90210 - Season 3 Episode 6 - “How Much is That Liam in the Window?”
Hey, remember how Mr. Matthews was an alcoholic and went into a boring downward spiral that culminated in him vandalizing the school last season finale and completely ignoring that fact that Naomi was about to get raped by Mr. Rapey? Well that’s all finally important now!
Okay, maybe the insta!rehab isn’t important, but the rest of it is.
The absence of Gay!Grandpa Teddy meant more screentime for Skeevy Oscar and lots of shirtless Liam (thus the shirtless Liam screencap instead of a Teddy is NOT a teenager one). One of these things is good. I’ll give you a hint — it’s not the one that includes tall, dark, and sleazy. I can’t even believe how much I missed that so-blond-it-almost-hurts old man. What is this show doing to me?
Fine, I’ll tell you what it’s doing to me.
The episode picks up the morning after Skeevy stole Ivy’s innocence and blah blah blah he eventually drops the bomb that he slept with both mother and daughter blah blah blah Ivy thinks she’s Marissa Cooper because her mom gave it up good to the dude who took her virginity, but she’s too boring for me to ever even care enough to want to see her OD in TJ blah blah blah why is this a storyline?
Also, I hate to say it, Adrianna needs to either have a new storyline — perhaps connected with actually going to the same school as all of her friends — or Jessica Lowndes just needs to leave this show. Option B is the best option, because I’m all for the cast members I like to save themselves. But then there’s always option C — Adrianna goes back on drugs. That always brought the laughs, right?
It’s just, we know the character has low self-esteem, but can’t they just transfer it away from being around pervy men who are way too excited to have someone else sing their dead nephew’s songs? Can’t they just end him the way the ended Javier? (It’s not like this show is original.) Can’t they just have Annie kill him? (It’s not like this show will punish her.) Can’t he just turn gay? (It’s not like this show is above that.)
I honestly didn’t even know who this girl was when I watched the episode, but now I remember her as the psycho who bought Liam at the perfectly appropriate for school bachelor auction. Whatever, I’m not the only one who had absolutely no idea who she was.
Anyway, Cray Cray (that’s her new name, seeing as how I don’t know what her actual name is, and I don’t care to learn it), wants to take Liam to go see the Cold War Kids at the Troubadour, and I’m starting to warm up to her. Liam says no (because the only music he listens to is the sounds of Annie’s whines of how her life as a murderer is so hard?), and I want to know why this show would tease me like that. Instead, we get The Like, because Beverly Hills is still living in 2004 or something.
And because this show takes place in 2004, Liam finally fulfills his lifelong dream of becoming Ryan Atwood (his replacement lifelong dream when his original lifelong dream of becoming Dylan McKay was dashed — becoming homeless will do that to you) by getting a place to live in Cray Cray’s poolhouse.
In case you lost count, that’s two instances of 90210 trying to be The O.C. in one episode and two more instances of this show being the worst.
At one point in the poolhouse — already a better set than the Beach Club, because I loathe the Beach Club — Cray Cray makes a comment about her and Liam being like Bella and Edward, and instead of being offended (but not surprised) by the writers even making that line exist, I was too busy being reminded of how Matt Lanter playing Edward in Vampires Suck.
Then I was too busy laughing hysterically at the emotional montage set to Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game,” because every time I hear that song now, I’m brought back to the movie theater where I actually paid to see The Informers and one of my friends would start singing the song every time Chris Isaak would be on the screen. Throw in the fact that Jessica Stroup in all her stick figure glory (love the Stroup — hate the insane weight loss that came with 90210) was in a scene with Chris Isaak in the movie, I couldn’t take anything about this song choice seriously.
Now I’m trying to decide which would be a worse torture — having to watch The Informers on a loop for the rest of my life, or having to watch this episode of 90210 on a loop for the rest of my life. Hmm.
Probably this episode, and here’s why:
Chris Brown is cray cray (not to be confused with Cray Cray), because he (and Liam) got beaten and has a bunch of scars…that, in the case of Liam, NOBODY EVER NOTICED UNTIL NOW BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T EVEN EXIST UNTIL THIS PARTICULAR SCENE YOU THINK THE WRITERS WOULD REALIZE THAT SINCE THEY MAKE MATT LANTER TAKE OFF HIS SHIRT EVERY CHANCE THEY GET AND HE SPENT HALF THE EPISODE WITH HIS SHIRT OFF THAT WAS AN ACTUAL PLOT POINT IN THIS EPISODE.
(Also, Chris Brown is a pretentious douche who can’t speak French or write to save his life. And dating Annie, self-preservation skills may be necessary.)
But wait, there was actually some stuff I liked. If you guessed “the stuff with Naomi, Jen, and Silver,” you’d be right, because we all know they’re the only worthwhile characters, right?
Okay, Navid is great too, but he does this thing where he just disappears from the show, and the only reason I’m not a fan of that is because it usually means he ends up on things like True Blood or Covert Affairs.
Plus, this part of the episode acknowledged the fact that Kelly is still alive and Silver’s legal guardian, simultaneously making me giddy (it gave me something more to write about in a recapview that’s already too long for a show this shallow) and bumming me out (all I want from this show is David Silver — he’s so precious to me). Kelly’s making sure Silver’s going to her therapy sessions with the new school guidance counselor, because since Jennie Garth wasn’t getting PAID (which is different from “getting paid”) by the 90210 peeps and left, Silver can’t tell her the truth about the whole Rapey thing. So there will be absolutely no discussion of Kelly’s whole backstory in Beverly Hills, 90210 about being raped and how that pretty much screwed her up for the rest of ever. There just won’t be.
So instead, Jen finds out that Rapey raped Naomi, and then this show gives me another reason to hate it, because I for one would LOVE for Jen to kill Rapey. NO ONE WOULD EVER FIND THE BODY, PEOPLE. Jen is greater than everyone on this show, and I wish they would understand this. She’s the Julie Cooper-Nichol of this show, dammit.
(The O.C. comparison #3. And even though it’s one I just made up and I’m grasping at straws for, I’m completely behind this one.)
This is what leads to Mr. Matthews admitting his alchy driving ways, and how he honestly believed that Rapey shutting the blinds of his office while alone with Naomi was for innocent reasons. Because, since it’s clear he remembers seeing this, the fact that he just shrugged it off at the time is another reminder that he’s completely useless.
Jen should get rid of him too.
-LaToya (ironicalness)
