Previous episode: “Caught”
You guys, this episode was directed by QUEEN AMY HECKERLING! No wonder why I liked it so much and our girl Dorrit didn’t even make an appearance, although her music did.
Carrie is still keeping up her secret life at Interview (Bitchy Barbara has been covering for her, aw!) and loving every minute of it. She’s working in an incredible office, with gilded men as a lunch order (Larissa’s request) and the adorable Bennett (who kissed Walt). She also gets to be an impromptu foot model and gets to keep the Manolo Blahniks. An experience that Carrie of course likens to fairy tales–maybe it wasn’t the prince but the shoes. Fair enough.
With any office environment, they have an outing, but since it’s the ’80s and Interview–on Friday night they are going to Limelight, which is a club in a church, so they can “worship at the altar of fun.” Honestly, that sounds pretty awesome.
Carrie has a dilemma on her hands though, to go to Limelight or the Junior/Senior lock-in, which gives her a perfect excuse to stay out all night in NYC. On the real talk tip, Carrie mostly wants to go so she can forget about Sebastian.
Mouse reported to Carrie about her hallway run-in with him where he told her that he was going to break up with Donna because he’s not the kind of guy who keeps dating someone he’s not into.
Carrie and co. don’t know that Sebastian actually did breakup with Donna though. This is only because Donna made Sebastian promise to not say anything until after the lock-in since she was organizing it. And she’s planning on telling everyone she broke up with him because being broken up with is a Donna life-first.
Since this show knows exactly what Carrie and all the rest of us want, we get this slo-mo of Austin Butler in a button down shirt. How old is he again? Too pretty. (Thanks Tumblr for catering to my fangirl feels)
They have a typically awkward interaction highlighted by Donna staring them down in the background. FYI, she’s still technically blackmailing Maggie re: cheating on Walt. Maggie hasn’t told Walt yet. This interaction has Carrie declare that she wants a “grand gesture.” GIRL, don’t we all.
While Carrie is getting prepped for her big night in the city. Maggie and Mouse are prepping by buying all the food from the diner. Maggie’s reasoning: “I like to have comfort food around.” Correct answer. They run into Sebastian, who isn’t going to the lock-in and Mouse sassily confronts about not breaking up with Donna. Sebastian fesses up and Mouse and Maggie tell him he needs to do a grand gesture. They are the cutest. They try to call Carrie but she’s running late and doesn’t answer the phone.
Back to square one until Sebastian comes up with a great idea. They should go to NYC and find Carrie at Limelight. Maggie declines because she has to talk to Walt and has her comfort food. You know what this means! A MOUSE/SEBASTIAN road trip! My shipping levels for them are still so high.
I think we all know that Carrie’s secret life is on the cusp of crumbling, so here’s a dad update. He’s out with George’s dad, notorious creeper, Harlan, on a double date. One of the chicks likes Harlan solely for his money and the other is just there to be supportive, so her and the dad hit it off.
Back to Carrie, she gets into Limelight and it’s fabulous. Her and Bennett begin prowlin’ for men.
Larissa isn’t super helpful since she’s been waiting “in line to do a line.” But she is the one who recognizes the cute guy is staring at Carrie not at Bennett. He asks Carrie if he can buy her a drink. You guys, people bought people drinks at bars in the ’80s if they found them attractive?!
Guess what drink he buys her?! A cosmo! Homegirl automatically declares it her drink and sucks it down. Props for that. Her and random cosmo-buying dude end up dancing and Carrie is lifted by drag queens (my dream) to dance onstage. The theme for the club this evening is “voyeurism,” so everything is videotaped. As Carrie dances onstage, she sees her dad dancing with some woman in the same club aka every 16 year old nightmare.
Of course all of the details of Carrie’s life come out–that she’s 16 to Larissa (which she’s into since she’ll have the youngest, hippest intern) and that she’s not doing the internship at the law firm to her dad. He’s furious, makes her leave and says literally every statement your dad ever said to you if you got caught with a wine cooler. Clearly, not an experience I went through.
On the Mouse/Sebastian road trip front, they get stuck in traffic for a long time but eventually make it to Limelight. By the time they get there, Carrie’s long gone. And her dad has banned her from coming to NYC ever again, which Carrie dramatically signifies by putting her Manolos in the back of her closet. She does apologize to her dad who annoyingly tells her she doesn’t know what she wants because she’s young.
Carrie gives the perfect angsty teen response:
Carrie: “You can’t stop me from wanting it [Interview]. From wanting a life that’s mine.”
I’m guessing Carrie’s dad will cave and judging from Sebastian showing up to the diner while she’s writing, she’ll have him to keep her company.
While Carrie’s situation kinda sucked, the lock-in was much worse. Donna has decided how she’s going to save face from the Sebastian breakup and uncover Maggie’s secret. She gets her henchladies to trap Walt in the A.V. room, since he’s in charge of the movies and tells him about Maggie’s cheating. He’s devastated and breaks up with her. The weird twist in all of this is that Walt and Donna get together?!
I know! They kiss over their respective breakups and later when Donna tells Walt he’s her boyfriend he agrees. It’s weird but I’d rather Donna have to deal with the inevitable beard fallout instead of Maggie.
Things of Note/Hilarity/WTF
- “Computers are a fad.” – Bennett
- Some of you may hate me for this, but I found Donna oddly likeable in parts of this episode. Mainly her explanation for why Rocky III is her favorite movie: “Are you kidding? Muscles and guys punching each other! Mr. T.! Yes, please.”
- “Logistics are for lame-asses who don’t know what they want.” 16 year old, leather jacket wearing logic (Sebastian obvs).
- Discussion of Jake Ryan (Sixteen Candles) being the hottest is always correct.
- “At some point they all do.” Larissa on dudes joining Bennett’s team.
- Larissa thinks Harlan is hot.
Next week: Carrie’s scared of liking Sebastian! The dad is talking to Larissa?
About the Contributor:
Kerensa Cadenas is a writer living in Los Angeles. She grew up on binge reading Sweet Valley High and watching Saved by the Bell at a very young age. Hence, she is now unable to grow out of this life-long phase. She loves terrible teen television, young adult novels and probably listens to One Direction more than she should. She also enjoys more adult things like margaritas on patios and dance parties. A Marcus Flutie/Nate Archibald man-hybrid remains her ideal.
