A Complete Rewatch: One Tree Hill

After (over)analysing the pilot of One Tree Hill last week, we can now move on to the second episode of the first series, entitled The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most. In this one, Lucas has joined the Ravens, and he is playing his first-ever varsity game. He is also bombing his first-ever varsity game, big time. Coach Durham seems to understand the stress and the pressure he is put under, but Nathan mercilessly makes fun of him for humiliating himself, and Lucas spirals into self-doubt and self-questioning. Dan's interest seems piqued by the son he never cared for, but for the time being, only because he is a threat to Nathan's precious career. We also discover Peyton's artistic inclinations and how insecure she feels about her art and the purpose of it all. During a literature class, Lucas and Nathan get into a fistfight, and Lucas gets close to abandoning the Ravens, wanting his life to get back to the way it used to be.

This episode, according to One Tree Hill tradition, received its title from a song, namely The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most, a track by one of emo's greatest, Dashboard Confessional. The song, a classic of its genre, talks about being broken on the inside while keeping a shiny, smooth exterior, and fooling everyone except yourself. I have always wondered if the lyrics of the songs matched the storylines and emotions in the episode, and this first one certainly does. The line "Laced with brilliant smiles and shining eyes and perfect makeup, but you're barely scraping by" is reminiscent of one of Peyton's drawings, the series where she pictures the daily life of a cheerleader, perfect on the outside, but meaningless at heart. The lyrics in the chorus, "the grave that you refuse to leave, the refuge that you've built to flee, (...) is the places you have come to fear the most" perfectly encapsulated the self-doubt at the core of the episode and the way everyone is protecting themselves from their fears instead of using them to their advantage.

GENERAL OPINION.

Revisiting these episodes for the millionth time, at least, somehow still holds things I had never noticed before. Sitting in front of my laptop screen in the morning, I catch myself looking in the background, analysing details in the decor, trying to see it all. Despite seeing these repeatedly, since the age of fifteen, I still notice larger things I never had before, and one of the most important ones is the regular use of parallels between scenes and characters. We saw it in the first episode when we had the juxtaposition of Nathan's varsity game and Lucas' amateur throwdown with his best friends, and in the scene where Peyton is driving through Tree Hill, expertly put alongside the scene where Nathan and his teammates steal a school bus. It's one of my favourite narrative devices, especially when done right, and it comes back again in the second episode, on a larger scale, to my greatest pleasure. The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most also contains one of my favourite quotes in the entire series and sees the introduction of two of my most beloved characters: Brooke Davis and Jake Jagielski. Everything is good, we are still in God-tier territory.

SOUNDTRACK

Overdue by The Get Up Kids

Switchback by Celldweller

Hard To Find by American Analog Set

Beside Me by Forty Foot Echo

To Hell With Good Intentions by McLusky

She's Got It So Phat by Bosshouse

Echo by Vertical Horizon

Further by Longview

Belief by Gavin DeGraw

QUOTES

For starters, I loved one of the opening lines, said by Nathan to Lucas before the basketball game starts, as they are about to enter the court: "You want my world? You got it." It could sound like Nathan taunting Lucas, the way he often does, but when you think about what comes next, Lucas' worries and the first cracks in Nathan's surface, you can wonder if it means something deeper, such as "You think getting out of your safe space was worth it? Look how brutal and unforgiving this really is."

After Peyton and Nathan argue, and Nathan abandons Peyton on the side of the road, he throws one of her "lame music" CDs outside, and she is just standing there, in her cheerleading uniform, holding her pompoms, shouting: "Damn it, Nathan, that CD was hard to find. It's an import!" I find the idea of Peyton being more bothered by losing her rare CD than having to walk alone at night hilarious. (It's definitely something I would say. Nobody gets to mess with my music.)

One of the most concise lines in all of the show consists of Nathan explaining to his father, Dan, what really happened during the fight with Lucas, in English class. "He wasn't swinging at me, dad. He was swinging at you." It says everything that needs to be said about Lucas' feelings towards the broken part of his family, and it shows a perceptiveness in Nathan we have never seen before. It's hard-hitting, and it's flawlessly penned.

"Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark in the hopeless swamps of the not quite, the not yet, and the not at all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists. It is real. It is possible. It is yours." (Voiceover, quote originally by Ayn Rand)

THE BEST BITS: PEYTON'S ART.

In the pilot, we met Peyton Sawyer, popular cheerleader, girlfriend of a boy on the basketball team, confident from the outside, smashing every cliché about the genre by being moody, surly, and into music of the loud, punk-rock persuasion. In the next episode, we meet Peyton Sawyer, artist, insecure about her work, spending a lot of free time drawing in her bedroom, but not getting where she wants to go with it. Ever since I started watching One Tree Hill, I have adored the artwork displayed as Peyton's (originally designed by artist Helen Ward), and some of the pieces used to be my computer screensavers, back in the day. As someone who has learnt how to draw, finally, during the pandemic, a desire partially ignited by my love of Peyton Sawyer's character, the introduction of her art in the series was always going to be special.

My favourite scene of The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most takes place in front of Keith's body shop when Peyton comes to collect her car after repairs. Lucas hands her the keys as well as the folder of drawings he saw her throw in the bin in front of the Thud offices, earlier that day. (Believe me, if I didn't love the rest of this scene as much as I do, I would pick up on Lucas disrespecting her privacy.) Peyton is understandably upset with him for prying, and he follows her outside to ask her why she isn't submitting her art to the magazine, because it's good. Her speech, part-angered, part-desperate, part-passionate, gives me goosebumps with every rewatch, even when I have to pause after every other line to write it down:

"I want o draw something that means something to someone. You know, I want to draw blind faith, or a fading summer, or just a moment of clarity. It's like when you go and see a really great band live for the first time, and nobody's saying it, but everybody's thinking it, we all have something to believe in again. I want to draw that feeling, but I can't. And if I can't be great at it, then I don't want to ruin it."

First of all, this is absolutely sensational writing. The mixture between something Peyton knows in her core, something she is sure and confident about, even if she puts it in the realm of impossibility, and the vulnerability in her words, in the intonation of her voice, in the way she doesn't want to ruin the one thing she loves the most, simply, is just right. The lines "I want to draw blind faith, or a fading summer, or just a moment of clarity. It's like when you go and see a really great band live for the first time, and nobody's saying it, but everybody's thinking it, we all have something to believe in." are poetry as well as painfully relatable. The writing for Peyton's artistic mind gets it. This is one of the quotes that, in my opinion, turn One Tree Hill from what could have been an average teenage show into something different and special.

THE LITTLE THINGS

One of the main premises of One Tree Hill is its small-town setting. It's in the title: it's about Tree Hill, a place like none other. Tree Hill, North Carolina, is a world of its own, with its own independent stores, music scene, and food joints, as if the outside world with the larger, most-known brands had never set foot in the place. In the Drama Queens podcast, the actresses explain how, for clothes shopping, they didn't have access to everything Los Angeles and New York City have, because Wilmington, NC, where the show is filmed, is such a small town. It led to the teenage characters being dressed like regular kids you'd see in your high school, in all its 2000s fashion glory, as opposed to wealthy teenagers in shows like The O.C, which also was a cultural phenomenon of the times. I never think of large brands and chain restaurants when I think about One Tree Hill, and it's why I was surprised to find McDonald's wrappers in two scenes. You can notice them in Peyton's car, in Keith's body shop, and he claims that "the prettier the girl, the messier the car," as well as in the bin where she throws her drawings, right in front of the Thud offices.

A few of the sets seem different from the way they were in the pilot. Keith's body shop looks more open to the outside than it was in the previous episode, and it doesn't seem to be burdened with small, uncomfortable windows anymore. Coach Whitey's office furniture has been moved around, and the door looks to have moved to the left. Finally, Lucas' bedroom looks a lot larger in the second episode, and the furniture has changed places too.

When Peyton is standing in front of the Thud offices, pondering whether to give them her drawings, if you look closely at the posters and notices on their windows, you can see there is a band called Jumbo Rubber Hand playing soon, somewhere. After a Google research, I can tell you they are not a real band.

In the pilot, Nathan was driving a black town car with blue, The Fast And Furious-esque lighting underneath. In this episode, he is driving a grey SUV.

When Lucas is in the school library, Jake comes over to introduce himself and give him a book as well as wise advice, and the two are chatting quite loudly considering they are in a library. It doesn't seem to bother anyone, adults and students alike, and they don't get told off for having a conversation.

There is one scene during which Haley and Lucas are walking down the street towards Lucas' house, and Haley asks about his porn star name, the combination of the name of your first pet and your mother's maiden name. This seemingly harmless conversation between two best friends leads to the second Dawson's Creek reference in two episodes of the show, when Haley says: "Dawson's Freak, starring Rocket Roe and Bunny Brigard."

THE MOST AMERICAN MOMENT

Once again, the most American moment of the episode is linked to sports and its culture. In the opening scene, Karen, Keith, and Haley are in Karen's Café, and Keith and Haley are about to leave to watch Lucas play. You can hear people walking down the road and driving to the game, chanting Nathan's name. See, I understand the United States seems to be into high school and college sports, but as a French person who was never exposed to anything like it, it almost feels bizarre to me. I cannot imagine a world where people would spend a perfectly good Friday night watching a high school basketball game, let alone chanting the name of a star player in the street.

In the same way, I find the rock painted blue and with Nathan's number, 23, in front of Tree Hill High, extremely American. This is how much you love your high school basketball player? And the school is okay with having a random rock painted as a tribute to him? Maybe it was even their decision? Who knows.

THE MOST 2000s MOMENT

You could question why Nathan, who is far from being a fashion icon, is the representative of the most 2000s moment two episodes in a row, but it makes a lot of sense. He is one of the rich kids in town, so he has the financial means to have access to trendy clothing and gadgets. Two of those stood out: the pair of headphones he is wearing when he arrives in the lockers, the kind that doesn't go over your head but behind and was the most uncomfortable thing known to the human race, and those wide-legged jeans he dons on the Rivercourt as he taunts Lucas with how well he can score a basket. There is an argument to be made about Nathan Scott being the quintessential 2000s teenager, and it starts today.

SOMEONE'S ON YOUR SIDE.

The pilot had informed us of the existence of a character named Jake Jagielski, but the only thing we knew about him, thus far, was that he wasn't involved in the tomfoolery slash grand theft auto situation. The second episode properly introduces us to Jake, a player on the basketball team, seemingly different from the others. So far, the only varsity player we know, outside of Lucas and Nathan, is Tim, Nathan's best friend and maybe minion. Tim is not given much of a personality, though we can see, before the first game, that he is here for team spirits and starts motivating chants in the locker rooms. Because everyone else fades into the background, it is easy to imagine they are all cut from the same cloth, worshipping Nathan...until Jake comes along. The only thing we knew about him is that he was not present at the bus incident, and the next time we see him, he calls Nathan out on his lies and embellishing of the story of his fight with Lucas in English class. The second time we see him in the episode, he comes up to Lucas in the library and opens with "you read a lot" before lending him Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged. As it is a novel I have never read, it is hard for me to decide if its themes are linked to those of the episode, but the author declared that Atlas Shrugged was about "the murder- and rebirth- of man's spirit," and I thought it fit perfectly to the matters at hand.

One of the main plot points in the episode is Lucas' insecurities and whether he belongs to the basketball team, and it seems to be a series of small, almost insignificant events that lead him to stick around and pursue the game he loves. One of these small but instrumental players, so to speak, is Jake Jagielski. By calling Nathan out on his lies, he sets himself apart from the others. He doesn't play into Nathan's games, and they are probably not friends. Nathan doesn't even value him as part of the team, as we can see when he critiques his playing. By befriending Lucas, Jake turns into his first ally in the team and shows him that people like him, the quiet ones who read, the imperfect ones, the ones who don't participate in Nathan's worshipping, have a place in the Ravens.

THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG AND THE CRACKS IN THE ICE.

From the very beginning, Nathan is shown as a popular guy, captain of the varsity basketball team in his high school, talented enough to bring scouts in his small North Carolina town, dating a pretty cheerleader, and has people chanting his name in the street, on their way to a game. Hell, the guy's even got a rock painted with his jersey number in front of his school. He is the king of these corridors.

However, if you look closely, it's empty. All his relationships are on the surface of everything. Tim, who we are inclined to call his best friend, is not much more than a minion. Just like in the pilot, all they talk about is Lucas. If this were a court and Nathan was the king, Tim would be one of the jesters, only here to worship him and tell him everything he wants to hear, blindly buying into all his stories, exaggerations, and lies. His relationship with Peyton is the textbook definition of empty. They are pictured making out in the back of his SUV after the game, but he isn't even fully involved and keeps laughing, thinking back about how terrible Lucas was on the court. It isn't that their relationship is based on sex. It is based on nothing at all. He is hanging out with his girlfriend, and he isn't interested in her or making out enough to stop thinking about his half-brother and teammate who blew a game. Finally, his relationship with his father, Dan, solely revolves around basketball. They never talk about other subjects. When Nathan gets into a fight with Lucas, Dan's gut reaction is to be worried about his son's career prospects, and the question "did you get hurt?" is only asked to check whether he will still be able to play or not.

In this second episode, we can see how Nathan is starting to crack under the pressure he is under, and it would be reasonable to wonder where the idea of quitting the team, though he brushes it away as something he made up on the spot, as a joke, came from. I'd argue that yes, Nathan is, so far, portrayed as a class-A douchebag, but underneath it all, he's most likely a kid who's lost, a kid who doesn't have anyone solid to rely on outside of basketball, and a kid who believes he's nothing if not a basketball player.

THE BATTLE OF THE BROTHERS.

I grew up in France, and the first few times I watched One Tree Hill was in French. Here, the show has a different name, and One Tree Hill has been translated into Les Frères Scott, which means The Scott Brothers, shifting the focus on the rivalry between Nathan and Lucas. In the pilot, it is shown how wildly different their lives are, and how they come crashing together to steer the whole town of Tree Hill out of its tranquil course. In the second episode, the differences between their personalities are what's heightened. Lucas is portrayed as a mature working-class kid, who appears older than he is. He reads books that aren't traditional teenager material, and he works with his uncle Keith at the body shop after school. He gets into an argument with his mother over her not coming to his first varsity game, and he apologises first thing the next morning, realising he was out of line and rude. On all accounts, this far, Lucas is the traditional "good kid" of teenage television, à la Rory Gilmore, the kind of solid, clever, reliable teenager who works hard, wants to do well at school, and who you believe can do no wrong.

On the other side of the Scott family tree, Nathan is anything but. He seems to have grown up in a household where no one ever said no to him, and he is taught by his father that appearances and basketball matter the most, beyond everything else. What other lesson could you take from a father who's annoyed his son got into a fight at school because it won't look good to the scouts, a father who doesn't try to understand what happened? Nathan lies and embellishes the truth to make himself look good, even when he is losing, but most importantly, he feels like he always has to show how much better he is at basketball, compared to everyone else. He's like this little bratty kid who would brag on the playground about how much better he is than you and show off that one thing he can do, over and over again, just to prove his point. The scene in which Lucas is training at the Rivercourt, and Nathan turns up, only to taunt him, threaten him, make fun of him, and show off his playing skills is almost comedic. There's this guy, the world could literally be his oyster if he focused, and he spends his spare time chasing the one kid he's threatened by, only to show him he can dunk on an empty basketball court with no defense to try and stop him. He is almost a parody of himself. I believe it ties up to Nathan being, somewhere underneath it all, a lost overgrown child who believes he's nothing if not a basketball player, but on the surface, he is shown as a ridiculous showoff.

TEENAGERS WITH PERSONALITIES.

Sometimes, watching pieces of fiction revolving around teenage characters can get frustrating. Why don't these teenagers have interests apart from who they are friends with and who they are dating? Why are they being shoved into these boxes where they have to conform to these tropes and never do anything in their spare time? I think one of the reasons why I love One Tree Hill as much as I do, and why I connect with it so much is that it depicts teenagers with interests. Lucas is more than the working-class boy who landed on the varsity team because his uncle loves him. He is a teenager into sports who reads Shakespeare plays and classic authors. For all his flaws, Nathan is a teenager interested in sports, and he seems to want to turn it into a career. Jake plays basketball and reads in his spare time. Mouth created his own sports broadcasting website. Peyton is more than a moody cheerleader who is, for some reason, dating the star of the team who treats her like the dirt underneath his shoe. She is an artist, knowledgeable about music and independent, small bands, and she is creative. We don't know Haley or Brooke well yet, but it's easy to imagine they will be developed into fully rounded characters with personalities and interests. There is something so exciting about watching a show that gives you so much insight into people in just two episodes, and who made teenagers more than the tropes other films and shows created. These characters have not been written as pieces in a game of who's dating who and who's friends with who. They are well-constructed, fully developed, and three-dimensional.

A CROSSROADS.

As mentioned earlier, I absolutely adore how One Tree Hill parallels scenes and characters, and in this second episode, it comes in the form of Lucas' and Peyton's journeys. Despite coming from two opposite worlds, they are closer than we think, and the place where they are at is extremely similar. Lucas has just bombed his first varsity game and feels insecure about his playing abilities. He chose to play in a structured team because he wanted to know if he was good beyond the river court, and he is wondering if this was not just wishful thinking, if he is worthy of it, after all. Peyton works hard at her art and is pondering submitting it to a local alternative magazine, unsure whether it is good enough to publish. She is trying to figure out if she has the talent to draw something that matters to someone, if she has the ability to capture the emotions she feels so strongly. They are both at similar crossroads, debating whether they are good enough to do the thing they love the most in a less private setting than their bedroom or their local court, feeling stuck inside their insecurities, and wondering where to go from there. Should they take the risk?

The parallel between their respective states of mind extends to the end of the episode, right when the ball starts rolling again for both of them. After hearing Karen's wise words, ("we're all afraid sometimes. All you need is a little help") receiving Whitey's advice, ("There's no shame in being afraid. Hell, we're all afraid. What you got to do is figure out what you're afraid of, because when you put a face on it, you can beat it. Better yet, you can use it") and seemingly finding inspiration in the book Jake lent him, Lucas finds the strength to get back on the basketball court, show up, for better or worse. He confessed how, as a child, he stopped playing because he did not want to become like Dan and Nathan, and taking the name off the back of his jersey is a way to spin his own narrative around and shed everything that comes attached with his lineage. He isn't letting being Dan's other son define him anymore. Peyton is insecure about her art and gives up on her application to Thud because her drawings "don't matter to anyone, do they?" Lucas takes a look at them and resonates with the piece that has the line "They are not you." He starts understanding Peyton's art better and is the one who gets the ball rolling for her, by giving them to someone who works at Thud, and by telling her that "your art matters. It's what got me here." It's just one person, but it's a start.

FOR FUTURE REFERENCE

At the start of the episode, Mouth and Jimmy come up to Lucas before he runs to the pitch, and they ask him for a few words for their brand new broadcasting website, ravenshoops.com. When Whitey throws them out of the corridor, they are ecstatic at the idea of being "banned media." Just like the more prominent characters, they have changed the course of their lives by taking their commenting to the next level, and it's fascinating to see how far it will go.

Before the opening credits, who she is a part of, we discover the character of Brooke Davis, one of Peyton's close friends and fellow cheerleaders, who seems to think Lucas is "good looking from the back." Is she just here to stir the pot? Or is she more than that, as implies her admitting she has fears, and she struggles to imagine much for her future, apart from marrying a rich guy, "unless I get fat." Is this show going to take the cliché of the ditzy, brainless cheerleader, and make it something more?