One thing that I’ve noticed
a lot of networks doing this year is that they are advertising the final
episode of TV shows (mainly dramas) that will air in 2012 as the show’s
mid-season finale or the fall finale. Another thing that I’ve noticed about
episodes of a TV show that have been promoted as the mid-season/fall finale tend
to go all out and make the episodes full of excitement and cliffhangers if it’s
a drama to get the viewers excited for the shows to return in 2013. I don’t
know if the networks’ executives are telling producers for TV shows to make the
episodes big and full of excitement, or if it’s simply the writers of shows
such as Grimm, Once Upon a Time, Revenge, Revolution, or in this case 90210 who
are deciding to make the episodes have enough excitement, drama and
cliffhangers in them to rival the show’s season finale. That being said, I
thought that this was a great fall finale for 90210. It was full of excitement,
interesting plot developments and some rather exciting cliffhangers at the end
of the episode.
While I enjoyed pretty much
all of the storylines in this episode, my favorite storyline was definitely
Liam’s storyline where he was working with Annie to figure out who has been blackmailing
him after he got another anonymous note from his blackmailer demanding that he
give them $500,000. Although, one thing that has really bothered me about this
storyline was the fact that given the writers have been acting like Liam has
become one of the hottest and most popular actors in Hollywood right now, it
seemed a little odd to me that he would be struggling to come up with that much
money. Plus, he also owns The Offshore, so he definitely has to have some money
coming in from that. Maybe I don’t have all the facts about how much money Liam
has made from his acting career, but for a show where the writers have acted
like Naomi has an unlimited amount of money at her disposal to spend ever since
she got her trust fund back in season three and the writers are now acting like
Annie’s equally loaded with cash from the settlement she got from Marla’s
family, it seems weird to me that they would act like Liam doesn’t have $500,00
to pay his blackmailer when he’s a movie star. If I had to guess, I’m guessing
the whole thing with Annie giving Liam the money is simply a plot device on the
writers’ part as way of having Liam and Annie slowly (slow for 90210 anyway)
move closer and closer to getting back together. After all, Liam and Annie have
been spending a lot of time together in the past several episodes. As much as I
love Annie and Riley as a couple, words can’t describe how much I want Liam and
Annie to get back together.
The other thing that I
really liked about Liam’s storyline is the fact that they tied it Annie’s
storyline with Riley where she was thinking about going to Scotland for writing
program that would apparently last two years. It looks like the writers are
indeed doing something with the idea of Annie exploring the possibility of
being a writer after all, which they set up at the end of the 100th episode
when she created a blog and was writing about her relationship with Patrick during
her time as an escort last season. What I don’t understand is why the writers
are acting like the only place Annie could possibly go for a writing program
would be another country. I can pretty much guarantee that there plenty of
opportunities to take writing classes right in Beverly Hills. For example, she
could always major in English at CU with a concentration in creative writing
like I did when I went to UNL. My guess is that the writers are using the idea
of Annie going to Scotland for two years for a writing program as another way
to set up the idea of Annie and Riley breaking up with each other.
As I’ve said before in
several of my other posts for the show, considering the show is infamous for
dropping storylines and never mentioning them again, I really do feel like I
should give the writers credit whenever they mention a storyline from a
previous season, so I have to give the writers credit for having Liam remind
Annie about how she felt when he told her that he was going away to work on a
deep sea fishing boat for the summer when they graduated from high school at
the end of season three. Annie realized that Riley was probably as upset with her
as she was with Liam for not really including her in his decision making
process when he decided to go work on a fishing boat.
The writers really seemed to
go out of their way to set up the idea of Annie and Riley’s relationship ending
soon one way or another in this episode. While Riley and Dixon were at the gym
together, a guy asked Riley if he was considering getting a risky operation for
people with spinal cord injuries like his. They made it sound like there’s a
good chance that the operation could kill him, which is why he was initially
against the idea. However, he changed his mind about getting the surgery toward
the end of the episode after he saw how happy Annie was when Dixon told her
that he doesn’t need to use his walking sticks anymore and that his doctor said
that he’ll be able to make a full recovery. If Annie and Riley don’t break up,
knowing the amount of time writers spend on a storyline I’m guessing that he’ll
die during the operation and Liam will end up comforting Annie as she grieves
Riley’s death for what will probably end up only being an episode or two before
she and Liam become a couple again, because that’s just how the writers for
90210 roll.
This episode really did
feature a lot of product placement for the new Surface tablet, which was
especially annoying in the scene where Annie gave Riley a Surface tablet for a
Christmas present and was explaining all of the different features that it had.
I had to laugh when Riley immediately told Annie to return it to the store
though. I’m sure that Microsoft loved that. The writers of 90210 couldn’t just
have Annie give Riley the Surface tablet, explain all of its cool features and
have him instantly thank her for the gift, his response to her giving it to him
was to tell her that he didn’t want it and that she should return it to the
store. Although, Riley did tell Annie towards the end of the episode that he
did like the Surface tablet after all.
As if that scene wasn’t
enough to beat viewers over the head with product placement for the Surface
tablet, Naomi used a Surface tablet to show Navid a picture of Bryce because
she wanted him to go out on a date with her in order to find out why she had
Max fired from his own company. At least the product placement for Microsoft’s
Surface tablet in this episode wasn’t even as remotely over the top and as
blatant as the product placement that Suburgatory did with it. Tessa’s whole
storyline for the episode of Suburgatory that it was featured in was that she
had become obsessed with her new Surface tablet, and it was shown in pretty
much every scene she was in. That was just way too much product placement to deal
with for my taste.
It was interesting to see
how the writers tied Navid into Naomi’s storyline in this episode where she was
trying to help Max deal with the fact that he had been fired from his own
company as well as the return of Alec. I liked it because the writers have
never really had Naomi and Navid interact with each other all that much,
especially one on one. The reason why Naomi created an online dating profile
for Navid and fixed him up with Bryce was because she saw how upset Bryce was
about her fiancée breaking off their engagement two weeks before the wedding.
Navid went on a date with Bryce, and sure enough she ended up telling him
everything. Apparently, she and Alec had dated for two years and he acted like
he wasn’t interested in being anything other than friends when they were dating
each other. Alec also apparently told her the answer to Max’s brainteaser and
promised that the job was hers’ if she promised to fire Max from the company
once she got the job.
Naomi was upset when Alec
returned and approached Max about the possibility of them starting another
company together, which is part of the reason why she wanted to try and get Max
his job back at his company. Despite Naomi’s attempts to cheer Max up and fix
the situation with Bryce since she’s basically the one who hired her to be the
CEO of Max’s company, Max was mad at Naomi for interfering in the situation. Once
Naomi confronted Alec about how he seemed to be obsessed with trying to take
everything Max cares about away from him and has tried to break them up, she
quickly realized that he had done all of that because he’s in love with Max.
So…yeah, Alec is gay, and he’s also a total closet case. In retrospect I have
to say that I kind of saw that coming though.
Anyway, Alec made Naomi
promise not to say anything to Max about this since he knows nothing will ever
happen between them. When Naomi came home to talk to Max towards the end of the
episode, she saw that he wasn’t there and found a note from him saying he was
going away on a business trip for a while. As much as I love Naomi and Max, I
feel like the writers have been writing them as a couple that’s on the verge of
breaking up this season. That’s exactly the kind of thing that has me setting
my DVR for 90210 and buying a season pass for 90210 on iTunes as well. While
I’m a major romantic at heart, I have to admit that I also love a good deal of
drama on TV shows too.
Even though this episode
aired several weeks ago, I have to say that I’m still not sure whether or not I
feel sorry for Adrianna and the way Dixon was treating her in this episode.
Personally, I think cheating on someone that you’re either dating or married to
is an absolutely horrible thing to do, so I can understand that Dixon would be
hurt and upset with Adrianna for cheating on him, but on the other hand he was
treating her like shit in this episode. He was constantly texting her things to
do, and some of his demands were absolutely ridiculous. At one point in the
episode, he told Adrianna that he wanted her to get highlights in her hair, she
did, only to have him tell her they weren’t noticeable enough. While she was at
the salon the first time, Adrianna saw Vanessa and discovered that she was
using one of her aliases that Annie had found an ID card for last season. When
Adrianna told Ashley that she had seen Vanessa, Ashley told Adrianna not to
tell anyone else about this so she could look into it. Adrianna tried to give
Dixon his present towards the end of the episode, but he told her that he
didn’t think they should exchange presents this year and walked off. I have to
say that I really hate Dixon this year and how the writers are turning Dixon
into a villain this season. It’s just not working for me.
Dixon also had a storyline
in this episode with Megan where he was trying to decide whether or not tell
her that he was in the car that her dad crashed into when he was in the car
accident that killed him. Towards the end of the episode, Dixon told her the
truth about the car accident. Instead of being upset about this news, she
immediately started making out with him. That was a major WTF moment for me
personally. The show has definitely had a lot of WTF moments throughout its
run, but thankfully they still aren’t as infuriating as the infinite amount of
WTF moments that Gossip Girl had throughout its run.
Toward the end of the
episode, Liam was riding his bike to meet Annie to carry out their plan to
figure out who has been blackmailing him, only to discover that Ashley was
following him. When he refused to tell her where he was going, she handcuffed
him, saying that she was arresting him. However, she didn’t take him to a
police station, instead she took him to what looked like a parking garage. Liam
continued to beg Ashley to let him go, but she refused to do that and injected
him with something in a syringe that knocked him out.
While all of that was going
down, Annie was waiting for Liam at the place where they had planned to meet
his blackmailer, and she was shocked to discover that Vanessa was very much
alive and was the one who was blackmailing him. I don’t know how this happened,
but somehow they wound up at The Offshore together at the very end of the
episode. They must have taken a brief break from arguing with each other in
order to drive to The Offshore so they could argue some more. Regardless of how
they managed to get to The Offshore while they were arguing, once they were
there Vanessa told Annie that Liam owed her the money since she fell off a
balcony and almost broke her neck. Annie just told that she was a crazy
psychopath, and she’s definitely right about that. At the very end of the
episode, they showed Liam handcuffed to a pipe in the basement of The Offshore
and was gaged as he was trying to scream for help.
I’m still trying to figure
out what Ashley and Vanessa’s connection to each other is. If they don’t share
some kind of connection to each other, then that means Liam has two crazy women
trying to make his life miserable for different reasons, which would really
suck for him. I wouldn’t put it past the writers to do something like that,
because Liam sure has a knack for drawing crazy women to him.
Silver also had her fair
share of drama to deal with in this episode. Silver apparently needs Teddy to
sign a release that would relinquish him of his parental rights before she can
have her embryos implanted. However, Teddy told her that he didn’t want to sign
away his parental rights and that he, along with Shane want to be actual
parents to the child. Some of Teddy’s reasons for this being that he didn’t
want his and Silver’s child to grow up thinking that he didn’t love them or
didn’t care about them if he wasn’t in their life. Also, Teddy thought that he
should be a part of their child’s life in case he and Shane had kids someday,
then Silver’s kid would have half brothers or half sisters. When Silver talked
to Naomi about the idea, Naomi initially said she would love to have two gay
dads who could give her fashion advice and that there could be benefits to Silver,
Teddy and Shane sharing joint custody, mainly that she wouldn’t always have to
worry about taking care of a child all the time and she would be able to take a
break from being parent, but then she said if she was being serious about the
situation that she hated it when her parents split up because instead of having
two homes, she felt like she didn’t really have any real home at all.
I had to scratch my head in
confusion when Naomi said that because she briefly lived with her dad and his
mistress, Gail, before she went to stay at the hotel where Liam was working at
as a bartender when he was first introduced in season one. I can’t remember all
of the details regarding this particular part of season one, but after a while
somebody told that she had to stay with her sister, Jen, if she wasn’t going to
live with either of her parents. What doesn’t make sense to me was at no point
did she act like she felt as if she didn’t have a real home other than being
upset about having to live in the same house that her dad’s mistress was living
in, but then again continuity and proper storyline development has never been
the writers’ strong suit on this show.
Going back to the subject of
Silver’s storyline, Shane ended up confronting Silver about letting him and
Teddy be a part of her baby’s life and told her that they will take legal
action if they have to since they do have legal standing regarding this matter.
I have to say that it will be really interesting to see where this storyline
goes if Silver isn’t able to use the two embryos that she has frozen since
Silver told Liam several episodes ago that she basically only has one chance to
try and get pregnant.
One thing that I’ve found
myself thinking about a lot lately is each of the characters’ financial
situations, and I don’t just mean Naomi’s who has been acting like she has an
unlimited amount of money to spend despite never having a really long-term job
and spends most of her days shopping and hanging out with her friends ever
since she got her trust fund in season three, which has really been annoying me
for quite a while now. We know that Liam is making money with his acting career
and The Offshore. Navid has basically become a club promoter this season, which
is just random. Annie has god only knows how much money from the settlement she
got from Marla’s family. Teddy’s dad is rich and he’s spending most of his time
living in Washington D.C. with Shane now, so who knows what his job situation
is. Adrianna has her singing career and is working for Dixon’s record label.
The character whose financial situation confuses me the most right now is
Silver’s. As far as we know, Silver doesn’t even have a job, so I have no idea
how she plans on supporting a child all on her own. That part of Silver’s
storyline just seems beyond ridiculous to me.
Finances and jobs are a very
bizarre thing in the world of 90210. When Silver asked Naomi if she and Max
were having financial problems, Naomi simply scoffed at the idea that she could
ever be faced with the possibility of being broke, and that the most upsetting
thing about Max losing his job is that he’s been sitting around listening to
Bjork all day long because he’s depressed. When I look back on Naomi as a
character, I can’t help but think how annoying she’s become in the sense that
the writers act like Naomi never has to worry about going broke despite not
having a job and despite the fact that she spends money rather recklessly. While
I’m still on the subject of my continuing 90210 versus Gossip Girl debate,
there’s not very much at all that I liked about Gossip Girl’s final season, but
one thing that I did like is Nate having to deal with The Spectator’s financial
problems. It was great to see the writers of Gossip Girl acknowledge that not
even rich people are immune to having financial problems and that trust funds
don’t have an unlimited amount of money in them when Nate told his dad that he
had used almost all of the money in his trust fund to try and get The Spectator
out of debt. Also, I feel like once Naomi got her trust fund in season three
and her rape storyline had been resolved, she simply became a second rate Blair
Waldorf, because a lot of her storylines are very similar to Blair’s storylines
on Gossip Girl, only they aren’t nearly as interesting or as well done, but
digress.
One last thing I’d like to
comment on is that it was really fun to see the band Tegan and Sara perform in
this episode. I became a fan of their music after several of their songs were
featured in season three of The L Word. One thing I’ve always liked about 90210
is the music they use on the show. I’ve always thought that the music
supervisor for the show picks great music to feature on the show.
All things considered, aside
from the obnoxious product placement for the Surface tablet, this was a great mid-season
finale and a great episode in general. The main highlight of the episode for me
was definitely seeing Liam and Annie spend so much time together in this
episode. Although, I really wish the writers would have given viewers at least
a little bit of information about what the deal with Ashley is and what her
connection to Vanessa is, assuming they do share some kind of connection to
each other. It’s really hard to tell sometimes if the writers are going to
connect various storylines to each other in some way. I’m also glad that the
writers appear to be going somewhere with the idea of Annie being a writer, at
least for now, because I think that has the potential to be interesting.
It’s been great having
Trevor Donovan back for Silver’s storyline, which has been both enjoyable and
confusing since it doesn’t come across as being very realistic at all. I really
hate the fact that the writers have turned Dixon into a bit of a villain this
season, even if I don’t like some of the things that Adrianna has done this
season either. The more that I think about Naomi’s storylines this season, the
more I really do feel like she’s become a second rate Blair Waldorf, and it’s
just not working for me.
That being said, I give this
episode a rating of a B+.
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