Let me start off by saying that I started writing this thoughts post before the second episode air, so I finished writing this post making the same speculations that I was planning to write about before I saw the second episode. I’m so happy that 90210 is back with new episodes, because I thought season three was beyond amazing, and I’ve been dying to see what would happen next, especially after they started releasing promos for the fourth season. Anyway, I have to say that I thought that this episode was a pretty good way to start the new season.
I thought this episode did a pretty good job of introducing several of the characters’ storylines for the season. Although, I kind of wish that they had done a two hour season premiere for 90210, especially since the show is now transitioning from it’s high school years into its high school year and there are a lot of new things that they had to address in this episode.
My favorite storyline of the episode was definitely the whole storyline with Liam trying to propose to Annie. I really felt like it was typical Liam to impulsively propose to Annie by walking up to her and putting the engagement ring down on the hood Naomi’s car after not seeing or talking to Annie all summer. To me, that was very true to the way Liam was when he was first introduced in season one. I’ve always been a huge fan of Annie and Liam pairing, because I think Liam still has that impulsive, kind of a bad boy edge when he’s with Annie, but he also has this soft, romantic and vulnerable side when he’s with her too. As soon as Liam and Naomi got together, I felt like lost all of his bad boy edge and became too soft and too mushy/love-sick to the point where it was kind of nauseating and made Liam feel like he wasn’t the same character he was when he was introduced. Plus, Annie and Liam’s relationship seems a bit more mature to me than he was with Naomi.
I have to say that I thought his second marriage proposal to Annie was really sweet, and felt so bad for him when she turned down the second time. I thought it must have been even more humiliating for him that time since he did it in front of everyone at Naomi’s party and the fireworks that he had arranged for his proposal went off right after she turned him down.
Liam’s storyline that they set up in the episode where they show all of the guys at a bar that’s up for sale earlier in the episode, but the episode ended with Liam waking up hung over wearing a cap from the bar and an employee walking by saying, “Morning, Boss.” to him. He obviously somehow ended up buying the bar after he got really drunk after Annie rejected him the second time. I’m curious to see how that all plays out. Is he going to keep the bar and run it, or try to sell it to somebody else? I’m anxious to find that out. I’m also really confused as to how all of the guys were able to buy beers when none of them are twenty-one yet. Did they use fake I.D.s? Also, given the fact that the legal drinking age in California is twenty-one, I’m also wondering if it’s even legal to have someone who isn’t twenty-one yet own and run a bar. Although, I do work in a grocery store and cashiers can scan and handle alcohol sales starting at the age of nineteen.
Maybe it’s the same way with working at a bar. I’m not too familiar on all of the laws regarding the sale of alcohol, so maybe I’m missing something here that makes this whole scenario realistic. I really wish the writers would explain that. Maybe they will in the next episode, which based on the promos it looks like the episode will deal a lot with the aftermath of Liam getting drunk and apparently buying the bar. However, I’m guessing that the writers are just expecting the viewers to overlook these details.
While I do think Liam’s second marriage proposal to Annie was very romantic, I do think it was pretty harsh of him to say that Annie was the only woman he ever truly loved in front of Naomi. It’s been a while a while since I’ve watched any season two episodes, but I’m pretty sure that he told Naomi that he loved her. I was kind of hoping that there would be some follow-up between Liam and Naomi about that, but there wasn’t. I guess I’ll just have to chalk it up to the fact that they are young teenagers who haven’t really learned the true meaning of love in a relationship yet and that they are sometimes are so quick to tell someone that they are dating that they love them when deep down might not truly love them.
I’m really excited to see where things go with Annie and Liam from here. I really like them as a couple, and I feel like they’ve constantly been breaking up and getting back together since the end of season two when Annie and Liam finally started to grow really close. Also, it looks like Annie might have already met a new potential boyfriend at college. I don’t know how I feel about this new guy or the whole situation. To me, it just feels like a repeat of what happened with Annie and Liam last season. They started off the season together, but immediately broke up, and she quickly started dating Charlie for a little while until Liam told her that he loved her and they slept together, which led to Charlie abruptly leaving because he knew that Annie and Liam were in love with each other and he didn’t come between them. I really hope the writers don’t keep them apart for too long this time and that when they get back together again that the writers keep them together for a while next time.
I loved Naomi in this episode, and I thought she was pretty funny in this episode, especially the parts involving her feud with a cowboy named Austin who is her new neighbor who was stirring up trouble for her when she was trying to throw a big beginning of college party and he was getting her in trouble with the cops. I’m really interested to see how the cowboy continues to fit into the show and how he’ll get involved with the other characters, especially now that Dixon is living with him since Navid signed him up to live in the girls’ dorms as a joke before he decided to not go to college after all.
I loved the way Naomi was constantly freaking out about something during the party: Austin taking an expensive bottle of champagne, the fireworks that Liam had arranged for his proposal to Annie going off, trying to hide Austin’s post from the cops as they were coming to shut down her party, etc. I can’t believe Naomi actually thought that throwing the pot on the bonfire was a good idea. What was she thinking?
It turns out that Naomi wasn’t pregnant like she had told Max at the end of the season three finale; I totally saw this coming, but I was kind of hoping that she would have ended up actually being pregnant and having a miscarriage later on. I think that could have been a very interesting story, and I kind of wish that the writers had gone that route. Oh, well.
I can’t believe what douche bag Max turned out to be when they showed a flashback of Naomi and Max at the doctor’s office to confirm whether or not Naomi was really pregnant like she thought. He started out by acting nervous about the prospect of Naomi being pregnant, but trying to be supportive for her sake at the same time. However, as soon as the doctor told Naomi that the results of the original pregnancy test had been a false positive, he was extremely giddy and was practically doing a happy dance. Also, it turns out that he and Naomi had had protective sex on several occasions. That’s just stupid. What on earth were they thinking? I guess they didn’t pay attention in health class when they talked about the importance of using birth control and STDs. Naomi spent the episode trying to forget about Max and became determined to become the most popular girl at CU after she realized that all of the other students view her as a nobody.
This storyline reminded me a lot of Blair’s storyline at the beginning of the third season of Gossip Girl when she was determined to become the most popular girl on campus. That kind of worries me, because not only did they have that storyline in this episode, Dixon, Liam, and the storyline with Navid and Silver taking in Navid’s sister make me worry that they will all start acting older than they actually are like the kids on Gossip Girl. I’m not too worried though, while some of the storylines on 90210 can be fairly contrived and hard to believe at times, it’s always been a lot more realistic than Gossip Girl has ever been.
At the end of the episode Naomi started to read a letter from Max that she had hidden in her yearbook, which was the first time that Annie and Ivy heard about her pregnancy scare, but she couldn’t bring herself to finish reading it. Ivy was going to throw it out, but Annie stopped because she thought Naomi might want to know what Max had said in his letter someday just like she wishes that she could know what’s going on with Liam. I have to say that I really liked this scene. I like when they have big group scenes with most of, if not the entire cast together and this episode had several big group scenes, which is one of the things that I liked the most about this episode.
It looks like Dixon isn’t going to go to college and wants to go straight to pursuing a music career. From the standpoint of living in the real world, I don’t think it’s a smart idea for him to do that. After all, last season Debbie told Annie that her not having a college degree was making it hard for her to find a job. You would think that Dixon would realize that not going to college could end up being a bad idea after what happened with Debbie not being able to find a job very easily last season.
Speaking of Debbie, Annie mentioned in this episode that she had moved to Paris with Ryan who had decided to move there to be with Jen and their son Jack when she told Dixon that Debbie would be furious with him for deciding to not go to college. I’m still mad that they cut Debbie and Ryan’s scenes out of the season finale and that they didn’t give Lori Loughlin and Ryan Eggold a proper sendoff. Also, based on the way Annie was talking about the whole situation you would think their father, Harry, was dead. Why didn’t she mention him?
In terms of what I think of the storyline with Navid and Silver living together and taking in Navid’s sister, Leila, now that the rest of his family is moving to Switzerland to escape his dad’s legal problems, but Leila wanted to stay, I’m not sure how I feel about it yet because the way I see it, it could go one of two ways: Navid and Silver could struggle with taking care of a teenager because they are fresh out of high school themselves, especially since Navid is also going to turn his dad’s former porn business into a music studio and he’ll have to jungle both, or the whole thing could end up with them acting older than they actually are, and not in a good way, but they end up being like Chuck on Gossip Girl who acts like he’s a middle-aged businessman who’s obsessed with carrying on his father’s legacy. If the writers can handle writing this storyline without making them end up being like the kids on Gossip Girl, I’m fine with them doing this storyline. If not, I’ll be pissed.
Although, I have to say that I think that Navid completely overreacted about the dress that Leila was wearing when she was telling him and Silver that she was thinking that they should all go out and do something fun, but they told her that she couldn’t go out because it was after midnight.
Adrianna returned from Africa determined to make amends with Silver for switching her medication that she takes to treat her bipolar disorder, and she basically used Leila to get to Silver. I’m so glad that Silver told Adrianna to get lost, because it really messed up her life and she did almost try to kill herself after Adrianna switched her medication with placeboes. To me, Adrianna is beyond redemption, and I really wish that the producers had decided to not bring Jessica Lowndes back as a series regular this season and had only brought her back for a few episodes to give her a proper sendoff and kept Trevor Donovan as a series regular instead.
Thanks to the prank that Navid had pulled on Dixon had been signed up to live in the girls dorm before he decided that he didn’t want to go to college. He didn’t have a place to stay until he responded to Austin’s ad for a roommate at his place, so he’s going to be living with him now. I thought that it was kind of mean of Navid to do that to Dixon, but they are just out of high school, so I guess you can’t expect them to act mature all the time. Also, at the end of the episode Dixon saw Adrianna walking out of Austin’s bedroom wearing pretty much only Austin’s shirt, so Adrianna and Austin obviously slept together. As soon as I saw that scene for the first time, I immediately guessed that Adrianna and Dixon will end up becoming a couple down the road. I have to say that if they are going to keep Adrianna around, I do think that Adrianna and Dixon could possibly make a really good couple, especially since they are both very passionate about music.
Speaking of Teddy, they actually featured him quite a bit in this episode, and I wasn’t expecting that because he’s once again just a recurring guest star. His storyline with him struggling with finding the courage to come out to his father was definitely one of my favorite storylines of the episode. It also involved my favorite line of the entire episode which was Silver telling Teddy, “You’re not gonna come out to your family on a napkin!” after he told her that he had written everything he wanted to say to his father down on a napkin after his father left the restaurant that they had lunch together at and was thinking that maybe he should just mail the napkin to his father. I thought that was hilarious. I also liked what Silver said to him about coming out to his family was not about doing it for them, but for himself and not apologizing for who he is. I thought that was very touching, and I think the writers have done an amazing job with Teddy’s whole coming out storyline.
Toward the very end of the episode, they showed Teddy on an airplane calling his dad and finally coming out to his father. I hate that they handled Teddy coming out to his father that way and that we didn’t get to see or hear his father’s reaction, but as soon as the producers announced that Teddy could be coming out as a gay man last season, I pretty much figured they handle Teddy coming out to his dad this way, because the writers of 90210 unfortunately have a tendency to have the characters find out big news off camera, such as Silver telling Annie and Adrianna that Mr. Cannon had raped Naomi last season. They didn’t actually show that conversation. I don’t know why they handled Teddy coming out to his father that way, either the actor who played Teddy’s father, Spencer, in season two was unavailable to appear in the episode, or the writers are just lazy, either way that really bugged me.
Annie found out that Marla’s family was contesting the will in which she left all her money to Annie, and that was handled off camera too. Sighs. I figured Marla’s family would contest the will as soon as Annie found out that Marla had left her money to her last season. Last season Debbie told Annie and Dixon that she and Harry only had enough money to pay for one of their college educations since they were both hoping to go to expensive colleges at the time, which left Annie and Dixon trying to decide which one of them to go to the expensive school they wanted to until Marla killed herself and left all of her money to Annie, which would allow both Annie and Dixon to go to the colleges of their choice. If there’s an upside to Dixon deciding to not go to college, I guess it’s that Debbie and Harry only have to worry about paying for Annie’s college education now.
Lastly, there’s Ivy to talk about. Raj started undergoing cancer treatments over the summer, and he’s now lost all of his hair. Naomi also invited them to move into her mansion since they didn’t want to have to live with their parents now that they are married. Most of the stuff involving Ivy in this episode basically dealt with Ivy having to jungle spending time with her friends while also struggling to acknowledge the fact that Raj has cancer. Ivy was planning to go to Naomi’s party until Raj decided that he didn’t feel well enough to go. However, Raj convinced her to go saying that it’s okay to acknowledge that he has cancer and that he can’t do everything that she wants to do, especially since they spent their honeymoon in a hospital while he got cancer treatment. Ivy went to the party, but she came home early and told him that he was right about how she shouldn’t pretend that he doesn’t have cancer, but her favorite part of the evening was coming home to him.
I really like this storyline and I’m anxious to see where it goes. It’ll be interesting to see if Raj ends up going into remission, or if he dies. I wonder if Raj ends up dying if Ivy will find out that she’s pregnant with his child, and that way he’ll live on after he’s gone. If they go that route, that would give this whole storyline an A Walk To Remember vibe to it, if you ask me.
All in all, I thought that this episode was pretty good for the most part, and I think this episode did a really great job of setting up several potentially interesting storylines. My main complaint that I have about this episode is definitely the fact that Annie found out that Marla’s family is contesting the will off camera and that we didn’t get to see Teddy’s father, Spencer’s, reaction to Teddy telling him that he’s gay either like I mentioned earlier.
Besides that, this was a pretty good episode, so I give it a rating of a B+.
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