The Smarm Before The Storm

It has been a while, hasn't it? I hope things will be a little more frequent from now, but I am making no promises because I inevitably jinx myself into breaking them when I do.


Skins 1x01 - "Tony"

Episode grade: C+


So, Skins! From the makers of Shameless (which I love, a lot), plus one episode, I think, by Simon Amstell (who I love, a lot). And I think some other people, who I am less acquainted with. Ways in which it is similar to Shameless; people will tell you it is nothing like real life, and that these characters are total caricatures. And in a sense, they're right, I think. Because while I firmly believe that there are real people out there in the world who are every bit as fucked up as Cassie, and Frank Gallagher, and everyone else; it's exceedingly unlikely that you'd find this large a group of them in the same place at the same time. If they hail from outside your sphere of experience, these people will, obviously, be totally alien to you, and if you need to tell yourself that no one is really like that to feel comfortable with yourself, that's OK. You're probably wrong, but let's just pretend.

Ways in which it is not similar to Shameless; most of these people talk in accents not dissimilar from my own, and so I generally know what the hell they are talking about most all of the time. Where Shameless is about family life, and the wonderful and fucked up things that members of a family do to each other, and themselves, and everyone around them, Skins is about teenage life, and the wonderful and fucked up things that teenagers do to each other, and themselves, and everyone around them. Which is really another way that they are similar. Which is not a knock, because replace the variables with whatever, and that's what all stories are about; people, and the way people relate to each other. The people might never eat anything and say "Wow" a whole lot, they might be exceedingly remniscent of Ozzy Osbourne in every damn way, they might have giant prosphetic penises all over their face. They're still people. Shall we begin?

Opening credits! So jolly and full of life! There's this jaunty tune, and we see flashes of all the characters (am I supposed to refer to them as "the skins" or what? I can never quite decide. Naw, that sounds lame, let's just go with "the kids". Because hey, I'm pretty sure every single one of the eight main characters is played by someone younger than me, which is really pretty odd right now) and it ends in these five plinked glockenspiel notes that just put me in a great damn mood like you would not believe. I love Cassie, and Sid, and Jal, and maybe even Tony eventually, but mostly I love those five glockenspiel plinks.

Every episode is named for the character it focuses on (which may have been a totally unofficial fan-invented thing, the wikipedians are having a big furore about this, of course, but either way it works for me); this one is called Tony, so we'll start with him. He's in his double bed, the bedcovers have a headless naked man and a headless naked woman lying side by side so that two people in that bed could take the place of the heads like those things in carnivals where you stick your head through the hole and people throw sponges at you. I could say something trite like "That tells you everything you need to know about Tony", but really, nothing tells you everything you need to know about Tony, because you don't want to know about Tony.

But if you insist, it starts like this; Tony gets out of bed, flicks on a song that I believe is by someone named "Chingy" and is called "Right Thurr", and starts doing some stretches, lifting some weights, admiring himself in the mirror. According to his myspace, Tony's favourite philosopher is David Hume, his favourite medieval king is Charlemagne and his favourite Primal Scream album is Vanishing Point. That tells you... something else you now know about Tony. He's also played by the kid from About A Boy, to which I'm sure I'd make well-placed amusing references if I could distinguish the plot of any Hugh Grant film I've seen from any other in my mind. Outside, a teenage girl walks by, dressed like I'm sure no parent would want to see their teenage daughter dressed (Well, Stella probably wouldn't care. You know what I mean.), and mascara spiders around her eyes. This is Tony's sister, Effy, and we've got a long time to wait before we get to know anything about her. Tony's watch sounds an alarm, which he takes as a cue to go to his window and watch his neighbour getting changed. Down outside, Effy rolls her eyes at this and, after a little irritated gesticulating, manages to attract Tony's attention her way. He nods, cranks up the volume on his iPod (TWAT!) to max, and gives Effy the 'OK' sign. Defying the whole "opposites attract" thing, this obnoxiously loud music draws Tony's dad into the room. Tony's dad is played by Harry Enfield, and so right away you know he's going to be every bit as loud and obnoxious as Tony is smug, and by that I mean a mighty shitload. I said earlier that maybe they're not caricatures, but I was only talking about the kids when I said that; most of their parents are wholly and deliberately massive caricatures (and played by fairly recognisable comedians, which is a decidely interesting approach. Whether or not it works in another matter entirely, but it's certainly interesting). While Tony pretends that the volume control on his iPod is busted, Effy sneaks into her room to pretend she's been there all night, and Harry Enfield yells and yells, and the only particularly significant part of what he is yelling, lost among the torrent of expletives if you're not paying close attention, is "EVERY FUCKING MORNING!". But that's not going to be significant until a long, long time later, by which time you'll have long forgotten it even if you were playing close attention, so it's really just yelling, yelling yelling. Shut up forever, Harry Enfield.

Later, in case you didn't already get the dynamics of the family from that little snippet, Tony sits in the toilet reading some Sartre, while Harry Enfield is trying to get in there. Harry Enfield swears at him, Tony quietly climbs out the window, shimmies down the drainpipe and, after a sly smile at the neighbour he was watching earlier, walks back into his house through the front door. Tony and his mother, Andrea, have a boring conversation about breakfast, Harry Enfield comes down, still swearing at Tony, and stares accusingly when he realises Tony is not actually in the bathroom. Tony smugly claims that the lock is broken, and in future, I'm not going to bother with the adverb, because 'smugly' is how Tony does every damn thing in his life. Harry Enfield swings at being down with the kids and misses completely by saying "You take me for a right James Blunt, don't you." Quite aside from the try-hard nature of it all, it appears to be wildly out of the only character he's displayed thus far for him to not just go ahead and say 'cunt' anyway. Andrea asks Harry Enfield if he must swear all the time, Harry Enfield responds by saying "Bollocking fucking shit" or whatever, and man, I do not know how I ever made it through the start of this episode without foreknowledge that it will get better later. Beyond the obvious fact that it really couldn't get much worse, I mean.

Tony finally leaves his stupid house, not that things are going to improve any right away, because now we get a horrendously overlong sequence of Tony calling up all his friends and being an unbearable little shit for hours on end. Look, I can see how pilot episodes are probably hard to make; introducing all your characters and themes and telling a coherent and interesting story and all, it's a lot to fit in, sure, but there have got to be better ways to go about it than this.

First on Tony's call list is Sid, who has dirty plates and clothes scattered around his room and moans and refuses to wake up yet when his phone goes off. Sid always wears a pair of emo specs and a beanie hat, and... is by far the character I can relate to the most in this show (though not because of those things), which is maybe why I thought this episode ought to have been called "Sid". But this recap is, superficially, at least, not actually about me, so let's move on. Tony tells Sid's voicemail that he is "a lazy turd" and that they have plans "concerning [Sid's] cock". Oh, how risqué. Tony's second call, to Chris, also just gets voicemail, so he tries Jal, who actually answers despite being in the middle of clarinet practice. He tells her to go to Sid's house and wake him up, she objects on the grounds that he lives half a mile away, Tony cuts her off because he has another call coming through. It's his girlfiend, Michelle, or 'Nips', as he calls her. Because, he tells her, "I've seen a lot of nipples in my time and believe me, yours are hilarious". And also, he's "nominated" her to "help out" with the epic quest to pop Sid's cherry. The number of times so far I've wanted to punch Tony is reaching double figures. The number of minutes elapsed in the episode is not. That is not a good score.

And then Chris calls him, and Chris is too busy having sex with an ex of Tony's to go wake Sid up, or I think that is what they said. I'm kind of running on autopilot for now. Leave a message. Right, somehow Tony accidentally tells Jal instead of Chris that Sid needs to get laid before he turns eighteen or he can't be Tony's friend any more. And Michelle agrees to help Sid out. Tony calls Anwar, who is a Muslim, and in the middle of prayers when he gets the call. Tony calls Sid's dad and tells him Sid has an exam that morning so he'll yell at Sid and wake him up, Anwar bitches at Tony for making his uncle want to stone him to death and says he can't help out with Sid's virginity because he's going with Chris to Maxxie's big gay night out, on the extremely fuzzy logic that there'll be plenty of horny women there with no one else to turn to. Maxxie gives Tony much the same story, except that, being the gay one, he's less with the 'horny, desperate women' and more with the 'taking the lads on a journey of discovery'. And tap dancing. I mean, that he is tap dancing right now, not that he wants to take the lads on a journey of discovery and tap dancing, though I'm sure that would be tremendously fun. Maxxie is quite astoundingly pretty, I must say. Tony gets back to Sid, who's got bored and started masturbating in the interim. I'm possibly wishing I hadn't made that confession regarding my ability to relate to him earlier, but apparently not enough to go back and erase it. Tony tells him to meet in the café and also that "Tonight, Mr. Happy is getting the keys to the furry city." Sid actually relays this message, verbatim and aloud, to his penis. I know this show is not overly concerned with maintaining realism, but that really is just fucking stupid. And if you've made it this far, reward yourself with a refreshing beverage of your choice, you deserve it.

You know why I hadn't given up by this point, originally? Those glockenspiel plinks. It's got to be. Hold on while I rewind, I need a refresher. Plink plink plink, plink, plink! Ah yeah. Anyway, Sid meets Tony in the café as per instructions, and apologises, saying he's "crap in the mornings". Tony tells him he's always crap, "no exercise, rubbish food and too much caffeine." Sid good naturedly tells him to fuck off, and confirms that the test Tony told Sid's dad about was just a ruse to get him out of bed, adding "Fucker." He sighs and tells Tony "This better be good", Tony grins. "Trust me, Sid. Tonight, we go to a party, and you finally pop the cherry. You finally get the V.I.P. tour of Netherland, You finally..." Sid tells him to fuck off, again, "...Not 'finally'." Tony glares and tells him "It's embarrassing", Sid objects that it's perfectly normal for "someone of 16" (in case you were wondering on the ages), Tony flatly repeats "It's embarrassing," and Sid, embarrassed, says "...Shit. Alright, how?" How do you not hate Tony, really. I mean, further in it becomes pretty clear that that is what we are meant to do, so, why this opening? Who thought it would be good idea to take the least likeable character they have created, the least likeable character anyone has created, and spend the first ten minutes of the first episode on nothing but the smug bastard talking, talking, talking? I don't get it. I am confused and alienated. Tony's Mensa-worthy plan is "Get a girl catastrophically spliffed up, and in her confused state, she comes to believe, however momentarily, that you are attractive enough to shag." And here is another that bugs me; maybe (in fact, probably) it's a regional thing and they're perfectly correct, but I've always been given to understand that the word 'spliff' refers to a, shall we say, enhanced cigarette, rather than the substance contained therein, as it is constantly used on this show. Whether this is a writer error or not, it's still annoying to me, because I am frightened of change.

Anyway! Sid, baked bean juice dribbling down his chin, asks which lucky lady has been selected for this thankless task, Tony is deliberately elusive and just says "I think you're going to like this", and Sid sees Michelle walking towards the café outside and immediately jumps to the conclusion and/or dares to hope that she's the one, because Sid is desperately in love with Michelle. That's a plot point. Make a note. So, Sid starts gushing praise at Tony for this, Tony attempts to correct him, but, despite being Tony, cannot get a word in edgewise, so he settles for the old "picture paints a thousand words" adage and starts making out with Michelle right there. Sid watches them and grimaces for a while and then, after a few minutes in which they show no signs of coming up for air, interrupts with "Are we getting me laid, or shall I just start filming and take it back for private time?" Woah woah! Ha! Tony acknowledges this display of wit by actually showing something other than disdain for his supposed 'friend', and asks Michelle "Who's stupid enough to fuck Sid?" Michelle suggests Cassie, Sid nixes this because "She's still in hospital", but Michelle tells him that they've let her out, "She's just not allowed near knives." Sid eventually shrugs "She'll do," Michelle tries to talk a little more enthusiasm into him by reporting that "Cassie's great in the sack. As long as she's not hungry." So, in case you hadn't noticed, Cassie is A BIT OFF, MENTALLY SPEAKING. I know it's subtle, but there are a few hints if you know where to look. Christ, and this is before we've even met her. Anyway, Sid wants to know who says Cassie is good in bed, Michelle and Tony, in unison, say "Everyone." Come on though, Sid would not ask that, Sid would assume Michelle was talking from personal experiences and keep that mental image around for later use. I'm just sayin'. Tony announces that they'll need "a lot of drugs" and gives Sid the address of his dealer, since he has "choir practice" and "tai chi" and thus no free time to get them himself. This is not actually a lie, shockingly. Now, no one who had met Cassie would actually be under the impression that you'd need a particularly sizable quantity of 'spliff' to get her into a confused state, but of course Tony is going to want plenty for himself, and be thoroughly willing to take advantage of Sid to affect that outcome. OK. Also, the dealer is called "Mad Twatter", which Sid skeptically asks Tony about, but he's too busy being fondled to pay attention to Sid any more, so Sid rolls his eyes and leaves.

And now, Tony sings. He's in this posh all-girls school for his choir practice, and they're all pointing and giggling at the sight of him. He has a beautiful singing voice, of course, and that has a power. A power to make all the two dimensional adults of the world of Skins say things like "Oooh, he's such a lovely boy" and blind them to the true horror of Tony. The sound he makes is graceful, wonderful, but when Tony is singing, that is when he is at his absolute worst. When he is at his most smug, most certain that he is better than everybody else in the world, and that he knows exactly how to get anything he wants out of any of them. OK, maybe I can kind of see where they're coming from on this; the bigger they are, the harder they fall and all that, but even knowing the fall is coming (Which is not a spoiler, because no one creates a character as hideous as Tony without the intention of giving them a comeuppance somewhere down the line. If you hated the world that much, you just wouldn't stick around long enough to write that story.) doesn't make this opening any less unpleasant to watch. I don't like Tony, by the way, in case you were wondering. While Tony's singing is going on, we get to watch Sid flicking through all the hundreds of pictures of Michelle he has saved on his phone, in case you hadn't yet picked up on the fact that he has a thing for her. There's at least a bit of humour injected into it by the old guy on the seat behind him looking at the pictures over Sid's shoulder and smiling contentedly to himself. Relatively speaking, anyway.

Tony finishes up, the teacher accompanying him on piano, looking quite flustered, tells him "That was lovely, Anthony," (YOU SEE?!) "I'm sure we'd love to have you in the chamber choir." The girls all titter, because they would indeed, a particularly vapid example of them strays from the pack to tell him "My fruhnds think you're reahlly cool, yah?" Tony has a little trouble translating from Posh to English, so she has to repeat "fruhnds" before he gets it. This is Abigail, who blinks far too much, and if you pause any frame in which she appears, you will see more teeth than you can count, for which I must give kudos to Georgina Moffat because that level of commitment to your acting has got to be actually physically painful. She asks Tony if he's still coming to her pahteh tonight, "it would be so safe if you did" and bleats about her parents being away on holiday and whatever, "so we're going to go absolutely wiuhld on drum and bass." She adds "After 8:30, because Miriam has to get back from her cello recital. And bring some fruhnds." Tony amiably says it sounds great fun, and he will, and his phone takes this opportune moment to start ringing, giving him an excuse to get out of there. It's Michelle, and apparently she hasn't yet persuaded Cassie to come along. Tony tells her to hurry it along, and then says "Alright, safe, I'm going to psychology and then I'll come jump you, yeah?" And as he says this, he walks past a doddering old professor, who is duly outraged and asks Tony what his business is here. Tony says he's here for an interview, Dr. Dodder refuses to accept this on the grounds that it is an all girls school, Tony clarifies that the chamber choir are looking for male parts (*snicker*), and addresses Dr. Dodder as "man", which gets his gander up even further. "My name is Mr. Griffiths and I'm the head of French here and addressed as sir! Do they even teach you French in that technical college you attend?" (The words "technical college" said with the appropriate sneer). Tony says they do, and he addresses his teacher as "Pierre", and all the girls snigger and Our Hero gets one up on the crusty old stupidhead grown-up, who actually literally calls Tony a "common little oik" at this point. Yeah, I've always felt that edgy teen "sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll" dramas need more plotlines ripped from Dennis The Menace.

Outside, he calls up Sid to ask if he's found Mad Twatter's residence yet; Sid is opposite a house with a car parked outside with the number plate "MD TW4T", so it's probably safe to assume he has. Sid has a little trepidation about going in, Tony rolls his eyes and tells him to get on with it. Sid steels himself and knocks on the door, at which point his phone rings again. He tells Tony to fuck off already, as a woman in lingerie answers the door and asks if he's her 2:30. So, of course, it's actually his mother on the phone. The prostitute at the door hurries him inside because "the neighbours are right bitchy with the digital cameras", Sid hurriedly tells his mum he'll call back later and hangs up. The prostitute shouts "Alicia! Little geek guy here, is he yours?" up the stairs, and another comes down. Sid, looking more confused than usual, says "hi", Alicia says "You're here for my accidental threesome, yeah?"

Back to Tony, a scruffy looking Welsh guy in the street tries to sell him a Big Issue, Tony amiably replies "Get a fucking job, Kenny" and then asks how his holiday was. Kenny tells him it was crap, "Four star means nothing these days" and then goes straight back to attempting to sell his magazines to passersby. Tony continues on towards the gang, sans Sid and Michelle. Jal says "Here he comes, cock of the year" and Maxxie wonders who's going to tell him they won't be able to attend Abigail's wiuhld pahteh. The others shush him as Tony gets closer, and Anwar asks what he was doing in the posh birds' school, Tony answers "Broadening my horizons", Chris refutes this, saying "those girls do not do fickety-fick with town scum like you", Tony jokes that maybe that has been Chris's experience, but "I say this world extends way beyond this little field of dreams we're dancing in, and I want to see that world." Jal and Anwar grin, Chris gives an awesome look of confusion and asks what the fuck he's talking about. Jal explains that he's quoting, "It's a literary reference," Chris says "What, you mean like Shakespeare and shit?", Jal tells him it's actually from the show that launched a thousand recaps, Dawson's Creek (which my dad has apparently got into lately, hilariously enough. Well, it is to me.) Chris says "Whatever, I don't know what that is" then immediately contradicts this by ranting about how they're all braindead if they can't think of better things to entertain themselves with than TV. Jal asks for suggestions, Chris considers for a while and comes up with "pills." Jal asks is that's all, Chris says "No!" and then pauses for a while before coming up with "shagging". Tony smirks "Cultural", and Jal nods her agreement with a sarcastic "Oh yeah". Hee. I actually really like this scene, all the bantering feels way more natural than anything else has so far, and I can actually see reasons why these people would be friends with Tony here. Jal teases Chris, saying he won't get anywhere with option #2 with the minute size of his penis. Everyone laughs, Anwar tells him he shouldn't have got it out, Chris complains "It was strip poker for fuck's sake, what did you want me to do?", Anwar points out that he wasn't even playing. Chris calls them all a bunch of pussies, which I'd say pretty effectively tells the story of what went on that night without actually, y'know, telling the story, which is pretty deft. "Anyway, enough of that," Chris continues, "We've got to get going, cuz we've got psychology, and we don't want to miss Angie, now do we?" Hey, is that a plot point introduced with something resembling subtlety too? Awesome! As they're getting up, Tony verifies that they are all coming to the pahteh, Maxxie (this is the first thing he's said since Tony got there, you'll note) reminds him about the big gay night out. Tony tries to persuade them with the allure of large quantities of spliff, but Chris tells him they're not in any great need of it, "the town's awash, it's like someone planted up Lithuania or something". Tony swears, because that means the ounce Sid is currently getting hold of will be way more than they need, and tries to call him. But, of course, Sid turned his phone off when his mum called, so Tony can't get through, and now the inevitable wacky hijinks will ensue.

House Of Twat, the prostitute that isn't Alicia sings "Stickwitu" to herself and paints her toenails, then looks at her watch and tells Sid "I've got to walk in on 'em by mistake now. D'you wanna coke or summin'?" Heh. Sid looks exceedingly uncomfortable, of course, and nervously asks if she thinks he'll be long. She says "Not once I burst in all flummoxed up, he won't", Sid clarifies that he meant Mad, and then asks if that's his real name. With a large air of forboding, she says "Oh yeah", and Sid fidgets nervously for a while and stands up, saying he'll come back later, but the prostitute pushes him back down and assures him it'll be fine, "Just don't stare. He doesn't like people staring. He's sensitive, y'know? Just don't stare at it." Sid nods in agreement, then realises what she said and asks what 'it' is, but she's already gone upstairs to yell "Hello? I've unexpectedly come home by accident!"

College, Tony leaves Sid a message to tell him the plan is aborted because nobody is coming to the pahteh, and to tell him to pick up his messages, and that he is an "absolute and utter lower colon". He snaps his phone shut and sighs. Cut across to Sid's phone, jiggling about in his shaking hands, while quite unreasonably loud moans come from upstairs. Sid says "Fuck this" to himself and gets up to leave, again, but there's a short scouser with an utterly ludicrous handlebar moustache standing in the doorway. Sid stares at him, he threateningly asks Sid if he's staring, Sid continues to stare and say he isn't, and then asks "so, you're Mad?" Mad confirms that he is indeed "Madison Twatter, PHD. You got a problem?" Sid assures him he doesn't have a problem (although personally, I am already thoroughly tired of his schtickzophrenia), and says "you're a doctor then?" Mad asks who said that, Sid reminds him of "the PHD thing", Mad says "Yeah, you could say that. You could say, um. Pretty. Huge. Dick." You certainly are! He heartilly laughs at his own joke then suddenly threateningly asks Sid which it is, "Doctor, or pretty huge dick?" Sid nervously suggests "Both?", to which Mad grins and tells Sid he likes him. Then, fuck it, I can't be bothered with detail any more. Mad continues to be an irritating psycho, Sid gets to the point; he wants an ounce of spliff, only "someone" said he could get it free now and pay later, which just sounds like an awful idea both ways, you nonce, Tony. Also, Mad grabs Sid's balls to check they exist, because they're his "collateral" if he fails to pay Mad back within 48 hours for the three ounces he gets thrust upon him. OK.

College. Jal reads out her essay, about the five stages of grief, and in the background, someone is crying. Once Jal finishes, we get to see who; it's their teacher, Angie. Now, I have repeatedly had to check imdb and wikipedia and all of them to convince myself that I don't actually recognise her from anything else, because she is seriously goddamn familiar, and I wish I knew why. Anyway, Chris cheerily says "No more sports science teachers, Angie. Eh, it doesn't matter how big his dick is...", at which point Jal interrupts to tell him to shut up, and then Angie, still crying, tells the class they're all so lovely, and their coursework deadline is next week, "If that's OK. It's important for my department's score." Everyone files out uncertainly, leaving her crying, Chris stays behind to offer to say the offending sports science teacher "touched [him] up in the shower", which Angie seems amenable to, but Jal drags Chris out of there before the conversation can proceed.

In the corridor, Sid finds Tony and asks if he managed to rope Cassie in. Tony says he did, but before Sid can enthuse too much about that, Tony also tells him he's a tit for not checking his messages. Sid gets out his phone and turns it on, it gives 'new message' beeps again and again and again. Sid stares for while and then looks at Tony and innocently deadpans "Problem?"

Meanwhile, Angie, with a pile of books in her hands, has finished crying and leans against the wall outside her classroom and sighs. Chris, who has apparently managed to get Jal off his tail somehow, approaches and asks if she's OK, then offers to carry the books for her. Angie, sounding kind of exhausted but not actually at all annoyed at this, tells him he may indeed carry her books, "but you don't have to do it every day, Chris." Chris grins and says "I do", and then grabs her phone, which has started ringing, from on top of the books and answers it. Angie tries to get him to stop, but with the books in her hands, it's ineffectual at best, so in the end she just lets him get on with it. I shall too, because this is fairly awesome: "Angie's phone. Look, stop ringing her, you wanker, or you'll have me to deal with. Yeah, Chris Miles here. Angie's friend. She's got a lot of friends, you know what I'm saying, you tosser? ...Right. Yeah, no, yeah, I'll have the coursework in by Thursday. Are you saying I can have an extension? Yeah. Yeah. ...And don't ring her again. Bellend." Angie can't help but smile, but then there's an awkward pause and she worries, "I'm not sure you're supposed to..." but then smiles and thanks him and hands him her books. He tells her "The pleasure was all mine", and starts to walk away, obviously knowing exactly where Angie needs the books taking without asking. She appreciatively watches his back as he goes for a while, then mentally slaps herself and follows.

Pahteh time! Oh man, finally. Chris and Angie are kind of cute, admittedly, but man it feels like it's taken forever to get here. Of course, you don't know when I started writing this recap; maybe it actually has. Tony and Sid approach, Sid wows at the size of Abigail's mansion, Tony tells him that this is the place, "And we have to sell an ounce of dope." Thank you for finally at least acknowledging that there might be words other than 'spliff' for it, even if that may actually be correct. Sid tries to tell him it's actually three ounces, but Tony is not going to let himself be interrupted right now; "What I reckon is, we tell 'em it's, like, I dunno, Mongolian hallucenogenic, right? There all so dim, they might just buy it." Sid tries again to tell Tony, this time he's interrupted by the arrival of Michelle and Cassie. Oh wow, Cassie. Cassie is, like, totally... wow. I believe the word 'spacy' (or is it 'spacey'? No, that's just Kevin, right?) was invented solely for her. Wow. I love her, I can't help it. She just... wow. Tony and Michelle proceed making out, and Sid looks a little disgusted, Cassie stares unblinkingly at Sid. Michelle eventually disengages to ask where everyone else is, Tony tells her they're not coming, "and Sid's got to sell or he's in shit with his dealer". Sid objects to the wording there; "MY dealer?!", Michelle hurriedly dissolves tension by presenting Cassie to them, in case Sid hadn't noticed her crazy staring. "Cassie, you remember Sid, right?" she asks. Cassie grins, "Yeah, wow, lovely. ...no. But, I like that you're funny-looking. It's cute, like, wow, man." Look, I understand perfectly if that bugs the crap out of you, I don't understand in the slightest why it doesn't do the same to me, honestly, but nonetheless, I just find Cassie absolutely adorable. Tony asks Cassie how her treatment's going, she says "Oh, it's cool. I wear a white dress, and now I can eat yoghurt, cup-a-soup aaaand hazelnuts now. I'm not sick if they let me play with cats. [I am not at all certain that sentence is right, but most of the actual words are wholly irrelevant, you know? She's like a Hybrid. She transcends language; I understand her in spite of the words, not because of them.] Yeah, it's like... hazy days, you know?" No one does. But Tony nods sagely and says "Well, that's encouraging" anyway, which is quite sweet of him even if he is being a sarcastic bastard. You may have picked this up a while ago, but I am going to get quite weird, recapping this show, and particularly Cassie. Episode two is her episode, so... I don't know. Just giving you a heads up. Like, wow.

Back to the show; Cassie is extremely touched by Tony's words, and tackle-hugs him. Actually, you know what, this is why I love Cassie; she is immune to the Power of Tony. Sincere, insincere, it doesn't make a blind bit of difference to her, and Tony does not understand this. He doesn't understand her, and without understanding, he doesn't have control, and I think Tony loves Cassie for this too. And the fact that we share this love of Cassie will heal the rift between us, and that's how I'll be able to not hate Tony, somewhere down the line, but like all good things, that will only come through waiting. Michelle finds this all very sweet until Cassie starts kissing Tony, at which she gently pulls her away and aims her at Sid instead, "Sid's going to be looking after you tonight." Cassie wows, of course, and then again when Tony tells her that Sid has a whole bag of drugs. "And I bet you won't even make me eat anything." Cassie has an eating disorder, OK, but next episode is called "Cassie", and that is the time to freak the fuck out about that. Sid looks to Tony and Michelle for guidance, because he's a little out of his depth, as ever, and manages to work out that "No" is the correct answer there. Cassie says "Thank you" and hugs him too, Sid awkwardly pats her on the back a little and Tony announces that it's time to go in and shift that ounce, at which point Sid finally manages to tell him it's actually three. Tony gives him a nice look of horror and disappointment.

Abigail opens the door and happily greets Tony, "And these must be your fruhnds". Michelle hilariously also cannot comprehend that word, but Tony introduces everyone to Abigail before there is time to dwell on that. Abigail announces that this is "super", Cassie says "Wow, you're lovely" and gives her the requisite tacklehug, Abigail declares this to be "super" also, though in a slightly more confused and frightened manner. I tell you what though, I could watch Cassie and Abigail just sitting in a room, calling everything "super" and "lovely" for hours on end. I can't tell you how awesome that would be. Cassie eagerly jumps up and down like a child asking "Where's the kitchen? I wanna see the kitchen!" Abigail hesitantly points her towards it and tells the others to come in, then suddenly stops them and says "Shoes! It's just that mummy had this carpet imported from Iran, and we have to be so, so cahfull with the pile." She grimaces a little at the holey socks that are revealed when Sid follows this instruction, but soldiers on and offers them some rum punch; "I'm afraid we're getting rather giggly on it, isn't that safe?" Tony agreeably says "Mmm, we love rum punch, don't we, 'Chelle?" Michelle gives him an "Are you fucking kidding me?" look but accepts the punch with a forced smile and a "Super!" (Hee!) on Tony's nudge.

Abigail leads them into the next room and introduces her fruhnds, "Sara, Josh, Sara, Maddie, Felicia [I think. It actually sounded like 'Blistia', but nobody has ever been called Blistia, I hope.], Hugo, Sebastian, Sara, Sam and Sara." It's an obvious joke, and on an unrelated note, either Hugo or Sebastian appears to be female, but goddammit, it's funny anyway. Also funny; Abigail asks Sid what his name was, again, and on being reminded, asks "Is that Polish or something?" Which is actually a cunning (as far as Abigail goes, anyway) segue into introducing Danuta, who is Polish, and I guess an exchange student or something. "She doesn't speak English," Abigail explains, "But you can just speak to her in French or Italian." While Sid looks a little bemused at this prospect, Abigail tells Danuta (in subtitled Italian) "This is Sid. He goes to a school where you don't even have to pay. Isn't that lovely?" Danuta laughs at the size of Sid's hands, and suggests that this indicates that he also has a small penis, which of course Abigail just translates to "She likes you." Tony brings the conversation to a point, at last, and asks Abigail if she and her friends would like "a little something." Abigail is confused, so Tony makes smoking gestures and says "You know, get a bit squiffy", and Abigail is all "Ohhh, yah, that would be so safe, you know." Sid breathes a sigh of relief, but then tenses right the hell up again when Abigail mentions that they can't smoke in the house, because "the silk wallpaper's just arrived from Rome, and mummy's awfully particular about odours, and we simply musn't or she'll go wiuhld". And then just to add insult to injury, they get to hear "This is M.C. Hugo on the decks, and we're going to have a tremendous time, yah? So let's shizzle on this dizzle, and pahteh dowwwwn!" Can't unhear that. The posh kids get their embarrasing-dad-at-a-wedding dances on, and after rolling her eyes at all this, Michelle decides to take off her coat and show them how it should be done, which Tony joins in with soon after. Sid watches Michelle and her short, clingy dress for a good long while, looking forlorn, then gets fed up of that and heads off to find Cassie.

Who is still in the kitchen, piling all the food tins into little symmetrical towers, because I guess she also has OCD. Sid says "Hi", Cassie says "Oh, hi! This is so so wicked! They've got such cool food. Look at it all. ...wow." Whew, that was a long time without a 'wow'. I was getting worried. Sid doesn't understand, at all, so he just lets her get on with it and vaguely mumbles "Cool..." when she finishes up and declares "I don't feel sick any more." She goes on to ask "Are you going to fuck me later?" by way of making small talk, Sid is rather taken aback that Michelle actually told her this part, but it's all wow cool lovely as far as Cassie is concerned. Sid decides not to pursue the matter right now and remembers that he has "all this fucking weed", and offers Cassie "a spliff". Hooray, familiar terminology! Cassie quietly tells him "You can't. It makes you hungry." Sid obliviously tells her he doesn't mind, Cassie stares at the floor sadly and says "I do." Sid, not knowing what the hell else to do, says "Sorry" and gives her an awkward peck on the cheek. Lucky for him, that is exactly the right thing to do, because the smile that Cassie smiles now, oh man. These two. Look, what I've got on my screen right now, they're both leaning against the kitchen counter, looking at each other and smiling shyly and I just want to take this picture and draw pink hearts around it. I want to write sappy awful fanfiction about them, and times like these, these recaps might veer dangerously close to doing so. I AM A CYNICAL AND JADED MAN AND SHOULD NOT BE HAVING THESE THOUGHTS. Nonetheless, I am typing the following sentences. What have you done to me, Skins?! OK, so Sid's got a clear Harry Potter thing going on with the glasses (and the hair, if he didn't hide it all the time), and Cassie is Luna Lovegood to the point that not getting Hannah Murray to play her in the last three films would be the biggest mistake those guys could possibly make (and man have they made a lot of those), and JK if those two are not together by the end of Book 7 I will hurt you. Yes, I realise they have already cast the part, and Hannah Murray is probably just a little too old anyway, and I'm sure Ms. Lynch will do an absolutely fine job. Some vestigial remnant of my point still stands. Possibly. There is probably also just a little vicarious living going on here because in addition to being a jaded, cynical man, I am also a sad and lonely emo kid.

Let's quickly move along. Big Gay Night Out! Which, as it turns out, not so big. There's precisely two blokes there, besides our kids. Maxxie looks so disappointed, aw. He tries to persuade Chris and Anwar that it's usually a lot better than this, but they're fairly doubtful. Chris starts to head off to find the pahteh, which Maxxie really isn't in the mood for, so Chris tells him "It's posh kids! All the boys are gay!" Heh. Anwar asks if the girls are gay too, Chris is like "Sure, why not?" and they all accept the fact that whoever is or is not gay, it will probably be more fun than they are having right now.

Five hours, four buses and two bottles of vodka later, they've found their way to Abigail's mansion, where, judging by the front garden, mummy is going to go absolutely wiuhld when she gets back. Inside, Chris pockets a few phones and wallets that have just been left on the table and shakes his head, declaring this "careless". Anwar sniffs at a not entirely empty champagne glass and then shrugs and downs it. They find their way to M.C. Hugo's Shizzled Dizzle room and Chris spots Tony, takes off his hat, scarf and shirt and yells "Changed our minds man, the monkey man's here!" And all the Big Gay Night Outers rush to embrace Tony and Michelle.

Outside, some idiot cameraman is standing behind a hedge, so we've just got audio right now. You'd think someone would've caught that before it went to broadcast. Fortunately, we don't really need visuals right now; There's springs rhythmically squeaking, and someone female is breathing heavily, peppered with occasional "wow"s. The cameraman finally finds his way to where he's supposed to be, and as I'm sure we all realised, Cassie is on a trampoline. I guess a minor error like that wasn't even worth correcting. Cassie falls down and just lies there, Sid, who is not letting the entirity of his three ounces go ununsed, even if no one else appears to want any, asks if she's OK. Cassie tells him to get up on the trampoline with him, "You've got to got to bounce, wooo!" Sid gives his joint an uncertain look, and then throws it away.

Inside, Chris grabs Abigail and starts dancing with her, she is horrified by his muddy shoes and cries "Take them off! Take them off!" which Chris misinterprets as a request for him to drop his shorts. One of the posh boys tries to pull Chris away, Tony lays him out with a pretty killer right hook. All the posh kids stand around looking horrified, and then Danuta lets out a hearty laugh declares that "at last, the real men have arrived!", pulls off her shirt and starts making out with Chris.

Outside, Sid is jumping on the trampoline while Cassie lies there, he stumbles and ends up straddling her to avoid actually falling on her. Cassie leans up and kisses him, but then says "It's no good though, is it Sid?" Sid asks "What is?" as a formality to hold up the pretence that this -logue is dia. Cassie explains "You fancy me," which Sid contemplates for a second and then agrees with, "But you really love Michelle." Sid lies back and laments the fact that it shows. Yeah, it always shows, and everybody sees it. And everybody except you always knows that everybody else knows too, Sid. You would too if you'd just admit it to yourself. But hey, if it's all a big secret, then maybe things'll be different when you finally find the time to tell her, which of course you never will, because you know damn well that she already knows and nothing will change except you won't be able to hold onto to this stupid false hope any more. Because maybe, this time, it's different, and she actually doesn't know and everything will change.

So, were where we? Right, Sid loves Michelle, and Cassie knows that Sid loves Michelle, and Michelle knows that Sid loves Michelle, which is all a great tragedy as far as Sid is concerned. Cassie continues to lay out the intricacies of this wildly precedented scenario; "[Michelle] says that Tony doesn't love her properly, but you do. And it's too fucked up because she like, totally loves him and just thinks you're sweet." Sid bemoans his sweetness, Cassie takes his hand and tries to assure him that everything will be fine, Sid asks what she'd do "if everything was just so fucked up, and you didn't know what to do?" "I'd stop eating until they took me to hospital," she answers, matter-of-factly. So hilarously delivered, and yet so very sad. And then she giggles and wows at how lovely the clouds are, and tells Sid he can fuck her now, if he wants, but he'll have to be quick, because she took a whole bunch of pills. And then she passes out. Sid shakes her and says "Oh, fuck", which is, of course, not a massively effective solution.

Inside, the kids are continuing to trash the place, Michelle is the first to see Sid carrying Cassie in, Tony declares that it's time to go, and they all gather their shoes and head outside, Danuta following. Chris grins and says "Good party," Sid asks if they could please hurry along "in case Cassie's, like, dying or something". Michelle says the city hospital has an all-night walk-in, "that's where I normally take her," Tony complains that that's miles away. Danuta makes kissy faces at Chris, Maxxie (Eyyyeaih, they've bloodied up his pretty face! Why couldn't it be Tony?) laughs "I think she likes you". Chris, in the loud, slow way of ignorant English speakers talking to foreigners everywhere, tells her "We have no bus or taxi. WE ARE STUCK." She smiles and dangles a set of keys, saying "Ve steal car, then make fook, English boy, yes?" Chris looks at the others and gives a hilarious nod; "Yes."

Cue Tony driving like an absolute loon while Chris and Danuta make out in the backseat and everyone else yells bloody murder at him. Tony panickingly tells the others to get Cassie inside quick, Anwar asks what they're supposed to tell the hospital. Tony says "I don't know, improvise. Go on! We've got to stash the car." At which point Cassie sits up and blinks groggily and giggles. "Oh, I had such a lovely dream. Wow." Tony rolls his eyes. Maxxie looks pissed at her too, even though his bloodied face had nothing to do with her passing out and, in fact, he probably would've ended up with worse if she hadn't. Maybe he's just annoyed at the world in general.

Tony stops the car alongside a lake or canal or something, Anwar goes running out to take a piss against a tree, Cassie leans out the window to watch the beauty of the world go by. Tony tells Sid to "get it out [Dirty!], we'll at least have a couple of spliffs before you're taken out and de-bollocked." Again with the familiar terminology. I swear all that nonsense earlier was part of the ongoing effort to drive me crazy in the first half of this episode. Which... I made a lengthy comparison involving Harry Potter characters a little while back; I think there is a lesson to be learned here, writers. Sid frets about the coming de-bollocking and sarcastically thanks Tony for his supportive words, Tony tells him to relax, because they'll find a way to sell it tomorrow. For he is Tony, and there is nothing he cannot do. Apropos of nothing, as ever, Cassie says "I like boats. They go places." Woah... deep, ma... Yeah, even I'm not going to try to defend that one. Tony notices that Anwar's been a while and asks if he's OK, Anwar tells him to shut up, because evidently he has shy bladder, and yells at everyone not to look. Even Cassie has enough grounding in reality to know that that is a signal for everyone in the car to immediately bore holes into Anwar's back with their eyes. Sid asks "Who's got skins?" (TITLE! Drink.) Tony roots around his coat pockets, but can't find them, and when Michelle groans that he's forgotten them, he jinxes the hell out of everybody by saying "We've had all our bad luck for today." Fucking IDIOT. Sid for some reason knows that Tony put the skins in his back pocket and gets him to turn around so Sid can fumble for them, and I may be overly enamoured of Sid + Cassie, but this is the very definition of HoYay. Frankly, that's the only explanation I can find for why Sid would ever consider this wanker to be his best friend. Anyway, in the midst of all this feeling around in back pockets, either Sid or Tony's elbow nudges the handbrake off, which in turn send the car careening into the canal. Ruh roh!

Anwar runs over to the edge and stands around looking ineffectualy worried, lots of bubbles surface, eventually followed by Michelle, then Cassie, then Sid, then Tony, then Maxxie. Thank God everybody's OK! Tony says "I think that could have gone a lot worse, don't you?". Sid laments the fact that he's lost all his dope, and ergo his balls as well, very soon. Cassie cheerily says "At least we've got our health! That's the important thing!"

Time for an iconic credits shot of everyone walking down the street in their soaking wet clothes, set to some indie-pop! Anwar appears to be as soaked as everybody else, oddly. I guess maybe he fell in trying to help them out? Why not. Also, every one of the boys is wearing more than one layer (except Anwar, who has a jumper tied around his waist), and not one of them has thought to give anything over to Michelle, who has got to be fucking freezing in that dress, so they are all jerks.

In the canal, Sid's bag o' dope floats to the surface. And, next morning, in her house, Tony's naked neighbour goes to her window, and looks a little upset that he is not there to watch her. In her bed, her husband complains that "anybody would think you wanted the neighbours to see you!" I guess they have this discussion every morning.

Tony's room. Tony and Sid lie in his bed, shirtless. Can't see if they are anything else-less. Tony' on the male side of his nude bed cover, Sid's on the female side. In case the dynamic of their relationship wasn't obvious already. Sid has a nagging doubt on his mind; "Chris and the Polish girl, they got out of the car at the hospital right?" Tony says "yeah", but does not sound remotely sure of himself. They both try to convince themselves that this is indeed the case. I don't mean to spoil anything, but... I don't remember if this "cliffhanger" is even mentioned in any future episode. And finally: "You still a virgin, then?" "Yep." Because it only counts if it's with a woman.