Liveblogging the New 90210

OKAY.

So, what’d everybody think of the new 90210???

I was thinking, ya know, I know you guys were disappointed that I didn’t do recaps of last season of AmIdol, so I thought I’d liveblog this groundbreaking moment in television to make it up to you. I decided that before realizing that the premiere was two hours long. But you know what? I did it anyway. Yeah. I love you guys that much. Also because I’m pretty sure I fractured my wrist doing yoga last night, so it’s not like I could go to my yoga class anyway. I’m like the most accident-prone person on the planet.

In fairness, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. And that’s all I’ll say.

I know a lot of you don’t want spoilers because you have it on TiVo and want to watch it later. Let me save you two hours. My recap/liveblog is after the jump. Enjoy.

8:02 pm: Kansas boy and Kansas girl have just moved from Kansas to Beverly Hills where their father — a former West Beverly student — is the new principal. I hope this is one of the first scenes they filmed, and that’s why the acting is so painful. Kansas girl apparently hooked up with some dude named Ethan while visiting LA a couple summers back. Ethan goes to their new high school.
8:03 pm: This Ethan dude’s getting road head in the high-school parking lot. See? We’re hip to what the kids are doing these days. It’s all about the parking lot road head.
8:04 pm: Hannah Zuckerman-Vasquez is doing the school news? Are you fucking kidding me? Come on.
8:04:30 pm: Heh. Witty Teacher says “What is that girl, like, thirty?” Sort of a redemption. Sort of.
8:04:45 pm: A McLovin’ reference. SEE? WE’RE HIP!
8:05 pm: Snobby girl uses “vagina” as an insult, in the classroom, in front of the teacher, and there are no consequences whatsoever. WE ARE REDEFINING TELEVISION HERE.
8:05:10: JENNIE GARTH!!!! She’s talking to the new principal, who jokingly calls her a “pain in the ass.”
8:06: A girl says “She’s def cute” in reference to Kansas girl. Do kids really say that these days? I thought it was just, like, a literary device employed on MySpace. I mean, Jesus, if I were an actress and someone gave me that line, I’d rip up the script and piss on it. In fact, I heard Britney Spears did that with the Crossroads script, but for entirely different reasons.
8:06:10: Snobby girl calls teacher a “bitch” behind his back. Look at all the swearing we’re doing! HIP! HIP! HIP!
8:06:30: Ethan is the boyfriend of snobby girl, who was not the girl giving him head in the parking lot. Ethan hooked up with Kansas girl a couple of years ago. I could have predicted NONE of this.
8:07: An HMS Pinafore reference? Okay. Small props.
8:10: OMG kids are hiding baggies of drugs in carved-out textbooks and selling them that way. Um, really? I think not. Carved-out textbooks are for Troop Beverly Hills, dummies. The kids in Beverly Hills may have more expensive drugs than kids in other areas, but they don’t have unnecessarily expensive ways of distributing them. But thanks for giving drug use that extra edge of mystique, guys. That’s cool of you.
8:14: THE PEACH PIT! WITH NAT!!!! Trying to use an espresso machine, unsuccessfully. Ha ha ha. Funny. I ::heart:: Nat.
8:14:30: Ugh. There’s going to be a plagiarism scandal soon. You know what? This whole show already seems like a plagiarism scandal.
8:15: Kansas boy plays lacrosse. He plays it well, apparently. So well that he unseats another guy from the varsity team. A fight ensues.
8:22: Snobby girl and her boyfriend hit up the clubs in Hollywood, because nobody IDs you when you’re rich. At the club, snobby girl runs into mean teacher who is, by the end of this episode, most certainly going to bust her and Kansas girl for plagiarism.
8:23: Boring adult stuff. This is going to be just like Gossip Girl, where the stuff with the kids entertains me and then I want to die while the grown-ups are talking. Remember when Lori Loughlin was Aunt Becky? That was awesome.
8:23:30: Aunt Becky just said “penis”! WHY COULD THIS NOT HAVE HAPPENED ON FULL HOUSE?
8:24: Grandma Kansas said “ass.” Also makes reference to being black-out drunk. Awesome. Then makes fun of the Amish. Even awesomer.
8:25: Snobby girl makes blanket statement that implies only assholes play lacrosse. No one bothers to correct her on this. Snobby girl leaves her purse at club. Drug addict girl steals it. These plot twists are BLOWING MY MIND.
8:30: It’s a new day, and everyone is making fun of Kansas girl at school. She soon learns why — classmate Erin Silver (sister of David Silver, of course) runs — get this! — a gossip blog! It’s called The Vicious Cycle and it covers all the goings-on at West Beverly. But this is different from Gossip Girl in ohhh so many ways. Erin’s blog is not anonymous, and it’s more of a vlog. Plus she has mad Flash skillz. Give me a break, guys.
8:31: Erin Silver was mean to Kansas girl because she was hanging out with Naomi, which, I have learned, is snobby girl’s name. I still haven’t figured out Kansas girl’s name. Erin Silver hates Naomi.
8:32: Jennie Garth — who is Erin Silver’s step-sister AND the guidance counselor — arrives just in time to lecture Erin (who goes by “Silver”) about how her blog causes problems, but I’m not listening, because I’m too busy gaping at how GINORMOUS Jennie Garth’s arms look next to the totally ana arms of Jessica Stroup, who plays Silver. Someone needs to treat this girl for an eating disorder pronto.
8:32:30: Annie! Kansas girl is called Annie! How very Kansas! Why not just skip the middle man and call the girl Dorothy?
8:33: There’s a bunch of drama about this lacrosse fight that I’m not quite following. Boys and sports are boring. But I think that Ethan just lied and said Kansas boy (I think his name is Dixon) started the fight on the lacrosse field, when really he was just defending himself. This will result in Dixon getting booted from the team. Dixon is sad about this and he and Annie talk about how sad they are.
8:35: Annie is mad at Ethan for lying and confronts him. She makes Ethan feel bad.
8:36: Annie is in class, and devastated to see that Naomi has submitted, verbatim, a paper that Annie wrote. Annie had lent her the paper to help her “get some ideas.” But, as Naomi tells her, “What did you think I was going to do?” I agree with Naomi here. Also, Naomi has purchased a $800 dress for Annie as a thank you. How very Beverly Hills.
8:36:30: Dixon, pissed at Ethan for lying about the fight, texts Naomi to inform her that Ethan is cheating on her.
8:37: To make things up to Annie, Silver helps her get a shot at being in the big school musical. Annie blows away the musical director. Her excitement is short-lived, as her father/principal confronts her with Naomi’s plagiarized paper.
8:41: Naomi thinks Annie ratted her out, but Annie’s dad recognized the paper. Naomi disinvites Annie to her birthday party. So sad.
8:41:30: More lacrosse dudes fighting. I think Ethan is trying to right his wrong.
8:43: Has anyone in the casting department noticed that Naomi actually looks older than the woman playing her mother? Principal Kansas makes Naomi rewrite the paper.
8:44: Dixon is back on the team, thanks to Ethan. Now Dixon feels bad about sending that text to Naomi.
8:47: Despite being both uninvited and grounded, Annie has snuck out with Silver to go to Naomi’s big sixteenth birthday bash. Jesus Christ, Naomi’s sixteen like I’m Mexican.
8:47:30: Cory Kennedy makes a cameo at Naomi’s party. And a photographer snaps them together. Like it’s gonna show up on Last Night’s Party. Do you see how hip we are?
8:50: Okay, so now everyone’s all psyched because, since Naomi’s purse got stolen at the nightclub, she didn’t get the text. But then drug addict girl returns the purse she stole (and tells Naomi that the guys at ‘The Pit’ found them) so Naomi has her cell phone again.
8:51: Grown-up stuff. Naomi’s mom is still mad about something Annie’s dad did twenty years ago when they were dating. Apparently they have a son together, that Naomi’s mom had years ago and put up for adoption. She just told him about this. He does the only adult thing possible, and walks away.
8:53: Naomi sees the text from Dixon, just as she has to do her big dance at her big party with Ethan. Naomi confronts him about the cheating. Ethan says nothing. Naomi cries.
8:56: Silver takes Annie away from the party and to the Santa Monica pier, where they find Ethan in a wet suit and surfing. How he got to the ocean, into his wetsuit and into the water before Erin and Annie got there — considering that they all left the party at the same time — is a question I’m not going to think about too hard, lest I give myself a headache.
8:58: Ethan confirms to Annie that he was, in fact, a complete ass, and then basically proclaims his undying love for her. This will sit well with Naomi.
9:00: Principal Kansas can’t sleep, and neither can Jennie Garth’s adorable little son, whom we meet briefly while getting the feeling that his father’s not exactly in the picture. Ethan shows up at Naomi’s place and she lets him in. Dixon joins Annie and Silver in Santa Monica and they all splash around in the ocean in their formal wear, as kids in Santa Monica do ALL the time. Right. Let me tell you. I used to live in Santa Monica. And it’s not that we didn’t get all crazy in the ocean late at night. But we didn’t do it wearing fucking evening gowns. We did it naked. That’s how LA rolls, people.
9:02: I love Grandma Kansas. She tells Principal Kansas that her computer froze up again. He asks what she spilled on it this time. “Scotch … I mean, iced tea. The good iced tea, too.” Best line so far. She then mentions that she has to finish writing her memoirs before her friend does. “We’ve slept with all the same men!” Can we just do a show about Grandma Kansas? I’d watch that shit.
9:03: We learn that Annie had a boyfriend back home, who just dumped her.
9:03:30: Apparently Principal Kansas has told Aunt Becky about his no-longer-secret love child. That was mature of him. Weird. They chat about it. Aunt Becky is surprisingly calm. This is probably because she’s been through this before — you know Uncle Jesse had like a hundred secret love children running around San Francisco. Have mercy!
9:06: Someone has dumped garbage all over the front hallway of West Beverly, and TP’d the walls. Like, the students are standing knee-deep in garbage. Um, is there no night-time security at the high school in one of the wealthiest zip codes in the country? This isn’t a couple of rolls of toilet paper strewn about, this is like a full truck of garbage dumped inside the edifice. They blame it on their rival lacrosse team. There are rival lacrosse teams? This shouldn’t amuse me as much as it does. Like, whatever happened to fucking football? Oh, and as an adorable touch, someone has spray-painted “WEST BEVERLY EATS SHIT” on the wall, but there’s an extra standing right in front of the “I” the whole time. WE ARE REDEFINING TELEVISION. Principal Kansas tells the boys that there is to be no retaliation for this. Right.
9:08: Ethan has brought Naomi a rose at school. They seem to be attempting a reconciliation. Even though we all know Ethan’s true love is Annie.
9:09: Annie walks in on a very attractive boy singing. The boy is apparently the lead in the school musical. There’s obviously a spark. The boy is super hot. I love that we’re totally stealing plot lines from successful Disney specials.
9:10: Witty Teacher asks students what a haiku is, cautions them not to say that it’s the new sushi role at Koi. WE ARE SO HIP.
9:11: Druggie chick is fucked up and starts singing in the middle of class. Per usual, no consequences, even though her eyes are bright red. We also learn that druggie chick is poor.
9:12: Witty Teacher is in the cafeteria, offers to give Jennie Garth half his sandwich if she’ll let him sit with her. Jennie says he can keep his sandwich, she’ll still sit with him. “Well, you’re too easy,” says Witty Teacher. “Anyone ever tell you that?” Jennie Garth smiles. “Not lately.”
9:14: Silver’s back to blogging. Annie’s sitting at the table with her. They’re talking about the hot singing guy. God, who does the Annie actress remind me of? It’s been driving me nuts since this thing started. And then it hits me: Lori Loughlin. She looks like a young Lori Loughlin. And that answers the other question I’ve been asking myself for months now, which is: How did Lori Loughlin even get this audition?
9:15: Hot singing guy — his name’s Ty — asks Annie to dinner.
9:15:30: Okay, the first time this episode I’ve actually laughed out loud. The camera cuts quickly to a really, really, really Goth girl talking to Naomi, saying “I am so sorry that happened to you!” Naomi’s like “Who are you and why are you speaking to me.” Goth girl shows her Silver’s blog, where Silver has told the world that Ethan’s been cheating on Naomi — and that he’s been cheating on her with druggie chick. Poor N. Whatever will she do now that her secret’s out? xoxo, Gossip Girl.
9:20: Dixon is sad because he knows the lacrosse guys are going to retaliate against Palisades High for their little stunt with the giant invisible garbage truck, but they won’t let him in on it since his dad’s the principal. Dixon wants to get back in their good graces by thinking up the “dopest prank ever.” OMG. Do kids still say “dopest”? What can I do to change that? Is there a charity I can donate to? Mothers Against Saying ‘Dope’?
9:22: Annie’s off to dinner with Ty, and, en route, calls her mom to ask permission. Aunt Becky agrees, but only if Annie and Ty agree to pick up Grandma Kansas’ computer and drop it off to her on the way. She agrees. There can only be trouble on that computer.
9:23: Grandma Kansas is drunk and wandering around the house with her glass. She tells Dixon that, when Principal Kansas was in high school, he and his teammates released 50 pigs on Palisades’ field. Apparently it took six hours to catch them all, and then they had to play their game in pig shit. Dixon takes to the idea like a pig to shit.
9:25: Ty is supposed to be taking Annie to dinner. But he drives her to a private airport instead. “Uh, where is the restaurant?” asks Annie. “Oh,” says Ty. “It’s in San Francisco.” Annie decides to go with him. On a plane. To San Francisco. As a minor. Without her parents’ knowledge. Isn’t some sort of crime
being committed here?
9:29: Witty Professor asks Jennie Garth to dinner. She tells him she has a kid. He says that doesn’t bother him. “Everybody comes with some baggage,” he says. Ouch. That was a dumb thing to say, and Jennie knows it. She drives off.
9:31: Ty has officially swept Annie off her feet. She’s smitten.
9:32: Jennie’s at the Peach Pit chatting with Nat, and then — BRENDA! ACK!!! She hugs Nat. Brenda and Jennie sit down for a meal together. Brenda’s in town for a month to do some sort of school play. Gee, I wonder if Annie will be in it. All these years have done nothing to fix Shannen Doherty’s teeth. It is awkward to watch Jennie and Brenda try to act like they don’t want to hurt each other.
9:33: Dixon has brought three pigs to Palisades in the back of an Escalade. They should consider using that in their advertising. “Back seat so big, it can fit three pigs!” Says one of the lacrosse dudes: “This is sick. I mean, disgusting, but also sick.” See? We here at the writing staff of 90210 understand that there is, in today’s youth jargon, not just a connotative but a denotative difference between “disgusting” and “sick.” WE ARE SO HIP.
9:34: Naomi is getting back at Ethan by hooking up with his lacrosse rival, Large Blonde Dude. Large Blonde Dude looks like an awesome kisser. I would get with Large Blonde Dude. In fact, he’s the first of these guys so far that I would get with. This is because the other men on this show have been positioned to be charming, pretty and non-threatening. Large Blonde Dude is the meat-head villain. This turns me on. Dude. What the fuck is my problem?
9:34:30: On the flight back from San Fran, Annie realizes that she has eight messages. “Oh, God,” she says. “My grandma was in a car accident.” My guess is that this is because her drunk ass was driving to pick up her computer, which Annie’s harlot ass was supposed to bring to her. If Grandma Kansas is dead I am going to be devastated. She is by far the best part of this show.
9:38: OH THANK GOD! Grandma Kansas is okay! Annie is very apologetic. Grandma Kansas is happily in bed, and busy telling stories about Al Pacino to Ethan’s grandmother. Ethan is there, too. The two of them sit out at the pool and talk about Ty. Ethan loooooves Annie. Then they talk about Naomi. Ethan love love loves Annie.
9:42: Principal Kansas is pissed about the pigs. He says that if no one takes responsibility by 1 pm today, the lacrosse season is over.
9:43: Dixon admits to the whole pig incident. His father, Principal Kansas, doesn’t believe him. Dixon tells him about what Grandma Kansas told him about his own pig prank. Dixon agrees to take full responsibility.
9:44: Druggie chick walks out of her big audition for some movie without any explanation.
9:45: Annie realizes that Silver and Naomi both have the same tattoo — the Chinese symbol for “Friendship” — on their lower backs. She asks Silver about it. Silver talks about how she learned her dad had an affair with her mom’s best friend when she was in eighth grade. Silver knew, but her mom didn’t, and Silver was petrified her mom would find out and get a divorce and start drinking again. Silver told nobody about it except for her best friend, Naomi, who promptly told everyone. So Silver’s mom found out and everything went to shit, and Silver’s dedicated her life to making Naomi’s life hell. God, I’m so glad blogs weren’t around when I was in high school. I would have gotten into so much trouble.
9:49: Druggie chick lies and says the audition went great.
9:51: Ethan tells Principal Kansas that he was involved with the pigs, too, and should be suspended.
9:51:30: Aunt Becky is holding something small and square in her hand and saying, angrily, “Look what I just found in my daughter’s pocket.” I am certain it’s a condom. But no. It’s a matchbook with the name of the restaurant Annie went to with Ty. “San Francisco, Annie?” Um, dude, just because the matchbook came from San Francisco doesn’t mean your daughter was there. Wouldn’t she be more concerned about why her daughter had matches in her pocket? This is a piss-poor plot device. I mean, geez, if my fifteen-year-old daughter were gone for all of five hours the night before and then she showed up the next day wearing a “Je T’aime Paris” T-shirt I wouldn’t be all like, “What the fuck were you doing in France last night?” Stupid, stupid, stupid.
9:53: Ethan and Naomi drama. He’s pissed that she hooked up with Large Blonde Dude. Ethan dumps Naomi. She cries.
9:54: Principal Kansas lets Dixon back on the team since Ethan fessed up, too. Uh. That was easy.
9:55: Witty Teacher shows up at Jennie Garth’s house with flowers, but finds Brenda at the door. He brought the flowers to apologize for referring to her child as “baggage.” He asks if he can take Jennie out and Brenda offers to watch the kiddo.
9:57: Principal Kansas and Aunt Becky are lying in bed chatting about whether or not to stay in Bev Hills. They decide to stick around for now. Then they make out a bunch.
9:58: Ty has arrived at Annie’s house to make out with her. They are sucking face on the front porch as Ethan walks up, clearly looking to recapture his romance with Annie. Ethan is sad and walks away. Roll credits.
9:59: As if on cue, my dog farts.