Beverly Hills, 90210 - Season 5, Episode 12

"Is it too late to get out of this faux presidency?"

"Rock of Ages"
Original airdate: 11/23/1994

Episode summary: Everyone's psyched about the upcoming Rolling Stones concert at the Rose Bowl. Dylan enters rehab and runs afoul of an annoying curmudgeon named Charlie. Brandon is forced to defend his right to remain CU's student body president during a Constitutional Review Board hearing.

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Recap: Brandon's in his room, studying, when loud music starts blaring from elsewhere in the house. He looks puzzled and steps into the hallway - and encounters Mama Walsh, who has also stepped into the hallway looking puzzled. The two go downstairs and find Papa Walsh bopping to the Rolling Stones in the living room. He grins and says they "still do it" to him, and then hands Brandon a bag filled with Rolling Stones paraphernalia and explains that he got it from a client. Brandon tells him what he'd really like is a couple of tickets to the concert, so Papa Walsh promises to do what he can, but says that the show may already be sold out. Mama Walsh remarks how surprising it is that so many people are still into the Rolling Stones after all these years, and Brandon and Papa Walsh just stare at each other in astonishment at her cluelessness. In the next scene, we get some rockin' concert footage of the Stones to remind us why they're still one of the most awesomest rock n' roll bands ever.

Beach house. Kelly's studying the proofs from her Seventeen magazine photo shoot. Brandon arrives and glances at them, and she gets all self conscious and tells him not to look at them 'cause she just spent an hour going over every little imperfection. He gives her a funny look and assures her that she looks great. I don't know about great - not with that ghastly Florence Henderson (circa The Brady Bunch) hairdo she's been sporting lately. Brandon shows her the Rolling Stones paraphernalia he got from Papa Walsh and asks her if she wants a t-shirt. She declines and tells him that the people at Seventeen gave her a concert ticket and an all access VIP pass so she can hang out with the Stones...'cause, yeah, that's believable. She makes a face and says she doesn't even want to go 'cause she has to study for midterms. A wistful Brandon tells her he'd love to go to the concert, since it would take his mind off of the Constitutional Review Board (CRB), which will decide whether or not he has the right to be president. Kelly clucks sympathetically and says she wishes he didn't have to go through this, then asks him why Alex Diaz has it in for him. Brandon smugly replies that it's 'cause he's president and Alex isn't.


Campus TV station. David and Clare are recording a promo for the upcoming Rolling Stones concert...but then start mocking the band for no longer being relevant. Outside the recording booth, Donna's like, "Cut!" and orders them to please stick to the script and avoid giving their personal commentary. Ray, who's there observing, tells Donna how wrong David and Clare are about the Rolling Stones, and that they're masters of rock n' roll and deserve respect. Fuckin' aye. Donna bats her big doe eyes at him and says she doesn't really know their stuff all that well, so Ray tells her he's been to every Stones concert since he was six...and that he'd really like to take her to this one.


Student Union. Mama Walsh runs into Kelly and asks her if she's seen Brandon. Kelly tells her he should be by shortly and invites her to join her and Ahn-drea at their table. Mama Walsh tells them that Papa Walsh scored two free tickets to the Rolling Stones concert...and a second later, Brandon arrives, sees the tickets and is stoked when his mom tells him they're front row, VIP, all access passes. Mama Walsh tells him if he doesn't need the extra ticket, Valerie wouldn't mind going, and Brandon murmurs, "Gotcha." Ahn-drea changes the subject and tells Brandon she heard that the CRB will be ruling on his presidency this week...then says if he needs any legal advice, Jesse would be happy to help him out. Brandon thanks her, but says he assumes the hearing will be postponed until the chancellor gets back to town, then excuses himself to go study. After he leaves, Ahn-drea tells Mama Walsh and Kelly that Brandon is clearly in denial about being impeached this Friday...and all three women furrow their brows concernedly.


Brandon finds Alex Diaz waiting for him at his office, and he's wearing his usual double dose of denim. Brandon wryly asks him if he's getting geared up for the legal battle on Friday, and Alex grins evilly and says he obviously hasn't checked his messages yet. Brandon tells him to just say what the message is, so Alex informs him that the CRB will be convening tonight - egads! - to determine the fate of his faux presidency via a three judge panel. Alex tells him he's going to lose for sure, and advises him to resign now as a show of good faith. If he does, Alex promises to back him for any other office in the next general election. Brandon pretends to look contemplative and says he does have Rolling Stones tickets for tonight...then says he just can't do it. He tells Alex he'll see him in court and brusquely thanks him for stopping by.


Rehab. Dylan and Valerie are strolling the grounds of the rehab center and chatting amicably. He apologizes for not being in touch after emerging from his coma, and she tells him that she too is detoxing. She no longer smokes cigarettes, dope, or drinks liquor. He's like, "What about sex?" and she laughs and says she hasn't doinked anyone...at least not in the last week. She hands him a bag with a Rolling Stones cap and t-shirt that Brandon wanted him to have, and he looks touched. She informs him that no one knows she was with him the night he crashed his car...and would prefer to keep it that way, and he agrees to keep her secret. She then tells him she stopped by his house the other day to fetch him some toiletries and found his stash and then promptly flushed it all down the toilet. He asks her if she did that 'cause she's afraid he'd use again, and she explains that she was afraid the police might get a search warrant and raid his house while he was in rehab. Some random guy appears, motions to Dylan and then points at his watch, and this segue-ways into Dylan quickly giving Valerie the heave-ho. He tells her he's going to have to get through rehab by himself, that it's the only way it's going to work, and that she needs to get on with her life without him. She pretends to agree that that's best and tells him she did, in fact, stop by the rehab center to say goodbye. The two kiss and hug, and she looks sad and forlorn as she watches him amble away.


Rose Bowl. Ray and Donna arrive at the Rolling Stones concert venue. She asks him how they're going to get tickets, since the show's probably sold out by now - and Ray tells her he's seen all the great shows without tickets. She looks alarmed and says she won't do anything illegal, and he grins and assures her that his plan is perfectly legal, then hands her a vendor's badge. She exclaims, "We're working here?!" and he's like, "D'yuh" and then the two display their badges to the security guards and make their way through the main gate.


Beach house. David and Clare dial onto the World Wide Web with their ginormous computer and go onto a primitive looking forum for Rolling Stones fans. Clare scoffs at all the effusive praise the band is getting, so she posts a derogatory comment about the Stones...and, predictably, gets a lot of angry retorts. David thinks this looks like fun and starts doing the same, then mentions that his dad got him a couple of tickets to the concert. Clare perks up and tells him it might be fun to see all the rabid fans up close and personal. The two amuse themselves by posting online messages about how hard the Rolling Stones suck.


Rose Bowl. Donna and Ray are dressed as vendors in white shirts and dorky black bow-ties. Ray tells Donna he wants to show her something, then leads her onto the huge stage...and the two stare out at the gigantic empty stadium. Donna tells him that one day it'll be him performing at the Rose Bowl, then makes a pretend concert announcement for Raaaay Pruit!! Ray picks up a guitar that just happens to be laying around, dedicates the song to her - the best thing that's ever happened to him (which was nauseating) - and then starts strumming and singing in his horrible breathy voice as imaginary applause erupts in the background. Donna clutches her hands and watches him adoringly, which too was nauseating. Suddenly, a roadie appears and yells at them to get off the stage. Ray says sorry, puts the guitar back, and he and Donna flee.


Rehab. Steve, Nat, and Willie the Cook drop by to talk to Dylan. They urge him to sell his share of the Peach Pit After Dark, and Dylan doesn't put up any resistance and wearily says he'll sign whatever they want. That settled, Nat asks him what it's like in rehab, and Dylan tells them he'll be going into group therapy soon...the kind that includes confrontational analysis. When the dinner bell rings, the three get up to leave...and Willie tells Dylan he feels bad for him, in particular the way he keeps fucking up his life.


The Walsh house. Papa Walsh is dorkishly dancing to the Rolling Stones in his living room. Mama Walsh enters the room and grins at him, which prompts him to - ack! - start unbuttoning his shirt...and so she reacts by taking off her sweater. He gives her a big smooch just as Valerie arrives home and stares at them in horror. The two immediately start buttoning up and tell her they thought she'd be at the Rolling Stones concert. She tells them she changed her mind and decided to stay home to study instead...and adds that she'll be upstairs and that they should just pretend she's not there. After she flees upstairs, Mama and Papa Walsh chuckle at the embarrassing encounter.


CRB hearing. Brandon arrives with Jesse as his legal counsel. Jesse tells him that these hearings are usually based on politics and personality, and that he'll have to get at least two of the three judges on the panel to side with him. Well duh. Brandon sees Janice and sarcastically asks her if she and Alex are ready for their coup d'etat. Janice says that while they may not be on the same side politically, she admires how he handled himself during the Roland Turner thing in the last episode. That's weird - I thought the general consensus from that mismanaged debacle was that Brandon was a weak and ineffective president. Alex, dressed in his stupid denim jacket, notices that Jesse is Brandon's counsel and makes a crack about how impressive it is that he hired an attorney of color, so then Brandon sarcastically snaps that he thought he'd just hired the best attorney...or rather, the only (somewhat) attorney he actually knows. As everyone takes their seats, Ahn-drea gives Brandon and Jesse the low-down on each of the judges on the panel, and Brandon's eyes glaze over and he mumbles that he wishes he were at the Rolling Stones concert right now.


Rose Bowl. Kelly and Steve arrive in a limo and head straight toward the security gate. Kelly easily makes it through with her VIP pass, then promptly ditches Steve after she catches sight of her Seventeen photographer and dashes toward him. Steve is dismayed when he's told his name isn't on the VIP list, and that no one left a ticket for him - as was promised by Miss Wells, some woman he's supposed to meet with in the VIP lounge. Steve is advised to go to the ticket window...but on his way there, he bumps into a hippie, who lifts his wallet.


Rehab. Dylan doesn't want to sit in the group therapy circle, so he's standing near the doorway, slouching against the wall. This vexes a rehabber named Charlie, who demands that "the new guy" share with the group what his problem is, and Dylan snaps at him to get off his back. A young woman with Felicity style curls asks Dylan if he went to West Beverly High, and Dylan tells her he did...so then Charlie scoffs, "Oh good - another over-privileged meltdown!" The therapist, who is clearly inept at maintaining any level of control over the session, weakly tells Charlie he's dominating the group again. Charlie snaps that he loves having rich boys for dinner and then barks, "We havin' fun now!" I'm sure we'll soon discover that deep down Charlie's a harmless curmudgeon with a big heart, but at the moment he's just being an obnoxious troll who should be ordered to keep his trap shut.


Rose Bowl. Donna and Ray are milling around, selling programs. Ray tells her they should start to work their way toward the tunnel, since the Stones will be arriving on stage any minute. Meanwhile, a desperate Steve is trapped behind a chain link fence...and when he spots Donna, he pleads with her to help him get into the venue. He tells her a hippie stole his wallet, so then Donna asks Ray if there's any way they can get Steve in, and Ray's like, "Sure" and asks him what size he is. In the next scene, Steve is decked out in a striped shirt, carrying a cooler filled with ice cream treats...'cause, yeah, it's totally believable that someone could suddenly become a vendor at the Rose Bowl minutes before a Rolling Stones concert is scheduled to begin. A few seconds later, Steve dumps his cooler and rushes off to get changed so he can head over to the VIP lounge. Meanwhile, the Rolling Stones take the stage, start performing, and of course they're awesome.


CRB hearing. Janice delivers her opening remarks and points out to the panel that there's nothing in the university's constitution that entitled Brandon to the student body presidency after Josh got incinerated in that unfortunate car crash. She accuses Brandon of illegally seizing the presidency for his own aggrandizement instead of agreeing to a new election. One of the panel judges hears his beeper go off and tells everyone they'll reconvene in fifteen minutes and resume with Brandon's defense. Brandon slumps back in his chair and tells Jesse and Ahn-drea that he's sure he's going to lose. Yep, I would be under that impression too. Ahn-drea admonishes him for his negativity, while Alex mockingly grins at him from across the room. Brandon remarks to Jesse that during his faux presidency, he called every meeting to order, even though the senate members were boycotting them. Jesse is surprised by this "new" information, looks thoughtful, and murmurs, "That's interesting." What's interesting is: what the hell was Jesse's case going to be without this information, since it ends up being the only thing he presents to the panel?


Group therapy. Charlie's yelling at Dylan to take off his Rolling Stones cap, and the Felicity curls girl yells at him to leave Dylan alone. Charlie says that the cap is symbolic of getting high, being cool, and par-taying...so Dylan explains that the cap is just a gift from a friend, and that it reminds him he has people on the outside who are rooting for him to get clean and sober. Charlie scoffs, "How pious" and rants that they don't call it sex, drugs, and rock n' roll for nothing. He orders Dylan to take off the cap again, and Dylan refuses and tells him he's the only one who has a problem with it. Charlie says he doesn't have to stay and listen to this, and storms out. Yay! The useless therapist asks the group why they think Charlie is so angry...and everyone agrees that the cap is a trigger for him to want to get wasted.


When the CRB reconvenes, Jesse addresses the panel and asks them to dismiss the complaint against Brandon. One of the judges snarkishly asks, "On what grounds?" so Jesse points out that the student senate has, in fact, been meeting regularly throughout the school year because Brandon cared enough to call every meeting to order. He adds that St. Brandon has single-handedly maintained the integrity of his office and should therefore be legally recognized as president. Janice objects and points out that at most of those meetings, the senators weren't even present. Mmm, yes...but that's probably more of a bad reflection on her and the rest of the boycotting senators than it is on Brandon. The panel quietly confers, and the judges speedily make their decision 2-1 in favor of Brandon. The head judge congratulates Brandon on his win and Brandon just gives him a dazed look. Jesse tells him he can probably still catch the concert, and urges him to take Ahn-drea along. After that, Janice comes over and congratulates Brandon, and he graciously tells her they should talk...and then Alex comes by, shakes his hand, and says, "No hard feelings." Um, whatever.


Rose Bowl. David and Clare are still waiting around for Mel to arrive with their tickets. David gets on a pay phone to try calling his father, while Clare whines that she's cold and cranky. After David hangs up the phone, a scalper offers them tickets, which they buy. In the VIP lounge, Kelly's trying to get some studying done for her midterm when she hears Steve at the door, trying to get past security. She rushes over, vouches for him, and the security guard lets him pass so that he can meet up with Miss Wells.


Rehab. Dylan's getting ready for bed when Charlie stops by his room. He tells him he can supply him with cigarettes, but Dylan says that nicotine is the one drug he's managed to avoid getting addicted to. Charlie explains that he gives every new person the third degree since he has a reputation to uphold, and Dylan goes, "For what? Being obnoxious?" Heh. Charlie insists that he can be quite charming and confides that he too used to be a rich brat. He then reveals that he's forty-two years old - egads, he looks a hell of a lot older than forty-two - and that he's struggling to get his shit together and expects "this go around" to be his last. He then politely asks Dylan if he can borrow his Rolling Stones cap, and Dylan tosses it at him.


Rose Bowl. The Rolling Stones are performing Start Me Up...and, in various areas of the stadium, everyone (minus Dylan and Valerie) is cheering and/or dancing dorkishly. 

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