Reasons to love, love, love Gossip Girl.

Gossip Girl, a television show centred around really rich, really privileged, really beautiful New York teens. A show that glorifies underage drinking, sex, drugs, rudeness, manipulation, and all around debauchery. It's been called scandalous, raunchy, irreverent and terrible. But I actually, really, really love it. And for all the reasons listed above.

Gossip Girl is in many ways, an ongoing morality play of how not to be, regardless of whether or not you've got oodles of money. It tells it's tale with style and pizazz, it makes you cringe, it's like McDonald's...so bad, it's good.

It's set in New York: For anyone who's been to the Big Apple they know that there is something, well, to be horribly cheesy, magical about it. You can't help but feel you are in "the big city". And it's an awesome feeling. New York is fashionable, sociable, dramatic, mature and artistic all at once. And yet it's hardcore. And yes, it's even hardcore when playing a role in a teenage soap opera. GG is only heightened by having The Big Apple as it's backdrop, and as the city that never sleeps, it makes sense as to why these rich teenagers are running amok all hours of the night. (It just wouldn't make as much sense if say the show was based in, oh I don't know...some random place like Nebraska, or Wisconsin.)

The Clothes: Please allow me to revert to a raging hormonal 15 year old or an editor for Vogue and gush about the unbelievable awesomness of the clothes on this show. Main characters Serena and Blair are on polar opposites of the fashion forum, with Serena living up to the blond-bombshell/whimsical updated hippie girl, and Blair as a modern day Audrey Hepburn (in clothes only). Always perfectly accessorized, from head to toe, the characters on this show are a constant stream of high fashion and it makes me kind of drool. Even Jenny, with her rock chic look is envy inducing (the multitude of leather biker jackets makes me contemplate grand theft.) The men are equally as fashionable, with the character of Chuck going back and forth between GQ sexy and Perez Hilton questionable, yet funky looks (there was the grey suit with the red, leather shoes, weird. But I kind of liked it.) Fashion is as important to Gossip Girl as the Big Apple is. It's trend setting. It's like, a walking, talking issue of Vogue. Horribly superficial? Yes. But oh, so pretty.

Chuck and Blair: These two are conniving, manipulative and totally in love. And I love it. The banter and the chemistry these characters and the actors who play them (Ed Westwick and Leighten Meester) have is incredible and a little out of this World. Both characters have grown exponentially in the past two and a half years. Both have transformed, from icky, cringe inducing horrors to actual 'people' with brains and hearts. The evolution of their relationship together and how it's been maintained on the series is lovely, yeah that's right, I said it's lovely. Yes, they're still Chuck and Blair but now, more often than not their shenanigans and evil-doings are for the good of their friends, (if not themselves at times, but not always.) Improvement? I think so.

Despite the fact that the characters are all so rich, they're so bloody miserable: It makes you feel better about yourself. Sure I'm not as slim as Blair, I don't have long flowing hair like Serena or Jenny, and I don't get to rock Louboutin's, Prada and Versace every day. But at least my friends aren't a bunch of over-sexed megalomaniacs.

The Music: They have awesome music that plays on this show. From Just Jack, to Jay-Z and Alicia Keys ("Empire state of Mind", one of the best songs ever), Anya Marina's cover of T.I.'s "Whatever you like", Lady Gaga who is as ubiquitous as dirt, the Plasticines (a French Female Punk Rock Quartet - awesome) to name a few. If you could take out all the talking and listen to a soundtrack of the show you'd be just as entertained.

Characterization: The characters are so perfectly suited to what this shows about it's scary. And though there's been a lot of criticism about whether or not teenagers are really anything like this, allow me to tell you, that in fact, some really, really are. I went to a high school full of rich kids (I myself not being one). Privileged, hormonal mini-adults are a scary bunch. They want for nothing and are therefore not afraid of much. They push the boundaries of what is safe, what is morally right, all while trying to maintain a mask of innocence and high achievement. They get good grades, study hard, and then drink themselves into oblivion. They have sex in the back of trucks, pool houses, perhaps on the auditorium stage while in the middle of drama class because they're teachers stepped out for ten minutes and given the class free time to work in groups (true story, this guy I'll call R and this girl I'll call Z, grade nine, my child-like sensibilities and belief in human decency quickly dissipated, and yes, all because of the rich kids. They don' tried to corrupt me.) The characters of Gossip Girl are based on real statistics, yes it's a little scary. But it makes for some highly entertaining television. The Serena's, Chucks, Blairs and Nate's of the World really do exist. And are every bit as conniving and manipulative as those we see being portrayed to a tee on TV. And let me just say, the actors on GG, are actually good actors. Yes it's over the top, but if Perez Hilton has showed us nothing these past four years, he's shown us that, over the top, wild and outrageous is just how the other half likes it.

The Writing: Yeah, I know what you're thinking, how can someone who claims to be a writer actually state that the writing in this show makes it worth watching? Well, it's like this, *little story here* Once I was watching Ebert and Roeper at the movies, and they were discussing the Rock's film Walking Tall, and Roger Ebert gave it a positive review, while Roeper looked on with a glazed look of incredulity. But Ebert put it something like this (I'm paraphrasing) "Some films are not meant to be Academy Award winning films, some films are just popcorn, but some popcorn is better than other." (Sure I may have slightly ripped off George Orwell there will a little paraphrasing a la Animal Farm, but you get the point.) But for those of you who may not, let me say this, Gossip Girl does not expect to win Emmy's and Golden Globes. It doesn't take itself seriously, and that's written into the scripts. It's easy to write drama, or in this case Melodrama, masterpiece theatre kind of work has been around for years. What's hard though is to be witty. Wit, sarcasm, and innuendo are not easy to come by, not in a good way at least. And Gossip Girl achieves that. The character of Blair Waldorf has had some amazing quotes, in season two I remember this gem, "Curse that Mother-Chucker." Which was either followed by or preempted with "Damn that Chuck Bass-tard." The last episode that aired recently had us reaping this beauty off Ms. Waldorf "I'm not a huge advocate of the downtrodden but I am a fan of not stepping on them when I'm at John Derian. If you turn these into lofts then where are they going to live?" From Episode 12, season 3. This is a show that doesn't take itself seriously. The writers know that they're catering to young teenage girls, fashion-obsessed women and me. Who is basically all of the aforementioned. The writing is brilliant because of that. It's not easy to be tongue in cheek without over-stepping certain boundaries (believe me I know this.) But they manage a perfect blend of melo-drama and witty banter. And they use big words. I appreciate that. I myself am prone to using large words while I pontificate at the masses. It's good to know other writers engage in that kind of pretension as well.

There are bound to be lot's of people who think I'm crazy for writing this all together positive review of Gossip Girl but honestly, sometimes I exhaust myself with my own intellect and every now and then I just need mind-numbingly simple entertainment, that is both parts pretty and well written, and you know what? Gossip Girl provides.