It’s Gossip Girl Graduation time! And on the UES, it’s done “a little differently…”
Blair and Serena have brunch and talk about how Serena’s now famous because GG broke the news that she got arrested. Serena is ready to graduate so she can finally get away from GG, who has plagued her more than anyone else. S asks B to change the subject, and Blair asks how exactly Chuck said, “I love her.” (Was it, “I LOVE her?” or “I love HER?”) S says this shouldn’t be news to her, but B says the problem is his inability to express his feelings to the one person who matters. B asks if S has even told Chuck that she and Nate broke up, and when S says no, B rushes her out the door to do just that–right into the arms of waiting paparazzi hoping to get a glimpse of the ex-con.
Pre-graduation, Videotaping Vanessa walks up to Nepotism Nate (who’s chatting up his gramps), and they catch up in a friendly way–he’s starting his internship soon, his grandfather and mother are on speaking terms again, he and Blair broke up, and he apologizes for how horribly he handled things with V. Since nothing is ever new with Vanessa and Nate really was a douche recently, she thanks him for all that stuff forever ago that guided her toward NYU, and Nate then invites V and D to his post-graduation party.
Jenny and Eric celebrate that graduation means the end of the Mean Girls, just as the girls walk up and ask if she wants to “throw her hat in the ring” for Queen. J says there should be no queen next year just as Blair walks up and says her minions don’t get to choose the next queen–she does. She struts away, actively combating her lame duck-ness. Penelope tells Jenny that they don’t listen to Blair anymore, so if she wants to be queen, she should show up to Nate’s party with the biggest piece of gossip, and she’ll get it. Because that’s how queenships are won and lost, duh. “Coronation” happens at midnight. J’s competition: freshman Emma Boardman (Remember her? That little skank whose mother interviewed Blair and Serena for Yale, and who blackmailed B into helping her lose her virginity? Yeah, I forgot too.) who walks up and flaps her skanky little mouth at J, compelling J to decide maybe she will go for queen after all, to break the cycle of mean girl abuse. Ha. Little J still thinks she can beat the system from inside the system. So naive.
Everyone is in robes, waiting for commencement to begin. Dan is moping because his name was left off of the graduation program. “Humph!” (-rey) A kid in a suit walks up and hands Dan the “correction” card that will go into the programs that says “Congratulations, Don!” Haha, no one still knows who Dan is. Blair walks up to Chuck and tells him how great she’s doing, but she could be better. She’s wondering if he heard that she… is so happy high school is over! Before she can say what she really wanted to, HM Queller tells the kids to line up for the ceremony.
Rufus and Jenny walk in to graduation, and sit right next to Lily and Eric–to his dismay, Rufus remembers that they reserved their seats together at some point after Lily revealed that she gave up their secret bastard child for adoption, but before she put her own daughter in jail to teach her a lesson and he decided maybe she wasn’t marriage material. Cyrus and Eleanor sit right behind them, and start yapping about what a great couple they make and how they need to get married. Lily bluntly tells them that they used to be headed that way, but not anymore. Awkwaaaard.
The students file in for commencement, and HM Q addresses the crowd as B tells S that she chickened out with Chuck. S says it’s okay, they’re all moving on. In the middle of celebrating their new beginning, Gossip Girl sends her final, wicked blast: “Not so fast. You’re not graduating until I give you my diplomas. Mine are labels, and labels stick. Nate Archibald: Class whore. Dan Humphrey: The ultimate insider. Chuck Bass: Coward. Blair Waldorf: Weakling. And as for Serena van der Woodsen, after today, you are officially irrelevant. Congratulations, everyone. You deserve it.”
HM Q asks the class to stand, but everyone is too stunned by this not-all-that-shocking blast to do it. Serena vows that Gossip Girl is going down.
At a post-graduation brunch, Serena pleads to the Mean Girls to help her take down Gossip Girl, but they’re too scared. Blair, Chuck, Nate, and Serena will have to take her on by themselves. Nate rushes off to do “damage control,” B runs to “gather intel,” and Chuck goes to “run some stats.” Scooby Gang to the rescue!
Rufus apologizes to Lily, and she asks for which part: the pre-graduation squabble, or the fact that he no longer wants to marry her? He says the problem is that she tried to give him money behind his back (Really? That’s the only problem?), but she says they both made mistakes and need to move forward. She leaves.
Nate approaches his grandfather and tells him that he had an affair with an older woman last summer, and she was married at the time. And she paid him. (Ohh, so that’s what she meant by “whore”! There were so many options, really.) Granddad promises to protect Nate if it ever comes out. Chuck asks Nate where Blair is, and Nate tells Chuck they broke up.
S asks for D and V’s help with “taking down” Gossip Girl. D says high school is over, and they all need to move on. S says they’re all still friends, and should defend each other… D hesitantly says they probably won’t stay friends after this, actually. Upset, S tells him to “have a good life.” D and V decide to head home.
The Scooby Gang hangs out on the brunch steps and try to profile the perp: GG blasts twice as much about Constance and St. Jude’s as any other school, meaning she’s probably a personal connection of theirs–she either goes to or used to go to Constance. Chuck decides she’s probably their age. The blasts all started when they began high school, and an older student wouldn’t care. Sherlock Archibald: “So you’re saying she’s a senior, like us.” Serena van der Watson: “Which means she’s in the room… RIGHT NOW!” They look around…
They scour Facebook for possibilities, and Chuck submits Nelly Yuki: low profile, good with computers, many grudges. Serena says there’s no way. S devises a plan: she sends a tip to Gossip Girl, and Chuck yells to get the room quiet. Someone’s phone beeps… it’s Jonathan! Chuck grabs the phone and throws it to Serena, revealing her text. JONATHAN IS GOSSIP GIRL?! Eric is shocked! We’re all shocked! But wait…
Jonathan is not Gossip Girl, but he IS a huge nerd: one day he “got bored” and hacked GG’s server, so now he and Eric have access to every email that gets sent to her. Gay nerds FTW! (But they still don’t know how to use this info to find out who she is? Somehow this detective train got derailed.) S, J, and the Hacker Gays peruse all the emails GG gets that she doesn’t blast, and their “theory” is that either she can’t substantiate some of them (like that’s stopped her before) or she likes to wait until the perfect moment for maximum damage. S asks if she can borrow Jonathan to help her “dig deeper.” J shows E the perfect piece of dirt that will get her the crown so she can “abolish the monarchy forever.” (What could it be? My money goes on the Uncle Jack/Blair New Year’s Bed-Rockin’ Eve.)
Mopey Sr. and Mopey Jr. sit at home moping, and Sr. tells Jr. he needs to go to that graduation party even though he has no friends and won’t have fun, so Dan does what Dad tells him. Rufus calls Lily just as she heads over to his house with a six-pack and some illegal drugs. She felt old (because she is old), and she wanted to do something young and crazy with Rufus. So… Lily and Rufus are gonna drink some beer and take schrooms together while their cumulative five underage children get drunk and have sex at a graduation party! And Rufus will probably propose when he is high as balls, judgment officially inhibited.
Eleanor helps Blair get dressed for the party, and B says she’s dressing for someone she hopes will love her in the way Cyrus loves Eleanor. Eleanor hugs B and tells her this time, “Don’t let him get away with it.” Precious mother-daughter moment, check.
Drunky Yuki thrashes around Nate’s party and heads over to Dan to tell him something she’s always kept inside… then she sees Serena and bolts. “Was she just about to tell me she loves me?” That makes soooo much sense.
Jenny goes up to Blair and tells her, “Gossip Girl knows.” Blair brushes her off, but Jenny says “…about New Years.” I KNEW IT! Jenny “just thought she’d want to know” that she’s going to give the juice to the Mean Girls in exchange for keys to the kingdom. Jenny tells B she needs to wake up because she’s not queen anymore, and B says J should shut her mouth because she doesn’t have what it takes to be queen. Jenny heads over to the girls and tells her that her gossip is too juicy to wait for midnight.
Blair approaches Chuck and takes him into a room. She wants to talk. “I prefer to talk after,” he says. She asks what he thinks about her coat, and then takes it off. “And now?” She asks about her headband, and then her stocking, and her dress… as she takes them all off. “How do you feel about me?” she asks, leaning over him. “I…” Just then, they get a Gossip Girl blast:
“Serena just couldn’t leave well enough alone. Since she had to find out the truth about me, I’m going to tell you the truth about everyone. Every gossip bomb I’ve got is about to drop, and if you’ve got a problem with that, take it up with her. Ever wonder why Miss Carr left town? It’s because Dan Humphrey had sex with her during the school play…”
GG keeps going, spilling about Jenny’s PG-13 photo shoot (and Nate was there), Dan going to jail, Blair and Uncle Bass, and Chuck and Vanessa. Nothing really earth shattering, obviously.
Chuck and Blair confront each other about their mutual barrel-scrapings, Jenny and Dan confront each other about their gossip (as if Jenny didn’t know Dan slept with Miss Carr?), and everyone turns on Serena in exactly the way that Gossip Girl wanted. And, in true form, no one realizes that if they just refrained from doing STUPID THINGS, none of this would have become gossip in the first place… except for Nate. Blair attacks Serena with the most venom for declaring war on GG (even though she helped her do it). Dan defends Serena, and then Blair attacks him for holding true to his label as the ultimate insider: getting into Yale, the New Yorker, the school play, and Serena. BLAIR CALLS DAN A HYPOCRITE! (I wonder if she read my article?) Nelly says Dan ignored everyone else but Serena–wait, so Dan is now TOO cool? My head is spinning. Penelope asks Jenny what she wanted to tell her, but it doesn’t matter now.
Blair finds Chuck in a room and she says he’s not mad at her about Jack, just like she’s not mad at him about Vanessa. They’re just doing what they always do, pushing each other away, and she won’t do it anymore. She asks why he can’t tell her that he loves her. Is he really a coward? She holds his face and tells him she loves him. She tells him to tell her the same, so all the gossip and hurt will have been for something. He looks at her and says, “Maybe it was, but it’s not anymore.” He leaves. Blair begins to cry.
Lily and Rufus are stoned out of their skulls while they reminisce about the good old days. They talk and talk and talk, blah blah blah… with the end being that Rufus proposes to Lily with a wrapped up old concert bracelet. She says yes. They kiss.
Nate finds Serena and tries to comfort her about ruining everything and generally being the worst. Serena is still worried that she will have no friends after this. She decides to text Gossip Girl, saying to meet her at the Oak Room or she will tell GG’s identity. Serena has no idea who she is, “but she doesn’t know that.”
Blair confronts Jenny in the bathroom and tells her that she told Chuck she loved him (again), and he didn’t say it back (again). With this info she’s giving her a chance to be queen, but Jenny doesn’t want it. Blair lectures Jenny about not being such a softie. “You can’t make people love you, but you can make them fear you. For what it’s worth, you’re my queen. I choose you.” Jenny thanks her. Blair gets a text…
Serena and Nate wait at the Oak Room for GG, and Dan shows up. He’s not Gossip Girl, he just wanted to find Serena. He asks what’s going on with her, and she says she doesn’t want to be irrelevant. OF COURSE that is what this is all about. He comforts her that she made him what he is. Blair walks in, and Nate thinks she’s Gossip Girl, and then Jenny walks in. And so do the Mean Girls, Vanessa, Eric, and… tons of others. They all get a text: “You wanted to meet GG? Well, look around. I’m nothing without you. And while most high school friendships fade, it’s my hope that what happened today will bond you forever. Now that all my secrets are out, you have a clean slate. Until college. Congratulations, I’m coming with you.” OF COURSE SHE IS. Serena says, “Drinks on me.” But where’s the bartender in here? I love how no one ever gets ID’ed.
Anyway, Blair apologizes to Serena, and tells S that it’s officially over between her and Chuck. But she’s going to be strong. Chuck watches her from outside, and Blair sees him as he walks away.
A few days later over at the VDW house, Rufus gives Lily a ring and they kiss. Eric gets a waffle iron he’s “dreamed about” (getting adorably gayer by the minute, are we?), Jenny has a cryptic meeting to get to with Blair, and Serena consults Blair on outfits to pack for her summer in Europe. They talk (again) about getting a fresh start. Blair gives S a present: it’s a framed mug shot. S asks if she’ll come to Europe too, but Blair says she needs to spend the summer contemplating the failure of her life. Sounds awesome! They hug.
In a coffee shop, Dan is already waxing nostalgic about high school, of course. Nate walks up and says the deputy mayor tried to get in his pants on his first day, so he quit. Now he wants to go backpacking in Europe with Vanessa. She says it’s too late, she’s already going with… THAT GUY! That random guy over there. Duh. The kid rolls with it, but says, “Yeah, we’re going to have a great time, Melissa and I.” She says thanks for trying, and the kid sits down with his book. Nate tells Vanessa they can just go as friends (unless they drink too much), and she agrees. The kid looks at Dan and they start up a conversation, learning they’ll both be at NYU in the fall. His name is Scott (LOVECHILD alert) and he looks at Dan knowingly.
Blair and Jenny invade Penelope’s all-too-literal coronation of Emma. Blair steals the gem-encrusted headband (oh God) and says she’s taking back her power with a final blow: GG is now blasting out all those secrets Jenny kept when she was protecting Nelly Yuki, and now the world knows them. There’s a new winner, and it’s Little J. Jenny unenthusiastically puts on the headband and puffs her Debbie Harry mullet up. Penelope scoffs at the new Brooklyn queen, but since Jenny’s dad is now marrying Lily, that makes her richer than all of them. Blair shoos Emma out of the way, and Jenny sits down and begins the major policy changes of her new administration: “Starting next year, no more headbands. Except for this one.” Hope and change, you guys.
In the coffee shop, Scott calls his mom and says he’s already met some cool people in… Portland, as he eyes his cut-out real-daddy mementos and says, “I think I’m gonna love it.” Dan gets a call from a blocked number and it’s Georgina saying that his money should be back in his account now, so he can go to Yale. He says he’s actually going to NYU, and she says, “Great. I’ll see you next year.” She hangs up. (THAT’S ALL? THAT’S THE SOLUTION TO THE POPPY LIFTON GRIFT?!)
Georgina’s standing at the Student Services counter at NYU and hands over her paperwork, and then requests her “best friend” as her new roommate: Blair Waldorf.
Serena packs up her car to hurry up and go to Europe already , and Carter walks up. He says he found something she wanted in Santorini, only now it’s in Figi: he hands her a report from a P.I.
“You found my father?” She tells Carter to get in the car, and they drive off.
Blair walks down the street and finds Chuck waiting for her with a bouquet and a gift. “Why aren’t you in Europe?” He says he was in Paris… and Germany… to get her favorite macaroons and stockings. He came back to tell her that she was right.
“I was a coward running away again. But everywhere I went, you caught up with me. So I had to come back.”
“I want to believe you, but I can’t. You’ve hurt me too many times.”
“Then believe me this time.”
She says, “That’s it?”
“I love you, too.”
They kiss.
“Can you say it twice?” They laugh. “No, I’m serious, say it twice.”
He says it over and over. “I love you, I love you, I love you…”
Senior Writer, BuddyTV
Meghan hails from Walla Walla, WA, the proud home of the world’s best sweet onions and Adam West, the original Batman. An avid grammarian and over-analyzer, you can usually find her thinking too hard about plot devices in favorites like The Office, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and How I Met Your Mother. In her spare time, Meghan enjoys drawing, shopping, trying to be funny (and often failing), and not understanding the whole Twilight thing. She’s got a BA in English and Studio Art from Whitman College, which makes her a professional arguer, daydreamer, and doodler.
