CALL this the “no spoiler” alert “O.C.” column.
Why? Because now that so many new shows – like tonight’s Season Four premiere – are released online before they ever hit TV, giving away the plot is almost a moot point.
The good news is that the show that captured our imaginations with grabbers like Ryan (Benjamin McKenzie) and Marissa (Mischa Barton) is still alive and well.
You know, the rich addicted slut moms, a lawyer who is so good-natured that he took in a troubled teen straight from the courtroom, the kids who grew up and started to go away to college – or just pretended to, while they are actually hiding in plain sight at the corner coffee shop.
Then there was the gorgeous one who was killed by a vicious loony criminal type who sideswiped the car causing it to fall into an embankment on graduation night, killing off the gorgeous model/actress. All just like real life.
Happily, tonight, the Mischa Barton-less “O.C.” will not be a disappointment – even though it just ain’t the same without her.
For one thing, Rachel Bilson (Summer) is a lightweight. Not that Barton is exactly Hillary Swank, But if Marissa had gone off to college and become an activist for chickens (I swear), somehow you’d believe it.
Bilson can’t carry the show.
Thankfully, every time McKenzie walks into the picture, it becomes another show altogether.
Four seasons ago, I wrote that McKenzie was like a budding Russell Crowe, with that same kind of intensity that forces you to stay glued to his face.
That hasn’t changed, although his character Ryan’s circumstances certainly have.
At the end of last season, Ryan – who has the worst and best luck of any kid (OK, he’s actually 28! – the oldest high schooler since “90210”) – was driving the car in which Marissa was killed.
Obviously, he had to go downhill over the summer, and he did.
Now he’s working as a bartender/boxer at a fight club.
Yes. A fight club.
It would be one step from there to the bowery if such a thing existed near Laguna Beach.
But since it doesn’t, the Cohens find him and beg him to return to the sweet life.
But will he? Doesn’t he have one last person to seriously mess up – or maybe kill?
Then there’s Summer, who is off at Brown. To show that she’s trying to get serious, they have her committed to all kinds of causes – like chickens.
Hello! There’s a giant war going on and her cause is chickens?
“The O.C.” is still a fine show, but I’m worried.