The O.C.: An Orange pile of CRAP

Back in 2003, the world was taken aback by the phenomenon known as The O.C. During this era, you could walk into almost any college dorm room and hear gasps, laughs, and plot predictions from O.C. viewers. And what a viewership: gay, straight, male, female, fratty, independent, we all loved The O.C. It was more clever than 90210, had more drama than Dawson’s Creek, almost as witty as Buffy, better drawn characters than Melrose Place—it was pure magic on your TV screen.

Then something happened—The O.C. started to suck, and suck hard.

It began when the show started to no longer be about the unique world that is Orange County. Marissa used to be the most popular girl in high school, Summer was her number 2, and when not attending their urbane, beachfront high school, they attended extravagant yet sordid parties. These parties were a world that the dorky, friendless Seth was not part of, nevertheless, he continued to pine over the unreachable and popular Summer. He was hindered from ever realizing Summer’s affection due the social hierarchy that ruled both the school and county. Three seasons later, that hierarchy has been forgotten, the parties no longer happen, and Summer and Marissa exclusively associate with Ryan and Seth (come on writers, you can’t be popular when you only have three people you ever associate with, one of whom you are dating).

Similarly, The O.C. circa first season was sprinkled with the adults gossiping, backstabbing, embezzling, and committing adultery. Now, the adults serve as little more than backdrop for Ryan, Marissa, Seth and Summer to interact with. Even the adult-centered plots seem like mere intermissions between involvements in the four teens’ lives. This isn’t a show about the idiosyncrasies of Orange County; it’s a show about a cast of one-dimensional characters who revolve around the four principals

Not only do these one-dimensional characters exist merely in orbit of Ryan, Marissa, Seth and Summer, their orbit is so weak that they are all at risk of being jettisoned out of the O.C. universe. There was Luke, who once hated Ryan, then accepted Ryan and Marissa as a couple, then crashed his car, then moved to Oregon with his gay dad. There was Lindsay, who didn’t respect Ryan’s worthiness of being born, then fell in love with Ryan, then found out that she was Kirsten’s half-sister, navigated the tightrope of dating your half-sister’s stepson, then moved to Chicago with her birth mom. There was Anna, who was funny, smart, quirky, and an all around perfect match for Seth, but Seth will always love Summer, and instead of keeping this awesome character around to continue to spice up The O.C., Anna got shipped off. For a while there, the writers even forgot that Marissa had a little sister, but rest assured, once Kaitlin’s storyline is resolved, she’ll be gone—I give it four episodes, tops.

Why only four episodes? Well, because that’s what The O.C. does: creates a complex, almost convoluted storyline that has promise to create oodles of drama, only to be resolved in two to four episodes. Back in the good ol’ days of Season One (when the writers cared about the plots), Ryan was the only one who saw through the nice guy façade of Oliver, seeing instead Oliver’s true nature as a Marissa-obsessed, compulsively lying, NRA card-carrying, psychotic freak. It took half a season before anyone else caught on to Oliver’s craziness, and in the mean-time, Ryan came off as a jerk. Due to dramtic irony, we—the viewers—knew that Ryan was right to not trust Oliver, and as such, we were on the edge of our seats as the drama unfolded.

Now jump to last season finale: Marissa had just shot Ryan’s brother as he was about to pummel Ryan! Wow--would the brother survive, would Marissa go to jail? We got the answers in the next season premiere, and they were “yes” and “no” respectively. The entire storyline was resolved IN ONE FREAKING EPISODE. Also, there was an evil Dean of Students who expelled Ryan and Marissa, but after a pretty weak blackmailing by Sandy, left The O.C. four episodes after he came. Remember when Marissa was a lesbian for a while? No? Not surprising. I could go on, but you get the picture.

Even with the plotlines being cut so short, they are far too predicable. When Marissa had to go to public school (because, my God, NO ONE should be sent through THAT torture), and she was befriended by Johnny and his clique, it was so clear what was going to happen. There would be a spark between Marissa and Johnny, Ryan would get jealous but trust his girlfriend, Marissa would try to resist Johnny’s expression of love, Ryan will clandestinely see Marissa and Johnny getting physically close, blah blah blah, BORING.

This show has become utter crap, its noxious fumes radiate from my TV, I can no longer watch the beauty and talent of Adam Brody be so heinously misused, I can no longer witness Marissa try to express feelings beyond her body’s hunger pains (seriously, I think Mischa Barton weighs less than the box of Triscits that she’s not eating).

It’s done, over, The O.C. is dead to me. Please excuse me as I watch Battlestar Galactica.