Season 2; Episode 14 - The Next Fifty Years: Of My Life Will Be Spent Coming Up With New Ways Of Saying "Steve's Hair Is A Sinister Underworld Filled To The Brim With Excrement" And "I Really Fucking Hate Brandon." Read On For The Most Recent Additions To My List.

(First and foremost, I'd like to send a birthday shout-out to the one and only Rach! A ride-or-die kind of a broad who's been an immense source of support of this nonsense for a while now...which actually kind of makes me question her judgment and psychological stability, but that's neither here nor there.  For your special day, Rach, as requested, I got you this profanity-laden blog post about a fair-haired loser who accidentally shoots himself and dies.  On his birthday.  So.  Happy Birthday to you? I guess? This is a really dreadful gift.)

In which we all know what happens in this one: Brenda bestows us with the dance move that launched a thousand-and-one imitations.  In my life anyway.

I've attempted to recreate this Julliard School Dance Division-worthy move since the moment this episode aired, only in the privacy of my own bedroom and, in more recent years, only with (potentially) a few pairs of judgy-ass cat eyes on me.  I've never been able to fully capture the grace and elegance Shannen Doherty clearly brought to the table with this one, but I try.  Still, I try.  Even if I ever only achieve 1/1,000,000th of the funk she's serving up here, I would be unable to share it with the public.  Mikhail Baryshnikov and Twyla Tharp and Blossom Russo would be so overcome with boiling jealousy and self-doubt, they'd never dance again, and I just wouldn't be able to live with that.

Oh, and also: Scott blows his digestive tract off.  And dies.  Whatever.

We open - as is so often the case - with the tip-tops of palm trees as we hear "This Is My Country" on the soundtrack.

We slowly pan down, seeing Douglas Emerson's name's final appearance onscreen...

...to the parched quad area of West Bev.  A choir is singing the aforementioned song and a bunch of other students who apparently have nothing better to do are gathered 'round.  We also see the banner proclaiming, "West Beverly Hills High School Time Capsule," and then the dates 1941 and 1991, hanging from the balcony.

Pan over the choir dorks.  I can say that because I was a choir dork in middle and high school.  And a really atrocious one at that.

More panning over the crowd.  This recedingly hair-lined dude wearing the unfortunate combination of a turtleneck under a button-down shirt (ah, the early-'90s) appears to be a member of the SAUNders family, or perhaps just another student giving Steve a run for his 41-year-old money in the 41-year-old department.

Sidebar: I didn't notice this person until I started screencapping but seriously, WHO THE FUCK IS THIS GUY.  He clearly arrived in 1991 in a time machine from the 1984 movie, This Is Spinal Tap.

Finally (and regrettably) we wind up on David, filming the goings-on in a shirt he appears to have fashioned out of the fabric scraps left over after Vivian Ward's polo match dress was made.  Except that since his shirt clearly moonlights as a fumigation tarp for the Spelling Mansion, it's more likely that he so fancied Vivian's dress that he headed to ALL the Jo-Anns to buy ALL the bolts of this fabric in ALL of the state of California, as well as parts of Arizona and Oregon.  Also: we're only 2:02 into this episode and I've already made a Pretty Woman reference.  I can hardly wait to see how many more I can cram in, given that I'm going through withdrawals, having not made a single one in my "Halloween" recap.  Moving on.

So then we get David's vantage point of looking through the camera (how clever) as he focuses on the banner.

Then we sadly get David's tinny voiceover as he pans down to Brandon and his Smug Brandon Mug (slathered in Blush-&-Bashful Bronzer, it appears) wearing a sports coat and a tie, and AHHHHHHHHHHHNdrea wearing what could be a cute dress but is more than likely an abomination.  I mean, it's AHHHHHHHHHHHHNdrea after all.  David says, "That's Brandon Walsh with the editorial board [ed. note: oh, please]; AHHHHHHNdrea Zuckerman, [and he seriously says "AHHHHHHHHHHHNdrea," like, exactly how I write it, and he sounds kind of irritated with it, which was pretty boss and very un-David-like, really] editor-in-chief of the Blaze."

Mrs. T.  Dressed as Bette Midler and Bette Midler's SHOULDER PADS in Big Business? Silly Mrs. T. - Halloween was last episode!

And then David gets this guy, "Mr. Chapman," who we'll see later in the episode as well as later in the season as Brandon and a 'roided-up Steve's track and field coach.

The Blonde Brigade, surrounded as always by a bunch of Nobodies.  David refers to them as "the Three Amigos," because he's just as quick-witted as I am.

He then sets in his sights Dylan and Brenda, and what a fucking nuisance to everyone else in the crowd, lurking around, stalking the clique he so desperately wants to be included in.  Also: see the horror in Brenda's eyes at his approach? That's pure, primal fear right there.

As he gets closer, he says, "Dylan McKay and Brenda Walsh, popular...a campus couple," and of course Dylan's reaction is to tell the troglodyte to go fuck himself.  Well played, Dylan, well played.

David creeps around getting more footage ("footage" = "jack-off material for later") as we wind up back with Brandon and AHHHHHHHHHHNdrea onstage.  (Don't hate me but I like Brandon's hair here; what can I say? I like a good pomp.)  He asks AHHHHHHHHHHNdrea how many verses are in the ever-loving "This Is My Country," because seriously, it's been going on for several hours at this point.  AHHHHHHHHHNdrea then reminds Brandon that, "Citizen Kane is Saturday night," which sounds like a surefire cure for insomnia to me, especially in the company of AHHHHHHHHHHHNdrea and her rat's ass hair, but whatever.  Brandon then makes the grave mistake of bailing on her, seeing as he's got a date with Emily that night, and though barely audible or visible, if you look hard enough and listen hard enough you'll observe AHHHHHHHHHHHHNdrea turning away and seething, "If I can't have you, no one can," out of her foaming mouth.

FINALLY, the choir is through and Mrs, T. and her SHOULDER PADS head to the microphone, advising everyone assembled, "I'd like to thank our special guests from the Class of '41, who invite all of you to take a closer look at the time capsule.  Thank you.  We'll see ya tomorrow." And then everyone claps.  Because this lame assembly is over.

David, in a shirt Dorothy Zbornak would deem "too shapeless," heads back over to Dylan and Brenda, embarrassing himself further by begging Dylan for "just one sound bite, please.  That's all I ask."

Season 2; Episode 8 - Wild Fire: Was This Title A Clever Foreshadowing Of Emily's Propensity To Light Homecoming Floats Ablaze???

(I will preface this one with HOLY MOLY, August-into-September has been a blur of work, a trip up to San Francisco to visit Benjamin [of Banana Walsh fame] for the long Labor Day weekend, my boyfriend going back to school and me having to safety-pin his mittens to his jacket and pack his lunches every morning and lay out his outfits every evening [none of that has actually happened] and my family coming for a visit here in L.A.  Also: napping, talking to my cats about nothing in particular, napping some more, again, watching Seinfeld [shocker] and procrastinating the writing of this recap because...? No idea.  I mean, other than San Francisco and my family's visit, my life is essentially a really, really uneventful, non-funny and pathetic version of Groundhog Day.  Anyhow, once again, apologies on the delayed posting of this thing.  I guess Emily Valentine's mere presence wasn't the kick in the pants I thought it would be.  Or maybe her hair just really turned my stomach and gave me the night sweats with a side of cholera, I don't know.  Whatever, without further ado, read on.)

In which Our Beloveds finally realize that they're really only truly Hot Sluts when they're together...which is a lie, seeing as Brenda continues to be a Hot Slut until the end of time and Dylan leaves his Hot Slut behind midway through Season 3...but I digress.  We're also introduced to Emily Valentine and her Hair Of ALL Horrors, which for some reason brings all the boys to her greasy, messy, desperately-in-need-of-a-root-touch-up'ed yard.  And finally: The Return Of Poor (Seriously, Where's The Gun?) Scott Scanlon! Now with 715% more Fucking Dork.  But after some For Real Talk he lays down on David this episode, he may just replace Brenda in The Special Place in the cold, charred, coal-like substance that resides somewhere beneath my rib cage (i.e. my heart).  It's on!

We open...at the BHBC?!? WHO THE WHAT.  I thought we were done with this shit!

Psych! We totally are.  This is just a dream.  Which you can obviously tell seeing as women are coming onto Brandon.  Anyhow, a waiter brings him a drink as these three skanks, who fell straight out of an episode of Just The Ten Of Us, rub their skank hands all over him and for some reason repeatedly kiss his cheek.

And then this delicate gardenia appears on the horizon, serving up some serious Kelly Bundy-level Essence Of Eleganté 1980s Video Vixen with those lace-front spandex booty-shorts and matching, midriff-baring, keyhole-in-the-shape-of-a-stretched-out-vadge top.  And she rolls up, breathily repeating "Brandon" over and over, and by "breathily," I mean "mannishly" because girlfriend sounds like Morgan Freeman with a chest cold.

Brandon of course pops innumerable Woodrows and proceeds to lower his grodsky octagonal Claire's sunglasses and peers over the top of them at the exquisite Swarovski crystal coming towards him.  But! Suddenly! Dream Dude's Girl's voice turns into Brenda's...

...and we cut to Brandon's bedroom inside H.O.W., as Brenda attempts to awaken her layabout brother with, "Get outta bed, pokey.  You don't wanna be late for school, do you?"

Brandon rolls over with his schlong at full-mast, presumably, and he and Brenda talk about the anxiety dreams she's been having for the last week (including one where she shows up for class unclothed) in the lead-up to the first day of school.

Brenda doesn't think that there's anything for her to be nervous about, seeing as she and Brandon aren't the poorly-dressed-and-coiffed hayseeds fresh off the covered wagon from Minnesota like they were the previous year, and Brandon says that it's probably because it's the "first day of school.  New classes.  New teachers.  Old boyfriends." Brenda asks, "What does that have to do with going to school nekkid?" and yes; Shannen Doherty seriously says "nekkid" and I love her for it.  And then Brandon makes a non-joke with, "Right.  Relax.  You were probably just tryin' to make a fashion statement." Shut up, Brandon.