Fingers crossed this one’s a bit happier, though I doubt it will be somehow. Well off we go…no random event this week and no girls in tight dresses either. Just a kind of ‘in memoriam’ thing of Dana’s best moments throughout the 3 seasons. And it’s fab and brings back all the happy memories of Dana I have. Personally, I never tire of seeing that shot of Dana and Alice naked kissing on the chair, after their first time sex all over the living room. Happy days.
We start the episode at Dana’s funeral. It’s a very big event, yet the gang only get to sit near the back. Alice, Carmen and Shane stand at the front with Howie, looking at the flowers and photos before the ceremony begins. Howie is upset that this whole thing isn’t what Dana would’ve wanted. The gang seem to feel the same but are going along with it all. Then Tina and Helena arrive, greeted by a bitchy look from Bette. So I’m assuming Bette and Tina have had THE conversation then, and Bette hasn’t taken it well. Tina wants to know why they’re sat so far back and Bette’s a bit snappy with her, but Kit reminds them both why they’re here – for Dana. They all sit down and Carmen asks Alice if she has spoken to Lara. Alice has left her messages but thinks she’s still in Paris and doesn’t know if she knows. I wonder - is she going to burst in and fling herself onto the alter? This funeral is lacking some classic lesbian drama – we all know it’s what Dana would’ve wanted.
The ceremony begins and they all sing a hymn, a struggle for all of the gang, especially Shane who’s crying already. That’s done it – I’m off now. Damn Shane and her crying. And then the service begins, and rather than talking about her skills with a strap-on and how great she was at dancing while she was hammered, the vicar talks about her dedication to her tennis and her longing for domestic happiness and a suitable love mate. All the gang are becoming confused, as he seems to be talking about someone else, but Alice is holding it together and reassuring them it’s okay, until Dana’s desire to find a perfect husband is mentioned and then Alice’s had enough. So she stands up and asks what he’s talking about. Dana was GAY you a-hole, and out she storms. Go Alice!
As everyone leaves the service, it’s clear that the gang are not welcome back at the house for the wake, so everyone is a bit lost and unsure of what to do. Bette goes home as she wants to spend time with Angelica before Tina takes her out with her “man friend”. The rest of them all wait for Alice to turn up, and ask Max about a job interview he has. It seems that he has an interview for a top job at the place that told Moira that she was neither fish nor fowl. He, or rather Jenny, wants to prove how sexist they are by wanting to hire Max but not Moira. Anyway enough of that blah…Alice turns up and the sneaky thing has managed to steal Dana’s ashes! She’s hidden them in a coffee cup. I hope it’s a gay Planet coffee cup! The gang are gonna have their own memorial at Dana’s old tennis camp. Ooh! The tennis camp where she met “bleep” (famous tennis player)? How exciting! I’m not even gonna tell you how many dreams I’ve had about that tennis camp. Let’s just hope the reality measures up.
Now Max is at his job interview, being shown around all the computer techie stuff. He talks a lot about ‘platforms’ and ‘chips’, but the important thing is that the guy who interviewed him last time sees him and doesn’t bat an eyelid. Max has passed as a man! I’m so relieved.
At Helena’s house, she sits quietly beside the pool, deep in thought, until she spots Dylan on the security screen, leaving something at the front gate. She gets there just in time to see Dylan driving off, all her worldly goods in her loaded up convertible. But she has left a letter and a package. Mmhm. What could it be? I’m hoping for a ‘Seven’ style twist and that Danny’s severed nuts are in that box..
Bette brings Angelica into the living room where Tina is waiting with Henry and The World’s Most Perfect and Therefore Annoying Child (TWMPATACTM). Tina introduces them both to Bette as “Angelica’s other mother”. Ouch. Seems that Henry thought it would be a nice idea to go to the aquarium this afternoon as an antidote to the funeral. Tina invites Bette to join them, but she can’t. She’s being headhunted for some Dean job at an art college. Henry is trying to be nice; I like how he says ‘dude’ and ‘bummer’. Shows he’s a bit of a hippy and he is chilled out in the most awkward of circumstances, which I think is a skill he may well need in future months. And to her credit, Bette is doing a fine job of hiding her pain in front of the children. But then TWMPATACTM asks Bette to take a ‘family photograph’ of all of them, including Angelica, and Bette looks heartbroken, but she does it and it has to be THE most unhappy looking photo I have ever seen. I found that scene hard to watch, but the one good thing about it was that JB was wearing a tight black power suit and hot damn, it was worth waiting 11 episodes for!
Shane sits on the steps outside the house, sobbing. Carmen stands by but either doesn’t know what to do or decides Shane needs to deal with it in her own time. Shane continues to cry. And so do I, again.
Helena watches a video that Dylan has done as a message to her – I know she’s a filmmaker but does she have to videotape everything? She’s given all of her footage to Helena, as well as the torn-up settlement cheque. Seems that Dylan has realised what she’s done and has decided to do the right thing finally. She apologises and starts to try to explain, but Helena can’t bear to listen so she puts mute on, but then she can’t bear NOT to listen so takes the mute off. What Dylan said in those few seconds, about why she was indebted to Danny, we may never know. Dylan continues to explain how she’s run away from facing stuff about herself and then says…“I really don’t know how to face the fact that I lo…” But Helena puts mute back on again before she can presumably say “I love you”. I think Helena knows that’s what she was going to say and doesn’t want to hear it and know that she’s lost her.
Max talks to the interview guy about engines, and that’s enough to get him the job! Men and their engines eh? But he seems far more excited about getting the job than he should be, if indeed he has only done it to teach them a lesson.
Carmen is doing the gardening whilst Shane finishes crying. Eventually she speaks, if only to say “would you marry me?” Carmen looks shocked and the lesbian world goes from mourning the loss of Dana Fairbanks: Professional Lesbian, to mourning the loss of the last great stud left in WeHo.
Bette is in the office of the unforgettable Joyce Wishnia, who has had her lesbian feelers out and already knows that her and Tina are breaking up, and isn’t surprised that Tina has gone off with a guy. Joyce tells Bette that she is in a good position to get 50/50 joint custody, but Bette isn’t gonna settle for that. She wants sole custody. She thinks that Angelica belongs with her because she would always feel like a stranger in that family with Tina and Henry. Is everyone just assuming that Tina and Henry are gonna stay together forever? They’ve only been dating for about two weeks! I see Bette’s point, but either way the kid’s gonna have issues to deal with – growing up half black in an all white family or growing up with a lesbian mother. Either way, she’s gonna have to deal with being seen as different.
Jenny and Max celebrate with champagne at the Planet, but Jenny is pissed off when she realises that Max wants to take the job and hasn’t told them that he used to be Moira. Max is into the whole idea of earning a good salary and settling down in their own house, but that totally turns Jenny off. She wants to expose their equal opportunities bullshit or whatever, and accuses Max of wanting to sell out and start sleeping with the enemy. I think that’s really unfair and what does she mean by that exactly? Anyway, Max tells it like it is…”if you think men are the enemy then you and I have a problem.” God, I could’ve told you that weeks ago Max. You have NOTHING in common – let it go!
Bette returns to the house to find Tina and Henry canoodling and giggling in the kitchen. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! That makes me want to throw something. How much does Tina want to hurt Bette? I know it’s tough, and there are two sides to every story, but have some sensitivity Tina and don’t do that in your shared home! This doesn’t seem like the Tina we know anymore. She seems like someone else and I am not happy about it.
Alice quietly sits and transfers Dana’s ashes from the coffee cup into a much prettier blue jar. But she also puts a tiny bit in a small pot. I hope she isn’t going to have a new shrine going on. We’ve already had crazy Alice; shrine lady. Let’s not go there again.
Kit and Angus are lying in bed when the doorbell rings. Bette has come to visit and talk. She’s just so lonely and she can’t bear it. I think she’s upset about Dana and Angelica, both of whom she seems to miss. Angus is a darling and tells Bette and Kit to take the bed. Then Bette asks him to look after Angelica tomorrow when they’re on their trip, but he says Tina has already asked him. Bette looks hurt by this, but he says exactly the right thing; “I’m your guy. Know that. You’ve got family here.” How cute is he?
It’s the next morning, and the gang arrive in convoy at the camp place. They’re going to hike to a special waterfall to scatter Dana’s ashes. Max takes over responsibility for directions, as he is the male of the group, so of course he is convinced that he knows best when it comes to directions. Off they all trot, to the sound of wood sprite/pan pipes/tribal singing. Sorry to show my ignorance here - I don’t know how to describe it really, but it’s nice. They arrive at the cabin where Dana stayed when she was at tennis camp and she first got it on with a girl. They go in and all sit round on the bunks as Alice tells the story of how they first met! Fantastic!
It seems that Alice was given an assignment to interview Dana for a sports magazine. Flashback to Alice with longer hair, looking especially cute in a tank top. Some things never change. She asks Dana if there was anyone who inspired her, so Dana tells her about the camp and her bunkmate who she admired a lot. It’s classic – Dana is thinking she’s doing a really good job at hiding the fact that she was in love with this girl, and Alice is doing that confused and smirky thing she did with Dana when she thought Dana was talking crap. Alice asks if it’s fair to say that Dana had “in love” feelings for this girl. Dana denies it, but Alice keeps pushing it, just as you know Alice would do, and hints at the fact that maybe Dana is gay. Dana gets stroppy and leaves, threatening Alice with her lawyers. Alice looks like “shit…that’s me fired.” Haha.
Anyway, back at the cabin Alice explains that Dana didn’t get her fired, and a while later they ran into each other at the Fred Siegel café, so she went up to talk to her. Flashback to Alice coming up to Dana at the car. Dana’s dressed kind of geekily and is waiting for her mum. Alice has the potential for pissing Dana off again, by pointing out that Fred Siegel is like the gayest café in WeHo (this must have been during the strange pre-Planet days). Alice asks Dana if she’d like to go to lunch sometime, maybe to the Fred Siegel café. Dana acts like she doesn’t know that Alice is trying to suss her out, but she does really. It’s really cute how they both are with each other, kind of friendly, kind of flirty. But Dana still won’t answer Alice about the girl at camp. Back to the cabin and Alice says that it took Dana years to tell her the truth about it.
They all reminisce about how in the closet Dana really was. Flashback to Bette and Tina’s Y2K party where they were partying like it was 1999. Haha. Alice has brought Dana and Dana has brought her ‘boyfriend’ Harrison, who is even camper than the last few times we saw him. Alice has some guy draped over her as she introduces Dana to Kit. Neither Kit nor Alice look at all convinced about Harrison. As Alice probes Harrison for more info about how long they’ve been dating, Dana notices Shane getting into a box with some woman who’s doing performance art (what did you expect at one of Bette’s parties?), proceeding to grope her from behind. And then she locks eyes with Dana, who is watching her far too intensely.
Back to the cabin and Kit laughs at how, even though she was shitfaced, she knew damn well that Harrison was gay and that she knew she had to help Dana get out of that closet. Flashback to Dana and Harrison at the party looking at weird art, Harrison acting gayer than Christmas. He soon gets distracted though, by Alice’s boyfriend giving him the lusty eye, and off he goes. So the gang call Dana over and she nervously greets them all. And the rest is history…
The gang are back outside, hiking to the waterfall, when Jenny tells everyone that she and Dana had fooled around once. This seems to be news to everyone except Shane. Jenny tells them about that night at the Palms when they met and Dana came back to her shed, and then they had the worst sex in history. That wasn’t sex Jenny…no wonder you thought it was bad! Trust Jenny to make it more dramatic than it really was i.e. to lie about it! But I did love that scene in Season 1; I think it’s probably still my favourite L Word scene of all time. Anyway, she then tells them all that they ended up spending the rest of the evening dancing and laughing together, which we see them doing, wearing the same clothes as that night and it looks really similar to that scene I love so much and it makes me smile.
Now they all sit at the side of a lake and Shane tells her favourite story of when she took Dana to a Tegan and Sara concert after she had split up with Lara. She wanted to cheer her up, so Shane brought her some acid. Flashback to Shane and Dana in the car, talking about taking the acid – how cute are they together? I always wondered how those two would be together, just the two of them – it’s kind of sad that I’m only finding out now, but better late than never hey? Inside the concert and Dana is swaying to the music, claiming she feels totally fine. And then it all goes trippy – Shane plays with her lighter and Dana starts seeing lights around Tegan and Sara, and then imagines that they’re talking about her, about how she’s a lesbian. Cut to Dana’s face – classic. I can’t describe it well enough to do it justice – you just have to see it. Anyway, she shouts out “I am not!” which confuses Shane and then confuses Dana, who starts laughing hysterically and then gets up to dance on stage with them, though I’m not sure if she really did that or not. It’s all a bit too trippy to tell. Anyway…it’s really funny and the gang all laugh at that story and recall how she was a crazy dancer, the best kisser, an incredible lover and a trusting trustworthy friend. And so they toast Dana. Love you, love you, love you.
Finally they make it to the waterfall and as they all gaze down, Shane tells Bette that she asked Carmen to marry her, but she hasn’t given her an answer yet. Shane really seems to want to fix the rift between Carmen and her family.
They all go down closer so they can scatter the ashes. Alice starts to speak but can’t finish, so Bette does – she says they know that Dana’s in a peaceful place and everything is okay. But Shane says “no, it’s not” and proceeds to be honest – she’s not buying all the spiritual bullshit and it’s not okay. She speaks from the heart and leaves the others to scatter their share of the ashes into the waterfall. They each take turns, and it’s very moving, but I can’t help but think how awful it would be if anyone of them scattered more than their fair share. Just imagine if poor Helena slipped and tipped it all out – Bette would be straight in there wouldn’t she? “You’ve always been a selfish bitch Helena”. In fact, when Helena does chuck hers it looks like it all comes straight back over her. Never throw ashes when there’s a strong breeze. That’s one of those lessons in life you don’t want to learn first-hand.
So they all leave, but Alice turns back around and sees what looks kind of like a Dana shape in the waterfall, and she’s comforted by it. As well as this, there’s a beautiful song being sung along the lines of “I’ll always be there”. And I must say that the visual effect there with the waterfall was top notch. That could’ve backfired and looked really cheap couldn’t it?
Carmen finds Shane and says “yes”, though I can’t tell if she is saying it just to stop Shane from crying or not. She then says “I do love you” as Shane looks down into the water and sees a shape forming that looks slightly less Dana like, but I get the point - Dana’s watching over them all.
Alice gets home, or at least back to Dana’s apartment to find Lara sitting on the doorstep surrounded by bags. They walk into the apartment in silence, and Lara breaks down at the sight of the place and the fact that Dana isn’t there. Alice cries too and reaches out to take Lara’s hand. They embrace, both crying, comforting each other, and then they face each other in their embrace and they kiss. Is it out of pain or comfort or lust or all of them? Who knows?!? Let’s see what happens next week shall we? It’s certainly gonna be an exciting finale if the previews are to be believed! But then the Season 2 finale was described as ‘dramatic’ and ‘groundbreaking’ yet it was mostly scenes of Betty and Heart singing catchy yet undramatic songs. I have a good feeling about this one, because I know Dana will be watching over it to make sure it’s a good one for all of us.
© Debbie Anderson for Laurel Holloman Online. Not to be reproduced without permission.
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