Gossip Girl – 1×01 Recap | MuchMusic.com

Gossip Girl – 1×01 Recap

September 20th, 2007

Welcome to the Upper East Side, b***h! The show starts with one giant, mother plug for handheld devices everywhere – seriously, I suddenly got the urge to run to my nearest Future Shop and return with a Crackberry. Judging from the number of people who go nuts with the texting when bad girl Serena van der Woodsen returns after a year away at boarding school, it would appear the titular but secret identity-clad Gossip Girl has one massive distribution list for her online pot-stirrings.

So why the surge of curiosity? It seems that no one knows why Serena left or why she’s back. Duh duh DUH. Serena’s erstwhile BFF Blair seems less than happy to have her back and naturally reacts by trying to get her boyfriend Nate to sleep with her (for the first time). Natch…how else would you react? It seems Nate had a bit of a thing for Serena though – so I guess it’s her way of locking down her man. But the angel of bad timing (namely Serena) puts a stop to that ill-advised move by showing up to the party.

Who else is interested in Serena’s comeback? Cutie Dan Humphrey…who aside from being the token poor boy who is unfortunate enough to not own a handheld but has a laptop…also seems to be nursing quite the crush on our girl S. Somewhat unrelated but Dan’s dad is hot. I’m just sayin’. As well we also meet his adorable younger sister Jenny (who, I’ve been told, looks nothing like her description in the books but who is played by the girl who played Cindy-Lou Who in the Grinch).

Blair and Serena meet later and make up (awwwwwwww) but S still won’t tell why she left…but she does appears to have drinking issues, so maybe that’s it? By this point though we have found out that she’s back because her little bro, Eric, up and tried to kill himself. Bummer.

Nate’s best friend and resident slimeball, Chuck (or as I shall now call him, Poor Man’s James Spader – PMJS) decides to work his best line on S by telling her he knows why she left. Good one, PMJS. He reveals that he saw her and Nate doing the horizontal mambo and NATCH expects she’ll be willing to do the same with him and end up trying to force the issue. She gets away but not before landing a well-placed knee to his junk. NICE. Simultaneously, Nate has been confessing his indiscretion to B who, and this is the understatement of the episode, doesn’t take it at all well. Surprisingly, B and Nate make up when he promises to never see S again, which seems like a crappy promise since they go to school together but whatever. His heart isn’t in the make up though as he’s only doing it to make his father happy…cue his pining for Serena for the rest of season one. That should be fun to watch… *cough*sarcasm*cough*.

B is throwing a giant Kiss on the Lips party but S ain’t invited…which is cool because despite a secret invite from the aforementioned adorable Jenny (who Eric seems to have already developed a tiny crush on when they meet briefly) she decides to avoid everyone by going on a date with Dan. Side story note – S’s mom, Lily and Dan’s dad, Rufus, had a thing in the past. It sounds as if she was a groupie to his rock star self in his has-been 90′s band. Their kids date seems to be going well until Jenny texts (again with the handheld) that she’s in trouble and they run to the rescue. It turns out PMJS is pressing his suit on yet another unwilling girl…he’s quite the catch. He can’t be very observant though if he managed to miss her texting TWO messages for help. Dan plants a nice punch on PMJS’s nose and they leave him bloodied and cursing Serena’s name. He yells after her to remember he knows everything about her. FALSE, dude, FALSE…you know one thing and you already told her what it is. Worst. Blackmailer. EVER. They bail on the party…but not before a number of people manage to demonstrate to S that she is like so not welcome there. Which should make school tomorrow very interesting…

Initial thoughts:

- Not bad…but not as great as I was hoping. The potential is there though…
- As much as I love Kristen Bell, they need to cut back on the narration before it gets annoying.
- Love the music they’re using (Peter Bjorn and John, Justin Timberlake, Angels and Airwaves, Albert Hammond Jr., Amy Winehouse to name a few)
- Everyone is very pretty…but where are the minorities? Although sadly, I think that probably reflects Upper East Side prep schools rather accurately.
- Favourite character so far: Dan – by a mile.

Episode Rating: C+

What did you guys think?

If you’ve read the books…did you like how they’ve adapted it?

Posted on Thursday, September 20th, 2007 at 1:16 pm by Sabrina Jalees and is filed under We <3 TV.