Gossip Girl season 2 episodes 1 and 2 recaps & review

The two-episode ‘Gossip Girl’ season 2 premiere sees the characters start a new year with drama, treachery, and gossip aplenty.

Episode 1 recap: Deb Brawl in a Blue Dress

After the Not-so-happy New Year, another year begins and all the main characters return to the fold. Julien has started anew and wants to do none of what she used to do before.

Zoya is rubbed off the wrong way since her father seems to focus more on Julien than her. Meanwhile, Julien has shifted gears completely and now wishes to pursue MBA and go to a college.

Meanwhile, Monet is irked at Julien who’s acting all new-year-new-me. She wants to snatch the crown that Julien so desperately wants nothing to do with anymore. At the debutante ball, Money concocts a scheme and gets her minion to ruin Julien’s moment.

Meanwhile, Zoya has arrived at the ball with her own plans of ruin as well, because of all the jealousy she now harbours against Julien.

However, her plans end up ruining Monet’s plans, who freaks out and unleashes all her anger and frustrations on Julien, amid everyone else lunging at everyone else as well.

Later on, Monet tells Julien that she’ll be taking her spot on the throne, which the latter has no interest in anymore. However, Monet isn’t concerned, for she wishes to compel Julien to start caring about it and battle her after she wreaks her new rule on the school.

Meanwhile, Max is increasingly insistent on Aki and Audrey coming out together in front of everyone. However, the two fear any public coming out just yet, with the Gossip Girl fanning the rumours about the trio’s relationship, it’s become an even bigger problem for them.

Chances come and go and they make promises one after another, only to not keep them in the end and Max is left humiliated every time.

However, a conversation with Luna, later on, help him realise a bit that he’s never taken into consideration what the other two’s feelings about coming out are.

Episode 2 recap: Guess Who’s Coming at Dinner

Obie’s girlfriend convinces him to go back to school and meet his friends, but he doesn’t want to. After agreeing, though, he bunks the school and goes to the arcade, which she comes to learn about, thanks to Gossip Girl’s Instagram.

She then convinces him to meet all his friends at a dinner where it just so happens that a lot of other parties would be converging as well.

To start off, Max wants to have a foursome with three of his other flames to give Aki and Audrey a chance to snap photos and quell all rumours about their relationship.

While he works endlessly to delay and stall with his foreplay, downstairs, his fathers have invited the Grammarcy Park Gorgon Iris over to dinner to butter her up for the park, by pretending to be more conventional in their ways. She’s a rather hardcore conservative and a blunt, narrow-minded bigot.

Audrey and Aki arrive at the dinner and then come to Max and all his unsatisfied sex partners from upstairs. Max’s dad tries their best to keep up the facade but everyone else ruins it all.

However, in the end, they all stand up against the old woman’s bigotry and have each other’s backs. Aki and Audrey make their relationship with Max public as well.

Meanwhile, Monet is immediately acting like a dictator at the school and after much reluctance, Julien has to go against her and sabotage her party later on. To her shock, it turns out to be a clever plan of Monet’s.

When Julien refuses to entertain any more of Monet’s rivalry BS, the latter stages the perfect moment for capture, making it look like Julien pushed her into the pool. The next day, Monet has all the other students on her side, willing to even follow her new uniform code.

Review

• ‘Gossip Girl’ season 2 premiere kicks things off with the characteristic elements being dialled up to an 11 from the very beginning.
• The characters are vile, petty, and obnoxious spoilt, and the show somehow tries to redeem them by cramming the friends-and-family-stick-together crutch.
• It’s a suffocating environment and similarly difficult writing to trudge through, with the pop-culture-referential flair of the writers becoming a bit too hard to handle at times.
• The second episode does better in employing a frenetic pace and gimmicky editing decisions amidst a progressive little message — a tone befitting of the teen drama.
• Overall, however, ‘Gossip Girl’ season 2 delights only as much as a vapid teen drama rife with bourgeoisie brats can — which is not much.

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