He Named the Boat Summer

Spoliers for The O.C. Finale and Angel that aired last night. Deal with it.

Has a major character on a network TV show ever gotten an abortion? And has life been ok for her afterwards? I was trying to think of this last night – Claire on Six Feet Under gets one at the end of season three, and then goes on a ridiculous dream sequence where every dead character on the show is glowing in a halo and taking care of a new glowing baby in Heaven (take that pro-choicers!) – but that's hardly network TV.

The O.C. finished last night, and most of the episode was spent agonizing over whether or not that main character's pregnant ex-girlfriend Theresa, who he is prone to hooking up with, would get an abortion. There was an interesting class element to it that was only hinted at – we have a rich white Californian family rounding the wagons to protect their son's good fortunes by befriending the poverty stricken servant he's knocked up and "being there for her" while politely forcing her into getting rid of the child ("You'll need someone there for you. I'll drive [you to the abortion clinic]"). The Coen parents reminded me a little of newly-rich Harry in Rabbit is Rich while he is trying to explain to his son, equally as detached from it all as Ryan, that they can just bribe his knocked up girlfriend into getting rid of the child ("she has a lot of brothers and sisters….she'll understand the value of a dollar").

But while Harry was forced to marry the girl he knocked up in the earlier books, and fought as hard as he could (which being Harry wasn't all that hard) to stop his son from having to do the same, Mrs. Coen had an abortion earlier in her life, and looked like she really wanted Theresa to not have an abortion to make up for it. Was it just me or did she guilt her into having the child? Even Peter Gallagher, who is as close to a moral compass as the show is going to have, was taken aback by his wife's actions.

Anyway, the season finale was thankfully on the good side.

Anyone in their mid-20s watching a completely unrealistic (kids in high schools wearing sport coats?) teen drama is more than likely a fan of nostalgic sentimentality, and the finale shovels it on.

It so sentimential that the finale ended up almost being entirely about the first episode. And not just in the continunity references – Seth's boat and plan to spend the summer sailing alone, the beach with the first party, the shots of Ryan leaving in the reverse order of him showing up.

All the characters are back at base zero – Ryan's stuck in Chino in what appears to be a bad news situation, Marrisa is drinking alone and Seth is friendless again with his plan to go sailing alone for the summer (bringing him back to borderline sociopath from cutesy emo geek).

I don't know if I can wait until October for it to start again. I'm still working through my thoughts about Angel last night – Wesley was in top form, and the in-joking and earlier Buffy references are a nice touch, but I could have done without Andrew (he was good the first time on the show though). While Buffy was really funny Angel never got the humor right, and last night's episode in Italy showed that. What should have been much funnier felt flat – all the real humor was from the random Buffy trivia thrown out (I particularly liked how they each tried to take credit for saving the world at the end of Buffy Season 2 with the portal).