The OC Episodes Ranked and The Cast Then and Now

It's been over eleven years since the greatest show in TV history, The OC, debuted, and over seven years since it was so ruthlessly taken from us.  My love of The OC is no secret, and frankly, it provided this blog with a lot of energy in the early years.

Today, Gawker released its rankings of every OC episode ever.  (Thanks to Jaleh for the link.)  I'll let you take a look and reach your own opinions, but the fact that The Rainy Day Women -- an episode that has been deemed by some to be the single greatest episode in any television program ever -- came in at #57 calls into question the integrity of the entire list.

Also, frienemy and fellow OC connoisseur, Ryan (no relation to Atwood), sent me a link to a Buzzfeed article entitled "Here's What The Cast Of "The OC" Looks Like Now."  It has a cool little feature, where you can slide a line across a picture to see what the actor or actress looked like then and now.  Included are:

1.  Mischa Barton (Marissa Cooper).  She still looks pretty good.  I still wish Jester and I would have had the courage to ask her to be our nanny when we saw her at the Troubadour in 2010. 

2.  Rachel Bilson (Summer Roberts).  She pretty much looks the exact same.

3.  Adam Brody (Seth Cohen).  He looks like was was stoned to the Bejusus belt in the "before" picture.  More than anyone, I think he was the character who made The OC.  Fans of The League, of course, know him as Ted, the guy with AIDS in the league who got hit by a car and died in the season premiere this year.

4.  Benjamin McKenzie (Ryan Atwood).  He won't allow God to let him age.

5.  Peter Gallagher (Sandy Cohen).  TV's second-greatest dad ever (behind Cliff Huxtable) still has his eyebrows.

6.  Samaire Armstrong (Anna Stern).  In my opinion, she looks better now, without that pixie cut.

7.  Logan Marshall-Green (Trey Atwood).  Apparently that scruffy, patchwork facial hair was not grown only for his role as Trey.

8.  Autumn Reeser (Taylor Townsend).  Maybe it's just a bad recent picture, but she looks a little crazy-eyed.  Then again, perhaps that's why she played Taylor Townsend so well.

9.  Tate Donovan (Jimmy Cooper).  I still wish Jester and I would have had the courage to ask him to be our nanny when we saw him at a diner in Santa Monica in 2010.

10.  Kelly Rowan (Kirsten Cohen).  Probably drunk, if I know Kiki.

11.  Melinda Clarke (Julie Cooper-Nichol-Bullitt).  She still looks pretty good.  And diabolical.

12.  Chris Carmack (Luke Ward).  Probably still playing water polo.

13.  Olivia Wilde (Alex Kelly).  Those couple months where Marissa and Alex were kind of hooking up were some of the happiest of my life.

While I was happy to see all of these shining faces, I thought there were some egregious omissions (with "before" pictures):

1.  Kaitlin Cooper.  When she heard she was left out of the article, she probably said, "Er yaw kedding may?" and then pouted her lips and crossed her arms.  Then she probably said "Gay dad trumps slutty mom" to the wall in her prison cell.  I assume she's in prison.

2.  Oliver.  I want to see what years of pill popping and punching oneself in the head does to a man.

3.  Volchok.  As Ryan pointed out, I suppose we don't need to see a "now" picture of him because vampires don't age.

4.  Johnny.  I could have reached right through the screen and punched him in the face every time I saw that hair.  Sure, he was killed off, but I need to know if he cut his hair because I can't live with the thought that he is out there, somewhere, with that floppy hair just waving in the California breeze.

5.  Che.  Yes, I know he eventually graduated from Brown, moved to Pawnee, Indiana, and formed the band Mouse Rat, but a picture would have been nice.

6.  Gordon Bullitt.  The oil tycoon who wooed Julie was a much-needed spark in the last season supposedly got engaged to Julie.

7.  Dean Hess.  I just have to know that he's dead, and I want pictorial proof.

8.  Theresa.  Perhaps the greatest plot line that was never closed up was the fact that Theresa had birthed Ryan Atwood's child (even though she lied and said it was Eddie's son).  What happened to Theresa and the child?

9.  Ryan Atwood, Jr.  I need to know that the aforementioned child of Ryan and Theresa has now matured into the adolescent cage fighter I know he can be.  Here's what I imagine he looks like:

10.  Hailey Nichol.  She was a stripper who appeared to have moved to Japan for a fashion job instead of sailing with Jimmy to Hawaii.  I'd like to see her face again to know that she's okay.