We’re rewatching all of Dawson’s Creek in honor of its twentieth anniversary. Will require some mind-numbing. Drinking game rules can be found here.

Season 4, Episode 22 “The Graduate”

By Janes

It’s time for yet another obscure high school tradition that we all forgot about–the graduation rehearsal! Joey is making a speech, because of course she is. If you remember, there was literally an entire episode about how she’s neither valedictorian or salutatorian, but such logistical concerns could never compete with Joey’s overflowing It Girl specialness.

Joey doesn’t have her speech ready yet, which she makes super awkward, even though her classmates are probably just overjoyed they don’t have to listen to it twice. However, that’s not nearly as embarrassing as what happens to poor Pacey, who comes to rehearsal late and is promptly told (by Mitch, who is truly terrible at this Fake Guidance Counselor stuff) that he needs to leave so he can study for his finals. Apparently, Pacey’s grades are “right on the bubble” of being able to graduate, which makes no sense. Either he’s passed the classes or he hasn’t. I guess there’s one required class where he needs to do well on his final to pass, but if that were the case, wouldn’t he have known that way before now? And wouldn’t Mitch and Principal Peskin have known way before Pacey had actually arrived at graduation rehearsal? (Also, why are they having the rehearsal like, a week before graduation? The kids will definitely forget how to walk in a straight line by then.)

Joey watches, pained, as Pacey is forced to leave his own graduation rehearsal. Later, Dawson tells her that her writer’s block is probably because of Pacey, because I guess now that Joey and Dawson are becoming a thing again, it’s mandated by law that they develop Pacey mentionitis. Joey is worried that Pacey will “resent” her if she tries to help him, which–yuck. I love Pacey, but it’s not her job to cater to his manbaby feelings! Dawson manages to be very mature about this (probably because he knows he’s winning), and tells her that she was in the relationship too, and has the right to talk to him and work out her unresolved feelings.

Unfortunately, Pacey is a little too busy self-destructing to think about things like closure. The literature teacher–the same one who was so kind to Joey after her one C grade–makes a super unprofessional crack at Pacey’s expense after his pencil breaks. This is more than enough to send Pacey over the edge, and he goes on a tirade about how none of the teachers care about students like him, but will “bend over backwards” for the honors students, who don’t really need their help. Too true. Pacey walks out of his final, which seems to be the death knell for his graduation chances.

Joey comes to his house and tries to help him, but Pacey isn’t having any of it. When she says there “must be something we can do,” he nastily replies, “I didn’t realize we were playing a team sport here, Joey.” Stung, she says she knows it’s over, but she wants to help him as a friend. Pacey finally softens a bit, and admits that he still loves her, and as much as he likes the idea of being friends, it’s actually a “bizarre form of torture.” He tells her he needs to not be around her for a while in order to get over her, which–fair. It’s sad, but definitely healthier than following your ex around with puppy dog eyes and insisting on knowing every detail about her sex life.

Needless to say, that bracing encounter doesn’t cure Joey’s writer’s block, so Bessie gives her something to help: a letter from their mother, which she wrote right before she died. I know we make fun of Joey’s mom card a lot, but this is actually really sad. She can’t bring herself to read it, so she asks Dawson to read it for her. The letter itself is a little weird, and actually sounds more like something Dawson would have written (I doubt a mother would use her last words to talk about her daughter’s “shy smile” or “deep, soulful eyes”). But I’m a complete softie, so I’m totally tearing up by the time Dawson reads: “Keep close those who shared your childhood. They will always love you in a way that no one else will, and will always be with you,” which is basically the thesis statement of the entire show.

Now we’re going to talk about something even sadder: the last time we’re ever going to see Drue. He shows up at Jen’s window, and they engage in completely adorable good-natured banter as he begs for her to let him in. When she finally does, she ruffles his hair, and I die a little bit. Then she covers him in a quilt, commiserates with him about their respective terrible parents (shot!), and faux-reluctantly lets him crash on her floor. It’s so cute, and makes me so sad. These two were definitely supposed to be Twoo Wuv.

Drue ropes Jen into a last-minute senior prank (which is kind of funny, since he was already suspended for a prank he didn’t commit). They’re going to program the school sprinklers so they go off during graduation–or, as Drue puts it, they’re going to turn graduation into a “glorious liquid wonderland.”

They, of course, immediately get caught by Principal Peskin. Since they’re about to graduate, he can’t really discipline them, so he keeps them hostage and plays terrible cello for a few hours. It’s about as boring for the viewer as it is for Jen and Drue. How meta.

Meanwhile, Tobey is trying to get Jack to DTR, and Jack does that annoying thing where he basically admits that he and Tobey are boyfriends, but refuses to say it. I know Jack has the added difficulty of internalized homophobia, but seriously, he should stop being such a fuckboy. Jack reluctantly says he’ll call Tobey his boyfriend when it’s “appropriate.” Whatever.

Luckily, that moment comes pretty quickly. Jack and Tobey pick up Andie from the airport, and there’s a super awkward moment where Andie has no idea why Tobey is there, and Jack STILL refuses to explain. She’s forced to ask directly how they know each other, and Jack finally admits that Tobey is his boyfriend, sounding like he’s pulling teeth. It’s not the most romantic, but Tobey seems pretty happy (and Andie is obnoxiously over-the-moon, as per uzhe).

So yeah, Andie is back. Her return is pretty inconsequential, except to remind us that she is a perky nightmare. Only now, she’s not just a perky nightmare, she’s a world traveling perky nightmare, which is the worst kind. She is not only the first person to get off the plane (I hate those people!), but she also goes on and on and on about how amazing and life-changing Italy was. Like, wow, I had no idea Italy had great architecture and food! What amazing insight! But I have to hand it to the writers: this is totally realistic. Of course Andie would be that person.

However, she does have a fairly sweet conversation with Dawson, whose friendship with Andie always felt pretty authentic (they are the two most annoying characters on the show, after all). He says he’s upset about Gretchen but “doesn’t feel like [he] has a dark cloud over [his] head,” and Andie is super impressed at how much he’s changed–although, to be fair, it’s kind of hard to tell whether this newfound zen is actually because his relationship with Gretchen is more mature or because he very obviously liked her less than Joey. Case in point: he says “Joey was my first love, but Gretchen was my first mature relationship.” Take (maybe our last) shot for Joey mentionitis!

The lit teacher decides to be a human being and let Pacey take the test (I guess after a homophobic sociopath, a statutory rapist, and Mitch, Pacey was due at least one decent authority figure). Pacey celebrates by attending a graduation party, where he reconnects with Andie. Andie says she’s sorry about Joey, and seems to mean it. He says he’s going to be all right, and asks her to tell him “what it’s like out there.” (Nooooo Pacey, don’t get her started!!) Mercifully, she focuses on the emotional part of leaving home, and says, “Leaving Capeside wasn’t an end, it was a beginning.” He tells her about his opportunity on Kubelik’s boat, and that he–yay!–graduated from high school! He says he wanted her to be the first to know, because she was the first one who ever believed in him. Aw. I kind of love that.

I’m hard on Andie, but in all seriousness, she’s much less irritating this episode than usual. And her hair’s perkiness factor has decreased about a thousand percent:

Pacey then finds Joey, and now that he’s flushed with his success, he has the grace to make things right with her. She asks him if the future looks “remotely bright,” re: graduation chances, and he pivots to: “It certainly didn’t when it held the prospect of never seeing you again.” Aw. He tells her he has to go live his own life “for a while,” but this isn’t where it ends between them. “So hypothetically speaking, if I were lucky enough one day to find myself owning a sailboat again, and I were to ask the woman I love [shot!] to go sailing with me… would she?” She smiles and says, “You wouldn’t have to ask, Pace.” This isn’t exactly a classic P/J scene, but I love it. It’s so bittersweet and touching.

It’s finally Graduation Day!! Pacey sits in the empty chairs before the ceremony starts and looks up at the sky, because he told Andie he wanted to “feel the sun on [his] face and know that [he] can overcome anything.” Then as he packs to leave, Dougie genuinely tells him that he’s glad Pacey will have a sea-bound summer, because “[he] deserves it,” and Pacey tells Dougie that he’s always looked up to him. Aw!

Dawson’s parents give him a watch and tell him that he’ll definitely make it in Hollywood or some shit (shot for undeserved praise!). Andie tells Jack that she’s staying in Italy, which reminds me there was a chance she might have ended up in Boston with them. *shudder* (Although it would have been kind of awkward if Andie attended Harvard while Joey attended Fake Harvard.) Grams refrains from punishing Jen for the prank she pulled with Drue, because Jen would “have to do a lot worse to undo how proud [Grams is] of [her] today.” Ugh, so cute. Dawson tries to make Joey laugh to get her to forget about her speech, but his jokes are so lame I’ve forgotten them in the 20 seconds it took to write this sentence. (Pacey would do a much better job!!)

Finally, it’s time for the sentimental graduation montage (yay, montages!), set to Eva Cassidy’s “Fields of Gold,” because that’s their official “bittersweet sounds of growing up” song now, I guess. Joey makes her speech, and it’s actually much less painful than I remember. I thought for sure she’d be one of those TV characters who gets up and talks about her own loved ones (::cough:: Rory ::cough::) and all you can think is–do these kids know what a graduation speech is? What are the other kids thinking while the valedictorian talks about her relationship with her mother for twelve minutes on their graduation day?? But mercifully, Joey only briefly plays the mother card (shot!)–and, weirdly, the Pacey card–before expanding her life lessons to graduation: “No matter where you go in this life, I hope you always take Capeside with you.” Meanwhile, we see Pacey happily arriving at the airport, not minding that he’s missing the ceremony because, as he told Andie, he “doesn’t need to compare [himself] to them anymore.”

Drue looks at his watch, and the sprinklers go off! How fun! Joey does her cute open-mouthed laugh, and Jen gives Drue an adorable look like, “You!!”

RIP Drue

They all throw up their hats (in slo-mo!), and Pacey boards his plane just as Principal Peskin calls his name to get on stage. It’s a quieter ending than most graduation episodes, but pretty satisfying. (Plus, we still have one more episode left!)

• Pacey tells Mitch that he’s late to rehearsal because his teacher was lecturing him on who won the Cold War, which “was us, by the way, so Go USA!” On the one hand, this is a ridiculous oversimplification, but on the other, this is absolutely what they would teach kids in a place like Capeside. +10 for realism.
• We’ve been hard on Mitch lately, but that’s because he’s such a dink! Why not tell Pacey he’s not allowed to go to the graduation rehearsal BEFORE he actually shows up? I know, it’s supposedly the principal’s decision, but… Mitch could have done something to make this less horrifically awkward. –Nerdy Spice
• I like to think that none of the kids laughed at the principal’s “Ricky Martin wears tight pants” joke because they’re woke kids who don’t like homophobia, and not because it’s a dad joke.
• Speaking of homophobia, Dougie actually tries to be helpful and supportive for once, and Pacey responds by rudely refusing his help by calling him “effeminate.” Ugh. He’s lucky I love him so much.
• Joey is wearing SO MUCH BLUSH. She looks good and everything, but damn. The post-breakup glow-up is real.

 

 

• Tobey is worried that Andie won’t like him, which makes me laugh. Even Abby Morgan could barely prevent Andie from vomiting rainbows all over her.
• Aww, Jack and Toby wrestling and flirting is so cute though! Even if Jack is doing that horrible thing where he acts like the “boyfriend” label is both stupid and unimportant, and completely terrifying —Nerdy Spice
• Wow, this scene on Pacey’s porch is brutal. Most of the time Joey gets to be the beautiful girl who everyone wants, but Pacey just tells her there’s no “we” anymore and it’s… pretty mean! But of course he follows it up with telling her how much he loves her and how long he’s going to keep loving her, so I guess… it’s not the most humiliating post-breakup scene possible. –Nerdy Spice
• Wow, I teared up at Toby’s giant smile when Jack finally dropped the “b” word. I am such a sucker.  –Nerdy Spice
• Drew is eating pickles out of the jar as a snack. WITH MILK. Now I actually like pickles as a low-calorie snack, but with milk? Ewwwwwww.  –Nerdy Spice
• Grams pretending to be a soft old lady so she can swindle Drue into cleaning her attic might be my favorite Grams moment of all time.
• I know Dawson reading Joey’s mom’s letter was supposed to be for the D/J shippers, but I actually really like it. These two have so much history, and Dawson actually knew Lilian. Even if she and Pacey were still together, this would be a nice moment.
• I also liked Pacey telling Andie about graduating before he told anyone else, but then he says he doesn’t want to tell them at all, which is–kind of a dick move. I get not wanting to tell everyone, but he’s not even going to tell Joey? When she’s been super encouraging and is visibly anxious about his success? Rude.
• Joey is seriously a saint. How many times has she heard Pacey whine about how “this wasn’t how I wanted it to end between us” and refrained from pointing out that he broke up with her? What angelic restraint she’s showing.  –Nerdy Spice
• The writers explain that Joey’s making a speech because she actually is the salutatorian now (I guess numbers two and three got senioritis) and because she won the “Pinnacle award.” You’re only supposed to make one excuse, guys.

Highlight:

There were a lot of sweet, quiet moments in this episode–especially between the various ex permutations. But the moment I totally lost it was when, as they’re leaving for graduation, Bessie puts lipstick on Joey, just like she did in the pilot. Then, as Jann Arden’s “Good Mother” is playing in the background, Joey finally gives Bessie the credit she deserves and tells her that their mother was right in her letter: Bessie took great care of her. Bessie says sadly that Joey deserved a mother, and Joey answers sweetly, “Bessie, I got two.” Tears!!

Most cringeworthy moment:

Andie was more tolerable than usual, but this category still goes to her and her stupid travels. “The architecture, the men, the food… did I mention the men?” VOM.

Most wrongly used five-dollar word:

Pacey claims to be “Invoking the hard-earned lessons of my youth” by walking around with his head down. Um… no. But if it’s any comfort for poor Pacey, all the kids who are graduating on time are also bad at using big words. —Nerdy Spice

Most early aughts soundtrack moment:

There were a lot of great 90s-esque choices in this episode, but the most hilariously early aughts song has to be the faux-indie-rock song that dramatically plays when Pacey sees Joey at the graduation party.

(A quick Google search tells me this song is “If” by Dragmatic, and I don’t know who they are, but they identify as “Alt-Country/Indie/Power Pop,” which is pretty amazing.)

Drunkenness level:

Seven, including two for Jen and Drue making fun of various B-movie cliches.

Season 4, Episode 23 “Coda”

By Nerdy Spice

So Dawson’s about to leave for his summer film program, and everyone makes a huge deal about Dawson and Joey’s impending parting. The two certainly have been hanging out a lot–and early in the episode, Dawson tells Joey he’s had a good time hanging out with her and holds the eye contact just a smidgen too long. Ohhhh no. On their last night, they go to the movies with Jack and Jen, followed by individual good-byes between Dawson and each of the other characters. Dawson and Joey go first, and have a fairly stilted good-bye, both of them made self-conscious by Jack and Jen separately urging them to spend the summer together (which would mean Dawson giving up his film program). Then Jack leaves, and Jen and Dawson say good-bye in a scene that might even border on sweet.

But then Pacey calls from what he calls “Paradise,” having borrowed a friend’s cell phone (while, by the way, wearing an absolutely hilarious Hawaiian shirt):

Dawson tells Pacey that Joey’s thinking about him every ten seconds and tries to get him to call her. Pacey doesn’t even want Dawson to tell her he called: “I just — I realized that you were the only person in Capeside that I regret not saying goodbye to.” He tells him that he still misses the way things were. And Dawson tells Pacey he’s proud of him. AWWW. I tear up at like every episode now. It’s actually embarrassing.

However, this seems to motivate Dawson to go over to see Joey for another goodbye–but she’s already on her way to see him. So they watch ET on his bed again, just like in the pilot, and discuss the fact that Gandhi won the Oscar, just like in the pilot, and then they have a weird conversation where they discuss their most life-altering moments and biggest regrets, like they’ve never met before. Janes was most incensed that Joey declared her kiss with Dawson to be her most life-altering moment (even though her mom died and her dad went to jail… twice), but I was most horrified by the fact that Joey’s greatest regret is lying to Dawson when he asked if she slept with Pacey, even though she had every right to lie because he was asking her such a horrendously inappropriate question. I mean, I can think of things in the last two EPISODES that she should regret more. Like the dress she wore to prom.

Finally, Joey tells Dawson she believes in magic because of him and his friendship (sigh), they say a much more teary goodbye, and Dawson tells Joey he would stay with her if it was right, but that it isn’t, because this chapter is over. Can I get an “Amen”? Then they kiss tepidly in front of his window, just like in season 1, which… come on, the corpse of you and Pacey isn’t even cold yet, Joey Potter!!

The person who’s really having a hard time with Dawson leaving, though, is Mitch. And this isn’t good, because due to his toxic masculinity, Mitch is horrible at handling his emotions. At a last-minute shopping trip to a “Cybercafe” that apparently also sells computers, Mitch tries to make Dawson get a dorky PC because it has 128 MB of RAM and a 32-gig hard drive (Hee! Finally Mitch makes me laugh!), while Dawson declares himself to be “a Mac,” but Mitch insists on buying the PC anyway. Then he gets all mad at Dawson for wanting to spend his last night hanging out with his friends. (Mitch is super annoying, but I’m really glad they had Mitch be like this and not Gail, because I feel like the stereotype that moms are really upset about their kids leaving for college and react by smothering them is like catnip to the thoughtless misogyny often displayed by this show.) But when Dawson gets back from the movies, Mitch seems to have managed to find a computer store that was open during dinner time and has left a Mac out for Dawson. He tells Dawson that he’s one of his favorite people, which is surprisingly sweet for such an irritating man. Finally, he tries to get Dawson to promise not to take drugs, but failing that, settles for getting a promise that Dawson will never join a frat. I feel ya there, Mitch.

Also, Jen, Jack, and Grams move out of Grams’s house. But it’s not very interesting.

• Aw, we start with Dawson and Joey watching a movie in his bedroom, just like a season one episode! Except now they’re watching Dawson’s movie, because it’s oh-so-meta, and Joey is wearing about a thousand times more makeup. –Janes
• Dawson actually makes a self-deprecating joke, calling his second movie Self-Indulgent Piece of Crap. What growth!
• Joey gets all sad when she sees that shot of Pacey-as-sea-creature pulling her into the water. I wonder if it’s because she remembers that that’s the first time Pacey “grabbed [her] ass.” –Janes
• “Everything comes to an end,” Joey tells Dawson. Is this the new “Everyone evolves”?
• This is probably one of those things that looks funner than it is, but… it looks fun.
  
• Ew. Dawson makes a crack about the yacht club uniforms getting “sexier” and Joey pulls his hair in response. CUT THE FLIRTING, YOU TWO. YOU ARE BASICALLY SIBLINGS.
• The kids lie around by some lake playing “Would you rather,” except they’re really bad at it. They all just keep posing questions and no one has to answer. Do they not understand what words mean? At the end, Dawson declares himself the reigning champion of “Would you rather,” but like, they’re not even playing! It’s like if you were playing Monopoly and you kept rolling the dice and moving around the board but didn’t buy any property or make any money, and then at the end, someone randomly declared himself the winner because he’d moved around the board the most times.
• Also, poor Principal Peskin. The kids are doing that thing that kids so often do during “Would you rather”–they pick one unappealing teacher and play “Would you rather” where the punchline is always “Or have sex with Unappealing Teacher”?
• Dawson says it’s “not fair” that his dad wants to buy him a 1000-dollar PC instead of a Mac, because he’s a “Mac person.” Wow, he was doing millennial entitlement way before it was cool. –Janes
• I actually feel sort of bad for Mitch when Dawson wants to go out with his friends on his last night instead of have dinner with his family. But then his gross macho Mitch-ness rears its ugly head, and that weird feeling promptly goes away. –Janes
• The writers have not one, but three characters remind us what a “colossal deal” the D/J goodbye is, because they know most of us care way more about Joey and Pacey–or like, Jen and Grams–at this point. –Janes
• As Jen and Joey are naming Dawson’s supposedly annoying qualities, Jen adds sarcastically, “Not to mention that thing he does where he puts you up on a pedestal and makes you the center of his universe? God!” But that, ironically, is the thing that’s most annoying about Dawson (well, especially the fact that he puts Joey up on a pedestal while simultaneously believing himself to be the center of the universe, so she’s basically just a garden statue in his life, but one that’s under a lot of pressure to be perfect).
• Jen does a cute throwback to the classic “I love your hair color, what number is that?” moment, and I absolutely love it. I’m such a sucker for all things pilot. –Janes
• Gail and Mitch rave about Dawson’s Leery eyes and their “hidden depth” and his heartthrob smile. Let’s take two shots for all that praise of Dawson.
• Gail tells Mitch, “Certain people, when they are feeling insecure about the future, would rather pick a fight and stomp around in the front yard than face the fact that they are feeling insecure about the future.” I literally transcribed this and wrote, “Hi, toxic masculinity in a nutshell,” and then Gail added, “Oh, and did I happen to mention that those people are usually men?” Heh.
• Dawson tries to demonstrate that he’s gotten artsier since his Steven Spielberg phase, but only gets as far as “Steven Soderbergh.” Oh, Dawson. Poor, sweet Dawson. –Janes
• It makes me laugh that Jen and Jack are sitting awkwardly in the back of the car (which, by the way, has the roof down, so they can also presumably hear and see everything) while Joey and Dawson stand on Joey’s porch for their awkward good-bye. It lasts for such a long time! First they babble about Spielberg, then they have the world’s longest good-bye hug, then Dawson stands awkwardly on the porch, then Dawson almost goes back to talk to Joey again, then he stands there awkwardly after he realizes the porch lights have gone off. Jen and Jack are probably like, narrating the whole thing to each other and wishing they had popcorn.
• You know what else is awkward? How it looks like Dawson is standing here in the rain during the first good-bye scene, but actually, it’s totally dry out–it just rains hair gel in his bathroom in the mornings, apparently. (Shot for this unusually bad hair day!)
  
• Jack and Jen get Dawson a cell phone as his going-away present. Jack says they could only get Dawson “five minutes of airtime.” Um, “airtime”? I think the word back then was “anytime minutes.”
• Dawson makes a joke about thinking Grams was going to “hop on a broomstick” because they were scared of her as a child. Cool, more misogynistic stereotypes! LOVE THOSE.
• Jen makes a joke about being Boo Radley since she lives with the scary grandma, and Dawson the giant tool says, “Except beautiful, and with breasts.” Well, that started out sweet. Shot for inappropriately bringing up sex.
• Then Jen responds to that inappropriate comment with, “Wit. We like that around here.” Even a pilot reference can’t save this moment, Jen. –Janes
• Jen tells Dawson to walk out of here, “have a great life, and don’t ever call me again.” Dawson kids her, “What, so I can confirm your worst fears about men?” Ha, that was kind of cute. When Jen says that they never slept together (another shot for bringing up sex randomly when they had just moved on), he asks, “Got five minutes?” Ha, at least he’s not overly ambitious about the stamina he’ll display his first time.
• Grams remarks that at least Jen won’t be one of those people who will always be chasing after the glory days of high school because of “You children, the way you carry on, always so dour and depressed about everything. Things can only get better from here.” Hee! You said it, Grams.
• Grams says that she and Gramps once lived in an apartment “downtown.” Capeside has a downtown?? –Janes
• Joey tells Dawson some long story about how she’ll know that his future girlfriend is great because Dawson likes her. I have one word for you, Joey: Eve.
• She follows this up by telling Dawson how incredible he is. Another shot!
• “Best-laid plans,” Joey remarks when Dawson asks why he’s still a virgin. Pun intended?
• Joey asks if Dawson wishes that they could just “fast forward four years and see how it all ends up.” I so wish that had been foreshadowing for a four-year time jump so we would have been spared the college years. That was the only thing One Tree Hill ever did right. –Janes
• It’s interesting that Joey, Miss “Everyone Evolves,” is the one to suggest that Dawson stay. That would kind of be fair (if not healthy), since she gave up Paris for him. But he’s a guy, so, you know… God forbid. –Janes
• Note to producers: Filming Dawson and Joey going in for a kiss in slow motion isn’t going to increase our anticipation.
• OMG, I know!! And those weird fade-in cuts? Like, it’s not enough to see them awkwardly lean in once, we have to do it five times, in increasing close-up!! –Janes
• Um, but I do like when they repeat this shot from the first season finale. Whatever, I like nostalgia, don’t judge me! –Janes
• RIP good seasons. It was nice knowing you. –Janes

Highlight:

Definitely Dawson and Pacey’s phone call, especially when Dawson tells Pacey he’s proud of him. It’s so tragic that the show didn’t commit to reviving their friendship. They were like the Alicia and Kalinda of the aughts.

Most cringeworthy moment:

Well, Dawson and Joey kissing generally makes me cringe a little bit, but the worst part is that Mary Beth Maziarz’s cover of “Daydream Believer” is playing in the background while they go in for their lukewarm liplock–you know, the same song that was playing when Joey and Pacey kissed during spring break. This is sacrilege–sacrilege, I tell you! Yes, I know this show is twenty years old and I am an adult woman who has better things to do than get emotionally involved in a silly shipper war that was already decided in my favor in 2004, but I do not care. I am so offended right now.

Drunkenness rating:

Six, fully half of which were for overly effulgent praise about Dawson.

---

Next installment here.

Previous installment here.