RECAP: Beauty and the Beast – Season 2 Episode 5 – Reunion

You might survive war, but a Westchester High school reunion might kill you

We learn that high school 10 year reunions are the ultimate event to find yourself. Unfortunately high school reunions might kill you, especially if you are a geeky mascot or a beast with a jealous vendetta.

The episode opens with Vincent’s quiet HOUSEBOAT. The calm is disturbed by a beast-burglar; played by that guy, Blair Redford, who is probably 30 but keeps playing teens on all those ABC Family shows (Switched at Birth, The lying Game).  So… ABC FAMILY BEAST is probably looking for Vincent, but he is otherwise occupied stalking Cat. Old beast habits die hard.

Speaking of Cat, she is at her place getting ready for her pre-10-year-reunion gathering. As she revamps her apartment to make it look like Destiny’s Child secret hideout, she talks on the phone with Gabe. He has nothing useful to say, just lame excuses for his poor bio-dad-finding skills and inappropriate remarks about crop tops.

Cat enters her bedroom and finds a Beast behind the curtain [guess that’s the hot adult version of a “monster in the closet”]. Vincent is there because he “needed to see her” and he was hoping they could “hang out”. Aw. However, Cat informs him that it is girl’s night, “no beasts allowed”, and kicks him out. I am not sure I would have had the strength to make him leave when he was looking THAT dreamy… But I am all about having personal time when you are in a relationship [I just wish they didn’t remind us of this concept every 5 min in this episode! Figure out who we are… blah blah WE GET IT it’s the theme]. All I am saying is … if Vincent was my boyfriend, every party would be a beast-only-PRIVATE-party, if you know what I mean...

The girls’ only party actually looks fun. It has everything an almost 30 woman could wish for: nachos, tequila, fondue and gossip. We surprisingly learn that Cat always had a thing for “bad boys”, even when she was in high school. Moreover, she had a thing for [unsuccessfully] trying to “redeem” the bad boys she dated. However, I don’t think that’s the case with Vincent. She is not really trying to “redeem” him; it’s more like she is helping him find himself… so I refuse to take this girl-talk as foreshadowing. The WESTCHESTER GIRLS finally ask Cat if she currently has anyone special in her life and….

CUT TO: Vincent having some hilarious bro time with JT. No words, just a game on TV, while they show their brotherly love by sharing snacks. And that’s all a 30 something guy could wish for.

The party is over and all of Cat’s friends leave except for Beth, her reporter friend, who was also on Switched at Birth… Do they cast ALL the guest-stars from ABC Family shows now? [Seriously, let’s do some guests’ inventory: Jane By Design (2); Switched at Birth (2); Make it or Break it/Ravenswood (1)] Anyway, Cat goes to her bedroom to retrieve Beth’s purse and finds a beast behind the curtain. Unfortunately it’s not her Beast, it’s ABC FAMILY BEAST! He grabs Cat by the neck and demands to know where the “beast hunter” is. He is briefly distracted by Beth’s voice and Cat actually manages to hit him [Isn’t he supposed to have superhuman reflexes and strength?] After getting his ass briefly kicked by Cat, he grabs her by the neck and is about to choke her when Beth comes in. And… he decides to… just jump out the window [instead of doing what any psycho beast would do and kill Beth]. Beasts of the week are confusing… especially this one, you’ll see.

Later, Beth gives her statement to a couple of uniforms. The whole “the assailant had glowing eyes and superhuman jumping skills” makes her sound pretty insane. The fact that Cat refuses to back her story doesn’t help her cause. While Beth goes over her statement again, Tess and Gabe arrive for some beast damage control. Gabe is adamant about NOT sharing the beast attack news with Vincent. I thought that was shady… I guess Gabe wanted to be the hero and help Cat, without V stealing his thunder. Suddenly, Cat remembers she kicked the beast’s face, so there’s probably DNA traces on her boot. Gabe volunteers to bring the shoe to JT to have him analyse it. So… don’t tell the beast, but tell the beast’s bestie?

Gabe storms into the GENTLEMEN’S CLUB yelling things like “Beast attack” “Cat” “DNA”. Little did he know Vincent was there having bro time with JT. I know Gabe is not particularly popular this season, but Sendhil has his moments and his shocked face when he sees Vincent was priceless. Anyway, Vincent demands to know more, Gabe wants to handle it himself because they are “all friends”, JT is all “Friends? SERIOUSLY DUDE, I DON’T EVEN KNOW IF I LIKE YOU!” Vincent finally gets annoyed and runs to see Catherine.

A few moments later, Beth talks to her people and instructs them to find something to corroborate her supernatural story. She must have some REALLY BAD research assistants because they never figure out that Cat herself was involved in a “beast event” a decade before. Catherine tries to convince Beth to hold the story until they have more facts. She tells Beth she is not a tabloid reporter and that she should ‘t damage her reputation blah blah blah … It was a compelling argument, so I’ll give Beth a pass for not noticing Cat was totally BS-ing her. Still… aren’t reporters supposed to be extremely insistent [and resourceful and skilled researchers]? I think Beth gave up a little too easily.

At that point, Vincent arrives at the apartment. Cat follows him to the scene of the beast-crime, where Vincent has one of his Phoebe-Halliwell-Beast moments. Basically he has a series of premonitions flashbacks “tracking impressions” [?] of the beast attack. Vincent vows to never let this beast hurt Cat again and jumps out the window. This was a relatively sweet scene but… I felt it could have been more emotional. They could have at least hugged. Felt like a missed opportunity for a Vincat “moment”.

So Vincent tracks ABC FAMILY BEAST to a deserted church. Once they are face to face the beast recognizes Vincent. This is, of course, one sided because of the whole amnesia thing. Vincent attacks the beast who doesn’t fight back and just keeps yelling that they are “friends” [not like Gabe is “friends” with JT like “friends friends”]. Finally, Vincent has some TIMELY FLASHBACKS and stops beating the crap out of ABC FAMILY BEAST. That’s when we learn that he IS in fact Vincent’s buddy from the army.

I guess I can start calling himà  ARMY BEAST: Zach Hayes

MISSION: Stop the “beast hunter” in order to survive until he realizes the beast hunter is his army buddy. Then his new mission is to help his “friend” remember stuff. However after a few drinks he decides to go into a jealous vendetta against him. Let’s say CONSISTENCY isn’t this beast’s strongest suit.

I am not particularly interested in the “beast fights”, but I actually liked this scene. They had an interesting [yet somewhat illogical] location and they integrated the flashbacks with the real time fight nicely. Furthermore, this beast was actually interesting because it related to Vincent’s past. Now, time for an irrelevant comment: I used to think Blair Redford was reasonably good-looking when I watched him on the abcFamily shows [but in all fairness everyone on those shows looks 13 so anyone who looks remotely like a man looks good]; however, all it took is for him to stand next to Jay for two seconds and I went “meh…” Not acting opposite Jay Ryan is something young male actors may want to consider for the sake of their careers.

Anyway, Cat and JT are at the GENTLEMEN’S CLUB when the beasts arrive looking pretty chummy… And I was suddenly hit by severe “bro-jealousy”… if that is a thing. Felt like Vincent was cheating on JT! Vincent explains everything is OK, because the beast attacker is actually his friend. Zach explains that he was tracking the “beast hunter” but now he just “wants to have some fun”. Cat is all “I may date people who kidnap me … but I don’t like the idea of being “friends” with someone who tried to kill me! I gotta draw the line somewhere!”

In other words, Cat doesn’t trust Zach so she goes to the precinct to dig dirt on him. However, Tess reminds her ONCE AGAIN of her high school reunion which is apparently the ULTIMATE EVENT to assert your individuality or something. I am actually going to miss my reunion this year due to my geographic constraints … How will I EVER FIND MYSELF?!!

While Cat gets her Ashanti on; Vincent, JT and Zach play pool at an army bar. Zach pushes Vincent to remember things a LOT. I think he was pushier than Cat on Kidnapped! At this point, I thought this episode was going to go in a completely different direction. I’ll share:

ALTERNATIVE STORYLINE: Throughout the scene, I got the feeling that JT never liked Zach [as usual Austin was awesome at subtly conveying this]; and I thought this was going to be a case of “unreliable memories”. Now, that would have been interesting. Imagine if Zach had started feeding false memories to Vincent, confusing our poor amnesiac Beast until he realized that Zach was taking advantage of his vulnerable state. Then Vincent could have concluded that he should only trust JT and Cat because they truly care about him and that real memories come with emotions attached like Cat said. END OF ALTERNATIVE STORYLINE.

I am being "bro-cheated"

However, as far as we know Zach’s information was accurate. In any case, he is obsessed with Vincent recovering ONE particular memory. He wants Vincent to remember someone called Gabriella. We learn that she was a girl with whom Vincent had a fling before deploying and that she “fell in love with him” [now that sounds totally believable]. Vincent is just as confused as everyone else in the audience and is all “What about Alex?” so JT explains they broke up before he went to war and that’s when Gabriella happened.

At the PRECINCT, Daddy Bob pays a visit to Gabe to ask about Cat’s attack. Yeah… that’s not suspicious AT ALL. Come on! He is either Cat’s father or he is involved with beasts OR BOTH! Instead of coming to that logical conclusion, Gabe asks Bob to help him find Cat’s bio dad. Oh… the irony. Gabe might be sporadically psychic and an amazing “beast-locator” but he absolutely sucks at bio dad finding. Tess enters the office and tells Gabe [in front of Reynolds] that she found out Zach murdered a girl named GABRIELLA dun dun dun.

BACK AT THE BAR OF SUPERFLUOUS FLASHBACKS AND BEST FRIEND BETRAYALS, JT wants to call it a day and avoid more unnecessary walks down useless memory lane. Zach starts acting like a jerk and Vincent tells JT to just go home if he wants. I obviously went “HOW DARE YOU CHEAT ON JT?” So… Zach keeps talking and talking about Gabriella, Vincent remembers a few things and that’s when Zach reveals that Gabriella was actually HIS girl. Dun dun dun. Lesson: Changing your beast affections might kill you.

I have a few things to say about this plot development. First of all, not everyone has Jay Ryan’s ability to go from nice to utter threatening in the blink of an eye… and I don’t think Blair pulled it off. It felt forced. Second of all, Zach’s motivations kept changing and I think it weakened the character’s arc. Basically… Zach wanted to kill Vincent because he was a beast hunter, but then he wanted to kill him because he [inadvertently] broke the bro code, but he wanted him to remember what he did before killing him? I feel he also wanted revenge from Muirfield at one point…  Dude, pick a motivation and stick with it.

Now… I don’t mind the existence of this Gabriella girl [that much]. It was a long time ago and Vincent was a young dude about to go to war who hooked up with a girl. Not exactly a crime. HOWEVER, the storyline DOES bother me for the reason that it messed up with the consistency of the show and it was a little pointless. As far as I remember, Vincent went to war without saying goodbye while still engaged to Alex. In addition, this plot doesn’t seem consistent with Vincent’s personality back then. Moreover, the point of this season is to establish the new Vincent has “bad boy” beast related tendencies. This had nothing to do with that, so why mess up with his back story? It wasn’t even necessary. Zach could have gone psycho beast on Vincent for many other reasons, for instance… just the fact that he is killing Beasts! Or he could have been working with a third party, or the remaining beasts on the blacklist… He could have been in love with Alex! So many possibilities, so I don’t really see the point of the Gabriella story. And that flashback? Also completely unnecessary.

After his big reveal, Zach almost starts a beast brawl but JT stops them. Time for Zach to make a pompous war declaration [like beasts of the week like to do] and leave. Vincent feels awful for what he allegedly did, but JT assures him that he didn’t know she was his girlfriend… so… what’s the point of all of this again? Oh, yeah Zach=revengeful best. Vincent decides to find Zach and make him understand… although I don’t know how he plans to do that given the fact that he doesn’t even REMEMBER what happened. But whatever….

Hey ya! It’s outkast time! We find out that the mascot was in love with Cat. So, before becoming a beast magnet, she was a geek magnet? Mascot dude is obviously still smitten with Cat, unaware of the fact that having a crush on Catherine Chandler may have deadly consequences, just ask Evan Marks.

Meanwhile, Agent Reynolds is talking with Vincent on the phone and he is all “Of course Zach is on the Beast-blacklist, I just thought you may have a moral dilemma killing a friend you don’t remember… I am considerate like that; but now that you remember him, please go ahead and kill him”. Vincent wants to find Zach and reason with him, Daddy Bob tells him his daughter is turning him into a softie.

Shortly after, Vincent finds Zach. V is all “let’s settle this in the human way, not the beast way”; however, Zach seems more partial to the beast way. Zach attacks Vincent and then makes an unnecessary bombastic proclamation of his plans to kill Cat. Correct me if I am wrong, but wouldn’t the plans of these beasts of the week be more effective if they didn’t PRE-ANNOUNCE THEM?!

At the REUNION OF ILL-FATED MASCOTS AND BEAST GIRLFRIEND TUG WARS, Cat is complains about the current state of her life, as one usually does after 10 years of graduating high school. Of course the usual complaints are more along the lines of “I don’t like my job” and not “Beasts rule my life”. Vincent shows up and to take Cat to safety before Zach can find her. Gabe wants to be the one to get her out because… he is superstrong and can fight of a beast… oh wait… NOT REALLY. Gabe and Vincent get into a literal tug war over poor Cat. Finally Cat stays with Vincent.

Vincent says he is “sorry” for ruining her night [read life] and she tells him it is not his fault. He encourages her to speak because he notices she is upset. Finally Cat admits she was looking forward to this reunion, but she feels silly making a big deal about it when Vincent has to face much bigger issues. He looks at her pained and it is very emotional. Cue SLOW SONG and I so wish they had started dancing! But they had a murderous beast to handle. I understand why a dance was out of the question, but I really thought it fitted the concept of the episode [more on that later].

It’s not a good day to be a [slightly creepy] geeky mascot. Especially with ABC Family beasts roaming around. Basically Zach kills the mascot dude and puts on his bear costume… [who didn’t see that one coming?] Zach grabs Cat, Vincent attacks him, Westchester’s class of 2003 flees the scene. Zach breaks free of Vincent and goes for the beauty-kill but just before he reaches Cat Vincent jumps him and breaks his neck. And… I actually thought this fight scene had meaning and a purpose [unlike Gabriella]. This beast execution was different. Vincent cared about this particular beast. He didn’t kill him because he was a mission. In fact he didn’t want to kill him. He killed him to save Cat and that’s significant.

I liked what the resolution implied, but I was once again disappointed with the “guest story” of the week. I LOVED the idea of Vincent reconnecting with someone from his unit. However, I DID NOT like how they handled the character. Zach’s motivations kept changing and it ended up being all about HIS jealous vendetta instead of dealing with their shared past. Another complaint I have about this season is that they introduced several interesting characters as guests and kept them around for only one episode. Not enough to develop a compelling storyline. I think they would have worked much better if they had 2-ep arcs for them.

BACK TO THE EPISODE. After the beast attack, Beth approaches Gabe and Tess to ask about Zach and why he was after Catherine. Gabe tells her he was probably PTSD, which we all know is code for code yellow. Tess finishes it up by giving Beth her best “go away high school girl friend; I am the new BFF in town, all right?” Beth is all “you are so obviously lying, but I am apparently the worst reporter ever so I am just going to stop pushing and go” END OF THE BETH’s ARC [for now].

Again, I had SUCH HIGH HOPES for the character of Beth! I thought introducing a reporter was a great idea. The whole scenario immediately reminded me of Moonlight  for some reason [maybe because her name was “Beth” lol]. There was potential for so much! She could have started digging, find information, come across Cat’s “saved by beast” article, question her, get in trouble, etc etc. I was very disappointed when she turned out to be just another one ep unrealized guest. OK… she came back, but not soon enough [and not for long]. She could have been the Will Tippin of BatB!

Vincent approaches Cat and gets all doctorly trying to make sure Cat doesn’t have a concussion or anything. It is terribly sweet. To make it even sweeter, Vincent acknowledges all the sacrifices Cat has made for him and promises he will make it up to her once his “missions are over”. She thanks him for saving her life and he says having her in his life is preventing him from a beast downfall… Aw… They have to “save each other”. Still holds true. They kiss and it is adorable; but damn… I think having ABCFamily guests messed up with the musical scoring team, because the song at the end sounds like something out of the final act of a Disney movie [not in a good way]! They decide it’s better if V leaves the premises of the recent beast attack. He runs into Gabe in the hallway and they have a brief standoff and it is kinda hot. Not TRAIN SCENE hot, but still…

Gabe approaches Cat and tries to sweet talk her. I still think she is oblivious to his feelings but seems like he has managed to earn her trust… which I still don’t get. I mean… he KIDNAPPED HER! I am sorry, but I wouldn’t trust someone who locked me inside BEASTON ABBEY’S tower prison. No matter what! Cat shows Gabe some pictures from her high school days. She finds a picture from her graduation and notices Daddy Bob in the background. Conclusion DADDY BOB IS HER BIO FATHER! Mmm OK, that was a lame way to do that particular reveal. But whatever END OF EPISODE. I have another minor complaint. I would have inverted the order of the last two scenes (Gabe first, Vincent later). In fact we didn’t need Gabe; Cat could have shown the pictures to Vincent and come to the same conclusion.

Now for the major episode complaint… And this might be JUST ME. I thought I was going to LOVE this episode. Overall, I thought it was an OK episode. Not one of my favorites, not terrible either. However, I didn’t think this was a particularly good episode as far as “reunion” eps go. Maybe other viewers didn’t want this, but I was personally expecting a “classic” reunion episode. It may be silly but I was waiting for all the cliché scenes: the confrontation with the mean girls, Cat showing up at the party with her hot boyfriend; or alternatively, Cat meeting her high school sweetheart and then Vincent showing up and getting jealous. And yes… I wanted them to dance to the tune of a corny slow song from 10 years ago! I know, I know it sounds TERRIBLY corny and cliché but it didn’t have to be. The entire “reunion” sequence on the Veronica Mars Movie was full of clichés [with a twist] yet it was awesome and true to the show at the same time [if you've never seen the show/movie watch THIS CLIP to see what I mean]. As I said, I may be completely alone in this … but felt like I needed to share and I am curious to know if anyone else would have liked that type of ep.

And that’s it for now. Till next week. Make sure to share this on all your social media platforms and feel free to rant in the comments section!

"Tell the truth... you've been sitting there since graduation,
haven't you?"
Raise your hand if you wanted a scene like that to happen

QUOTES

Cat: Girls only, no beasts

Tess: Is that how you win friends and influence people?

JT: You gotta talk faster

Tess: Go, have a life. Get your Ashanti on. 

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