Tonight Gossip Girl celebrated Martin Luther King Jr.’s life and legacy by introducing some people of color into the show! Just kidding. But Blair’s dad came back with his sexy French boyfriend (related: Are Eleanor and Cyrus EVER coming back?!) and Dorota got an awesome Yale sweater, because once again the denizens of Gossip land were fixated on Yale as if no other school exists in the entire damn world, and like the casts of 90210: Original Recipe and Saved By the Bell, all the Gossip ladies and Gossip fellows will surely go to the same college. Except for Jessie. She went to Stanford.

In other news, Lilfus are banging each other silly and being disgustingly sappy all over the effing place now that Rufus is totally over the fact that she gave away their son and he died his parents lied about his death. (And Kelly Rutherford is adorably, totally with child, except that we will not speak of it, just like over on How I Met Your Mother, because they haven’t seen fit to write it in [yet].) Poor Eric.

So Serena and Dan got into Yale and Blair got waitlisted. I don’t have a lot of experience with Ivy League admissions, but wasn’t Serena kind of a delinquent for awhile there? She went off to boarding school mid-year as a sophomore (I think) then showed back up as a junior, which would leave some unpleasant holes in a transcript. And I am not entirely convinced she’s literate. I guess we’ll just shove this latest violation of reality under the bed with Nelly Yuki’s fashion sense, Chuck’s stash of transgender hookers, and the timeline of Rufus and Lily’s relationship (the spinoff is going to have so much fun with that). Also, she’s incredibly powerful and can convince the dean of Yale to give her admissions slot to Blair. Whatevs.

There’s a new English teacher at Constance! And she looks very, very young (the actress was born in 1983, which I would have said makes her way too young to be a high school teacher, but then I have to remember that my brother, born in 1983, is a high school teacher) and Blair hates her. Because she gave her a B on one paper and that will clearly destroy her GPA. Which only proves that Blair can’t do math. It’s another nice nod to Gossip Girl‘s complete lack of connection to anything approaching reality that only now, near the end of Blair’s four-year reign of terror at Constance, does she catch a punishment for what’s really one of her less evil and vindictive stunts. Come on. That teacher is an idiot for trusting Blair (don’t they have a faculty lounge at Constance? Where someone would have warned her about the be-hair-ribboned sociopath in fourth period?) and she’s going to do something highly inappropriate with Dan. Getting what she deserves, I say.

I love Chuck’s non sequiturs so very, very much. Like how he tried to buy anthrax with Uncle Jack’s credit card, and got him on the sex offender registry. Ha! But both Chuck and Jack are still making veiled, viperish references to Lily’s sordid past, and I hope the writers have some sort of fire behind that smoke. Because aside from being married like fourteen times and taking off her clothes for Robert Mapplethorpe, what has she done that’s so bad? I’m going to need to see evidence that she was a member of the Khmer Rouge or something.

And then everyone went to the opera. Even Vanessa! She got herself and Nate terrible seats down in the pit where all the other tubercular poor people hurl the rotten bits of their lunch at the performers if they don’t like the show and it’s a penny to sit on a cushion, while all the rich people sneered and Gwyneth Paltrow dressed up as a boy to make out with Joseph Fiennes. And Nate was a gross snob about it, so they moved to Nate’s box and made out in front of the entire audience.

Remember back to the pilot, when Chuck tried to rape Serena and Jenny? Yeah, apparently it runs in the family, because Uncle Jack tried to rape Lily after she signed the paperwork (initiated before Bart’s death, aww) to adopt Chuck and become his legal guardian, therefore transferring control of Bass Industries to herself and Chuck, cutting Jack out. But he was unsuccessful, because this is not SVU and we’re not ready for the sexual assault of a pregnant woman on an 8 p.m. show, I don’t think.

Next week it’s a rerun. Boo!

This week: The return of Nate! I missed Manbangs so much. And thank Gossip Girl he showed up to the reading of Bart Bass’s will to give his precious love, Chuck, all the moral support an amoral, self-destructive, pretty little plum could want or need. The look on Chuck’s face when Nate showed up was like whatever’s inside him actually switched back on for the first time since Bart died. Which was super sweet. But then Bart left him the controlling share in Bass Industries, which Chuck then tried to hand off to his (SURELY EVIL) uncle Jack, who (ew) nailed Blair at some point in the past. Could there be more daddy issues in that room?

Not pictured: Rest of big happy family

In related news: Something is totally, terribly wrong with Eric van der Woodsen’s hair. It appears his colorist has gone the way of any alone time with his sparkly teenage boyfriend Jonathan, since Jenny is enthusiastically cockblocking him at every turn. Again: Shut up, Jenny. And shut up, three little twats of the apocalypse! Yes, the mini mean girls from episode 3 reappeared, only to act as a distraction to allow Nelly Yuki to steal Dan’s phone. And then share the text revealing the Lilfus baby with Evil Bitches, Inc. Nelly! Come back from the dark side!

There was one truly creepy moment on the show that made me intensely glad I didn’t go to high school in the era of mobile communications. Shortly after Penelope and the Mean Girl Squad (and their collection of completely adorable plaid coats) overheard Dan talking to Rufus about how he can’t tell Serena that they share a half-sibling and therefore it’s a little icky and incesty (you know, I really don’t see it) and then texted Gossip Girl about how Lonelyboy is obvs cheating on S, Dan walked out of the school building into a gauntlet of beady-eyed, gleaming-haired hawks staring hungrily at him and lusting to shred the flesh from his bones. It was chilling. Or I may be extrapolating my own high school experience.

Also gross: Uncle Jack answering “you, obviously” to Blair’s “What do you want?” Statutory rape was gross when Nate was tapping the Baroness Schrader and it’s gross now. Basically everything about Uncle Jack gives me the creeps now. It didn’t seem as icky when Chuck was procuring his own hookers and blow, but Jack hiring escorts for him just seems … untoward. I suppose I’m just in a terribly prudish rut right now. It’s all the tremendously wholesome Veronica Mars and Friday Night Lights I’ve been watching lately.

And on the subject of Rufus Jr.: Rufus is still being a tremendous, selfish ass. I get that he’s heartbroken over this kid he never knew he had, but there are two kids he knows about that he has abandoned wholesale (not that he knew the news of the Humphrey–van der Woodsen hybrid would come out via Gossip Girl, but still, they are minors) to go on this mad pursuit, punishing Lily all the way. Yes, it’s sad. But like I’ve hollered at Brothers & Sisters for the last couple of episodes, he’s not that kid’s father. Chris, the man who adopted and raised him, is his father. God, Rufus. Stop being such a fucking child.

Wait, WHAT?! He’s dead? Why bother with all this? Gaah. All right, there has to be some sort of Christopher Pike faked-my-own-death-with-a-stolen-stash-of-cocaine-and-then-set-some-kids-I-hated-on-fire scenario going on here. Right? I mean, Chuck Bass said “I’m sorry.” Stranger things have happened. (Ha. I am totally right on this one.)

2008 saw a lot of great performances by whole bodies. Tina Fey couldn’t have told a lot of funny jokes if she hadn’t been able to say them with her mouth. And learned the lines by reading them with her eyes. And walked to the studio with her legs.

But there are some body parts that worked overtime this year, picking up the slack where other body parts just took up room (I’m looking at you Ellen Pompeo’s forehead!).

As such, let’s take a quick vote — which TV body part deserves recognition for its Outstanding Achievement in Being a TV Star Body Part? Let me know in the comments if I’ve left off a deserving part. Otherwise, going clockwise from the left…

Welcome back! The only good thing about Monday and being back at work is that we get more Gossip Girl. And this week we got a whole lot: Chuck’s hot uncle Jack, a ton of Dorota, Serena broke up with Aaron (WOOOOOO SERENA!), and Jenny realizing that she is, in fact, a fifteen-year-old. Oh! And the Rufus-Lily love child lives!

Hey there, fresh meat.

I was never a huge nighttime soap–watcher (no Melrose Place for me, thanks Mom, way to cripple my blogging career), but there was a brief dalliance with As the World Turns in college, and if there’s one thing sudsy serials taught me, it’s that 1) characters use each other’s names way more than real people ever do, and 2) Gossip Girl kind of needs to step up its game. The show is obviously kind of beyond Kelly Taylor choosing herself levels of plotting, but it would be nice to see some mad wig-ripping. Like, the Lilfus love child needs to show up mid-affair with someone. Or! Ooh, it could be Georgina! That would be awesome.

Did I mention Chuck’s hot uncle Jack? Kind of half Lance Armstrong, half Rob Estes. I wouldn’t have figured that would work, but raaaar. I think we should keep him around and he should shag…someone. Lily? Serena? Nate? I don’t really care. Just someone, anyone, take your pants off. There’s way too much standing around and talking intensely at each other lately. Although it seems Uncle Jack may have nailed Blair. Which would be pretty wig-ripping, I gotta say.

Related: Rufus is horrible. His anger at Lily for giving up their baby has turned him into a blandly vicious prude (it appears Matthew Settle had an unpleasant Method acting–ectomy over Christmas) who won’t let Dan and Serena get it on in the giant Brooklyn loft. That is not the kind of high-quality parenting we’ve come to expect on Gossip Girl. Or does Rufus just think that Serena might be the baby? Mathematically it’s impossible, but when has this show ever paid attention to math? They asked us to believe Lily was rocking Doc Martens and lunchbox purses (and also shagging Trent Reznor) during Lincoln Hawk’s ’80s heyday. Uh-huh. I suppose it would be too much to ask them to make a timeline and watch a little I [Heart] the ’80s?

God, I love Blair and Chuck. I love her hat and her lipstick. I love when he crumples into a sweaty, tragic mess. I love them together. On that score, well played, Gossip writers.

Y’all, this week’s Gossip Girl was a hat trick: a funeral, a wedding, and Blair and Chuck gone nuclear. And (AND!) Blair got some actual emotional support! Dear god, this was the least ironic episode of Gossip Girl ever and I kind of don’t know where to start with it.

So. Bart is dead. Logically, his vast fortune (which Gossip Girl describes as bigger than both Trump’s and Bloomberg’s, which, um, wow) would be split between Lily and Chuck, which makes both of them go off the deep end. Bart’s PI, who as we recall knows the truth about Lily’s time in “the hospital in France” (which doesn’t sound like a sanitarium, as we’d been led to believe), tried to sell the truth to both Chuck and Lily’s mom. Violent, angry, brooding-to-the-point-of-crazy Chuckles is the one who got it, but Cece is the one who spilled the beans to Rufus just before he was planning to go away with Lily for Christmas to rekindle their hott ’90s love. The last thing Rufus said to Lily when he met her at Grand Central was “Was it a boy or a girl,” so that appears to answer the question: Lily aborted their baby. And possibly had a mental breakdown afterward. In January I guess we can look for Rufus to mope around a lot and possibly write a song about what a genetic combination of Jenny and Serena and/or Dan and Eric would have looked like.

In happier, chuppah-ier news, Eleanor and Cyrus got married! It was adorable, except for Little J shoving herself into the works and demanding to make Eleanor’s wedding clothes as some sort of make-good for being an insufferable twat the whole season. What’s she going to offer me, a haircut? But seriously, the wedding was lovely. And Cyrus offering Blair his shoulder to cry on after Chuck spurned her “I love you” was a sweet and wonderful moment that we don’t see much of on Gossip Girl.

We're going to a barn-raising in Thailand for Passover.

Over in Statuesque Blonde Land, Aaron Rose continued to jerk Serena around like the world’s best-coiffed yo-yo. Why does that rat-faced twit insist on looking Amish at all times? It’s mean to the Amish. Since news of Bart’s death interrupted Serena and Dan’s tête-a-tête about sleeping with Aaron and Aaron’s ex, Lexi, respectively, last week, they took up where they left off, which led to Dan getting into the latest in his ongoing series of pissing contests with Aaron. Siiiiigh. And then Aaron convinced Serena to go to Buenos Aires with him for Chrismukkah, because who doesn’t go to Argentina in December?! With a high school student?! JESUS. At one point, in the car on the way to the airport, Dan called Serena because his father had just gone all icy and silent on the subject of Lily, and Aaron said, “You can answer that.” Because it’s HIS JOB TO GIVE HER PERMISSION TO ANSWER THE PHONE. God, this relationship makes me want to punch that little hipster Mennonite.

Blair and Chuck. Oh, lawd. BLAIR AND CHUCK. So Chuck made it his job to wear red eyeliner and skulk about looking up at people through his eyelashes menacingly. He called Lily a whore! And Blair’s tiny, charred heart broke and she finally told the Mad Bass that she loved him, TWICE. There was comforting! HE CRIED! And then he skipped off to god knows where, leaving only a note that said not to come looking for him. Yeah. Because the Gossip Girl writers will really get rid of Chuck Bass in this vile economic climate.

So that’s it, Gossipers and Gossipeuses, until January. I hope you enjoyed all the hijinks and lowjinks this fall. Remember: Don’t go see Bride Wars! It’s bad for humanity.

Greetings, disgruntled twentysomethings. Did you miss Gossip Girl as much as I did? That is to say, mildly, kind of like you miss Stovetop stuffing the 10 months of the year it isn’t acceptable to eat it at two meals a day? This week, Serena finally found herself a worthy adversary in her weaselly artist boyfriend’s perky, pithy ex; Jenny remembered that she’s a fifteen-year-old and is supposed to worry about boys rather than her career; Bart is slimy and evil; and Nate and Vanessa are so doing it. I hope! SOMEONE has to do it! This show has been as racy as Baptist sleepaway camp lately.

V, it is your own fault for believing a 15-year-old made this dress.

Have I mentioned how much I love Dorota? When Blair and Chuck were making their little wager, she was lurking, concerned, in the background, just being deeply, deeply awesome. I love how she bakes and Blair says she’s the one doing it, and how she frowns on physical interpretations of Cyndi Lauper’s “She Bop.” (“God is watching, Miss Blair.”) And how she appears to loathe Chuck more than mildew on bathtub grout. She uses Facebook! She thinks long hair equals whore! She may be nudging Chuck out of first place in the Characters I Want to Get Drunk With and Play With Each Other’s Hair sweepstakes.

The evil Constance Billiard Ho Bag Squad reared its many heads again this week as everyone schemed about the winter’s most importantest social event ever, the Snowflake Ball. (Srsly?) One evil wench enlisted Jenny to make her a dress for the ball (which was, BTW, hagsville), and Jenny, in a fit of pique over Vanessa’s perceived betrayal (OMG she kissed Nate! When she spent the beginning of the season, you know, kissing Nate! Horror!), passed on Token Minority’s see-through designer gown to Vanessa so she’d take her knickers on parade in front of 17-year-old New York society.

Here’s my question for the week: Have the teenage characters on Gossip Girl always been, like, 35? Or 52? Because this week Blair wore a blouse I swear my mom owns, and Serena’s artist beau confessed that he’s a teetotaler and passive-aggressived that she should be, too (which, as Sars just mentioned, is bad for your relationship! Duh!). And Bart Bass dabbled in gay teenage romance, which I guess makes him kind of like a warped Emma Woodhouse. It’s starting to seem like Rufus and Jenny Humphrey are the only teenagers on this show. Oh, and the Captain. He’s about at Jenny’s maturity level with his whole let’s-run-off-to-Dominica! gambit. Tell me the TSA can’t identify Fake New York’s most-wanted financial fugitive when he comes through JFK?

It's a good think I'm not a van der Woodsen, because on Thanksgiving I like to wear elastic-waist pants.

So Nate and Vanessa and Eric all returned this week, to varying results. I’m still not Vanessa’s #1 Biggest Fan, because I’m jealous of her hair and because everything she says makes me want to take a cheese grater to my ears. But mostly because she seems to hover halfway between earnest do-gooder and devious schemer, and the result is that she’s not very good at either. Nate’s eyebrows did the lion’s share of the heavy lifting this week as his father returned and declared that the nest egg he stole from his clients bought a lovely house on a Caribbean island where the Captain, Anne, and Nate can all live in delightful criminal exile. Except that the Captain is planning on kidnapping his wife and child for ransom? Or something? Since the Captain came up with it, it was a shit plan. Nate, being the only person on this show (other than Eric) with a moral compass, thinks that’s a terrible idea! Because then, how will Hogwarts Yale know where to find him when they send their acceptance letter tied to a unicorn’s horn?!

Eric finally got an AWESOME storyline. After Bart slithered in and revealed that Eric’s gentleman friend might be poking his swim captain (so the Gossip Girl writers are penning their own slashfic now?), Chuck revealed that both he and Bart keep a private investigator on retainer. I am choosing to believe that this PI is Veronica Mars. And then Chuck let Eric into Bart’s Safe of Magical Spy Tricks, where he grabbed both his and Serena’s files. What will we learn next? That Serena actually killed someone at boarding school? That Eric is the product of Lily’s second marriage, to Daniel Craig? That Nate and Serena are ACTUALLY SIBLINGS OMG?! No, juicier: That Lily was institutionalized as a teenager for as-yet undisclosed mental-health issues and she didn’t tell her son about it when he tried to kill himself even though that would have, maybe, I guess, helped. But Eric is a wise little elf who is incapable of holding grudges, although that seems to be more an evolutionary flaw of the younger van der Woodsen generation than a strength, because mark my words, S, this will end in TEARS. Or blood and fire. One of those.

P.S. The delightful Aliya won our Gossip Girl giveaway from a few weeks ago. So the DVD, soundtrack, and SUPER AWESOME BOARD GAME will be going to Aliya’s house, since she had the best answer to Never Have I Ever: “Voted for Sarah Palin.” Brava, patriot! Watch in good health.

This episode is titled “Bonfire of the Vanity,” which is fitting, because Jenny finally learned what an unbearable scheming twat Agnes is while continuing her eyeliner tour of terror, Dan sacrificed every moral principle he ever had on the altar of Adam Moss, and Serena’s artist boyfriend wasted everybody’s time by continuing to be a manwhore. Also, everyone mocked Hazel for being single because they are vicious bitches and Blair wore a giant ruffle as a shirt.

Leeanne made this after a night on mescaline in Kitty Hawk.

Possibly the funniest thing I have seen on Gossip Girl this season was Blair chanting “GraceKellyGraceKelly GraceKelly” through her teeth as Wallace Shawn nattered on about $18 peonies. And one of the least realistic: No way does Eleanor Waldorf dig Cyndi Lauper. Blondie, yes. Cyndi, no. This week reinforced my belief that Dorota might just be the best character on this show. Not only is she the actual Cyndi fan in the penthouse, but she has the ability to throw together a fabulous rooftop party in the length of a Hampton jitney ride and, unlike Blair, she understands the critical difference between Eleanor’s paramours: The one who isn’t a closeted homosexual just might make the better partner (for a lady, that is). Blair, of course, does not get it, because Wallace Shawn is wee and vulgar and practical. Her deep, seething emotional wounds with regard to her mother, however, ensure that Blair can never let anyone be happy when she isn’t. (But seriously: Eleanor basically gave Blair a miserable eating disorder. She kind of deserved this.) Unfortunately for B, no one ever told her about getting involved in a land war in Asia. Or not to drink the cup in front of her. It’s nice that the little monster has finally met her match. Good thing death wasn’t on the line.

Over on the Dan Humphrey, Boy Reporter beat, 17-year-old Dan has apparently gotten a juicy feature assignment from New York magazine (apparently no one told Dan that print is dead), investigating Bart Bass. That right there is just a frigging genius idea, because if Bart doesn’t kill him, Chuck will. Dan’s also too stupid to realize that when you have a billionaire over a barrel, you at least make him pay for your freshman year at Yale. Christ, do I have to tell you everything, Dan?!

So Jenny still sucks. (Roommate: “No one ever told her how to be an effective emotional blackmailer, did they? You move home and play nice for a week then do whatever you want.”) After she and Agnes had a violent falling-out, complete with Agnes setting fire to all those ugly puffy dresses (HA!) while Jenny just STOOD THERE while Agnes doused them in lighter fluid and then sloooooooowly struck a whole pack of matches, Little J set out on her own, but quickly discovered that 15-year-olds aren’t allowed to sign binding business contracts and oops, she doesn’t have a place to live! Except for that gigantic loft with her permissive father! God, I am so tired of this Project Runway–meets–The Little Match Girl storyline. The only thing worse than “Jenny romps around the city footloose and gray matter–free” is “Rufus takes parenting advice from Dan.” Goddamn, Humphreys. Sack up.

I’m serious. Not even one dressed as the love child of Popeye and Liberace. Especially one dressed as the love child of Popeye and Liberace. Someone needs to tell Chuck Bass that playing hard to get is Dawson’s bag and that he and Blair are BORING when they are not clawing and rasping and hurling insults and/or sucking face.

And now to the A story: For the first time in recorded history, Nate Archibald figured something out first! Well, figured it out before the only person on this show who’s a dimmer bulb than he is: petulant skeeze-magnet Jenny Humphrey. Has any person ever deserved the good things that happen to her less? I’m thinking she’s a close second to Nicole Richie. Maybe.

Buy some matches, guv'nor?

All right. Perhaps the only person on this show I still have any respect for is Eleanor Waldorf. (And that’s only because she was in Independence Day.) Dan and Serena had the same conversation for the forty-third time (“I want to be friends!” “Well, I want to judge you!” “We can do both!” “You’re a whore.” “You’re from Brooklyn.” “I hate you!” “I hate you more!”), Vanessa pouted about last week’s abortive seduce-and-destroy storyline, and that horrible girl from The O.C. showed up.

It’s like the writers reached for their American Apparel hoodies, kicked their Chuck Taylors up on the table, took a big sip of crazy juice and thought, “What could we to do make Sara’s head explode? Yes! I’ve got it! Find someone who’s a bigger asshole than Little J!” That person would be Willa Holland, who showed up in the totally unwatchable fourth season of The OCk as monotone, unmourned Marissa Cooper’s previously missing little sister, Kaitlin. (I hate that I know her stupid name without having to look it up.) Here she was playing some sort of sullen model named Agnes who attempted to lead stupid, stupid Jenny down the Dov Charney–makes–amateur–porn primrose path. Luckily, since it would have been actual child porn if Taylor Momsen took off any more clothes, Sir Nate of Manbangs showed up to protect her slack-jawed, kohl-addled virtue. And then they made out, their two collective brain cells bouncing hormonally around their pretty little heads.

Next week: Jenny wears a shmatte and does her hair like Kenley. But Lily and Rufus join forces! I hope Lincoln Hawk makes an appearance and then goes on tour with Blur.

Attention fangirls and fanfellows: Don’t forget to enter our Gossip Girl giveaway! Deadline is Friday.

Sound the trumpets, strumpets: We have an awesome Gossip Girl giveaway today!

Even rich people like free stuff.

Thanks to the delightful people publicizing the hell out of this show, we have one gift pack to give away. The gift pack includes Season 1 of the show on DVD (field hockey catfight! Blair + Chuck in the back of the limo! SERENA AND NATE IN THE CAMPBELL APARTMENT OMG!), the brand-new soundtrack from the show, OMFGG: Official Music Featured on Gossip Girl, AND the sparkly-like-Nate’s-eyes Gossip Girl–themed board game, titled Never Have I Ever. Throw in some comically overpriced martinis, very short skirts, and an ascot and you have one hell of an evening right there, friends.

Here’s the track list for the soundtrack, you know, if relaxed and groovy music-from-TV is your thing:

1. The Kills – “Sour Cherry”
2. The Kooks – Do You Wanna”
3. Phantom Planet – “Do The Panic”
4. The Teenagers – “Feeling Better”
5. The Virgins – “One Week Of Danger (Demo Version)”
6. Nadia Oh – “Got Your Number”
7. Crystal Castles – “Crimewave”
8. The Republic Tigers – “Fight Song”
9. Junkie XL – “Cities In Dust”
10. The Ting Tings – “We Started Nothing”
11. Oppenheimer – “Breakfast In NYC”
12. The Pierces – “Three Wishes”
13. Albert Hammond Jr. – “Hard To Live In The City”

Ha! “The Virgins”! Like there are any of those left on the show!

You guys, I am so jealous I am no longer eligible to win the swag. So if you want in on all this awesome, e-mail tifaux -at- gmail -dot- com with the subject line Team Chuck Bass, and include in your e-mail a sentence that begins with “Never have I ever…” and ends with something that will amuse me and Dan. “Accidentally killed a drug dealer” and “Failed to close the deal with super-boring minor British royalty” will get you disqualified. And remember: Tights are not pants! Contest ends next Friday, Halloween. For extra credit (read: to win immediately) put on your Gossip Girl–inspired costume and send us pictures.