Product: Gossip Girl: The Complete Third Season (2009)
Rating: 3.0
Not as good as previous seasons
Welcome to The Upper East Side, home of the New York elite. In a world dripping with money, prestige, power, and politics, it's hard to know who you can trust among the lies. In classic Beverly Hills 90210 style, the CW series Gossip Girl, based off the popular book series of the same name, follows the lives of a group of privileged, beautiful young people and the ugly, dramatic problems in their lives. The clothes, the shoes, the backstabbing, the scandal...it's just another day or, entry, on the gossip blog written by the anonymous Gossip Girl.Gossip Girl here, your one and only source into the scandalous lives of Manhattan's elite...In season three, our favorite socialites head off to the next big adventure: college. But things aren't as easy as they seem to be. Even though the socialites may be splitting up and heading to different schools, their relationships and betrayals are still as strong as in high school. Blair (Leighton Meester), still hoping to keep her queen bee status, moves into her dorm at NYU, only to find that her roommate is the notorious Georgina (Michelle Trachtenberg), who has plans to make Blair into a social outcast.Meanwhile Serena (Blake Lively) returns from Europe with some new secrets. While preparing to head off to Brown, she and boyfriend Chuck (Ed Westwick) have a tragic falling out and, instead of being blue, Serena decides to get even. Not only do Serena, Blair, and the others have to deal with the betrayal, breakups, social games, and drama, but they have to figure out how to make college fit into their lives.Along with the juicy and much-enjoyed return of Georgina, season three also features guest appearances by Hilary Duff, William Baldwin, Joanna Garica, Laura Harring, Kevin Zegers, and Tyra Banks plus cameos by the Plastiscines, Sonic Youth, Jimmy Fallon, and Lady Gaga.While season three delivered everything that makes this show so deliciously exciting (and, honestly, one of my guilty pleasures), it just wasn't quite as enjoyable as the first two seasons. Though I still found myself wrapped up in the scandalous lives of the teens, something about it seemed a little off. I think that the transition to college didn't do the show well -something about the high school universe seemed to really capture the spirit of Gossip Girl to me, and the college environment doesn't work as well.Another issue is that the show started out incredibly slow. The first 10 or so episodes were just not as compelling as previous seasons and felt a tiny bit repetitive and somewhat rushed. Thankfully, the last disc to disc and a half make up for it, as if the writers and cast finally figured out how to make the college thing work. I hope season four can continue the momentum here, but it's still a little questionable.This five-disc set includes some really fun special features, including music videos of clips of season three set to Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance" and Plastiscines's "Bitch," a hilarious gag reel, deleted scenes, "Gossip Girl Mode" feature, which allows for a unique interactive viewing experience with episode 16 "The Empire Strikes Jack," and "A Gossip Girl Fabulous Affair," which is all about throwing a party in true Gossip Girl style.Season three is presented in wide screen format with the option of English, French and Spanish subtitles.Though not as good as previous seasons, Gossip Girl: The Complete Third Season is worth watching.You know you love me. xoxo, Gossip Girl.