Wednesday, March 7, 2018

Youth & Consequences 1x05 Review: “Narc-ish” (Cerberus the Spy) [Contributor: Alisa Williams]


“Narc-ish” 
Original Airdate: March 7, 2018

In episode five of YouTube Red’s Youth & Consequences, Hook finds himself in some deep trouble. Before school, he and Jane are making out in his car when a police officer suddenly pulls up and goes straight to Hook’s trunk, where he has a stash of weed gummies. He’s arrested and hauled down to the police station. Jane’s devastated, while Farrah’s suspicious about the whole situation. Why would the officer go straight to a legally parked car in the school parking lot, and how did he know to look directly in Hook’s trunk? Somebody tipped the police off to Hook’s business.

Grace approaches Farrah in the hall and tells her she had nothing to do with it. Even though she just made a play last week for a cut of Hook’s business, getting him arrested wasn’t part of the plan. At least that’s her story. Meanwhile, the police release Hook back to his house with a charge for possession. They have no evidence that he’s been dealing — yet. They keep his laptop to search, and every student who’s ever bought from Hook is now freaking out that their name is in there. Hook’s also been expelled.

Jayne’s made a list of all the potential students who could have narced on Hook, and the squad divides it up so they can investigate. Farrah’s not totally convinced there is a narc, though. She thinks something else is going on.

After school, Farrah pays a visit to Hook and attempts to cheer him up. Jane gets to Hook’s house just as she sees him and Farrah hugging. She’s pretty jealous but tries to unsuccessfully play it off. Before Farrah heads out, she asks if the cops are going to find anything on Hook’s laptop and he says no. The laptop is school-issued and he’s not dumb enough to put anything of consequence on it.

Farrah enlists Colin’s help in finding out more about these school-issued laptops. She wants him to steal Principal Cowher’s laptop so they can see what she’s been up to. Farrah has a theory that the school’s been spying on its students through the laptops. Colin feels like asking him to steal his own mother’s laptop is going too far but Farrah finally convinces him by saying if he does this for her, she’ll tell him how she found out he’s the one behind the Crotch. Colin’s been wanting to know this forever, so he finally agrees.

The plan to hack into his mom’s laptop is going to require Farrah’s hacker friend, who just happens to be... Jayne! Colin’s shocked that Jayne, who he’d always dismissed as all boobs and no brain, is actually a computer genius. He tells her to just make sure she gets the laptop out of his trailer hangout and back into his house before his mom gets home. She’s currently at a staff meeting and the other Jane is keeping an eye out to let them know when the meeting lets out.

While Jayne works, Colin and Farrah head out to the girls’ soccer game to do some investigating of their own. Farrah has a run-in with Grace and Stacey. Grace still claims she had nothing to do with Hook getting arrested and Farrah still doesn’t believe her. As Farrah walks away, Stacey comes running out to defend Grace, which makes Farrah livid. And we get to find out exactly why Farrah’s so angry at Stacey through a flashback from the previous summer.

When Farrah found out her dad was cheating with Stacey’s mom, she went immediately to Stacey with the video evidence. They made a pact to send the video to their respective parents that night — Stacey would send it to her dad and Farrah would send it to her mom from an anonymous account.

Except, only Farrah followed through on the pact. Stacey didn’t tell her dad about the video or that she knew her mom was cheating on him. The next day, Farrah confronted Stacey and she said that her dad lives for her mom and it would destroy him to know she’d been cheating. She just couldn’t do it. But Farrah did send the video and destroyed her entire world in the process. While Farrah now has to pick up the pieces of her broken life, Stacey gets to keep pretending like she has the perfect family. It’s something Farrah can never forgive her for, and that’s why their friendship ended. It’s also why, no matter how cruel Farrah is to Stacey, Stacey’s never said anything bad against Farrah. She feels she deserves Farrah’s wrath.

Back in the present, Farrah storms away and cries in her car about the run-in. It’s clear Stacey’s betrayal still hurts and was just made worse by how readily Stacey defended Grace over something so inconsequential. While Farrah cries, Colin sees another opportunity to chat with Hannah when her soccer game ends. He manages to score a date with her, but when he tells Farrah, she’s not as thrilled as it seems she should be — considering she was encouraging him to get to know Hannah in the first place. She just thinks it’s a bit creepy that Colin is using his knowledge from the upskirt video to chat with Hannah about things he already knows they have in common. Colin doesn’t see what the big deal is. He’s not doing any harm, just trying to forge a connection.

They don’t have time to discuss it further though, because Jayne has made a huge discovery on Principal Cowher’s laptop. It turns out Principal Cowher and Superintendent Moorhead hired a hacker who goes by the name Cerberus to spy on the students through their laptops. There’s a ton of photo captures of students doing illegal activities, and a lot of those photos are of Hook. Each of the photos was taken from the camera of a school-issued laptop.

Because Colin held up his end of the bargain, Farrah tells him how she found out he’s behind the Crotch. Last year, when the former person graduated, they had left the Crotch to Farrah. But she didn’t want it. She says that when she refused it, it was given to Colin and she saw him open the same package she’d originally been given. She says it was just a coincidence that she happened to be there when he opened his locker and found the package from the former Crotch. He reminds her she doesn’t believe in coincidences, but doesn’t push it too hard because he’s worried about his mom.

Their knowledge that she’s been spying on the students could cause her to lose her job if it gets out and he doesn’t want that. Despite spying on students, she’s a good person who was just trying to figure out who the Crotch is. And of course, the Crotch is her own son.

It’s a messed up situation, but as usual, Farrah has a plan. She sends an anonymous letter to Principal Cowher letting her know that they know what she’s been up to. If she doesn’t ask the cops to drop the charges against Hook (it was, after all, an illegal search) and reverse his expulsion from the school, then they’ll release the info they have. Principal Cowher really has no other choice unless she wants to lose her job, so Hook is reinstated and the charges dropped. Jane is there when Farrah tells Hook the good news, and isn’t happy when Hook gives Farrah a big hug and thanks her for her help.

Hook says even though he’s coming back to school, he’s going to be out of the dealing game. He has too much to lose if he’s caught again. But that doesn’t mean the school will have to be without its drugs. Stacey and Grace have sold the last of Hook’s special waters and realized it’s actually pretty easy to get away with it. They might just take up the job.

Meanwhile, Colin heads to the cafeteria to meet up with Hannah, but just as he gets there, he gets a text from Cerberus. It seems Cerberus knows Colin’s the Crotch and is none too pleased that Colin’s aware of his existence and his spying for Principal Cowher. Cerberus says he’s watching Colin, and Colin panics and runs out of the cafeteria, while Farrah watches his sudden departure with concern.

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