The Fall of The OC
Ryan: Whoever you want me to be.
So it began, this OC thing, with an offer of utmost compliance, a commitment to be nothing other than what the other desired. In that very first episode, the show seemed to make the same offer to its viewers: we will be what you want us to be. If you want titties, we’ll give you wild cocaine-fueled bikini booby-bounce bashes. If you want violence, we’ll welcome you to The OC bitch—with a beachside brawl and a demonstration that this is how it’s done in Orange County. If you want Marxist class warfare, we’ll show you the poor kid who steals cars and can’t even tie a tie and let you all exclaim together: “Chino? Eww!”
In other words, The OC is you and me. It is something so pure and so real you almost want to die after watching it because you feel like your life will never be more fulfilled.
Or at least, that’s what it used to be. Before Seth became a whiny asshole, Ryan started wearing flannel shirts, and Luke was written away, The OC made life worth living. But Season Two thus far has redefined “sophomore slump.” Like Lindsay, who was not just an “error” in Cal’s past
but also one in the show’s future, The OC needed to check its identity: the tasteful teen drama had become a sappy soap opera.
Season Two’s first episode, “The Distance,” was so highly anticipated that many thought it would be like losing their virginity for the second time. Instead, it spent so much time tying up lose ends that it ended up less satisfying than masturbating in the fifth floor bathroom of Lamont. From there, things only deteriorated. Averaging six to seven erections per episode was not unheard of in Season One. Now—with the notable exception of Episode 6, “The Chrismukkah that almost Wasn’t,” a multiple-orgasm tour de force that left fans across the country changing their underwear—you began to count yourself lucky if you got a semi-boner once.
A dark cloud formed over campus common rooms. People glanced anxiously at their friends and laughed nervously at Seth’s jokes even when they weren’t funny. Like Phil Collins, true fans could feel something “in the air,” but no one wanted to be the first to say it.
Was the show really going down the tubes? How could something so glorious fade so fast?
We have a couple of theories.
“Your breath smells like Marissa.”
Despite her permanent status as one of the worst characters on the show, Marissa maintains tremendous agency within the volatile youth culture of Orange County, and her love interests often draw an uncanny parallel to the current quality of the show. Episodes when she’s with Ryan: Stellar. Episodes when she hangs out with Oliver: Terrible. Episodes when she dates Luke: Greatest of All Time.
In the second season, she is severely confused, and not surprisingly, the show has paid the price. First, there was DJ “the Yard Guy,” a sketchy, vaguely Mexican boy toy and a categorically atrocious character. While he must be commended for getting closer to the manicured lawns and luxury vehicles of The OC’s upper-crust than any other minority, he needed to go. As Seth once said, “What happens in Mexico stays in Mexico.”
Next, there was the highly controversial Marissa-Alex pairing, perhaps the hottest lesbian couple outside the annals of www.vivid.com. But this isn’t porn. On the contrary, this is a serious television drama, and the much-publicized coupling constantly disappointed as potential arousal was defused by Marissa’s manly voice and awkward advances. Even the first kiss, which the network hyped up for five weeks, was lukewarm.1 Her love affair with the bottle was arguably more exciting than the Alex affair.
Speaking of which—did Marissa go to AA? Because she’s totally drinking way less lately.2 What happened to the good old days of Orange County Ice Teas by the pool and spiked lattes in the student lounge? We could easily have added another category to this list above. Episodes in which Marisa loved the bottle: tremendous. Ultimately, getting with “DJ” was nowhere near as cool as mixing a blackout cocktail of tequila and pain killers in “TJ.”
“Hey Alex, we’re going to grab some smokes and some more beers, we’ll be right back.”
This non sequitur, delivered by one of Alex’s degenerate friends, was so powerful it almost made us soil our pants, and
it brings us to the central issue of newcomers and guests, an issue which lies at the crux of The OC’s woes. Basically, there are three categories of newcomers in Orange County: a love interest for Ryan or Seth, a love interest for Marissa or Summer, and an older, random, and usually depraved woman connected to one of the main adult characters.
While Ryan’s Chino girl, Teresa, wasn’t exactly aces, at least she was D.T.B. (down to bone) and, ultimately, D.F.I.C. (down for an illegitimate child). Meanwhile, his Season Two flame, Lindsay, is quite possibly the most miserable human being who has ever existed, from her whiney complaints about not having a dad (as if anyone would want such worthless daughter) to her annoying insistence that girls can do as well as boys in science [insert Larry Summers joke here].
The second category spawned the “Zach Attack,” an inexcusable pussy who allows his girlfriend to walk out on him by chalking it up to “fate” and is not man enough to have sex with her in a hotel on Valentine’s Day!
Finally, the random, depraved women. Despite looking like a horse, Lindsey’s mother won some initial power points for having the audacity to commit adultery with Caleb Nichol, but lost credibility when it was revealed that she didn’t even know whose sperm it was that seeded her precious little Lindsay. So they wrote her ass off the show! And Rebecca, the ugly hippie who attempted the sin of all sins by threatening Sandy’s marriage, is hardly worth the ashes of her dead father that she tossed into the sea in the worst scene the show has yet provided.
“You guys are, like, the moral center of the universe.”
When Julie Cooper saw Kirsten’s fugitive ex-flame and raised Kirsten’s a lesbian daughter, she not only confirmed that she is one of the few characters that has remained true-blue, but also hinted at the complete absurdity of the Kirsten-Sandy marital strife that has threatened the purity of The OC bubble. The Cohens are the foundation of the show—the handsome, Jewish, smooth-talking husband and the gorgeous, WASPy, wine-guzzling wife. They are the perfect couple, the parents every college-aged fan secretly longs for. And now suddenly, the man with more integrity in his left testicle than the entire OC population is compromising his marriage for an unattractive anarchist? In Orange County, the measure of a man is judged by the size of his eyebrows, and it was beginning to look as if Sandy had engaged in some secret waxing.
Unfortunately, this out-of-character horseshit was just the tip of the iceberg. While terrible new characters swarmed into The OC, the usual suspects either moved out or underwent bizarre transformations. It seems most telling (and unspeakably sad) that Jimmy Cooper and Luke left; apparently, there just isn’t any room for great guys in the new fabric of Orange County.
Luke was the perfect dynamic character, whose beautiful transition from water-polo-playing bully to “friend to the world” was the result of heartbreaking insecurities rather than poor script writing. By deflowering Marissa, banging Julie even after she blocked him on AIM, and playing golf while wasted, he redefined “baller status” for high-schoolers everywhere. If he would swim to The OC from Portland wearing Speedos and a swim cap or emerge from the pool at one of Cal’s parties (again, in a Speedo and swim cap), all the unreasonable episodes would be forgiven.
“I’m going to Chicago.”
Thank God! See you in hell with all the other bastard children, Lindsay!
In the last episode to date—“The Rainy Day Women,” perhaps one of the top five episodes of all time—the rain came and, quite frankly, it was like a wet dream. All the bullshit was washed away by the pure droplets. Kirsten and Sandy made up. Lindsay and Zach left the state. And, best of all, Seth and Summer were finally back together. The Big Kiss came, and our Spidey Sense said, “The OC is back, bitches!”
The OC appears poised for a dramatic return to form as the old order reemerges. The previews for the next episode—in which, as far as we can tell, the old crew of Ryan, Seth, Marissa, and Summer get locked in the mall and hilarious antics ensue—suggest a return to the crazy caper format of some of last season’s best episodes. And from there, who knows? Ryan and Marissa might reunite. Maybe Jimmy Cooper will even come back. The future is bright, but let’s not count our chickens yet…
Because in the end, who really cares? I mean, it’s just a show, right?
Wrong.
Watching, discussing, and analyzing The OC may seem like an absurd pastime. But if you can find meaning in this absurd pastime, chances are you can find meaning in that other absurd pastime called life.
1. It must be admitted that the greatest part of the Marisa-Alex tango has not been the view on the screen but the results on the street: the rise in high-school girl copy-cat lesbianism is a boon to high school boys the world over.
2. In a classic case of art mirroring life, Marissa’s decline in liquid intake has been paralleled with decreased drinking by fans playing the “OC Drinking Game,” which says a lot about the show’s new identity. Let me explain: The old rules no longer apply. “Drink a shot every time someone from Ryan’s past makes an appearance?” You’re sober, buddy. “Pound a beer every time someone loses their virginity?” Thanks a lot Zach, you huge pussy. We made up a new game for Season 2 in which you drink every time there is a gimmicky plot twist, a character who acts despicably out of character, or Lindsay plays her stupid oboe. Needless to say, we got blackout.