'Gossip Girl' finale reveals Gossip Girl and the Upper East Side future
Did you enjoy the big surprise? And all of the cameos?
The "Gossip Girl" finale
Credit: The CW
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"Gossip Girl," which concluded its six-season run on The CW on Monday (December 17) night, was never a great show. I'm not sure if it ever was a particularly good show. But for much of its 121 episode run, it was a stylish, entertaining guilty pleasure that offered enough moments of cleverness to compensate for (but never excuse) some astonishingly icky sexual politics.
Titled "New York, I Love You XOXO," Monday's finale mostly steered away from the key plotlines in what has been a largely dismal concluding season.
Dreadful relationships were discarded or severed or ignored. Twisty revenge schemes were deemed irrelevant or accelerated or ignored. And romantic stumbling blocks were removed with characteristic gracelessness or ignored.
The result? An mostly amusing finale that answered a few questions, tied up arcs in neat bows and featured enough cameos and guest stars to please and distract and placate most fans.
Did they finally give Chuck Bass a monkey?
No.
But other than that, I guess I got what I wanted out of the "Gossip Girl" finale, namely a free Monday hour on my DVR and the identity of the enigmatic Gossip Girl.
Click through for some brief thoughts on the "Gossip Girl" finale. I don't write about this show very often, but I've never missed an episode, so I might as well say farewell... With spoilers, duh.
OK. Let's get this out of the way.
The identity of Gossip Girl is...
[drumroll]
DAN HUMPHREY.
If you're a Firewall & Iceberg Podcast listener, you know that Alan Sepinwall made the correct call this afternoon. Sepinwall's very reasonable rationale behind his prediction: Dan Humphrey is the name of a character on "Gossip Girl."
And he was correct.
I'm certain that there are some wrinkles in the Dan-as-Gossip-Girl timeline, wrinkles that I can't identify as a regular-but-not-encyclopedic "Gossip Girl" fan.
The show traced Dan's origins as Gossip Girl back to his first real interactions with Serena and explained that the legendary blog was borne of his desire to become a part of the upper crust world, a world he was able to write himself into when she got off the train in what was the series pilot, calling himself "Lonely Boy." [You will know that I am the author of a secret gossip blog when the anonymous author refers to Daniel Fienberg only as "Bearded Man."]
Of the main characters, mostly they were pretty chill about the revelation.
Nate was giddy because Dan gave the scoop to The Spectator and as we all know, the key to kickstarting the fortunes of an under-read tabloid is breaking the identity of a blogger beloved by spoiled Upper East Side brats for discussing the scandals of seven people and never changing his/her site design in six years.
Chuck Bass was OK with things, because he killed his father and married Blair, plus Dan had the decency to stop posting about them after their car accident.
Serena had no problems with it, because despite all of the protestations about character growth, she's fundamentally a love-starved airhead with no personal ambitions and she's excited that her boyfriend is cool.
The only person not so pleased?
Blair.
"He schemed and lied and spread horrible stories," said the pot of the kettle, unaware of their shared stygian hue.
Serena protested, "What he did this whole time is write a love-letter to us."
No.
It's here that I must interject.
What Dan did was what Dan does. And mostly he was pretty mean and self-serving.
Two seasons ago, he penned the roman a clef "Inside," making their lives into a barely fictional expose. Everybody else discovered he was "Anonymous" and many of them were pissed off and the show suggested that he’d become evil and lost his true identity.
This season, Dan dropped the pretense and just started naming names in a series of online excerpts that may or may not be joined in a book about their over-privileged Scooby Gang. People were very unhappy with him and called him horrible names and the show suggested he’d become evil and lost his true identity.
Heck, diidn't Dan's whole career begin with a story in The New Yorker that was also veiled autobiography?
Yes, we were all surprised and happy that Dan Humphrey was Gossip Girl, but why the heck were we surprised? Dishing on the disreputable doings of his comrades and lovers and his family has been Dan's modus operandi for many years. In fact, Dan Humphrey has never to have anything to offer as a writer other than the dirt he scraped off of everybody else's shoes, so... Dan Humphrey as Gossip Girl doesn't just make sense. It's probably pretty stupid of us [me] not to have realized it. It's what Dan does. He exploits his friends for his own gain! It's a love-letter!
Of course, there are kinda nasty sides to this that the show had to quickly gloss over. Gossip Girl did, if you'll recall, humiliate Jenny Humphrey after she lost her virginity to Chuck Bass, the guy who tried to date rape her in the pilot. [Glossing over Chuck's various near-rapes and sexual assaults is what "Gossip Girl" does, like spilling his friends' secrets for money is what Dan does.] So yes, it's a bit inappropriate and hinky that Dan was writing stories about his teenage sister having yucky, yucky sex with Chuck Bass. And that briefly offends Rufus in that way that many fathers, even fathers as inattentive as Rufus, would be distressed to learn that their sons are taking an unhealthy interest in their sisters' deflowering. But Dan reassured Rufus that Jenny WANTED to be publicly humiliated so that Taylor Momsen could get far, far away from "Gossip Girl" to continue her career as a punk rock Lolita. And because this was what Jenny WANTED Rufus is totally down with it.
Finally placated, Blair announced, "I guess that means it's all over. That we call all grow up and move on?"
And the audience said, "Yes, please!" Though we all secretly wondered how much moving on they're going to be able to do, since all of the characters on "Gossip Girl" collectively decided to drop out of college in their sophomore years and never, ever mention that they spent a long time at expensive prep schools and stressed about getting into Columbia, so maybe they should have stuck around and gotten degrees.
Fortunately, the show flashed ahead to reassure us that all was well in the future, specifically zipping along to Dan and Serena's wedding where, it must be said, the bride was smoking hot.
In the future...
Blair and Chuck remained married and they had a little boy named Henry who looked like the doll from "Child's Play." Nobody mentioned how many times Chuck had been arrested for domestic abuse. [Earlier in the episode, Blair got uppity with Serena about all of the bad things Dan had done to her and Serena responded that Chuck had done worse to her. Blair responded, "He's one of us," perhaps the most disgusting allowance for deviant criminal behavior that the show has ever attempted. Because Chuck was from the same social circle, we excuse violence, attempted rape and that thing where he sold Blair? Well... OK! If this were a 1800s Gothic romance, that might fly, but Chuck Bass is no Heathcliff, whether we're talking about the brooding anti-hero or the chunky cat who just won't be undone.]
Thanks to the Gossip Girl scoop, which no doubt earned him weeks and weeks of traffic, plus mass advertising, Nate was a successful publisher and was contemplating running for mayor. No mention was made of his dalliance with Sage, which was disappointing because enough time had passed that I'm sure she was legally able to vote. [The scene early in the episode in which Nate refused to let the police interrogate Sage because she's a minor was a reminder of just how far off the rails "Gossip Girl" went with that particular relationship.]
Georgina and Jack Bass were a couple! [Because they're disgusting people and they deserve each other.]
Lily and William were back together! [Because they're disgusting people and they deserve each other.]
Rufus and Lisa Loeb were a couple! [Because they both like hipster glasses and they deserve each other.]
Jenny and Eric were back for the wedding, but we learned no additional details about their lives. [Because we don't care.]
I think they also showed something about Ivy's future, but I'd rather not acknowledge that "Ivy" was a thing that happened on "Gossip Girl."
That was all reassuring and seeing Dan and Serena together will surely make fans pleased. Unless they thought Dan belong with Blair, in which case they were utterly at odds with the show's writers, who made Dair into a thing for a couple episodes and then rushed back to the warmly abusive confines of Chair. And unless they thought Serena belonged with... Hmmm... Did Serena ever have an alternative boyfriend who didn't suck or who wasn't part of some problematic -- i.e. twice her age, or her professor or funny looking -- power relationship?
The best part of the finale, though, was a tremendous five-minute segment after Gossip Girl's identity was revealed. In a rush, we saw the reactions from long-forgotten or repressed characters like Jessica Szohr's Vanessa (disappointingly not in bed with the movie star played briefly by Hilary Duff) and whichever characters were played by current "Arrow" co-stars Willa Holland and Katie Cassidy. [I remembered that Cassidy was on "Gossip Girl" and wanted revenge on Nate or something. I don't recall what Willa Holland was on the show, so I'm just going to pretend she was in character as Kaitlin Cooper.]
And then, in the best bit, a Gossip Girl voiceover cut to Kristen Bell reading lines for the movie based on Dan's book, reading lines with... Rachel Bilson!
"If I'm being honest, I don't think you can pull off high school anymore," Bell told Bilson. That made me happy.
In general, most of the "Gossip Girl" made me happy enough, which is all I could ask.
A few more thoughts:
*** Having Chuck and Blair get married to cover up an act of violence was frankly pretty perfect. If I thought the "Gossip Girl" writers were winking about the core issues with the couple's relationship, I'd be pleased. Instead, this was just fitting.
*** I liked the flashback scene to the Serena/Dan meet-cute, especially after having watched the retrospective special, which was mostly a tribute to bad hair styles over the years. Poor Penn Badgley had some of the worst hair, which is an unusual thing to say about the male stars on a show like this. But, in reality, Blake Lively and Leighton Meester looked spectacular through the show's entire run, while Badgley, Chace Crawford and Ed Westwick were probably the ones cringing through the finale.
*** Line of the episode: William to Ivy - "You're a Lifetime movie called 'Nobody Gives a Damn: The Ivy Dickens Story.'" Zing.
*** Good use of the Met and Central Park on tonight's episode. One of the things that was well observed in the retrospective special was how well "Gossip Girl" handled its location shooting.
*** Because I don't pay attention, I didn't know Blair's middle name was Cornelia or that Jack Bass's middle name is "Xavier."
*** Dorota deserved a better send-off. Poor Zuzanna Szadkowski was always buried in the credits, but she was often the show's MVP.
What'd you think of the "Gossip Girl" finale and the big Gossip Girl reveal?
A long-time member of the TCA Board and a longer-time blogger of "American Idol," Dan Fienberg writes about TV, except for when he writes about movies or sometimes writes about the Red Sox. But never music. He would sound stupid talking about music.
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Login or create a HitFix account Login SignupDavid
December 18, 2012 at 1:17AM EST Reply to CommentHaven't watched for a long time so thanks for the recap. I may actually have to itunes this finale.
JonathanWiki Reply to comment...
December 18, 2012 at 10:18AM ESTAsh Ge the cw tv app it's free
December 23, 2012 at 3:11PM ESTBrett
December 18, 2012 at 2:05AM EST Reply to CommentIf the people I know knew that I watched this show, I'd never hear the end of it. But I watched every episode, and damn if I didn't enjoy it. Goodbye, Gossip Girl. You were an oddly addicting show.
Sam
December 18, 2012 at 3:15AM EST Reply to CommentWilla holland was a model i guess for eleanor. And she lit jennys designs on fire etc
dan Oh right! I vaguely remember lingerie being involved. Lingerie and fire! Wonder why I didn't remember better...
December 18, 2012 at 3:21AM EST-Daniel
txt
December 18, 2012 at 3:32AM EST Reply to CommentWilla Holland played the young model who in her jealous rage burned all of Little J's fashion collection. yes, it's quite pathetic that I remember that by heart without having to google it. But that was a pretty memorable arc on the show when i was really rooting for Little J.
a bit of a side note, the final music on the show is by Taylor Momsen's Pretty Reckless! i though that was quite the treat.
The season is quite underwhelming and the finale was rushed (I actually wished they had 13 episodes to wrap up), but it was still quite satisfying (and hello, best meta cameo moment in a TV finale!)
In the end, like you said, Bearded Man, Gossip Girl was never good, but it did always made me happy. I will miss all the witty banters, Kristen Bell's snarky voice-over, and seeing all the pretty people and fantastic local and gorgeous fashion...XOXO GG.
Evelande Dufrene
December 18, 2012 at 4:50AM EST Reply to Commentjenni works for blair because her baj said "J by Waldorf" and she said she had a last minute inspiration.
Evelande Dufrene
December 18, 2012 at 4:52AM EST Reply to CommentJenny is working for Blair, because her bag said "J by Waldorf" and she said she had some last minute inspiration, meaning that clothing line.
Silver
December 18, 2012 at 7:10AM EST Reply to CommentGossip Girl hasn't made sense in a long time. Give them all the awards for illogical story-lines that glamorize abuse.
Katie
December 18, 2012 at 8:31AM EST Reply to Commentso in addition to glamorizing a factually abusive relationship ("marry me so you can't testify against me!"), so basically dan is gossip girl all in the name to be a super super creepy stalker to some girl and ....the happily ever after is that they get married?
Just...wow. Honestly, I like Schwartz from Chuck and The OC, but I don't think I'm ever watching a show from his production co ever again.
Kate What you said!
December 18, 2012 at 3:26PM ESTevolution1085
December 18, 2012 at 10:35AM EST Reply to CommentIs it sad that Desmond Harrington did better work tonight then he's done on five seasons of Dexter combined? (yeah, that's kind of sad)
I'd like to say that all these characters are truly awful people (although I never missed an episode) but you can't really blame them, as their parents are worse. Serena is just a more vapid version of Lily (really, ending up with the guy who gave you fake cancer?), Dan is Rufus' pretentiousness concentrated out, Nate literally became his father through his business shennigans, Blair's egomanical streak started with her mother giving her self image issues... and if they fast forwarded a couple more years, I'm sure we would have gotten some quality restraining order banter between Chuck and Blair as Chuck is selling golf balls to North Korea or something equally ridiculous.
Amanda
December 18, 2012 at 2:09PM EST Reply to CommentIs there a Gossip Girl boardgame yet? Because I'd really like to trade Blair for a hotel on Boardwalk.
Alison Boardwalk is taken, how about St. Charles Place?
December 18, 2012 at 2:22PM ESTAmanda Yes! Good one.
December 18, 2012 at 3:00PM ESTKate Bless you!
December 18, 2012 at 3:26PM ESTneverthehero
December 18, 2012 at 2:37PM EST Reply to CommentI watched the majority of Gossip Girl. The thing that bothers me when people rail against Gossip Girl and the development of the characters, how is Josh and Savage not to blame for how they are written?... It's funny these two are lavished with so much praise but never for how they portray their characters.... Yes I know this is based off stories/novels but from what I know they changed a lot anyway...
duncan
December 18, 2012 at 4:14PM EST Reply to CommentThis recap nailed all my feelings about Gossip Girl to a T. Yet I still enjoyed it. Gossip girl watchers. The few. The not proud. The easily satisified.
The Kristen Bell nod was pretty cheeky stuff by the writers. Well played.
Crystal
December 19, 2012 at 2:13AM EST Reply to CommentGossip Girl went from a poorly written but interesting show from seasons 1 to 2 into an offensive pile of crap. I didn't think the writers could get anymore disgusting when they had Jenny sleep with the man who tried to rape her and whitewashed Chuck pimping out Blair to his Uncle and injuring her iduring a violent rage but they proved me wrong by romanticizing Dan stalking and tormenting Serena for years while Blair marries her abuser and excuses his past behaviour because he's wealthy. I will be avoiding the show's producers future projects.
toni
December 19, 2012 at 6:01AM EST Reply to Commentfor six seasons from September 19, 2007 to December 17, 2012. It ends tonight, xoxo #GossipGirl ,you'll me missed :)
Jamie
December 19, 2012 at 4:08PM EST Reply to CommentI love Gossip Girl but this season is the worst. It seems that the writers just got lazy and found out last minutes they were not coming back for a next season so they had to rush and tie up all the story lines. It was a sloppy written season which never met my expectations in which I know Gossip Girl writers could have. Serena... what can I say about her character? After the second season I gave up on her because as the writers of this article clearly points out (and Dan in an episode), in the end she is an empty blonde who only sees herself only as relevant as the man she sees. I understand her character is suppose to have father issues and Lily never really gave a damn about her but I was really hoping to see her character mature and she becomes a strong independent woman who doesn't need a man to identify who she is..... but she'd not and she does. :( Blair kept going back and forth in trying to be a better person and we did see that several times but in the end she did admit who see is and she will try to be a better management but that what gives her, her strive. Chuck never killed his father and I think did the most character development from all the characters. Yes he didn't help his father but I'm sure if he tried, his father would have just pulled him down and try to kill him. Nate.. Lets be honest, Nate was there to be a pretty face and is the male version of Serena. Dan got what he wanted in the end but I think his character has low self esteem and will always try to be on top to keep his pretty blonde please.
magic dress
December 26, 2012 at 5:42AM EST Reply to CommentLove Chuck!!!: http://www.magicdress.co.uk/
Shana
December 30, 2012 at 11:36AM EST Reply to CommentAs a huge fan of the show, you expressed all my feelings about it perfectly. Bravo, I wish I knew there were more fans like me out there before the show ended. Most people think it's another weird vice I have, like collecting hello kitty stuff.
darci
January 10, 2013 at 1:33AM EST Reply to CommentOK, so there were enough hints in the final season to conclude that Dan was Gossip Girl, so this wasn't a huge surprise. So no, I didn't really tune in for the suspense, but more just because of how much time i've invested in the show over the years, and I had to watch the end. The series highlights montage was nice, and covered all the bases well enough without being too drawn out.
Oh and since this series has always had really strong music, I thought it was fitting that they had two great standout uses of music in this episode...first, I loved the hilarious 1960's Batman-esque campy music that played during Bart's death scene. I literally couldn't stop laughing at it. Then, I also thought it was great that they had a cover of Serge Gainsbourg's classic "Bonnie & Clyde" sung in English by Great Northern. I've always loved that song and it's many various covers, but this is the first English one I've heard and I love it.
daf
February 11, 2013 at 12:59PM EST Reply to CommentLoosing Jenny and Eric van der Woodson made gg a weaker show. They had Serena sleeping with everyone and only chuck and Blair were decent actors. For Christ sake Dan had no emotions, and Vanessa,s character was redundant. If only they had made Jenny gg with the help of Dan it would make Sense of things , I loved gg but season 6 left me with a bad taste in my mouth .