TVSquad

Last night, I rehung my "I Love Ryan Atwood" poster over my bed. This poster doesn't actually exist physically, but it does in my heart. During season two I'd taken the metaphorical poster down. I'd ripped it down in fact. I threw it on the ground and did a dance of anger on it. Why? Because, quite frankly, season two of The OC sucked. But last night, I picked the poster off the ground, smoothed it out, and scotched taped it back up on the wall. Only two weeks into the new season and already things are feeling like the first triumphant season. Mostly because, last night...Ryan punched somebody. He made their nose bleed. I am a firm believer that it's not an episode of The OC, unless Ryan punches somebody. Unless there's a fight and an extravagant party, then it's just a rejected episode of Dawson's Creek, as far as I'm concerned.

Last night's episode introduced two new characters to Orange County -- both of them deliciously obnoxious. First, there's Taylor, a blonde perky overachiever (think Reese Witherspoon in Election), who's trying to steal away Marissa's position as social chair, while also keeping the part in her hair perfectly in place. Then, there's Dean, the new Dean of Security (sorta unnecessarily confusing name/title thing there) at Harbor High. When I was in high school, all our security guys were big black dudes, but Dean is about as white as white can get with his feathered blonde hair and piercing blue eyes. Let me explain it this way, if The OC was filmed in the 80s, Dean would be played by Johnny from the Cobra Kai in The Karate Kid. That's the kind of evil white guy stuff we're talking about here.

Both of these new characters have the same goal -- to destroy the dynasty that is Ryan Atwood and Marissa Cooper. Or as Dean calls them, "Harbor's most-notorious couple." Apparently, in light of Marissa shooting Ryan's brother last season, some of the parents at Harbor have a problem with Ryan and Marissa remaining in school, and there is a petition calling for their expulsion. This, of course, is a huge shock to everybody except the viewer since every season begins and ends with some combination of Ryan and/or Marissa getting threatened with expulsion. But, in an unusual move, Ryan is saved from expulsion, while Marissa gets the boot.

They both go to Dean's office to try and explain that Marissa is a good girl and should be given another chance. But Dean has heard all the Newport gossip and knows all about Marissa's alcoholism, her shoplifting, and (let's all say it together now) the overdose in Tijuana. Confronted with the facts, Marissa was hard-pressed to defend herself. You could almost see her teeth grinding together. I know she just wanted to yell out, "Look, I went through all that crap cause I'm on a teen drama and a particularly outrageous one at that. I had to do all that stuff to keep the viewers tuning in every week, which is also the reason for me shooting my boyfriend's brother in the season closer last year!" You just know that she wanted to scream that, but it probably would have breached some sort of line between reality and television. So instead, she just called Dean a big poopy head and he put her on Double Super Secret Expulsion...forever!

Meanwhile, over in Sandy and Kirsten land, things continue to get weirder and weirder with Charlotte, played by Jeri Ryan. So much so, that it incited my roommate to start calling her Ms. Creepy McCreeperson. Creepy convinces Kirsten that she isn't ready to go back home yet, and talks her into coming up to her lake house for a while, as sort of a half-way house. Kirsten, who normally is on top of crap like this, falls for it and heads to the hills with Ms. McCreeperson. They invite Sandy up for dinner one night, and after he leaves Creepy fakes a cry-session that would put Jim Bakker to shame. While Kirsten tries to console her, it is revealed that Creepy has a bottle of booze, but she hasn't drank it...yet. Kirsten takes it away from her (just throw it in the lake Kirsten!) and goes upstairs. Suddenly, Creepy McCreeperson's tears dry up and she pulls out a flask and takes a big swig of it (you little bitch!)

Cut to Jimmy and Julie Cooper (who has the most evil-looking eyebrown and bangs combo in the biz), at a fancy restaurant. (Before I get to the plot-point here, I just want to point out that earlier in the episode, Julie met Jimmy at another restaurant and hadn't been sitting down for more than 10 seconds when a waiter brought her a dirty martini without her even asking...how badass is that?) Anyway, Jimmy proposes to Julie. Holy crap, what is he thinking? He's thinking he needs some of Caleb's money since it's revealed in this episode that Jimmy is broke (again) and owes some money to some shady gentlemen that "could make things very bad for Jimmy by just picking up the phone and making a single phone call." Uh, Jimmy! Jimmy is really starting to tick me off. I know it sounds bad, but I feel sorry for Julie Cooper. She's worked so hard on all her scheming and manipulating, just for Jimmy to take it away from her again. How many times can a woman claw her way to the top without her manicured nails get chipped? Riddle me that.  

The show ends at the annual carnival and Seth getting super-nauseas on the ferris wheel (I thought Ryan was the ferris wheel-phobe.) Summer steals the spotlight from Taylor for reorganizing a better carnival. Seth is there, so there is a lot of witty dialogue. Blah, blah, blah...okay...the best part. Ryan and the newly expelled Marissa show up and take a whirl on the ferris wheel when evil Dean shows up in a finely-pressed linen shirt and tie. (Only a white guy with blonde feathered bangs would show up at a carnival in a tie.) Anyway, Dean grabs Marissa by the arm and starts dragging her out of the carnival. She resists. He grabs her again by the arm and the camera does a close-up of it this time to give the audience a little "wink, wink...you know what's gonna happen next." It's at this moment that my roommate (who's a guy) yells out, "Oh, that dude's gonna get punched! He's gonna get punched!" And...he gets punched. Ryan socks him right in the nose...KAPOW! Totally, old school Batman-style. Dean gets up and his nose is all bloody, but he's got an evil grin on his face ala' Cobra Kai Johnny when his crony unfairly karate-chopped Ralph Macchio's knee. And...he expels Ryan. Of course!

The preview for next week's episode looks even better with the hinting of some sort of serious romantic liaison between Ryan and Marissa. Now, I don't want to sound overly-excited or too high school-ish, but....I THINK THEY'RE GONNA DO IT! Everybody watch next Thursday and jump on The OC train.