Gossip Girl
Posted: Wed Jun 04, 2025 5:39 pm
I wasn't sure whether I should start a thread for this because 1) I've already talked about it a lot in the Good Morning thread, and 2) I'm in the last season so it's not long until I don't have much more to say about it. But still I ramble. Teen drama from the late aughts that is keeping a high level of suspense the whole time as opposed to how Ugly Betty kind of petered out after the writer's strike started and also the trans character left.
So, here's some thoughts about the characters:
I really liked Serena at the start of the show because she seemed so sweet compared to everyone's expectations of her, but she's turned pretty sour later on! Like doing stuff purely out of malevolence and not trying to understand other ppls side of things. Her becoming the new Gossip Girl for a while and using it for her gain was like...! Kind of brutal!
And my opinion of Blair has changed around a lot too. I really disliked her at the beginning because of how mean she was to Serena for seemingly no reason, like with how she accidentally outed Erik as being in a rehab center (in an attempt to humiliate Serena). But I like her a lot more now. She's really into scheming, which is fun, and also it backfires on her often, which sometimes is annoying but sometimes is really interesting. She ends up in pretty dramatic situations, like holy hay the thing with the prince turning on her after their marriage was completed was so scary, I wanted her to get out of there but she got so backed into a corner.
Chuck.... idk. He SUCKED first thing in the show bc he like was on the verge of raping Jenny. They DO address this later on in the show, sort of, but for the most part I think they want you to forget about it. I don't think it's forgivable, and I didn't like his other behavior early on anyway because he just seemed so salacious and rude and self-destructive and hateful. But he changed quite a bit after his dad died and he went through the grieving process. And I guess I did soften on him a bit later on in the show, which is kind of annoying because they set him up from the start to be so bad, but now I'm just like oooh more scheming, more weird drama with Blair and with corporate shit.
Nate is a pretty boy and I like looking at his face and the rest of him too. Which is easy because he bones down a lot.
Dan is... interesting. There's all this stuff now with his book "Inside" and the vicious tell-all sequel he's writing and it's clear how much the Upper East Side has infected him, because he was supposed to be such a good boy from Brooklyn. I don't understand why he was dating Blair, like that came out of nowhere kind of just to cause drama with Serena suddenly liking him again.
Jenny's gone now but gosh she was such a complex character. She was also supposed to be a good girl and she got hit HARD with the UES infection and kept ending up in really terrible situations and acting out and almost filing for emancipation and running away from home and getting drugged and crazy shit. Like I was happy when she got written out of the show because it was frustrating and scary to see how many bad places she ended up in because she wouldn't listen to reason (she's a child) and her parents were unable to control her (their fault).
I'm sad Erik got written out of the show because he's gay and I want more gay people just being gay people.
Also yeah Ivy. I love Ivy because I love a princess and pauper storyline. I can't help it. She was poor and had a horrible home life and she gets hired to impersonate a rich society girl in order to steal her trust fund for the girl's mother, and yet the family she was pretending to be a part of her just fully embraced her and wouldn't let her go. And it was scary all the times that random side characters found out her secret and threatened to out her. And when it came to a head and her family (especially CeCe) stood by her and refused to accept what Max was saying it was so awesome, I was like she made it! And then later the same episode it all falls apart because she feels guilty for Blair and Chuck's car crash (even though it was actually because Nate's cousin was trying to hurt him and they just got into the wrong car) and she runs away and I was like nooooooo. And like stuff comes up again later when CeCe gets sick and it turns out Ivy's been caring for her this whole time and when CeCe dies and the truth is finally revealed I'm so upset with how the family responds. I can understand them feeling betrayed because Ivy literally was hired to con their family and pretend to be someone she's not. But they don't even try to understand how things changed. How she didn't even want to stay there at first and Serena kept pulling her back and showing her this familial love that she so desired. And that it wasn't about the money for her, it was just about the family, and they don't understand it, they can't understand it, it's so frustrating to me! It turns out that they're capable of love, but only if you get it "the correct way". When she was mistaken as "family", she got that love, and when they realized she wasn't, then the love was gone and she never got it back. When they found out she was poor, they wrote her off because they thought she was only after their money, which like is so horrible because it means that they think no poor person could ever actually care about them because poor people only want to steal their money. And they can't understand that Ivy never asked CeCe for her money, didn't even know she'd been left everything in her will, although I think they go so hard at Ivy here because they don't want to examine the fact that CeCe leaving Ivy everything in her will meant that CeCe felt a closer familial love with Ivy than with her own real daughters, and that hurts them. I can understand that reaction, but they never try to develop it (or at least they haven't thus far). Lily is pretty cruel in the way she tries to destroy Ivy and it really turned me against her. Like I said, I'm happy Ivy got the money back and I'm happy she's having fun scheming but I'm so sad for her because it's clear that all she truly wants is back in the family, and she's never going to have it.
Okay I wrote a lot about Ivy.
Also I gotta repost this meme I made:
It's just so wild that Dan and Blair were like omggg what if people find out... we're FRIENDS... how are we going to break it to them... while everyone else is like oh my god Lily committed perjury and she's going to go to jail and they're going to lose Bass Industries for good.
Lily is so complicated because I liked her a lot originally and really wanted her to end up with Rufus and then I was scared about her cancer thing and that ended up being fake and then I was worried about her going to jail and like have been times where she's been a better parent and a worse parent, like when Georgina outed Erik at the dinner table (god I haven't even talked about Georgina yet) and Lily reacted SO poorly, it was devastating. She had a good talk with him after though and like it didn't make me hate her as a character, it was honestly kind of interesting to me because of my own experiences. I liked her Lily defended Serena when Columbia wanted to kick her out for having an affair with a teacher. It feels like there's so many times where Lily has automatically sided against Serena and it was nice to see a change there. But yeah there've been a lot of negative things she's done. I can't deny that her committing perjury and claiming that an innocent man committed statutory rape against her daughter was BAD, even though I was like noooo I don't want her to go to jail, she's in her good mom arc. And also I'm so upset with her about the Ivy situation. Paying off the nurse to testify in court that Ivy manipulated CeCe to give her all of her money is so fucked up. And then she and Rufus got divorced because Rufus wanted to help Ivy and not let her be homeless? God.
Help. This post got so big. I guess I wanted to talk about it after all.
So, here's some thoughts about the characters:
I really liked Serena at the start of the show because she seemed so sweet compared to everyone's expectations of her, but she's turned pretty sour later on! Like doing stuff purely out of malevolence and not trying to understand other ppls side of things. Her becoming the new Gossip Girl for a while and using it for her gain was like...! Kind of brutal!
And my opinion of Blair has changed around a lot too. I really disliked her at the beginning because of how mean she was to Serena for seemingly no reason, like with how she accidentally outed Erik as being in a rehab center (in an attempt to humiliate Serena). But I like her a lot more now. She's really into scheming, which is fun, and also it backfires on her often, which sometimes is annoying but sometimes is really interesting. She ends up in pretty dramatic situations, like holy hay the thing with the prince turning on her after their marriage was completed was so scary, I wanted her to get out of there but she got so backed into a corner.
Chuck.... idk. He SUCKED first thing in the show bc he like was on the verge of raping Jenny. They DO address this later on in the show, sort of, but for the most part I think they want you to forget about it. I don't think it's forgivable, and I didn't like his other behavior early on anyway because he just seemed so salacious and rude and self-destructive and hateful. But he changed quite a bit after his dad died and he went through the grieving process. And I guess I did soften on him a bit later on in the show, which is kind of annoying because they set him up from the start to be so bad, but now I'm just like oooh more scheming, more weird drama with Blair and with corporate shit.
Nate is a pretty boy and I like looking at his face and the rest of him too. Which is easy because he bones down a lot.
Dan is... interesting. There's all this stuff now with his book "Inside" and the vicious tell-all sequel he's writing and it's clear how much the Upper East Side has infected him, because he was supposed to be such a good boy from Brooklyn. I don't understand why he was dating Blair, like that came out of nowhere kind of just to cause drama with Serena suddenly liking him again.
Jenny's gone now but gosh she was such a complex character. She was also supposed to be a good girl and she got hit HARD with the UES infection and kept ending up in really terrible situations and acting out and almost filing for emancipation and running away from home and getting drugged and crazy shit. Like I was happy when she got written out of the show because it was frustrating and scary to see how many bad places she ended up in because she wouldn't listen to reason (she's a child) and her parents were unable to control her (their fault).
I'm sad Erik got written out of the show because he's gay and I want more gay people just being gay people.
hatkirby wrote: Tue Jun 03, 2025 2:16 pm (honestly I'm not on Lily's side rn because I really liked Ivy and Lily and Serena HATE Ivy) (it's really sweet that Ivy cared so much about CeCe and I kind of love that CeCe put her middle finger up at her real family and left an inheritance to the person that treated her better than her real family) (which was Ivy) (I knew no one was going to be able to be normal about this though) (also why are Blair and Dan dating like this seems so random) (I'm also kind of not on Serena's side rn because she's the new Gossip Girl and she's using it for her own gain and she was purposefully mean to the real Charlie and then got mad at her for retaliating) (there's been a lot of times when I've thought Serena was so sweet and bad things were just happening to her anyway, but rn I feel like she's in her villain arc).
Like I'm upset with Rufus too, Dan actually brought up in a recent episode that Rufus was always the voice of reason, he was always doing the right thing, and I felt like he really stuck to that for a long time, up to and including being on Ivy's side after it came out that she wasn't really Charlie Rhodes. But then his marriage with Lily just completely dissolved and he started sleeping with Ivy which is so weird and aaaaa what happened to him. I know his character kind of just stalled out in the background after he got married to Lily, while Lily continued to be a big driving force in the show, and they needed to make him interesting again, but dang like. How are they going to wrap this up.hatkirby wrote: Wed Jun 04, 2025 12:14 pm Ok so I'm still on my bullshit and WHAT is happening in this show. Like I'm still not on Lily's side and I think it's great that Ivy got the money back because Lola is on her side now, and that Ivy wants some revenge on Lily because rn she honestly deserves it (she and Rufus got an annulment and she re-committed to her ex-husband who died and came back to life?? why is this happening?? the show made a point about how perfect they are for one another! also after all the mourning and pining that Chuck has done about his dad, his dad is finally back and he's just an antagonist now, he's fucking up Chuck's life, that's so sad) but also like WHY is Rufus sleeping with Ivy, it's so weird, like the age difference is kind of uncomfortable, she's an adult but she's like early-college age whereas Rufus is parent-of-someone-in-college age. The real fucked up age difference is Nate and his girlfiend (not a typo) Sage who are 21(?) and 17, and they say how he's not taking advantage of her because he's a good guy and even her dad is okay with this and I'm like idk man she is too young for this and it's demonstrably negatively impacting her behavior in the way that the Upper East Side always seems to infect people in this show. And like yeah Nate is a good guy and he didn't know Sage was underage at first but like it is suss that he keeps dating her (and she says at one point "it's legal I checked" and I dunno man I dunno if it even is, and even if it is I don't think this is. great).
Also yeah Ivy. I love Ivy because I love a princess and pauper storyline. I can't help it. She was poor and had a horrible home life and she gets hired to impersonate a rich society girl in order to steal her trust fund for the girl's mother, and yet the family she was pretending to be a part of her just fully embraced her and wouldn't let her go. And it was scary all the times that random side characters found out her secret and threatened to out her. And when it came to a head and her family (especially CeCe) stood by her and refused to accept what Max was saying it was so awesome, I was like she made it! And then later the same episode it all falls apart because she feels guilty for Blair and Chuck's car crash (even though it was actually because Nate's cousin was trying to hurt him and they just got into the wrong car) and she runs away and I was like nooooooo. And like stuff comes up again later when CeCe gets sick and it turns out Ivy's been caring for her this whole time and when CeCe dies and the truth is finally revealed I'm so upset with how the family responds. I can understand them feeling betrayed because Ivy literally was hired to con their family and pretend to be someone she's not. But they don't even try to understand how things changed. How she didn't even want to stay there at first and Serena kept pulling her back and showing her this familial love that she so desired. And that it wasn't about the money for her, it was just about the family, and they don't understand it, they can't understand it, it's so frustrating to me! It turns out that they're capable of love, but only if you get it "the correct way". When she was mistaken as "family", she got that love, and when they realized she wasn't, then the love was gone and she never got it back. When they found out she was poor, they wrote her off because they thought she was only after their money, which like is so horrible because it means that they think no poor person could ever actually care about them because poor people only want to steal their money. And they can't understand that Ivy never asked CeCe for her money, didn't even know she'd been left everything in her will, although I think they go so hard at Ivy here because they don't want to examine the fact that CeCe leaving Ivy everything in her will meant that CeCe felt a closer familial love with Ivy than with her own real daughters, and that hurts them. I can understand that reaction, but they never try to develop it (or at least they haven't thus far). Lily is pretty cruel in the way she tries to destroy Ivy and it really turned me against her. Like I said, I'm happy Ivy got the money back and I'm happy she's having fun scheming but I'm so sad for her because it's clear that all she truly wants is back in the family, and she's never going to have it.
Okay I wrote a lot about Ivy.
Also I gotta repost this meme I made:
It's just so wild that Dan and Blair were like omggg what if people find out... we're FRIENDS... how are we going to break it to them... while everyone else is like oh my god Lily committed perjury and she's going to go to jail and they're going to lose Bass Industries for good.
Lily is so complicated because I liked her a lot originally and really wanted her to end up with Rufus and then I was scared about her cancer thing and that ended up being fake and then I was worried about her going to jail and like have been times where she's been a better parent and a worse parent, like when Georgina outed Erik at the dinner table (god I haven't even talked about Georgina yet) and Lily reacted SO poorly, it was devastating. She had a good talk with him after though and like it didn't make me hate her as a character, it was honestly kind of interesting to me because of my own experiences. I liked her Lily defended Serena when Columbia wanted to kick her out for having an affair with a teacher. It feels like there's so many times where Lily has automatically sided against Serena and it was nice to see a change there. But yeah there've been a lot of negative things she's done. I can't deny that her committing perjury and claiming that an innocent man committed statutory rape against her daughter was BAD, even though I was like noooo I don't want her to go to jail, she's in her good mom arc. And also I'm so upset with her about the Ivy situation. Paying off the nurse to testify in court that Ivy manipulated CeCe to give her all of her money is so fucked up. And then she and Rufus got divorced because Rufus wanted to help Ivy and not let her be homeless? God.
Help. This post got so big. I guess I wanted to talk about it after all.