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Every Thursday night millions of Americans turn on their television to watch The OC, which is a show about high schoolers dealing with common teenager problems like sex, balding, and lesbianism. Since I am an American and I own a television, I decided to tune in for a couple episodes to see what it was all about.
Let me first state that I have always been completely against this show without ever having watched a full episode. I have actually made this joke:
"The OC? More like the Oh-Sucks!"
So I've only been watching over the last few weeks for the purpose of this column. But I have to admit that I might be hooked. My experience with The OC has been a lot like when I kissed a girl in eighth grade. I thought it would be disgusting but then after it was done, I kind of wanted to do it again.
And since we're on the subject of my awkward trip through puberty, here's the first thing that you should know about The OC: In no way does it reflect what kids actually do in high school. Or at least, I hope not. Where's the sexual frustration? The random mustache hairs? The experimental masturbation? If I were a writer for The OC, the show would center around delinquent pubic hairs, growth spurts, and boners in the classroom.
I really think one of the characters on the show should be based on me at age fifteen, a.k.a. a 5'4" 120 pound freshman on the football team who wears his jersey to school on the Friday before the big game and gets laughed at by girls and then told he's "cute," but not we should make out sometime cute, more like you remind me of my eight year old little brother who usually has ice cream all over his face cute. And I was also afraid of taking showers with my teammates after practice.
But apparently in The OC, people like me don't exist. Instead, all the actors are pretty, witty, and at least twenty-five. Whatever. The formula seems to be working.
Like I said, this show is really popular.
Question: How popular?
Answer: Well, even the doctor from House watches it.
Question: But House is also a Fox show. That sounds like a network self-call to me.
Answer: Self-call?
Question: Yes. Fox is making a self-call.
Answer: What's that?
Question: They're tooting their own horn. You know what a self-call is.
Answer: Yes, I do. But some of my readers might not.
Question: Oh. Good point. I can't believe we had to go through this whole dialogue just to explain what a self-call is.
Answer: Yeah, I know.
Based on my limited experience, here's an analysis of each of the shows four main characters.
Ryan, played by Ben McKenzie (DOB: 12 September 1978), is a troubled youth from the wrong side of the tracks in Los Angeles. In the pilot episode, he finds himself in trouble for stealing a car. His punishment: living in the guest house of Peter Gallagher, his Jewish Lawyer! How come Tony Danza didn't get called for this role?
Ryan is pretty much James Van Der Beek in Dawson's Creek but without the tube socks and with 1/8 the forehead. He sometimes exhibits questionable judgment. In the two episodes I've seen, he has left his extremely drunk girlfriend, Lindsay, on a beach at night in Los Angeles while he goes to get coffee; he has openly hinted to his girlfriend that he wants to get back together with his ex-girlfriend, Marissa; and he has played his girlfriend's father in a best-of-seven series of pool for the right to date his daughter. This, to me, sounds like a guy who doesn't want to stay in his relationship.
Odds that Ryan gets Lindsay pregnant by the end of the season: 2-1
Odds that Ryan kills Lindsay with a pool cue by the end of the season: 4-1
Odds that Ryan kills Lindsay with a pool cue because she lied about taking her birth control pills: 7-1.
Seth is played by Adam Brody (DOB: 15 December 1979), who I recognized right away from his guest appearance as Barry "Romeo" Gilmore on Judging Amy in the "Romeo and Juliet Must Die - Well, Maybe Just Juliet" episode, along with his role in American Pie 2 as High School Guy. As a high school guy living in Orange County, Seth is actually funny. He is a neurotic comic book devotee and his chemical formula is:
John Cusack in Say Anything + Woody Allen in Annie Hall - 5 years
An example of his wit: To explain how pissed off he was, he said, "Sometimes Bruce Banner turns into The Hulk." I just decided that I'm going to the weight room this afternoon. I'm doing one set of bench press, delivering Seth's line to a girl on an elliptical machine, and leaving.
Seth's kryptonite is his ex-girlfriend who is named...
Summer (played by Rachel Bilson who is a year older than me). Summer is hot, but in a very attainable way. If she were a real life high schooler, she'd probably be the girl who looked like a sweetheart in high school but then ended up being a slut by her senior year, and at graduation parties she turned into a one hundred pound sexually transmitted disease. The worst thing about these girls is that they get to start all over when they get to college and nobody knows they're sluts anymore.
Marissa (played by Mischa Barton who is only nineteen! Almost high school-age!) is Ryan's ex-girlfriend. But recently, her love interest is Seth's other ex-girlfriend (not Summer, but Alex). Alex, as the name would imply, is confused about her sexuality because sometimes she likes to kiss guys but sometimes she likes to kiss Marissa.
Actually, she's only kissed Marissa once. It happened last Thursday night. But everyone who has watched the show for the past few weeks has, like, totally known that it was so going to happen. So now that the famous kiss has actually taken place, the question in male locker rooms across the nation has become: Can a kiss between two very attractive women ever be a letdown? In my opinion, as long as the kiss can be categorized as "making out," it's not a disappointment. Anything less is a tease, anything more is bonus material to be used later.
So was I satisfied with the end of last week's episode? Yes, I was. Am I going to watch next week's episode? Not a chance. The OC is for girls, and any guy that watches it is a pussy.
But the thing is, Peter Gallagher kissed his ex-fiance and I think his wife is really pissed at him and I want to see if Seth and Summer get back together but of course she would have to break up with her current boyfriend first and...
Okay, maybe I'll keep watching.
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