9 things nobody wants to admit about Gossip Girl

6. Serena and Blair fought WAY too much

Throughout all six seasons, Serena and Blair were the best of frenemies. They were best friends and pseudo sisters, but they also had the ability to be each other’s biggest enemy. We caught a glimpse of this early on when Serena models for Blair’s mother’s fashion line, and Blair becomes jealous that her bestie tends to steal the spotlight. As the stakes got higher and their cyber stalker stirred the pot, their fights also got bigger. But their arguing happened a lot and often ended with public displays of humiliation and Serena being tired of fighting. We were tired, too, S! In hindsight, I would have loved to see them take their ride-or-die spirit up a notch.

5. Why was Dan Gossip Girl?

Although the pleasure of the series was mostly just spending time in the lives and dramas of these characters, there was also the prevailing mystery of Gossip Girl’s identity. Who was this ominous, omniscient know-it-all wreaking havoc on the scandalous lives of New York’s elite? Well, as season 6 would revealed, the all-knowing “she” was none other than Brooklyn-dwelling, literature-loving, self-professed “Lonely Boy” outcast Dan Humphrey.

Look, I have no pitches for a GG identity reveal that would have been more satisfying, but it’s time to admit that by season 6, finding out who was pulling the strings was hardly important anymore. Over the course of the series, Georgina had been involved, and even at one point, Serena had the GG password. What would have been more intriguing would have been an identity reveal after high school or the first year of college, a time jump, and a second GG crowned post-college, which brings us to…

4. The show should have skipped college

When a teen drama launches with its characters in high school and its cast as 20-somethings, there’s a choice to be made. Either you power through the college years (Dawson’s Creek, 90210, Buffy the Vampire Slayer) or you jump ahead past college altogether (One Tree Hill, Riverdale, Pretty Little Liars). Gossip Girl attempted the former but should have went with the latter.

As bogged down in overly complex storytelling as the second season may have gotten, it was iconic — the series still in its prime. On its heels, the third season had a lot of work to do to launch the characters out of Constance/St. Jude’s and into college or whichever path they chose to take. The post-high school transition was clunky, but like season 2, still iconic.

Now, the fourth and fifth seasons catch some heat for not being as good as the first three seasons, which is par for the course for any aging series, particularly a teen drama. But there was some really good stuff in those seasons, including a new maturity. I can’t help but imagine that would have worked even better if the series had hit fast-forward past college after season 3. They acted like adults since day one; let’s just get there already. It could have been a valuable retooling for the series as some of the dynamics ran stale and/or became contrived.