So Gabriel's story, which we know is at least partially untrue, is that he met Serena at Butter on the night that Georgina roofied her, and fell in love with her at that point. He hooked up with Poppy, but now is caught because he needs her social connections to fund his project. But you know -- from the second the previews bite his "I want to meet everyone in Serena's life" from Seder -- that it's going to fall apart, and of course it does, grandly, thanks to the superteam of Blair and Chuck, who needed only the paper-thin excuse of destroying Serena's relationship in order to run around being sneaky and gross like they do. Of course, this romance/alibi taunts the junkyard dog deep within the soft heart and delicate cheekbones of Nate Archibald, and he gets a jank apartment in Murray Hill so he and Blair can go to Columbia and NYU respectively, but still live together. So yes, he asks her to move in with him, but spends most of the entire storyline trying to explain to Chuck that in fact it's all about him and Chuck, of which Chuck is already aware, and how he's declaring his ownership of Blair in a fashion so creepy that even Chuck literally goes, "Why not just pee on her?" After all, it's what Chuck would do.

So Serena, piqued, brings Gabe to Lily's Palace co-op meeting, where high school girls are always invited apparently, and Blair and Chuck produce Poppy, who goes off on Gabriel in an obviously manufactured way, and he fake-chooses Serena over Poppy, thereby losing investors in his scheme to bring wireless internet to Africa or some shit. In the end, Gabe skips town and Poppy plays wounded bird, but not before Rufus drops off a check in the amount of All Rufus's Money, which Gabe talked him out of by playing on his class issues. Which is nice, because it brings Rufus into the storyline in a way that will fuck up his brain hopefully, which is second only to watching someone physically beat him.

While all of this is going on Nate asks Blair to stop running around spying on Gabriel and Serena with Chuck, because it's going to lead to backseat fucking, and she says that he has to trust her, and would he mind going back to their new apartment and christening it solo, so she can drive out to God knows where with Chuck to track down Georgina Sparks so that she can confirm that she didn't take Serena to Butter once she roofied her. This is treated like the one clincher clue by B and C, who are just ravished by each other's presence, but otherwise played as this continually more desperate game on the part of Chuck and Blair to spend time together while solving a nonexistent mystery. In the end, though, Blair is vindicated, as Georgie knows full well they weren't at Butter that night, so suddenly the fake mystery becomes a real mystery.

Meanwhile, Serena does some tricks of her own and realizes that Gabriel is lying about certain things, but Gabe and Poppy are playing this whole other game where Poppy acts like he took her for a bunch of money too, so now Poppy -- who has morphed into some bizarre cat burglar/supermodel megazord of awesomeness -- seems like a good guy, but is actually a bad guy, but actually kind of rules for taking all of Rufus's money along with that of the entire UES.

This episode felt three hours long, but like in a good way. All the people who are supposedly really close -- Serena/Blair, Chuck/Nate, Dan/Vanessa, Jenny/Rufus -- actually get some screentime together, which is awesome. Serena and Blair have a little bit of a fight about how it's ironic that Blair's obsessing over Serena's boyfriend when her own current boyfriend spent a year or two obsessing over Serena. (We're cleaning house left and right on those pilot continuity issues, I guess, but then Passover doesn't have to come but once a year.) Jenny analyzes the shit out of her Dad, gives him a hideous ring like a palm or Tarot card reader would wear to give to Lily, and basically hounds him into various decisions. Dan and Vanessa get drunk and come clean about various things, but as usual these days Vanessa's stuff -- fucking Chuck twice, for e.g. -- is way better than Dan getting a blowjob from Georgina, which everybody already knew, and plus who cares.

Blair scoffs about Chuck, obligatorily, comparing Nate to the kind of boyfriend you can hold hands with; when they end up at Georgie's location, they sleep until morning in the back of a limo and wake up holding hands, so that was awesome. But not as awesome as where they are, which is a place called OMJC, and is basically one of those creepy camps for kids who have gone all True Blood on themselves and think they've found the answer. Chuck spends his time shoving aside gay kids praying themselves straight and young women praying themselves back to virginity long enough to get fully scared to death by Georgina's intense rehabilitation/cult-like stare and smile, but it's his mention of Blair -- who's fled back to the city, realizing the Georgina thing was at least partially an elaborate plan to divide her from Nate -- that really gets the fever going. Georgie hops in a cab, "URA Fever" starts playing, and they head back to save Serena and the UES from whatever Gabe and Poppy are up to.

Is this show really just about awful people saying awful things to each other? Our vlogger thinks so.