Gossip Girl: Welcome back, Upper Eastsiders!

I know I’ve been getting my Gossip Girl fix this summer via her Twitter feed, and if this review isn’t enough for you, she’s also live-tweeting all of the episodes this season.  But enough of plugging someone else, let’s resume our story, already in progress.

Last season, a lot happened only it didn’t feel like it week to week.  This season, everyone has longer hair.  Spotted, Chuck Bass goes after some leggy blond–Ashley Henshaw with American Girl hair–even though he has a girlfriend–oh yes, he’s up to his old tricks.  At least that’s what we’re supposed to believe, it’s some weird Crash sexual game that he and Blair play.  Meanwhile, Jenny has been living it up with the Barefoot Contessa at the van der Woodsen manse in the Hamptons.  She and Eric have been hiding evidence at Serena’s request, so once again Serena’s lying.  And Dan’s got this creepy post-high school metrosexual look (and has been working out for his new role in The Stepfather) going that he’s going to go share with Vanessa, who he thinks spent the full summer in Europe with Nate.  Only that’s not exactly what happened as Nate lands in Manhattan in a helicopter with another new Columbia student–she’s Bree Buckley, arch-rival of the Archibald clan.  And in another dramatic entrance, Serena is hounded by the paparazzi when she returns from Europe.

We’re around another van der Woodsen/Humphrey breakfast table when Rufus says they’re all going to a polo match.  Dan pulls Serena aside to show her drunk photos of her partying up in Europe, but as usual she doesn’t care.  Chuck and Nate wax exposition about Chuck’s new bellhopper look and why Nate should get with Bree.  Blair and Serena spend their walk talking about her little sexual game play with Chuck so they can keep the spark in their relationship.  My advice?  Use vodka and black underwear like everyone else! Serena plants the seed of doubt, as is so easy to do with Blair’s insecurity.

Dan and Vanessa have coffee and talk about their summers and new hairstyles.  She and Nate hooked up once but came back and met Scott; she thinks they’ll like each other.  I think they’ll practically be brothers to each other.  Anyway, Vanessa grabs Dan’s wallet and sees he’s been stuffing his designer wallet filled with $100 bills–a graduation gift from Lily, which to Vanessa is akin to Frodo finally giving in to the power of the Ring.  Yeah, not so much.  Exhibit A: Frodo had the Eagles and Dan has a limo (that he kept secret from Vanessa).

Back at the apartment, Rufus is flipping through the Euro-rags with photos of Serena and no top, with Serena in a dance club, and with Serena doing body shots with Prince Harry.  Serena’s still feeling photogenic because she pretends to lose control of her top so paparazzi with get her away from Carter Baizen; she later tells Dan that Carter has been stalking her and she’s trying to avoid him.  In other scheming, Scott is encouraging Vanessa to confront Dan at the polo match, but we know he just wants to see Dan’s family–he’s got a copy of his original birth certificate.

Polo Match!  Nate introduces his date, Bree, to his grandfather and at the same time hands back the keys to a new car; he’s again rejecting his family’s influence.  Bree’s not amused by Nate’s using her because she’s not currently in her family’s good graces.  She wants to get back with them and she also wants to get with Nate.  In short, she needs them to be discreet, and Nate’s going to have another secret relationship, until his grandfather tries to use the relationship in his feud against the Buckleys.

Across the tent, Blair and Chuck are looking for another woman to unwittingly participate in their idea of foreplay.  While Vanessa is trying to confront Dan, Blair pulls him aside so they can follow through on their plot against Carter.  They’ve got a restraining order to keep Carter away from Serena, and he’s about to reveal what really happened, when polo player Nacho (seriously?) gets Serena to throw out the ball.

Scott gets away from Vanessa and meets Rufus.  As Scott is talking about being Rufus’s number one fan, Serena rides across the field on a horse.  Everyone’s shocked and confused.  And by everyone, I mean me.  Carter rides after her and they talk about her quest to find her father.  Carter reminds her that her father didn’t want to see her.  But now Carter wants to make out with her and he gets his way and into her pants.  Somehow, Carter winds up shirtless and alone, with no sign of Serena.

Back at the match, Vanessa is all snotty with Dan and he’s snotty back at her.  I like it when these two fight.  It makes Vanessa almost interesting.  Also interesting, this relationship dynamic between Blair and Chuck: they’re almost good together in a mutually assured destruction kind of way, even as they realize they don’t need games to know how they feel about each other.  Well, they don’t need games with a third party: they’ve moved over to her playing the bitchy restaurant customer and him being the ever friendly maitre d’ who works hard for his tips.

We end with Vanessa and Scott hooking up, Nate and Bree hooking up in the car he decided to keep, and Rufus not hooking up (Lily is still visiting her sick mother) but buying up all of the photos of Serena.  But Serena’s got her own plan, she’s been paying one of the photographers to put the photos of her in all of the foreign papers, hoping that her father will see her in one of them.

Next week the college year starts and Georgina Sparks is Blair’s new roommate.  How will our former Queen B survive?

Listen to The J Factor with J.B. and Jaimie here or on iTunes.

Season 3, Episode 1: Reversals of Fortune (originally aired September 14, 2009)

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Photographs courtesy of The CW, Giovanni Rufino