TV Recap: Awkward 3×15-“A Very Special Episode of Awkward” and 3×16-“Less Than Hero”

Previously on Awkward.: Jenna ditched Matty and friends for a tryst with Colin the lamer and a new friend called Mary Jane, as long as we’re speaking in After School Special-isms for tonight’s episode. No surprise then that this episode opens with her macking it with Colin surrounded by burnouts in the icky under-the-bleachers sanctuary (what happened to hanging out on the grassy knoll over there?). Jenna declares that DTR-ing (AKA defining the relationship) is for suckers, letting us know that she is going to eat these words by the end of the night.

Writing class: it’s time for the annual lit magazine, and everyone is expected to submit an essay about Heroes and Villains. Mr. Hart cracks that considering the level of talent in his classroom, the magazine will be more like a flier. Not the most encouraging, but someone has to keep it real.

Val’s looking to enter a video contest in which the winning school earns a school nurse for a month. How badly off is this school…? She waxes poetic about her favorite television drama: the After School Special. “Controversial subjects, socially relevant issues…Lifetime for teens,” she explains. I was about to ask if these kids live under a rock, but I realize now that health classes may have found new mediums to teach life lessons with, rather than use the same skipping videotapes of 80’s After School Specials they used until at least 2007. She requests that the kids ask their friends to join in, but only the attractive ones. Jenna lies to get out of it—she and Colin cannot help since her mother sprained her back. Val infers that this is due to a sex injury and claims that Jenna’s dad must be a “stingray in the sack.”

Matty watches Jenna sadly, Sadie commenting, “You are so nice it’s annoying,” in the background. Aw, Sadie. You just really get me. Matty thinks that somewhere deep inside Jenna is still his friend. I think this gives her a lot of credit considering how much of a dick she’s been to everyone, especially him. At the After School Special meeting, Sadie suggests they do a story about a loser girl who threatens suicide for attention, becomes popular, and slowly destroys any semblance of friendship and goodness in her life. “And then, SHE DIES,” Sadie says, looking happier than she has in awhile. They’ll call it “What Are We Going to Do About Jenny?”

While Val plays the Ma Lacey to Sadie’s hysterical Jenny, her Get Well Soon balloons show up at the Hamiltons’, alerting the real Ma Lacey to the fact that her daughter is a filthy liar. She forces Jenna to go to the school where she is cast as Concerned Friend #4, much to her chagrin. Sadie-as-Jenny explains that she dumped video Matty for “a pothead douchehole,” prompting Jenna to go off script. She tells “Jenny” that everything is fine and her life is none of their business. She storms out, putting her in Matty’s path so she can promptly bitch him out again. He thinks better of talking to her, leaving her to light up in the hallway, as she is now wont to do. Jenna, has Colin removed your brain? Val acts like any educational professional would and suspends her.

We get another sneak peek at the After School Special, in which Jake-as-Colin accidentally kills his drug dealer, then kills himself. Sadie-as-Jenny almost commits suicide in the aftermath but changes her mind with the help of her friends. Kite flying montage! Val realizes that Jenny is a metaphorical Jenna and seeks her out for a reconciliation. Jenna bitches her out (I’m so tired of this phrase at this point, I hope Jenna gets her shit together soon), “I’m not your friend, you’re my guidance counselor. And a shitty one at that.” In a fit of vengeful adolescent rage, Jenna writes a scathing Heroes and Villains paper about Val.

 Mr. Hart refuses to publish Jenna’s vitriolic paper about Val, noting its cruelty. Jenna fights back, claiming if it were her and it were true, she’d deserve it. Puh-lease, Jenna. You couldn’t handle your friends not showing up on time to your lame barbeque. He implores her to think about it again, giving her his favorite book and the reminder that words have power.

Tamara and Ming are talking about Jenna and her pretentious fake glasses, but Jenna claims she doesn’t care because she has Colin. Yak. Speak of the devil! Colin calls her essay “cruel but insightful” and “controversial like all great writing.” I haven’t read it, it being a fictional piece of writing in a television show, but pardon me if I’m not impressed by a rant about a teacher.

Ma Lacey and Val team up with Ally for something she has a lot of experience with: an intervention. Sadie has tagged along so she can live tweet the meeting from @YourHarshTruth, her unfiltered advice twitter. Obviously I checked to see if MTV had actually created this—it is a real twitter belonging to one “Sadie Saxton” that has 2000+ followers…and zero tweets. DISAPPOINTMENT. Ally explains, “You wanted a peer presence, Lil Bitch has no friends.” Upon Jenna’s arrival, Sadie says what we’ve all been thinking: “Jenna, you have a problem. You’re an asshole.” Jenna curses them out and stomps upstairs, leaving the intervention team to drink away their defeat. In this most recent fit of rage, Jenna tells Mr. Hart to publish the essay.

Jenna leaves to go out with Colin, causing the parents put their feet down. After dealing with more venom from her ungrateful daughter, Ma Lacey gives the ultimatum: “If you leave, don’t come back.” Of course Jenna leaves anyway, she’s got a weirdly boring underground nightclub to go to! This looks like the set for the Teen Wolf rave, only that looked waaaay more fun. Colin invited Angelique, but Jenna’s determined not to worry—she’s out with the coolest guy at the coolest club! Writers, I have a problem suspending my disbelief enough for that whole sentence. “Tonight’s festivities are brought to you by the letter X,” Colin says smugly, presenting white pills to the girls. Colin, your cutesy drug talk is annoying. I still haven’t gotten past the Adderall offer–“A ticket for the A train,” and now this? HE is the “coolest guy” on this show? I don’t think so. Also, when did Colin go from being the annoyingly pretentious literary dude to club drug enthusiast and dealer? Inquiring minds, MTV. Anyway, Jenna chickens out, but Angelique drugs the shot she gives her anyway. JENNA: your new friends suck. Colin and Angelique are feeling friendly, but Jenna can’t bring herself to be part of a ménage a trois featuring Colin and his ex. Colin shrugs and starts macking it with Angelique instead, which seems to startle Jenna.

Jenna calls Matty to pick her up, which I have trouble believing. I feel like she might have at least tried one of the friends—Jake, most likely—before going to Matty. Matty is super considerate of the ungrateful wretch (I’m not going to be over her behavior for awhile, folks), who starts crying when she finds an earring in his car because, “it’s not mine.” Jenna asks Matty to hold her, thanks him for being her hero, and is dropped off at her house.

There’s a whole side plot about Jake running for class president, but it was so boring I didn’t even know what to do. Tamara, as Jake’s self-proclaimed campaign/life manager, freaks that he hasn’t done any campaigning for class president. This somehow results in Jake yelling about how Tamara thinks she knows better about everything and how she tries to turn him into the perfect boyfriend. Tamara aggressively throws glitter on the ground. It was very disjointed from the rest of the story and didn’t exactly follow a logical progression, so I found that it kind of got lost in the rest of the story

Next week: sanity sabbatical over! And now Jenna has to face the consequences of her Heroes and Villains essay.

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