Gossip Girl never fails to keep me riveted, even in the face of ridonkulous college shenanigans. Last night's episode was full of double-crossing, manipulation and of course, the ultimate in teen soap entertainment, a kickass catfight.

I couldn't honestly tell you why catfights are so entertaining. If I saw one in person, I would probably be horrified or embarrassed for the girls involved or fearful for their wellbeing. But it's different on TV, and even more so on Gossip Girl. It's just so satisfying to watch a growing feud between two frenemies escalate into a hair-pulling, nail-clawing girl-brawl, especially when the frenemies in question are one Serena van der Woodsen and one Blair Cornelia Waldorf.

Let's recap the brilliant Gossip Girl encounter, shall we? At the dean of admission's intimate gathering of promising prospective students, Blair (Leighton Meester) outs Serena's involvement in sex, drugs and killing a guy, prompting Serena (Blake Lively) to drag her outside to finally have it out. Blair snits that the only reason why Serena is even in contention for a spot in the next freshman class at Yale is because of her appearance in Page 6 and other tabloids. (This turns out indeed to be the case. The dean only wants her at Yale for the publicity she can bring to the school.) A full-on brawl begins when Blair throws her purse at Serena's head, and my, it is a glorious one. Never before have I seen a more perfect catfight in all of television. The highlight for me was when Serena ripped off Blair's larger-than-life headband, saying, “I hate your stupid headband.”

As over-the-top as that catfight was, it was pretty realistic that the two girls would immediately call a ceasefire afterwards. It must be exhausting to be Blair, always scheming to bring Serena down. And Serena just wants things to go back to normal so that she can stop using her brain. Sometimes, all you really need is to get all of your pent-up aggression out in the open.

As brilliant as this episode was, however, I must point out some things that irritated me. Sometimes, I think that Josh Schwartz & Co. must not have gone to college because of the ridiculously unrealistic way that they write their college storylines. (For example, Seth Cohen from The O.C. applying only to Brown and nowhere else. Who would do that?) It's a small matter, in the scheme of things, because I understand that they are just manipulating circumstances to tell their story. But one thing that would never happen: Dan Humphrey scrounging around to get a letter of recommendation from random Yale faculty. Why can't he just get a letter from one of his English teachers? Also, I realize it has been a while since I applied to college, but I always thought that college admissions interviews were done by alumni living near the applicants' area, and not on campus on a school-organized outing. Of course, I didn't attend a fancy-schmancy high school like Constance Billard or St. Jude's, so maybe this is another perk that the Upper East Side elite enjoy.



-Debbie Chang, BuddyTV Staff Writer
(Image courtesy of the CW)