SERENA: y u mad? 

There’s a lot of stupidity and illogical arguments happening all over the Gossip Girl fandom right now. There’s so many things and opinions pissing me off right now, and I wanted to talk about the biggest thing that’s bothering me. It’s ridiculously long, but I’ve got a lot of time on my hands today (obviously) and felt like sharing.

edit: I wanted to put a little read more thing because it’s so long, but for whatever reason, it’s not working, or I’m not doing it right (help?). But I wanted to say this is NOT a hate post, I don’t hate Derena, or Derena shippers. Just my opinion.   

I cannot even believe people are ready to shoot Blair for what might happen with Dan…

-Serena slept with Nate, Blair’s boyfriend, because she was drunk. People will make the argument Blair and Nate weren’t really in love. They may not have been “in love” but Blair loved Nate and their relationship was meaningful. If you’re still not convinced, watch the pilot where Nate confesses to Blair and she’s destroyed. Blair kisses (note: does not have sex with) Dan (note: not Serena’s boyfriend) because she has feelings for him (note: not because she was drunk) and Serena flips a shit. 

-The whole “friends don’t date friends exes” doesn’t fly. Let me reiterate this fact: SERENA SLEPT WITH BLAIR’S BOYFRIEND. I suppose you could say that’s in the past, Serena was a different person then, blah blah blah. Even if I thought that changed anything (which, I don’t, by the way), Serena still seriously dated Nate in later seasons. And I’m sure you could say that was long after Nate and Blair had been together and they were over one another—but then that holds true for Serena and Dan. They broke up a long time ago and for a good reason.

-And the whole “but Serena wasn’t over Dan, she still had feelings for him” excuse fails, too. THAT’S BULLSHIT. It’s not a coincidence that Serena only had “feelings” for Dan after he starts becoming close with Blair. Serena can deny that she doesn’t need nor want the attention, but as soon as the spot lights taken off her, she has to get back into it. But I’ll get to that later. If Serena had real feelings for Dan, she wouldn’t have chosen Collin at the ballet. There wouldn’t have even been a choice to make. What she did to Dan in 4x8 was horrible. For me, this episode is the ULTIMATE Derena deal breaker. My heart absolutely breaks for Dan during that scene by the fountain, where he’s supposed to be her date, but when Collin shows up, she drops him like he’s nothing. Also: Nate, Gabriel, Tripp, Carter, Ben, and even Max. Not mentioning Aaron because she breaks up with him for Dan (but then the sibling stuff comes out). Also, just because she kisses Dan when she’s with Nate doesn’t mean that she has feelings—she was upset with her daddy issues, and Dan comforted her, and it just all felt so high school and so they kissed. If she had real feelings, she would have chose Dan.

-Can we just focus on WHY Serena and Dan didn’t work out? From the beginning, their problem was that Serena was not who Dan expected her to be, and he couldn’t accept that. Because of this, Serena felt like she had to hide who she really was from him. She lied to him constantly throughout season 1. Need proof? It’s starts in 1x2: Blair wants to tell Dan the truth about the Shepard wedding, and Serena desperately wants to keep it from him. She even gets mad at Nate for having been honest with Blair about what happened between them. Then it occurs all throughout season 1—Serena goes to any length to make it seem like she’s not the girl she used to be. 

-1x12: They get caught at the Constance pool partying, Serena’s the one who had the key to the pool, everyone knows this but Dan. 

-1x15: Serena gets drunk with Georgina and ditches her study session with Dan and gets Chuck to tell him that she has food poisoning. Dan pretty much finds out when their stories don’t match up, but she goes on with the lies anyway. And later, after Georgina roofs her, she keeps up the lies.

-1x17: Serena tells Dan she cheated on her to avoid telling him the truth. 

Pretty much the last couple episodes in season 1 are full of Serena lying to Dan. She can come clean and admit these things to Nate, Chuck, and Blair, but Dan is always kept in the dark, because she doesn’t want him to know that side of her. It’s hard to blame her. The Pete Fairman thing is obviously really hard to admit to herself, let alone her boyfriend who doesn’t really understand her world in the UES, and Dan’s inclination to judge doesn’t make things any easier. By the time Serena actually does come clean about everything, Dan’s already slept with Georgina. So, in addition to Serena’s constant lies, now there’s infidelity, and basically, their trust, their foundation is shot to hell. Dan even admits it. It all goes back to the fundamental problem with them:  Serena cannot open herself up wholly and entirely to Dan because of her past and because of his expectations of her. Both Dan and Serena want Serena to be different from the typical Upper East Sider, but, in a lot of ways, she’s not. Dan’s disappointed and frustrated when she doesn’t meet his expectations. Serena tries her best to hide her dark side and her past, at any cost, even if it means lying to her boyfriend.

D to S: “I just think too much has happened. I don’t know how to make things go back to what they were.” 

Season 2, they try it out again, but it just goes back to the same thing. The elevator scene in 2x3:

S: “We keep having the same fight. At the Bass’s brunch, at the wedding…”

D: “But we talked about the fight at Bart’s brunch…”

S: “And now here. I can’t change who I am, Dan.”

D: “Me neither.” 

So that, for me, is the root of Dan and Serena’s problem. But even if they can get past it… there’s a few other really important things why Dan and Serena won’t, in my opinion, work out.

-I don’t know if a lot of Derena fans realize or fully comprehend this. Dan’s father is married to Serena’s mother. They share a half brother. Can we just step back for a moment and realize the implications here?  Your step father is your father in law, your brother is also your brother in law. It’s borderline incestuous, but then there’s the argument fans will say, well, they’re not actually related. Even so, it’s just WEIRD. 

-Serena has literally been treating Dan like he’s disposable, stringing him along and dropping him whenever it suits what she wants at that moment. She does whatever she wants with absolutely no regard for anyone else’s feelings, especially Dan.

-4x8: I already mentioned this, but she invites Dan to be her date, but then Collin does one big gesture for her, and it’s goodbye Dan, because she got what she wanted: Collin. 

-4X12: Dan and Serena are supposed to discuss where they stand after she comes home from Paris. She’s so wrapped up with doing right by Ben that she keeps delaying it, indifferent to the fact that Dan has his internship interview. First, she does it to go through the safety deposit box with Chuck, but promises that she’ll meet him at the Waldorf’s. Now, it’s partly Dan’s fault for putting Serena ahead of his own interests, but Serena, if she cared about Dan more, or at least as much, as she does herself, wouldn’t have made him wait. Even after she makes him miss it the first time, Dan misses it again, because Serena just has to make a “quick detour” on the way there. Serena even realizes it. S to D: “I don’t mean to take your for granted.” Intentions aside, it’s her actions that count.

- 4x14: Serena gets the idea to put Ben in the loft where Dan lives. Let me just clarify: Serena persuades Ben, new love interest, to move into her ex-boyfriend’s home. S to D: “We’re not dating, so if it’s all the same, I don’t need your permission or protection.” Serena says it herself: WE’RE NOT DATING. WE, DAN AND I, DAN AND SERENA, ARE NOT DATING. NOT IN A RELATIONSHIP. THUS SHE CAN DO WHATEVER SHE WANTS WITH   WHOMEVER  REGARDLESS OF HOW DAN FEELS. WHY IS THIS SUDDENLY A DIFFERENT THING WHEN DAN’S INTO SOMEONE?

-5x5: S to B: “The truth is I was jealous…you’re the star of Dan’s book.” God forbid Serena is happy for Dan, an aspiring writer since high school, for his first novel. No. The ONLY thing she cares about is how she is portrayed (or not portrayed). She even uses her friendship with Dan to do better at her job. And, all of a sudden, she’s concerned with her past relationship with Dan. Serena only seems to care about her relationship with Dan when his relationship with Blair is threatening to become more meaningful. 

-Even Blair, who, in 4x11, is definitely closer to Serena than she is to Dan, notices it.

D: “And for the record, I haven’t given anything up  to be with Serena.”

B: “Oh, of course not. Besides your time…and your dignity. You are chauffeuring me around, aren’t you. And, I’m just curious, when was the last time you wrote anything?”

-So, I’m going to get back to the main point of this. I really believe that Serena has absolutely no basis to be mad at Dan and Blair. She did far worse things to Blair with Nate, her and Dan broke up for an important, irreparable reason, they share a sibling, their parents are married, Serena takes advantage of Dan even as friends, and her feelings for Dan only resurface when Dan and Blair’s relationship might just overshadow her. Serena just wants what she can’t have, she’s living in the past, and she needs to grow up. I think Blair says it best in 4x22: 

B to S: “And with all your Dan issues, It’s obvious that you think your romantic fate was sealed in the eleventh grade, but I’m growing up.”