Season 1, Episode 9: "The Right Stuff"

Directly across the street from Lucky Junior High School is Lucky High School. To Dodie Bishop, it may as well be Disney World.

She swoons at its very existence, praising it like the second coming of Jesus. Ginger and Macie watch her literally skip up to the building, and behind their smiles, they're facepalming handprints into their skulls wondering what kind of heinous crimes they committed in a past life to have ended up in the same circle as Dodie.

So, what are they doing at high school? Apparently, Macie is taking a French class there, so Dodie and Ginger are walking her to the front door. Macie hyperventilates into her lunch bag at the mere thought of high schoolers, because somebody needs to be on the opposite end of the spectrum to balance out Dodie's unnatural obsession with high school.

Ginger's like, "Don't worry. Courtney's going to be in the class, too," but Macie reminds her that they're not exactly amis, so what's the point of even mentioning that? And wait--since when is Courtney taking high school-level courses? 

Winston pulls up and lets Courtney out, and she's sporting a French-inspired ensemble shipped directly from the dry, skinny hands of ridiculously underpaid Chinese slaves.

I bet the French don't even like berets.

Courtney assigns Macie and herself French names to match the French culture they're about to absorb. So now Macie is Brigitte, and Courtney is Catrina. Cute. "Catrina" notices "Brigitte's" lunch is scattered all over the ground and learns of Macie's anxiety. Courtney's like, "What's there to worry about?" As if on cue, a couple of snobs that attend the high school walk by and start talking shit about Courtney and the gang, so Courtney turns around and asks them what their problem is, much to Ginger, Dodie, and Macie's heart-attack-inducing shock. Someone is actually standing up for themselves on this show? Someone call the Channel 1 News! 

After some back and forth tongue-lashing between Courtney and the snobs, Ginger tells Courtney how amazed she is for having a backbone, and Courtney gives her some advice that really should have been stated last episode, "Standing your ground is everything when it comes to high school." It almost seems like the writers realized they done skrewed up, and are making up for it by bringing in the moral in the first three minutes of this episode.

Carl goes garbage picking all over the neighborhood while Hoodsey lingers behind, struggling to climb up a hilly street.

In one of the bins, Carl discovers a book filled with mail-order oddities, which I'm guessing is a compilation of all the weird shit people have ordered in the past, like spiked dildos and Japanese clown lamps. Carl takes the book, and Hoodsey, and takes off to do things.

Courtney and Macie arrive at class, and the snobs trail behind them. They stare at the preteens angrily because they have nothing better to do, I guess. Darren's older brother, Will, slides past them and greets Courtney, whose panties hit the floor at the sight of him. Will takes a seat behind Macie and they chit-chat about mutual friends until the teacher arrives.

At the elementary school, Mrs. Gordon announces the upcoming science fair to the class with the topic, "What Makes a Genius." While Mrs. Gordon goes over the requirements, Carl shows Hoodsey all the cool stuff people ordered, including a microscope slide of Albert Einstein's DNA. Damn, where can I find this book? It sounds wicked.

The principal comes into the French class and interrupts the lesson on verb conjugation to speak with la Mademoiselle outside for a moment. While the class waits for her to return, Will turns to Courtney and tells her how people with pools are the bee's knees. Courtney answers with an uninteresting anecdote about her own pool, and before we're completely subjected to her materialism, the camera pans to the back, where the snobs are like, "This girl is totes making me sick." The camera pans back to Macie and Will, and the conversation leads to Macie revealing that since she's home alone most of the time, her pool is unoccupied, so Courtney announces that Macie is throwing a pool party at her house to the whole class, to their roaring delight. High schoolers crashing a middle schooler's party? Hey, sure, why not? I'm sure it'll be beaucoup de plaisir.

Only the rich and influential can make you throw a party at your own unchaperoned house at the mercy of your social future.

The boys starve in the cafeteria in an attempt to save up their money to buy the last of Einstein's DNA from the mail-order oddities book. Why couldn't they just bring lunch from home, then? They're not forced to buy the cafeteria's food. Hoodsey's growling stomach urges him to scope out some free grub, with no luck. When Carl leaves the table, Blake pulls out a big ass porterhouse steak from a picnic basket.

You gonna share that?

Macie runs into the bathroom to hyperventilate into a paper bag again. Where does she get all these hyperventilation bags? I guess she packs a bunch just for occasions of deep stress. Just as she's calmed down, the snobs walk in to wash the green envy off their hands. They start complaining about all the attention Courtney is getting to the point where they realize that she's a threat that must be destroyed. They loudly announce that at the pool party, they're going to pull the straps off her bikini "to show everyone what she's not made of," right as Macie pokes her head over the stall to listen in. Okay, wait, hold on a second. These girls are going to do what now? Let me see if I can find the logic in what they're doing here:

- these high school girls are pissed at a junior high school girl for... exisiting?
- they throw a hissy fit, even though Courtney has done nothing to them, except defend herself rather politely when they harassed her
- they decide to seek revenge because she stood up to them and is a tad annoying
- to do this, they plan to sneak up on her at the party and pull off the top of her bikini to show everyone how "fake" she is

WTF? Freaking bullies. Do these twits have nothing better to do?

Anyway, clumsy Macie slips on the stall and gets her sweater caught on the hook on the back of the stall door. It swings open, and she nervously tries to break the ice. The snobs threaten Macie with her social standing if she dares to say a word about the plan to Courtney or anyone else. Damn, what is it with these catty girls on this show?

The snobs walk out and tell Macie that they so can't wait for her pool party that she never even planned in the first place. Has it ever occurred to you, Macie, that you could just cancel this party? Hell, you don't even have to give these people your address! I know you just want to be accepted and liked, but it's your (parents') house. Why complicate things just because Courtney Gripling is involved?

After school, Courtney tells Ginger and Dodie all wonderful things about Macie, and about how she invited the whole French class over for a pool party. Ginger and Dodie are like, "Woah, radical!" Shouldn't this odd change in character set off a red flag? Macie is mousy. Who would ever think she would throw a party for a bunch of strangers? Unfortunately, Ginger and Dodie are too excited about the fact that a party is happening that they fail to stop and think why Macie would go out on a limb and do this thing she wouldn't ordinarily do.

Macie catches up with Ginger and Macie and tells them that it was Courtney who decided to throw a party at her house erratically. Ginger's like, "Maybe she was just trying to get you more popular." Dodie's like, "Yeah, I mean, this is a huge milestone for us girls!" Seeing as neither of them are willing to offer any real advice, it's up to Macie to deal with this one on her own. And yet I talk about Ginger having no backbone.

Your face is made of shame.

Carl counts thirty-seven dollars and change from his piggy bank, which means he can buy Einstein's DNA. While Hoodsey grabs a moldy container of cottage cheese to eat, Carl gets on the phone to order the DNA, only to be bought out three minutes too late and be told that there is none left. He's offered Nixon's DNA instead, but flat out refuses, because, who cares about Richard Nixon anyway? This just may be the dumbest, most random subplot of the series yet. So, Carl freaks out because now he has to do actual work to come up with a real science fair project. In the midst of Hoodsey's freakout about not wanting to go to summer school for the fear of heavy sweating, a lightbulb flashes in Carl's weird little monkey head. He decides to collect bio samples of everyone they meet and compare their DNA to Einstein's DNA for "geneocity." Now, that's genius! Except, where are you going to get his DNA? They ran out, remember? But Carl mentions that since it's a fourth grade science fair, they'll just wing it.

As Ginger and the girls plan Macie's party, Carl and Hoodsey barge into Ginger's room for some DNA samples.

"Hello, ladies, we're here for your DNA. Assume the position of compliance." - Carl

Ginger kicks them out, saying that they're trying to plan a pool party, which intrigues Carl. The boys leave with quizzical smirks, considering the pool party would be an excellent place to collect fresh DNA.

The girls want a make-out room for some chaperone-free heavy petting, but Macie's like, "This is a pool party, not some hippy-dippie lovin'!" which made me laugh. Ginger gets mad and asks her why she's got a big stick shoved up where the sun don't shine, and Macie dramatically confesses the plan the snobs have in store for Courtney via charades. Jeez, Macie, it's not like the snobs stuck a hidden camera on you.

In Courtney's room, Courtney is trying on an itsy bitsy teenie weenie yellow polka dot bikini (it's actually purple with red polka dots, but whatever) when Blake comes bursting through with a cardboard box to tell Courtney what came in the mail for him. Courtney is too busy trying to figure out how to bump up her boobs, so she shoos him out. Blake leaves angrily, but drops a piece of bubble wrap behind. Courtney picks it up, examines it, and decides to use the bubble wrap to plump herself up.

Ginger and Dodie learn about the snobs' plan to "de-bikini" Courtney. Ginger thinks that they should help Courtney, even though she's not their best friend, but Macie--gasp!--says she doesn't care about Courtney as her social standing is on the line. And Dodie sides with her! Shame on you, Macie! I expect something like that from Dodie, but never from you. Man, Dodie has become a really bad influence on you, hasn't she? Ginger ought to dump both of your pretentious asses.

Ginger calls up Courtney and beats around the bush. She tries to get her to change her swimsuit to a one-piece instead by saying that they're totally in right now. Courtney straight up says, "I bet Dodie told you that," which Dodie overhears. And boy does she get insulted. Yeeeeeee-es!

Courtney ain't changing, so the next step would be to tell Courtney what the snobs plan to do, despite all the threats from the snobs. Nope. And now, I shall quote Mean Girls' Janis Ian, because I feel that this is important. "There are two kinds of evil people. Those who do evil things, and those that see evil things happening and don't try to stop it." And by the looks of it, everyone here except Courtney is going straight to Hell.

They decide to just try to keep the snobs away from Courtney for the duration of the party.

In the doghouse, Carl sews a pair of swim trunks with sample collecting pockets for Hoodsey, who's really adamant about trying them on. But he does anyway, and they fit nicely. Nevermind the fact that they look like crapola.

Ooh, Hoodsey's getting a fashion ticket for that one.

At the pool party, Hoodsey collects everyone's ABC gum. Meanwhile, the snobs approach Macie and demand to know if she told Courtney about their plan. Man, they're really scared of getting caught, aren't they? Well, to be fair, Courtney is rich, so she could sue them all the way to their social security if she knew what they were going to do. I still hate the fact that everyone lets themselves get pushed around like a mop in this show just to save their social standing.

Darren shows up with a bunch of inner tubes for floatin' and tubin' and what not. Ginger asks for his help with some "interfering" between the snobs and Courtney, and he's like, "Sure, why not?" Will shows up and starts teasing his little bro, but Darren retorts back by calling him by his real name--Wilbert--causing himself to be thrown into the pool. Metal and all.

This is exactly what it's like to have siblings.

Courtney arrives and greets all with a smile, including the snobs, who offer to play "chicken" with her and Wilbert, I mean, Will. In a final attempt to stop Courtney's bubble wrap boobs from being exposed to thirty high schoolers, Ginger pulls her to the side and begins to tell her about the plan, but Courtney's like, "Oh, you don't have to be jealous of my new awesome fraaaaands. You'll always be my friend!" Aww. Before Ginger can get another word in edge-wise, Courtney runs off to play chicken. You had your chance last night on the phone, Ginger. Why did you wait until the last minute?!?!

The trio and Darren decide to join in the game to catch Courtney's bikini top when it falls, what good that'll do I have no idea. So, the game begins and everyone starts going at each other like, well, chickens. People fall off shoulders, Courtney giggles incessantly, and clumsy Darren ends up sinking along with Macie on top of him.

Courtney goes tête-à-tête with the blonde snob while the brunette snob sneaks up behind her. I really didn't care to learn their names. They're mentioned in the episode, but I don't feel like looking them up.

Ginger notices the brunette going for Courtney's top, so she sends Macie to the rescue. She's able to untie the strings, just in time for Macie to throw an inner tube over Courtney's chest.

Ginger scoops Courtney's bikini top out of the water and hands it to Dodie to hold. The lifeguard blows his whistle to call out the violation, thus kicking everyone out of the pool. He calls the party off, even though he doesn't have the authority to do so. Seriously, this guy is just the lifeguard. Who gave him the right to end the party?

The snobs wallow out of the pool, pissed that their plan was thwarted. Will we eventually hear about Macie's social life in shambles? I doubt it--those girls were all bark and no bite, anyway. Courtney swims up to her saviors. She realizes that Ginger was trying to warn her all along, but was too blinded by her coolness factor to notice. At least the plot has been resolved, and the viewers are presented with a positive moral this time around, so that saves me an extra two paragraphs of rage at the end of this post. Anyway, Courtney thanks the trio, proud to know that they're her real friends.

Nice to know Miranda isn't a good friend.

She takes back her bikini top back and leaves.

Sometime later at the elementary school science fair, Mrs. Gordon is judging Carl and Hoodsey's project, unconvinced that some kid's earwax has a similar DNA structure to Einstein's. Just as we're sure the boys will be trading water balloons for scantrons this summer, Blake saunters over and boasts about his project to Mrs. Gordon, the very same project that Carl was going to buy but was three minutes too late. The nerve of that rich bastard! Mrs. Gordon, angry to discover Blake's academic dishonesty, disqualifies him from the competition, much to Carl and Hoodsey's delight.

While Mrs. Gordon is skeptical of the validity of Carl and Hoodsey's project, she realizes that they at least put some effort into their project, thus getting them off the hook for summer school. And then Higsby almost blows up the school:

Lessons Learned From This Episode: high school is cruel; bored high school girls are cruel; don't be Brandon Higsby