OMFG, thank God Gossip Girl is back. We all knew that Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester) would stage a comeback after her humiliating fall from grace. The real question was how or if Jenny Humphrey (Taylor Momsen) was going to fight back?

Naturally, Little J can't run with the big girls forever because she's po'. Well, relatively po', anyway. She has to resort to stealing Valentinos and begging Nate (Chace Crawford) to borrow $8000 ("I promise to pay you back!" Yeah right.) just to make sure that she looks good at the birthday party that she can't afford to throw. Since J can't compete like that, she has to supplement her slim pocketbook with some good, old-fashioned bitchiness. But Blair has bitchiness in spades, as well, so who is going to win?

Let's review happened last night on Gossip Girl.

Jenny and her posse (with the absences of Nan Zhang's Kati, it is becoming less multicultural than ever) orchestrated a synchronized Yoplait bombing on Blair's well-coiffed tresses, but we can't give her full credit for that. It looked like it was more Hazel's idea than Jenny's. Let's give Jenny the benefit of the doubt and just give her half a point.

However, Jenny did come up with the idea for Blair's dinner humiliation, inviting Blair out to the exclusive dining establishment Butter in the East Village, and then hanging her out to dry there. As cruel as this scheme was, however, it was mostly born out of the intensely evolutionary desire for self-preservation. There was no way that Jenny was going to be able to afford the seared Bella Bella Farms foie gras, plus pay back Hazel that 120 bucks from last night's outing. It was a clever plan, nonetheless, but in terms of pure spite, she again only gets half credit.

Now it's Blair's turn to answer back. Hoofing it to Williamsburg and convincing Rufus (Matthew Settle) to throw Jenny a surprise party for the posse in their loft was genius. The party was hilariously juvenile, with pink balloons, rice krispie treats and a huge sheet cake with Jenny's face printed on the frosting – entirely different than the sumptuous and sophisticated fare that Gossip Girl's Upper East Siders are accustomed to. Blair was able to look sweet and generous to Rufus, but she knew that the girls would ditch the party as soon as was humanly possible, so she went ahead and reserved a table at Butter for them.

Blair gets major points for the planning and execution and follow-through. Blair is nothing if not resourceful in her evilness. Leighton Meester almost single-handedly makes Gossip Girl such a pleasure to watch.

Blair was able to regain the upper hand, but I'm not ready to write off Little Jenny Humphrey quite yet. The potential for bitchiness is strong with her, and her resilience is something else. She only needed a few hours to think of a way to get back on top, while Blair needed an entire three weeks to get over her humiliation.  Jenny showed a glimmer of this potential at end of the episode, when she arrived unexpectedly at Butter on Nate Archibald's arm, and snagged Blair's seat. This was a revenge that Blair would have relished had she not been the victim of it. Chalk up another for Jenny.

Dan (Penn Badgley) tells Jenny that she has so much more to offer than those other girls, but she just needs a find a way to believe that. Once she figures it out, then and only then, she can bring on the true vindictiveness like Blair. And it won't take long. After a little bit of careful honing and maybe a trust fund from a mysterious and wealthy distant relative, and Jenny will be poised to take over the posse as soon as Blair graduates.



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