Episode 5x14 "Heartbreak Cory"

The seniors of John Adams High are making final preparations for their class ski trip. They're in the school's hallway, I think they're waiting for the bus. Now, I know that a "senior ski trip" was mentioned in some capacity in a previous season, and it's killing me that I can't remember when it was. Somebody please save me on this one.

A few days in ski country with no parents? That's right, our boys want to get laid. Shawn's even got blueprints of the ski lodge to plan their midnight shenanigans. Hey Shawn, how was the Super Bowl? What's that? Not gonna bring that up again? Gotcha.

And they do this kinda bullshit thing where OF COURSE THE WOMEN WOULDN'T BE INTERESTED IN SEX, but it's the 90's, so what are we gonna do.

 Romantic plans are better made with your partner, though, as Topanga informs her boyfriend. So they have a little flirty romancey dialogue and it's actually compelling, and... passionate. Like everything else this season, the Corpanga romance dialogue is either great or garbage. Mostly garbage, but this one deserves credit.

Anyway, we get to the ski lodge/hotel that's housing an entire senior class, and things have immediately taken a turn for the worse. Cory has apparently destroyed his ankle getting off the bus.

A female employee of the ski lodge is somehow able to assess the damage, and claims it's a mild sprain, which will prevent Cory from being able to ski. All of his friends leave to go skiing without him, leaving him alone with the female employee. The chemistry between Cory and this girl is immediately overwhelming. They banter, it's adorable, she gets them both some hot chocolate and they start to play backgammon. She introduces herself as Lauren.

Lauren is played by Linda Cardellini, who's done all KINDS of work over the years, and is still very active. She was Velma in those Scooby Doo movies with Sarah Michelle Gellar, but more importantly, she had a recurring role (8 episodes) as Sylvia Rosen in season 6 of MAD MEN! Yup, that's right, DON DRAPER had a season-long affair with LAUREN FROM BOY MEETS WORLD. HOWBOUTDATSHIT.

Hey Linda Cardellini, maybe you should find your own man instead of takin somebody else's all the time. Me, for example.

It fades to black for a commercial, and we come back later in the day when Coren are working on a jigsaw puzzle. They banter some more, and it's still adorable. Trouble arrives in paradise, though, when Topanga returns from the slopes. Shawn can see exactly what's going on here, no matter how much Cory denies it.

Later that night, Corpanga and Shangela are playing one of those silly couples'-games and Topanga's being very cutesy and romancey and blech. Cory asks her what animal she would want her partner to be, and she says a falcon, because they always come home or something. Recalling that earlier flirting bit, we can see how very hard they're trying to show us that this is a good relationship.

Wow, really guys? Because I could have sworn the entire basis of your relationship was "I wanna be like them." But if we're just gonna pretend that 5x08 never happened, that is fine by me. Make no mistake, I'm glad they're back in reality, but I can't just gloss over these inconsistencies.

Topanga invites Lauren to play their stupid game with them, which... why...? Apparently it's Cory's turn to answer a question, and Topanga hands Lauren the book of stupid couples' questions game book of questions. Lauren, the sly fox that she is, finds a question about whether or not the guilt of having an affair would affect Cory's behavior. He freaks out and starts rambling, it's hilarious.

Because they're jerks, Topanga, Shawn, and Angela decide to go to bed right after Lauren starts playing, leaving Cory in her clutches once again. They have some more sweet dialogue, the chemistry is as real as ever, and they look at the moon rising over the mountains together while some emotional acoustic guitar plays. The guitar tells us that they're really trying to sell us on this pairing, right, and I think that's the critical reason that people (or maybe just me) like this episode so much. It's not some bull shit homewrecker story, you know the one, where at the end Topanga tells Lauren to keep her hands off of "MAH MAN" and the audience cheers, IT'S NOT THAT. It's a genuine look at the thought of "wow, maybe there's someone else out there." We are absolutely not supposed to hate Lauren, she is not evil, she just likes Cory. And that's all infinitely better than the "NOPE WE'RE MEANT FOR EACH OTHER FOREVER" crap they've been feeding us with Topanga lately.

We learn that Corauren ended up talking all night when Mister Feeny (the chaperon of the ski trip, of course) greets them the next morning with a "How ya doin". I think one of the GMW review blogs is or was keeping track of the number of How Ya Doin's, Seems like Michael Jacobs is a fan of that line. And so am I.

Feeny tries his best to reserve judgment, and his disapproval is very subtle. It seems that he wants to let Cory make his own choices instead of giving a speech, which I think was a very mature decision from the writers.

Lauren gets up to start doing work related things, and Cory follows her, showing us, and her, and Shawn in the background, that his ankle is better. But when Topanga joins the scene and asks about his ankle... he claims it's still bothering him. And Shawn is PISSED. Cory tries to explain that he can't have feelings for another girl, which still doesn't answer the question of why he lied about his ankle, but here we are.

Later, Cory confronts Lauren to make sure she understands that "last night didn't mean anything." She responds expertly with "You lied to your girlfriend because last night didn't mean anything?" It's 100% clear at this point that Cory likes Lauren and is in denial, and she decides to kiss him. Now, whether or not that crosses a line, and how significant that line may or may not be, are topics way beyond the scope of this blog. And that's okay. We're supposed to be conflicted. This is the first time the audience is mostly silent for a major development like that, you know why? Because the audience's noises are intended to guide us, to show us when something is funny or sad or romantic, but this time? The show doesn't want to tell us how to feel. We're not supposed to know. It's uncertain. It's hard. Even Cory's not sure how to respond, so he just walks off, clearly affected by the kiss.

In the next scene, Shawn insists that Cory never ever tell Topanga about the kiss. I think we can all agree that that is terrible advice. Cory did absolutely nothing wrong and they're both idiots for not telling Topanga. Granted, I would wait until they left so that Topanga can't start some shit, but he should definitely tell her. Whatever. Cory takes Shawn's advice.

He does explain that he lied about his ankle in order to stay and explain to Lauren that talking all night didn't mean anything, and Topanga handles it like the rational adult she is. It's impressive for a tv show, and it'd be more impressive if I could focus on anything besides Topanga's TALONS.

 Seriously, her fingernails are INSANE in this episode. Other than those claws, she's been the best version of herself that we've seen in a while, which was definitely necessary for this story to work. Anyway Topanga asks if anything else happened with Lauren, and Cory, and he says no, which we know is a lie. As everyone is leaving the lodge, Lauren gives Cory a letter to read since they never got a chance to talk after the kiss. Naturally, the letter falls out of his bag for Topanga to find as a cliffhanger.

Nothing actually happens during the credits, it's just some upbeat guitar music and the show's logo. I honestly really like this tune, it's so relaxing, but maybe that's mostly nostalgia.

Plot: 1.0 - It's a good story. Very real. Even though it is mostly a bottle episode. There isn't actually a whole lot of content, but it's fun to watch Cory and Lauren talking.

Character Development: 0.75 - I don't really know what to do for this one. It's significant that Cory slightly questions the soulmate-ness of Topanga, I guess. And I'll give points for the imaginary development of Cory dating Lauren.

Humor: 0.75 - It was funny enough. No Eric, though, so it was big odds going in.

Life Lesson: 0.5 - I don't know what to do for this one either. THIS EPISODE IS SO UNCERTAIN. AHHHHH.

3.0 out of 4.0. I like this episode and maybe I shouldn't. I guess I just like Lauren. Her chemistry with Cory is explosive, and she's so much more interesting than Topanga. And I'm pretty sure Cory knows it. Also, how old is Lauren supposed to be? She said she moved to the mountains when she was 13, but other than that we got nothin.

Thanks for reading, see you Wednesday.

All images used under Fair Use.