The Sandy Cohen Chronicles: "The Perfect Couple"

The near-unanimous reaction to hearing that Marquette had received a verbal commitment from Seymour (WI) guard Sandy Cohen was "What, the dad from The O.C.?" As such, it seemed the obvious thing to do would be use The O.C. references when he makes an outstanding play for the Golden Eagles. We'll spend some time this summer recapping episodes of the classic Fox drama, making notes of major Sandy Cohen moments along the way and giving everyone a guidepost as to what the hell we're talking about come November.

Makes sense, right? Ok, hit it, Phantom Planet!

Season 1, Episode 10 - "The Perfect Couple"

Directed by Michael Fresco

Written by Allan Heinberg

Previously on The O.C.: Ryan and Julie go toe to toe over how she treats Marissa.  Anna agrees to help Seth get into Summer's good graces... or does she have her own interest in Seth in mind?  Sandy's new job lands him a case against The Newport Group, AKA his father-in-law's real estate company that his wife works for as well.  Ryan and Marissa finally end up together and make out on a Ferris wheel.

Ryan and Marissa are busy having make out time in the pool house, but things have to wrap up as it's nearly curfew time for Marissa.  As the new couple make plans for their first official date on Saturday night amidst more kissing, Kirsten just wanders straight on in to the pool house with something or other to ask Ryan.  She launches into apology mode immediately, and as Marissa heads off as she was planning to do so anyway, Kirsten has to admit, "This never happened with Seth."

The next morning, Kirsten and Sandy come to the realization that they should probably discuss sex in the house rules with Ryan, and this dissolves into a discussion of their own sex life.  Or rather, lack thereof, as both adults are working long hours due to the suit that Sandy's firm is bringing against The Newport Group.  They make a sex appointment for later that evening, including Kirsten's promise to start without Sandy if he's not home in time. RISQUE!

At school, Seth inquires as to Ryan's past sex life and ends up with his brain melting out of his ears as Ryan has to take a moment to stop and count.  Marissa and Summer are having a chat about how things are going with Ryan as they bump into the boys.  Seth takes the opportunity to tell Marissa that Ryan has already planning "the best date ever," as Ryan learns lesson number one of having a best friend and a girlfriend at the same time: NEVER LET THEM TALK TO EACH OTHER.

Over at Fancy Time Law Firm, Sandy lets Rachel talk him into a long night of work.  After all, they have a settlement conference with The Newport Group tomorrow, and they must be prepared.  Sandy is, of course, an idiot.

Speaking of The Newport Group, Kirsten heads over to Caleb's office to let him know that they can work late since Sandy cancelled on Sex Night.  *sigh*  Kirsten's surprised to find Julie in Caleb's office, but she's just there to convince a surprisingly casually dressed Caleb to let her use his yacht for a benefit for the local children's hospital.  Nothing else happening here, of course, and that kiss on the cheek as she leaves isn't even slightly suspicious, not even in the slightest.

Back at school, Ryan is totally boned on date night ideas, as he's never actually been on a date, and he tries to pry ideas out of Anna and Seth.  Seth ends up going on a tangent about Summer and Anna all but starts shouting "SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP."

Marissa comes home from school to find Julie waiting on the couch.  It's time for a family chat, minus baby sister Kaitlin.  Julie wants the hospital benefit to be the return of the Cooper family, although Jimmy doesn't seem to be totally happy with Julie.  No, I take that back.  His exact words are "No one has less nice things to say about your mother than me."  Definitely the words of a guy mentally ready to reconcile with his estranged wife.  Anyway, Marissa agrees to go to the benefit, even though it's on Saturday night.  Marissa runs over to the pool house to share this idea with Ryan, and while he's not super excited about spending time with Julie, he goes along with his girlfriend.

The next day, Seth won't shut up about Summer, not to Ryan, not to anyone, not even the housekeeper.  Ryan and Seth end up talking about the benefit and Ryan shoves Seth towards Anna to ask her.  She accepts after Seth promises to stop talking about Summer so much to her.  For those of you that watched the show when it first aired 11 years ago, especially those of you who were roughly Seth's age: Did Seth seem like this much of a moron at the time?  I mean, if you were Seth's age when you were watching this, did you see Seth being a total dumbass about how Anna feels about him?

The settlement conference scene appears to exist just so Caleb can take cheap shots at Sandy about how much time he's spending with Rachel.  I have nothing else to say here.

Marissa and Ryan are in Marissa's bedroom at Julie's house so Marissa can pick out a dress for the benefit.  Marissa is living in Optimism Land regarding her parents while Ryan is hesitant about spending lots of time with Julie.  Julie comes in, compliments Marissa's dress choice, apologizes to Ryan, and then hugs him.  What?

Sandy comes home still pissed off about Caleb and the meeting.  Kirsten and Sandy have angry words, and Sandy and Ryan commiserate about in-laws.  Ryan finishes wrapping up the trash and takes it outside.  He gives his traditional "I'm outside" look at the Cooper house, and sees Caleb and Julie sharing a post-date kiss.  WHAAAAAAAT

The next day, Ryan and Marissa are in the pool house getting ready for the benefit.  Marissa's still being optimistic while Ryan is bordering on full blown panic mode because of what he saw last night.  Anna arrives, dressed in a manner to make you ask once again, WHAT THE HELL IS SETH'S PROBLEM?  Kirsten's ready to go, too, but Sandy's not, because he's not even at home.  He's at work, where Rachel's sitting on the floor, eating Thai food, wearing a cropped T shirt, and stretching upwards to expose her midriff as much as she possibly can.  Later, she literally starts crawling towards Sandy laying out all of the things that they're doing without actually having an affair, in some sort of explanation as to why they should totally be having an affair.  Sandy doesn't fall for her harlot tricks, though, and heads out to the benefit.  This is sexual harassment, right?  First she tells Sandy that she put her ass on the line to get him hired, now she's making advances on him.  Sandy's at least got enough for a complaint to the HR department, right?  And do you have to be a lawyer to work in the HR department of a law firm?

Anyway.

We head to the yacht for the benefit, and Ryan's there for all of about 35 seconds before Julie sees him seeing her looking at Caleb.  Well played, bucko.  Right after Julie called you "trustworthy" in front of everyone.  The first thing out of Caleb's mouth to Kirsten is "Where's Sandy," but luckily, Seth is right behind her with his date, Anna.  Summer arrives, but you can't really bust into a conversation that Caleb Nichol is having with his grandson and his date, so she's screwed.

Julie finds Ryan inside the yacht and thanks him for not spilling the beans about Caleb.  Ryan tells Julie he's not okay with lying to Marissa, and Julie tells him to keep his nose out of her business.  She's kind of all over the place on this whole "suck up to Marissa" plan.  Out on deck, Marissa accuses Summer of being jealous of Anna and being totally into Seth.  Seth's perspective on Anna's plan is working.  Too bad that's not actually Anna's plan.  From there, we transition to Marissa and Ryan talking, and she's still on Optimism Island about her parents getting back together.  Ryan tries to mitigate her enthusiasm by just being a wet blanket, but she pushes him on the issue, thinking it's just part of his history that has him expecting the worst.  Ryan said he couldn't lie to Marissa, so he drops a hydrogen bomb on Optimism Island and tells Marissa about Julie and Caleb.

We skip forward a few hours in the party, as it's night time now, and Anna and Seth mock people as they had planned.  They're having so much fun and Seth is such an idiot.  In fact, I literally wrote that in my notes BEFORE Anna kisses him and he runs off looking for a beverage.  I predicted Seth being a moron.  I get being awkward around girls as a teenaged boy, but c'mon, man.

Julie starts giving the keynote address of the benefit, and while she's doing the boring part, we cut to Summer intercepting a wandering Seth and kissing him.  Then she freaks out because "Oh my God I like Seth Cohen."  Seth asks her to repeat it and she tells him that she'll kill him if he tells anyone.  Yes, absolutely keep chasing this girl instead of the cool one with similar interests as you that keeps kissing you.  Wonderful plan, doorknob.

We cut back to Julie's speech, and after thanking Caleb for being generous with his yacht, Julie makes the unwitting mistake of giving Marissa the live microphone to announce the winner of the romantic getaway raffle.  If you didn't see Marissa making the "no one deserves a romantic getaway more than Caleb and Julie" speech, I don't know what to tell you.  Julie doesn't understand what dropping the mic means, so she chases after Marissa and explains to her that when she said that the benefit would show that the Coopers were back, she meant the Cooper WOMEN, as she/they attach their wagon (and pocketbooks) to Caleb.  Julie forgot the part where Marissa hates her, though, so lying to her was a terrible plan.  On the plus side: Sandy and Kirsten won the romantic getaway!  Speaking of Sandy, he arrives at the benefit right after Kirsten tears into Caleb for using her personal life against Sandy at the conference but hiding Julie from her, and Kirsten's ready to leave.  Bummer, dude.  At least you have that getaway trip, though.

The episode wraps up in the pool house where Marissa's going to spend the night, and she declares the entire evening to be the best date ever.  At least Ryan's not taking any heat for telling her the truth, right?

Best Sandy Cohen Line/Moment: I'm combining these into one because there's not a good one-liner from Sandy in this episode.  However, he does have a dynamic speech/walk out combo on Caleb at the conference:

Sandy: I've gotta tell you Cal, I've dealt with a lot of shady characters in my line of work, but I've never seen anyone stoop as low as you. You'll poison anything - the air, wetlands, even your daughter's marriage - as long as you can profit.
Caleb: You've been living off my profits.
Sandy: If you think I'm bought and paid for, you just wait until I get you on the stand. Don't let my silence here mislead you. I'm taking you down.