Sunday, September 21, 2008

90210: Episode 1: "We're Not in Kansas Anymore" (continued)

And we're back!

After we return from the opening titles, Ethan asks Annie how her day is going and assures her that he isn't "that guy" by which he means "the type of guy who cheats on his girlfriend by getting random hummers in a random Hummer", even though he most certainly is that guy--especially since the whole reason he's explaining this is to make sure Annie doesn't tell Naomi what she saw.

Shortly thereafter in the parking lot, some curly-blond skurfer (skater/surfer/iono?) dude brings Adrianna her book. Apparently she'd picked up the wrong one. Upon closer inspection, however, the book he brought her has a secret compartment that is filled with a sack of drugs! Intrigue! The book isn't the only thing he brought her: skurfer dude says that his supplier needs the hundreds of dollars Adrianna owes him. She makes the pathetic next-day guarantee typical of all penniless junkies.

Some dykey bitch comes up to Annie, seated, and steps on Annie's notebook. They bond over common knowledge of the obscure teen music scene and over Annie's toughness, and the dykey bitch introduces herself as Silver, her last name, because she prefers not to use her first name Erin. After Naomi spirits Annie away from the conversation, Kelly the counselor walks up and we find out that she and Silver are sisters! (BH90210 Rewind: Kelly Taylor's half sister Erin Silver was in scattered episodes as she grew up during the series.)

While Naomi tells Annie that Silver has a vicious website and invites Annie to her "not-so-sweet sixteen" party, Naomi's parents are in the principal's office. Mr. Matthews--the too-cool jerk teacher--and Principal Wilson explain to Naomi's parents that she is required to do the book report she is over a week late turning in. Naomi's mother (Mrs. Clark) tries to persuade the principal by reminding him that if things had turned out differently, she and he could have had a child together, and they could be discussing that child's grades. (You see, they had dated in high school.) We can be sure that child will exist when the cast of 90210 gets sucked into a parallel reality--a parallel reality inherently saturated with humorous circumstances such as this.

BH90210 Rewind: The Peach Pit. This diner was THE hangout for the student body of WBHH back in the '90s. It was such a cultural icon, VH1 included it in television promo spots for its I Love the '90s miniseries.

Nat still runs the Peach Pit, though he has trouble working these new-fangled espresso/capuccino/whatever machines. We arrive in the middle of a conversation between Naomi and Annie concerning Naomi and Ethan's scandalous behavior online. What's the behavior? The world may never know. All we know is that Annie is shocked that anyone would do that. Afterward, Naomi offers to buy Annie an 800-dollar dress, but Annie refuses on the grounds that it goes against her Kansas-Amish upbringing. To smooth things over, Annie offers to let Naomi read her book report, hoping that Naomi could get some ideas to use in her own book report about the same book. Naomi accepts, since she isn't Amish.

On the lacrosse field, we see that Dixon isn't bad. Navid is there to cheer him on. George, a member of the team, hits Dixon, who then defends his own honor by beating the shit out of the guy who hit him. The whole team gets in on it. Fade to black.

When we return from commercial, Dixon's alcoholic granny is telling him that next time he needs to fight dirty. Annie asks permission to go to the party and is permissed. Granny then excuses herself from the table because Mom's tater tots just aren't Beverly Hills cuisine. Annie and Dixon move to one of the bedrooms where she tells him about the hummer Ethan got. Dixon says that means that Ethan really doesn't want to be with Naomi any more, or in other words, "He's just not that into her."

At The Pit--what appears to be a hot nighttime version of the diner Peach Pit--that night, Naomi flashes some cash, which catches indebted Adrianna's eye. Corey Mr. Matthews runs into Naomi at the bar, and after they flirt shamelessly about her late book report, Mr. Matthews informs the bartender that Naomi is, in fact (not in lie), underage and should not be served any fire water.

As all this is taking place, Naomi's mother Mrs. Clark arrives at Principal Wilson's house. The three adults drink lots of fire water (wine, actually) and talk about how Principal Wilson once broke the H of the HOLLYWOOD sign. Mrs. Clark needs a ride home because she's smashed, so Mom offers to drive her home, mentioning her eagerness to trade stories about Principal Wilson's hot cock--I'm not making this up, I promise--but Mrs. Clark respectfully declines. (At this point, Principal Wilson informs us that Mom once dated a guy named Morris Cornbloom and lived with him in a tipi. Also, Principal Wilson informs us that he is essentially a huge douchebag, since he only dated Mrs. Clark because her mom had a beach house.)

While the family talks about how hot Annie looks in her dress, Granny recounts tales of Ricardo Montalban cracking eggs on her ass. At the club, Ethan and Naomi talk about how Ethan is going to lie for George because they're teammates and that's what teammates do. Adrianna steals Naomi's cash-laden purse. Commercial Break.

The next day at school, everyone makes fun of Annie for dating cows. See, Silver's video blog "The Vicious Circle" gets a half million hits and this week's edition was all about Annie's Kansas past, complete with humorous Flash animations. When Annie confronts Silver about this betrayal, Silver says that she never would have done it if Annie hadn't dissed her by hanging out with Naomi, whom Silver thinks is evil incarnate. Annie implies that Silver is worse than Naomi, since Naomi isn't the one who engaged in cyber-bullying. OUCH!

Kelly walks up and talks to Silver about the dangers of internet blogging and how blogs always start problems. She drives the point home that though Silver hates Naomi, the blog hurt Annie and did nothing to Naomi. Kelly then has to explain to Silver that she doesn't always have to be a school counselor; she can be a big sister sometimes too. They discuss their mom and Silver says she's ok. Blah blah blah.

Ethan lies to the coach and Principal Wilson about Dixon's involvement in the fight, resulting in Dixon's being kicked off the team. Dixon, forlorn, talks to Annie about how lacrosse (la-X, as they say) makes him feel more like Principal Wilson's son, since Principal Wilson played it in high school. Annie says that's stupid, and that since Dixon's been part of the family for eight years, he really is Principal Wilson's son.

Annie then reams Ethan, telling him everything he sucks at including, but not limited to, honesty. Then she almost cries when she realizes that Naomi turned in Annie's report as her own work. Bummer. Naomi though, in high-waisted short shorts (and not for the last time), gives Annie the 800-dollar dress in exchange for letting her plagiarize her paper. Tit for tat.

Annie and Silver go down to watch play practice, which sucks. When the theater teacher says as much, Silver suggests to her that Annie get to be in the chorus to round out the sound. Since the theater teacher, like all theater teachers, bows to the whims of the student body, Annie gets her shot. She dances maniacally and upstages Adrianna, the lead. Once again showing the passive director dynamic, the theater teacher invites Annie to join the show. This means Silver and Annie can be friends again.


[Oh, yeah, I forgot. In the middle of that whole theater bit, Dixon sent a text to Naomi, telling her that Ethan is cheating on her. This is, ostensibly, to get back at Ethan for being a lying bastard about the laX fight.]

In the office being questioned about plagiarism, Naomi thinks that Annie turned her in. They quarrel, and Naomi disinvites Annie from the NSS16 party. Later, Naomi and her mom are in the office, and Naomi's mom is pitching a bitch about Naomi having to rewrite the report. She questions Naomi's ability to get into a good college, which shocks Naomi. Principal Wilson agrees that everyone thinks Naomi's stupid... except him. At this point Naomi throws her mother out of the office and begins handwriting the report on what may or may not be a legal pad.

At some point, Ethan apparently went back and told the truth about the fight because Annie can see that someone has beaten the shit out of him (presumably George). When Annie tells Dixon, he realizes that he should probably not have sent that text to Naomi. Annie is appalled that he would do that, because Ethan will know that she was the one who told the secret of his hummer to Dixon. Uh oh. Commercial break.

When we return, Principal Wilson and Mom Wilson are talking about punishment. Apparently Annie needs to be protected since BH is a latter-day Sodom and Gomorrah, but Mom thinks they let Dixon off easy because he's adopted. They go up to check on Annie, but guess what? She flew the coop (but not before telling Granny).


It's your typical rich-bitch sweet sixteen party. Crowds of people everywhere. Creepy screens showing video of Naomi's face. Silver and Annie (crashing the party) talk about Ethan while Dixon and Navid walk around shooting footage for the school news. As Navid tends to frequently do and say questionably gay things, we have a new feature:

GayWatch-Navid: As Navid follows (with his camera) the ass of an attractive female classmate, Dixon asks, "Who is that!?" to which Navid replies, "Not a chance in hell, is what you call that. Just remember I got you in. You are not a guest; you are my bitch."

Just as Navid shows up to tell the others that he found out Naomi's purse--including her cellular device--was stolen and therefore she didn't get the text, Adrianna walks up to Naomi and returns the purse, saying that the guys at the Pit found it.

Principal Wilson is at the party looking for Annie but is sidetracked by Mrs. Clark. She tells him that they need to talk. Seems that the Principal stopped seeing her twenty years ago after a pregnancy scare; she went to an abortion clinic and then spent a year in Europe recovering... OR SO HE THOUGHT! She really spent that year being pregnant and then gave the kid up for adoption. The son is still out there somewhere, all adopted.

Naomi is about to dance the spotlight dance with Ethan. This must be a second spotlight because it's shining from the ceiling, not Ethan's ass. Before she goes out to him, though, she reads the fateful text. They dance anyway.

Ethan compliments her and says he loves her. She looks at him and asks if he's cheating on her. He doesn't answer. Everyone is watching. Naomi tells everyone else to join them on the dance floor and thanks them for making it the best bday evs. Then she leaves Ethan alone on the dance floor (sort of, since everyone else is now starting to dance).

Annie feels terrible, so Silver suggests they go hang out with poor people to make themselves feel better. If one were to cross Vegas with Beach Blanket Bingo, they'd get the setting of this new party. As Silver and Annie arrive, they see Ethan coming out of the water, bedecked in a wetsuit. Silver explains that she and Ethan have been coming to this party every weekend since eighth grade. Annie goes over and apologizes to Ethan for spilling his scandalous secret. Ethan tells her he's a complete ass. Annie says only half an ass. Ethan says he's trying to rebecome the guy that Annie likes. Blah blah blah.

Time to close out the episode: Principal Wilson and Mom are in bed, but Principal Wilson is battling with the knowledge that he has a son out there somewhere.

Kelly is on the phone with some guy who is apparently the father of her four-year-old son (who has blond curly hair).

Adrianna gives the skurfer the money she stole from Naomi's purse.

Ethan shows up at Naomi's house and she lets him in.

Dixon and Annie agree that California doesn't suck.

People in nice clothes dance in the water because they're rich and we're not in Kansas anymore.

Quotes to remember:
Granny Tabitha on fighting: "Never worry about being fair, just grab onto those jewels and twist them, like a garbage bag."
George to Ethan about Dixon: "Dude, don't be such a puss; who cares about that puss?"

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