Это - новый год, и каждый герой Сплетницы пытается начать все заново. Блэр и Дэн пытаются игнорировать друг друга. Оби идут в интернатуру. Блэр решает присоедениться к Индры Нуйи, шестой самой влиятельной женщине в мире. Эта женщина подруга Элионор Уолдорф, и Блэр пытается использовать это в своих целях. Потом мама и дочь понимают, что Блэр не может идти этим путём и обе приходят к выводу, что Блэр должна стать следующей Анной Винтур (для тех, кто не знает, Винтур - лавный редактор американского издания журнала Vogue).

Заговор Дэна немного вызывает жалость. Он хочет попасть в интернатуру в издательство, но продолжает пропускать собеседования, чтобы побыть с Сереной, которая шантажирует свою мать и освобождает невинного человека из тюрьмы. эС объединяется с Чаком, чтобы бороться с Лили. Они сначала пытаются шантажировать ее с копией подделанного показания под присягой, из-за которого Бен попл в тюрьму, но Лили удается временно «обезвредить» Чака, объясняя, что она продаёт Bass Industries из-за финансовых проблем, и что покупатель обещал не разорять эту компанию. Чак полагает, что она говорит о Расселе Торпе, старом друге его отца, который вернулся в городе, со своей очаровательной дочерью Райной. Но, к сожалению, Торп не покупатель.

Нейт раздражён, что он стал нянькой для своего отца, который ничего не хочет делать. В конце концов он находит отцу работу. К сожалению, у двуличного Торпа.

Серена, как обычно, терпит неудачу в своём плане. Но получает то, чего хочет. Впрочем, как всегда! Лили подкупила судью Бена, чтобы его освободили досрочно. Серена приглашает его на ужин, чтобы принести свои извинения.

В итоге, Серена проводит вечер с Беном, а Дэн и Блэр отправляются вместе в кино.

When the show comes back Blair hasn’t left her bedroom in a week because she’s “sick” and Dan has tried calling her once after the kiss but she never called him back. Dan tells Eric that he kissed Blair and he doesn’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing but that it was just a kiss. Eric suspects he likes her which he weakly denies. Meanwhile Chuck calls Serena and asks her why Blair didn’t want to see him when he went to find her and Serena replies that it probably has something to do with her failed career aspirations. Chuck decides then that he has to help boost her professional self-esteem so that she will come back to him. He calls up Emmeline? (the W lady who went to Bora Bora or whatever to follow her true love, who’s apparently back) and asks her to call Blair and request her assistance in this exclusive NYC powerful families photoshoot. Blair is giddy to help at at the photoshoot she confides in Emmeline? that she kissed someone and that kiss “changed” her. Emmeline? immediately texts Chuck to let him know she’s kissed someone and is in love or something to that effect. Chuck then goes to Dan to ask him who Blair kissed assuming that he would know what guy from W she found a connection with. Dan asks why he thinks that he would know/what has he heard etc. Chuck tells him that Blair confided in a source that she kissed a boy and that it was life changing. This stuns Dan and poor thing, gets his hopes up. Dan can’t really hide his shock and frankly awe at what Chuck has said and rambles on about how Chuck should maybe let Blair be happy with this new guy if she seems happy and that perhaps he’s done her enough harm blah blah blah (paraphrasing). Chuck leaves with a smirk and phones someone (can’t remember who, I believe Emmeline?) and says he knows who Blair kissed and asks for another favor, i.e. another scheme. Later on Eric goes to visit Dan again and Dan is dressing up in a tux stating that someone called him to be a part of the photoshoot. Eric tells Dan that Blair is working the photoshoot and perhaps she set it up so that his status rises enough to date him. Cut to the photoshoot. Blair asks Dorota to pack her new sexy lingerie etc because she’s going to finally be with the person she loves or whatever and Dorota thinks it’s Dan. Blair is shocked and says no, that Dan is a duck or someting and Dorota says no more like a labrador, etc. and she tells her that they only kissed to determine whether they had feelings for each other and they didn’t. and that she wants to be with Chuck (fuzzy on these minute details) Dan arrives at the photoshoot and Blair is bitchy to him and and Dan asks why since she wanted him here to which she looks over and sees Chuck staring at them. She realizes this is a CHuck scheme and tells Dan that Chuck knows. Blair confronts Chuck and says that yes they kissed but it meant nothing to either of them (Dan confirms this) and that all it did was make her realize that she wanted to be with Chuck. Chuck admits that he asked Dan to come but only to show Blair that Dan doesn’t belong in “their world”. Blair defends Dan and said that he is more mature than CHuck will ever be and that she in that instant realizes that CHuck hasn’t matured yet and may never be ready to be an adult and be worthy of her. She walks away.

Chuck and Blair have ZERO interaction in the episode. The Prince arrives in NYC and has a box delivered to Blair which contains the Roger Vivier shoe she left him in Paris. Blair is giddy because he’s come to visit and he wants to see her but it has to be a secret since no one knows, esp his family, that he’s in NYC. Blair agrees to be discreet and they decide to meet at a dingy coffee house by NYU. Meanwhile…Dan tells his Dad that he’s taken a job for Paris Match. Paris Match, a french magazine, has an exclusive scoop that the Prince is in NYC and they’e hired Dan to tail to him discover what he’s doing here etc. (the irony!. eyeroll) Meanwhile….Vanessa at the end of the previous episode left a voice message for Serena letting her know that Dan and Blair kissed. Serena thinks Vanessa is lying but enlists her cousin Charlie (who we meet in 4x19 and has a sparkle when she sees Dan) to follow Dan just in case (Charlie and Serena were scrolling over Gossip Girl’s old posts and Charlie kept seeing that Dan and Blair were spotted all over the place. Serena believed it was all innocent and coincidence but either way sends her cousin to spy). Charlie follows Dan to the NYU coffee shop who in turn had followed the Prince to the coffee shop. Blair shows up and of course all Charlie sees is Dan enter followed by Blair. She informs Serena of what she’s seen. Meanwhile in the coffee house Blair sees Dan and yells at him for being there and then informs him that she has a date with a Prince. Dan leaves but Charlie doesn’t see that. Serena then turns up at the coffee house and sees that Blair is with the Prince and Blair tells her he’s secretly here to see her and that she has to keep it hush hush. Serena promises to and tells Charlie that she must have been mistaken and it wasn’t Dan with Blair. Charlie decides to follow Dan because she knows she wasn’t mistaken. The Prince tells Blair that his family found out he was there and that he can’t be seen with her because the family will know he came to see her. Blair tells him she has a plan. She calls Dan and tells him its his fault for ruining her perfect date and he has to make it up to her . He confesses he realized it was the Prince’s family that tipped off Paris Match that their son was in NYU and they were manipulating the magazine to find out if he was with Blair which was why he quit the gig (sidenote: awwww). Blair says he needs to help her by pretending to be with her at the Pink Party, stage a kiss so that the Prince’s butler (or whomever was sent to take him back to Paris) sees it and then they will go away satisfied that he’s not with Blair. Dan doesn’t think it is a good idea at all but Blair scoffs at it. She takes him shopping to Paul Smith to find a pink tie and Charlie (who’s been following Dan) takes a pic of them together to form more evidence for Serena. At the Pink Party the Prince and Blair arrive separately and yet are texting.

So as I’ve stated…this isn’t the end of Blair and Dan but when you throw CHuck redemption into the mix I just don’t know if Dan will make the cut. Clearly his feelings for her will linger, the question is whether Blair will admit to feelings for Dan. As of right now she’s more than convinced she feels nothing for him.