Aliens in America, Gossip Girl, The Amazing Race - Happy Birthday Jesus, Let It Be Gay and Marry

Aliens in America - Church - Ep. 110
Gossip Girl - Roman Holiday - Ep. 111
The Amazing Race - This Is Forever, Now - Ep. 1207

For the sake of continuity, I'm going to quickly post this last blurb, and also because the first Aliens in America's "Christmas" episode was an amazing scathing critique on religion and belief in America, and does so, while still keeping the spirit of belief alive! Simply brilliant!

Gossip Girl talks Christmas as well and everything is gay and marry though Blair gets a little trippy. Meanwhile, The Amazing Race continues running during the holidays (with another new episode next week as well).

On Aliens in America, Raja is very proud of his Muslim religion but is very curious about the Tolchuk's Christian beliefs and wants to understand it more in order to better himself (hint hint hint? Crazy religious people, I'm talking to you!). The Tolchuks meanwhile have been spending their blessed Sundays at the church of America, the local mall, but decides to attend church for Raja's sake (and the fact that Claire requested birth control pills for Christmas which freaked Franny out).

Raja and the Tolchuks head to church only to discover their church is now a chicken fast food joint (too bad they didn't use a product placement with the chain Church's Chicken). They head across time to the megachurch where Franny sends Claire off to the chastity club, Justin discovers the power of prayer, Gary discovers retail therapy in the church, and Raja discovers Jesus. Well, not really, but he does become appalled when Justin starts using the power of prayer to get sex from the hot girl at school, and fixes the fight between Justin and Dooley (is it me or is Adam Rose's bug eyes getting bigger? Yet still adorable. I still love him for being Max though) who has stolen Justin's method of praying to get sex with the hot chick.

Seriously, brilliant. It skewers everything about the organization of Christian religion (love the store, loved the collectible plates Gary buys, loved that Claire managed to meet a hot guy in the chastity club and started making out and making Franny freak out) yet actually strengthened the case for belief and morality (well, mostly, Justin and Dooley still didn't really get Raja's point that using prayer to get sex with the hot chick was bad but they did become better people still).

Meanwhile, over on Gossip Girl, Serena and Dan have missions to come up with the best gift for under $50 (wait, that's a challenge? Not the norm? Holy me and my friends are cheap then), while Blair's father Harold, comes back to New York for the holidays but brings along his new boytoy boyfriend Roman (that's R-OH - MON to you), who was introduced by ex-wife Eleanor. Got all that?

And don't forget, Lily and Rufus are still playing coy as Allison fights Lily off and Bart Bass continues his pursuit completely oblivious to the other plots. And like father like son, Chuck Bass is off in Monaco oblivious to the New York scene, but he's smart enough to snag Nate, keeping the two boys away from Blair. And why did we not get any shots of Nate and Chuck on holiday in the south of France? Sounds a little gay to me doesn't it?

Blair is not liking father + boyfriend time and sets up her little bitchy evil plot (oh joy!) to bring back Roman's controlling ex-boyfriend but Eleanor is wise to her daughter's evil trick (she DID teach her everything she knows!). So in the end, Eleanor plays reluctant ex-wife/best friend to Harold and Roman and they all learn that Blair needs her daddy time and that family time is important during the holidays. What is this? Full House?

Meanwhile, Serena needs Vanessa (she's still on the show? Oh yeah, they need about 2 months before audience feed back of our hatred for her affects the producers decision to fire that actress) to help pick out a perfect gift for Dan after she fails miserably (and after Vanessa gives Dan the best gift of all, getting one of his stories (a story about Serena when he first saw her) published in the New Yorker), and Vanessa hatches a plan for Serena to give Dan a snow job. When Dan discovers the winter wonderland Serena created for him, the two make out and wake up together the next morning... I'm sure a snow job was not the only job done. (Oh, did I just type that? How crude of me.)

Dan meanwhile gives Serena the gift of wood... in the form of a big Christmas tree in their hotel living quarters, all with the help of Jenny and Lily of all people. Lily, she who told Rufus that she was off to on vacation with Bart, and regrets it after. Meanwhile, Rufus discovers that Allison has been talking with the man she had cheated on Rufus with, and he's cute and likable and Rufus would probably be friends with him if he wasn't schtooping his wife. So for Christmas, Dan and Jenny get the gift of uncomfortableness when Allison and Rufus realise that their marriage is pretty much over. So just as Rufus tries to call Lily and profess his undying love to her, Bart of course asks Lily to marry him. Which also means, Chuck and Serena will be brother and sisters... ew.

Finally, The Amazing Race is off to Italy and between some flag waving, DaVinci codes, and car troubles for TK and Rachel AND Kynt and Vyxen, it was another entertaining episode that didn't really matter in the end because it was a non-elimination episode. Oh, but it did matter for Donald and Nicolas who completed the only fast forward on the race by getting "FF" tattooed on their arms permanently. I'm sure they are cursing F#$KING F#$KERS at the producers right now.

Nicolas & Donald - 1st Place
Nathan & Jennifer - 2nd Place
Ron & Christina - 3rd Place
TK & Rachel - 4th Place
Kynt & Vyxsin - 5th Place

Luckily, it was the 1st of two non-elimination rounds (hey, I thought they said there were going to be no eliminations this season) and Kynt and Vyxen are still in the race. Unfortunately, there's a new speed bump for them, in a new twist called "Speed Bump" in the next leg where only their team will need to complete an extra obstacle.