’d like to suggest hair care, because dude, the mop. No.) Never fear, Sandy is swooping in to make sure it’s all good legally, no matter how intimidating the oddly blonde Dean tries to be. Ryan overhears and Sandy’s eyebrows go into full worried look before Ryan broods off.
The next morning, Seth decides to be extra friendly and bring a cup of coffee out to the pool house for Ryan. Ryan though is totes clear headed since last night and doesn’t need that extra friendly touch because he’s decided that he’s done with school altogether. Even when he’s on the phone with Marisa, who is at school. Because apparently in this show even the public schools are places where no one is ever really in class. Don’t you go worrying though, the floppy haired boy whose name I still haven’t caught is there to hear that Marisa is relatively apathetic about this at the moment. Ryan and Floppy Hair had something in common earlier though, will he try to get through to him?
Mari: Ryan jumped from a bad note in his transcript to decide that all education is the worst. Like, shoot. Surely community college is an option? SOMETHING?
Katherine: Cut to Julie in a lovely condo at the beach, where the realtor mistakes her for a “Ms. Morgan.” She’s in love with this place and is totes in. Except somewhere along the way, the lines got crossed and this is not the property the realtor thought was right for Julie, even with the purse full of cash she has for selling Caleb’s ring. As one might have suspected, when Ms. Morgan does walk in, it is none other than Charlotte! That plotting wench comes in totally condescending and evil, but doesn’t seem to do much more than piss Julie off.
Back over at Harbor, Summer has been avoiding Seth for reasons she doesn’t really specify and then has no trouble sharing that she’s plotting against Taylor and Dean Hess, but seems to think she’s really in it as a means to get Ryan back into school. Summer may be too wise for me to understand.
Back at the Cohen house, the parents are being clued into Ryan’s plan by a phone call from his tutor and the appropriate worried eyebrows show up to take the news.
Over at the pier, it seems that Floppy hair’s name is Johnny and just as I suspected, he’s here to talk to Ryan. I’m hoping it’s some sort of reverse psychology thing though, since they’re actually talking about job alternatives and not school at all. Looks like Johnny’s going to hook Ryan up with his Uncle’s commercial fishing gig.
And it must’ve been right then, since he’s not at dinner and the Cohens are all just mopey around the table until Mister Missing finally walks in and announces that he’s got a job! As we might expect, when he needs permission from his guardian to go, Sandy isn’t very happy about it. When Ryan says that he tried things their way and it didn’t work, Sandy wants him to try harder, but Ryan gets slightly yelly about it and Sandy actually signs the consent form, even though Kirsten and Seth are against it.
Ryan goes ahead and talks to the boat captain the next day and it looks like he’ll be ready to head out tomorrow at sunset, right after he takes care of some, “loose ends,” he’s got to deal with.
But wait! Back at Chez Cohen, Kirsten is explaining to Sandy that they must do something, but Sandy really thinks he’s got the right approach. First he tries to tell Kirsten that since he left home at 17, Ryan can totally do it too! But apparently everything is different now and Sandy left to start his life, not to throw it away. Sandy insists that he’s going to do the Jedi-mind trick thing and let Ryan realize on his own that this isn’t going to work for him.
Considering that he’s kind of the main conflict in the show, I’m kind of doubting that he’s going to disappear.
Mari: Perhaps those super wise eyebrows know this as well.
Katherine: He was ahead of his time with that eyebrow game, that Sandy Cohen.
Enter Marissa, who apparently doesn’t know where Ryan is, and in asking, finds out that he plans to leave. What happened to that whole tying up of loose ends you’re going to do Ryan? I think it’s time to get going on that one!
Fortunately, as Seth walks into Summer’s room, she’s already plotting on how to expose Taylor and get Ryan back into Harbor.
Mari: I don’t know how the Sidekick is going to help, other than providing awesome product placement dollars for the show. Wouldn’t that Sidekick have a different number than the Dean?
Katherine: Mari, I think you’re confused. It’s not just a phone, it’s a Sidekick. It’s clearly got some sort of magical power that will confuse any young girl’s mind.
Back at the pool house, Marissa has apparently decided that the best way to find Ryan is to just sit in his room until he comes in. If he ever closed the door to the pool house, I might call that creepy. Ryan does a terrible job of even grasping at the ties to be able to tie up this loose end by claiming that he just needs to make a change, but not for them. I’m not sure that it works that way.
Cut to a shady-bro-dude pulling up to a motel with Charlotte asking about Julie Cooper. Inside said motel, Charlotte tells Julie that the condo they were both looking at earlier has been bought, by Charlotte, in Julie’s name. The only condition is that Charlotte wants to use the extra room when she’s in town. I’m still not trusting this chick. (M: Good call.)
We see Ryan talk to Seth and Marissa talk to Summer, both of them wanting to just get a goodbye dinner for Ryan over with, which is a lovely way to set up the super awkward dinner consisting of conversation about pad thai, tofu and parrots. It’s all pretty much leading up to Marissa showing that she’s mad, until it comes out that Johnny is the connection for the job and it’s clearly too much for her. Ryan tries to go after her when she leaves, but she makes it pretty clear that if he’s going to leave, she’s going to be mad at him, nothing more to it.
The next morning Sandy and Kirsten try one last time, including Sandy admitting that he was trying the Jedi-mind-meld on him! They do the typical parent thing of saying that hard work and staying out of trouble for the rest of the year and then a few semesters in community college will totally lead him to a good 4-year school! But that’s not so easy if you come from Ryan’s family you guys. At least that’s what Ryan claims until Sandy explains that the Cohens are his family now, obviously!
But is that true? Ryan points out that he might not be an Atwood anymore, but he’s also not really a Cohen, so what does it matter if he’s lost at sea or lost on land? While it’s totally apathetic 17-year-old logic, I can’t really argue with him there. At least he’ll always have a door open to him, thanks for that Sandy!
Mari: It hurt my heart a little bit. Sandy calls him son in this episode, I believe, and I think he truly sees Ryan that way, but Ryan’s still having a hard time seeing himself as part of the family.
Katherine: Same, I totes want the magic of the eyebrows to be enough for Ryan, but he’s just put up too sturdy a wall for the eyebrows to knock down yet.
Marissa confronts Johnny at the beach, because that’s such an easy place to find someone! She laments that she didn’t really get to tell Ryan how she felt and now she doesn’t even know where he is, but that whole Johnny set this whole thing up is coming in handy, because he does!
Julie and Charlotte go to Julie’s new condo to celebrate, which totally includes Charlotte calling someone to say, “She’s in.” Definitely plotting, guys.
And here is Marissa, getting to confront Ryan at the fishing boat! Excuse my lack of knowing what happened to Jimmy, I assumed he had died somewhere between the last time I was here and now, but apparently he did the same thing to Marissa that Ryan is now doing, which makes Ryan just as much of a coward in her eyes. Ouch, man!
Next thing we know, Sandy walks in to talk to Dean Hess himself. Lawyer brows come out and Sandy lays it all on the line with the Dean, but not before being adorable in his fatherly comment about new tech being intimidating. (M: His fumbling through flicking the Sidekick open is adorable.) For as nice as he is, Sandy is pretty great about making his demands and sticking to it. Dean Hess sees that he doesn’t have another option, so they’re probably going to let Ryan come back, except didn’t he just leave?
NO!
You know that thing in Science Fiction where if you don’t see someone die/dead they didn’t/aren’t? Ryan walks into that diner on the pier, where Seth and Summer are comforting a mourning Marissa and in that half moment, The OC is a sci-fi show. Seth also announces that Sandy was officially successful and Ryan gets to return to Harbor.
The show ends with an adorable scene of the two young couples walking on the beach, discussing other jobs Ryan could have, the last one of course being the best.
Ryan Atwood: Fluffer.
Next time on The OC: Oh, hey, look. Taylor Townsend is organizing another event in S03 E06 – The Swells.
I'm constantly covered in glitter, but surrounded by dinosaurs, so it tends to work itself out. I talk into a camera far less often than I'd like, but more often than most people seem to from the looks I get when I do it in public. Dr Pepper and Dots will always be a prefered date/hostess gift over flowers for me.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
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