S03.E19: Back In The High Life Again

[Maherjunkie]

Maybe Shondra likes Sex in the City and Samantha in particular.

[CeeBeeGee]

Loved seeing Steve and Ohnnnndrea flirt some more.  I am now 100% aboard the Good Ship Sanderman. They would've been so cute together and would totally have balanced each other.

Yes, the pool boning is gross but damn, if Dylan doesn't look adorable with his wet hair plastered against his head. It makes him look so much younger and sweeter without that ludicrous 2-inch DA he was always sporting. And Kelly looked stunning in that red dress.

Jim McKay is just so fucking sleazy. I guess Dylan couldn't really see him correctly, being his ignored son and all, but YUCK.

I honestly think the worst aspect of the betrayal is that for weeks, they knew, others knew, and Brenda was thinking things were back to normal. I've been in that position and the humiliation, that knowledge that others knew, and the feeling they MUST have been laughing at you, is the WORST. 

[CurlyATX]

I'm torn on this one.  Now as an old-lady (I'm probably as old as Cindy was!), I'm not sure if I'd let Brenda or Brandon hang out with these folks.  Dylan already has shown himself to be a bit of a loose cannon (the temper tantrum he had at the party, plus he did encourage Brenda to sneak out to Mexico).  The fact that there is a contest is so gross...I'd be so sad to see my child degrade him/herself to be chosen.  Jim has been a rule-follower accountant making OK money.  Jack is a  Bernie Maydoff character who has scammed the system and got out so quickly;  I'd be pissed too. 

Plus, I'm not sure if I'd want to parent someone else's kid, especially one who was dating my child. 

It's weird how I'm slowly turning into Jim as I get older.  (Hong Kong, here I come!)

[Petunia13]

Cindy and Jackie were probably the funniest and realest characters on the show and quite pretty. The actresses each had a very likable quality.  If the show had a spin off of just them and Deshawn and Val it would have been 10x more entertaining than the college years seasons. 

[Jax7917]

I posted all of the above on another thread somewhere because I didn't see this one until now. Seriously, how dare dylan catch an attitude with brenda. He BETRAYED her to the biggest extent. Even though they were teens and you can understand their age/ hormones, this would still be a shitty thing to do and unnacceptable even as an adult. I too am more annoyed with kelly and I think it's because dylan has always showed himself to be a pure asshole, always nasty and does what dylan wants to do. Kelly on the other hand let this whole affair start from pretty much the day brenda left for paris. She didn't even let the plane leave the ground before she was all flirty with dylan. I felt that the way things went down was pre-determined and kelly knew exactly what she was going to do as soon as brenda left town. And then she has the nerve to get defensive when Brenda gets angry about seeing them out together on a date. The whole thing could have been better if they actually felt bad about it. But instead they were all like "oh come on Brenda get over it". whaaaat? Not sure how they were able to escape getting a black eye before she stormed off. 

But what reallllyy pissed me off was that brenda forgave them pretty much the next day because dylan's mom gave her some necklace charm that means "forgiveness". In no way shape or form would dylan and kelly ever be forgiven for what they did, let alone a couple days later.

I also hated how kelly all of a sudden put on a southern accent in the first year of college. Bitch, where did that come from? Idk, kelly just bugged me lol

[AndySmith]

To be fair, Kelly did show much more remorse than Dylan, in that she showed some remorse.

What southern accent?

[thesupremediva1]

On 3/7/2016 at 11:58 AM, AndySmith said:

I'm not sure if that was the director's choice or possibly LP's own frustration at SD? In any case, JG actually does play the scene like Kelly really does regret how it all went down

What you're seeing here, based on everything I have read over the years, is bleed. If anyone would like to find who to blame for the destruction of Brenda/Dylan and the genesis of K/D as a lasting concept, look no further than Luke Perry.

He went to Charles Rosin and Aaron Spelling and asked to start doing more scenes with Jenny. Enter: Summer of Deception and Kelly and Dylan as soul mates. If you watch the early seasons closely, a Kelly/Dylan flirtation was always alluded to, and in the slumber party ep, Kelly confesses that she tried to get a date with Dylan after he and Brenda started dating. You know it's just a matter of time before something goes on with those two. It's a natural narrative progression. But, if not for Luke's "suggestion" and overall frustration with Shannon, I'm not sure K/D would ever have been endgame.

Dylan was, understandably, sick of and done with Brenda. Their relationship became nothing but drama, but they did really love each other. When people point to this scene and question how Dylan could be so callous, my immediate response is that you're seeing Luke mad at Shannon there, not Dylan mad at Brenda. And it tells you how sick the entire crew was of Shannon's antics that they didn't call for a retake. They really buried Brenda in season 3. For pete's sake, Brandon didn't even have the stones to cut out Dylan or Kelly senior year. The writer's room was piling on. 

Jenny, IMO, did a great job of playing Kelly's conflicted feelings and doing the ultimately shitty, teenage thing - being really nice to someone while do something awful to them. It as all so pitch-perfect for high school behavior, it's no wonder that love triangle lives on in infamy. 

What contributed to the nail in the Brenda/Dylan coffin, beyond Luke Perry's request for an exit at the height of Dylan Mania (they'd have given him anything he wanted in those years), is that Jenny and Luke have insane chemistry and get along really well off-screen. They're close to this day. I read Jenny's autobiography last year, and she has a chapter in it called "Kelly and Dylan Forever." 

So, in summary, a lot of things went on offscreen that contributed to what you saw in that scene. And while Brenda/Dylan were set up as the OTP in season 1 and 2, the show did a pretty amazing job of selling Kelly and Dylan as soul mates from seasons 3-10. I guarantee you'd have seen a different show if Shannon was easier to work with, but that's not how it went down. The writers, production, and actors had so many issues with one person that the original concept morphed into something else entirely. 

Edited July 5, 2018 by thesupremediva1