A very eventful O.C. this week saw the appearance of Ryan's brother Trey, the re-appearance of Summer's ex Zack, and the revealing appearance of Julie in The Porn Identity - on a widescreen projector no less. And best of all, Ryan showed a brief range of emotion. But much like Whitney Houston's stretch of sobriety, it was short-lived.
So, Ryan's brother gets out of jail and finds his way to the "House of Wayward Atwoods"-- aka casa Cohen, and things go swimmingly at first, even after he meets Seth.
So how's it feel to be out?
Good.
Well that's cool -- monosyllables run in the family.
Things turn when a store manager/plot device accuses Trey of stealing a watch from the store. Trey flips out and flips over some furniture, and almost comes close to maybe barely punching the evil, menacing 150-lb white manager. But he shows a touch of restraint and doesn't strike him. Ryan is pissed, though, and gives Trey the cold shoulder.
Meanwhile, Zack returns from Italy and from the audience's long forgotten tertiary character graveyard. Seth remarks, "People never leave and come back." My thoughts exactly. And now was not the time to break that rule. But Zack's return gave the writers a chance to throw a little tension between the "Summer lovers" when Zack tells Seth a secret.
Can you keep a secret?
Sure. I know my track record with secret keeping hasn't been that good... but it's got to turn around sometime, right?
Unfortunately, this was not it, and when he spills to Summer that Zack met a girl in Italy, Summer gets jealous, which causes Seth to get jealous, which causes Zack to get something, but I couldn't really follow anymore because everytime Zack came on the screen I nodded off. And then Seth and Summer began to fight...
I have begged you to do plenty of stuff -- to give up comic books, to stop mumbling...
But apparently Summer gets past it with a Seth apology and they resolve their differences. At the same time, though, Ryan's brother buys him a watch to apologize, but Ryan assumes it's stolen and gets pissed off even more. That is until Trey reveals the receipt and throws it in Ryan's face - which is so very unrealistic, because why would he go back and spend money at the exact same place that tried to screw him? And didn't he know Ryan would get pissed? And if it was a gift, why was it not in a box?! (Ok, maybe I'm analyzing the O.C. just a little too deeply here. I'm just a little addicted - it's like fucking crack, or speed, or vanilla frosted mini-wheats. I just can't get enough!!)
Alright, I'm calm now. Anyway, the Ryan brothers kiss and make up over a fight in Chino (is there a law that says there must be a fight every time they go to Chino?) and it seems that Trey will be around through at least the next episode, staying in the Cohen pool house and perhaps eventually befriending Seth and Summer and banging Marissa. Time will tell.
The third plot line involved Julie's porn and Kristen semi-affair with her co-worker that starts to heat up but stops before going anywhere... yet. And Julie's porno makes its debut performance at a crowded house of rich bores scarfing down overcooked hors d'oeuvres. (I had to look up the spelling). Anyway, I could see the porn reveal coming from a mile away, much like I can see the eventual Marissa/Julie real life porno flick 5 years after the O.C. is cancelled and no one from Fox will return their calls. Well at least Marissa got a few lessons in lesbianism to help her in the future. Speaking of lesbians, did anyone see or speak of Alex this week? Anyone? Yeah, she's gone. But Zack came back. Not exactly the best tradeoff in the world. But that's cool. And I will leave you with the best line of the night, from Seth Cohen, describing his jealousy of the "perfect" Zack.
Unlike Zack, who is anxiety free, with a big smile and natural athleticism. That guy makes me feel very Jewish.
Gotta love the Jew jokes. It is Good Friday after all.
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