The College Years: 'Gossip Girl,' Season Three Preview

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FOR A TV SHOW about teenagers, the concept of "going to college" can be the kiss of death.

"One Tree Hill" skipped the idea of college entirely, choosing to fast-forward four years in the future for the Scott brothers and their associated lady loves. "Dawson's Creek" just became more melodramatic and over-written as the Capeside crew took to Los Angeles and Boston for college. And the university-living years of "Boy Meets World," with the trite episodes about married life and roommate bickering, completely lacked the charm of Cory's, Shawn's and Topanga's middle and high school seasons.

So how fashionista-favorite "Gossip Girl" will deal with the college years is as much of a conundrum as any of the love triangles or parental drama that's on the show itself. With its third season premiere Sept. 14 at 9 p.m. on The CW, Serena (Blake Lively), Blair (Leighton Meester) and their respective dudes trod their designer-swathed feet into New York University, Columbia University and Brown University, and although Dawn Ostroff, president of entertainment of The CW, said that show creators Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage have "figured out a very clever way to keep them all in New York," we've got some questions. How is "Gossip Girl" going to stay on top of all the characters' dramas? Will all their romantic relationships stay intact? Is Chuck Bass (Ed Westwick) really going to become more like the character he's based on from the original "Gossip Girl" novels and engage in a gay kiss?

You can never tell with a primetime soap opera, but curiosity is just a healthy part of an active mind — and here are the five things we're pondering most about this upcoming season of The CW's prettiest, most outlandishly vapid hit.

LESS BLAIR?
If you had the awful experience of hearing Cobra Starship's "Good Girls Go Bad" all over radio and MTV this summer, you probably picked up on the fact that Meester, who portrays Blair on "Gossip Girl," was featured on the track. Meester has spoken publicly about how she's pursuing a pop music career — she told Entertainment Weekly in May that she's working with producers Kenna and Polow da Dan, who have been linked to Lupe Fiasco, The Pussycat Dolls and Fergie, and that her sound will be "very pop" and dance-floor-ready.

Entertainment Weekly was able to listen to three tracks — ballads "Push and Pull" and "Almost Perfect" and the electro-pop "Lights Out" — and if those songs start getting greater rotation on radio, who knows what path Meester could take? She could pull a Katherine Heigl, start trash-talking "Gossip Girl" and take a leave of absence from the show to record more music (as Heigl will do to film "Life as We Know It").

We're not sure if Meester would be that self-absorbed, but if her "Queen B" identity transitions into real life, it could happen.

HILARY DUFF'S EGO?
Gossip blogs love tracking when "Gossip Girl" starts recording around New York City, and covering all the associated drama (and costumes) on-set is of course mandatory. So when the New York Post reported in August that Hilary Duff — who is joining the series for seven episodes this season — was holding up production with diva-like demands and catty behavior, blogs jumped all over it.

The Post claimed that "one of the girls refused to get out of her trailer" and that "no one could believe they would actually hold up taping for her," but about a week later, CW executives were squashing the rumors like none other. According to the show, the report was "absolutely not true," but we'd hazard a guess that where there's smoke, there's usually fire. Plus, Duff is supposed to be playing a haughty movie star who attends New York University for a traditional college experience, and we could envision Duff trying to bring more reality to her part by you know, acting it.

IS THAT GEORGINA?
After "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" finally wrapped, it seemed like everyone associated with the show kind of disappeared — Sarah Michelle Gellar settled into married life with Freddie Prinze Jr., Nicholas Brendan had a flop with "Kitchen Confidential" and Alyson Hannigan has a steady (albeit somewhat boring) gig on "How I Met Your Mother." It's only Michelle Trachtenberg, who played Buffy's suddenly sister Dawn toward the end of the show, that has continued catering to the teen demographic — and as Serena's nemesis, Georgina, she's the ultimate opposite of Buffy's largely innocent little sis.

The manipulatively back-stabbing, boyfriend-stealing character has made Serena's life a living hell — specifically when she made it seem like Serena killed a man — but her character somewhat reformed last season by helping Dan recover some lost dough and aiding Blair in ruining another girl's reputation. But will she be back to her utterly catty ways this season, as Blair's roommate at NYU? We hope so — we want to be able to "tell Jesus the bitch is back."

MORE NUDITY?
Like any good starlet, Meester has also spent the summer dealing with her fair share of nudity — namely in the form of a sex tape that supposedly starred her. Although Meester didn't comment on the tape until last month, when she appeared on the cover of Harper's Bazaar ("The tape is not real. So it makes me sort of sad. It's unfortunate that it got carried as far as it did. ... People think it's real because somebody says it is."), the buzz from them — and the see-through dress she wore to the 2009 MTV Movie Awards — helped raise her profile from random hot TV actress to uber-downloaded Internet celebrity.

That, coupled with the random nip-slips that keep plaguing Lively on-set, could suggest that this season of "Gossip Girl" will include more nudity than normal. And for a show that numerous parents' groups have already outcried for its sexually suggestive content and promotional material, we're interested to see how far they could push it.

JENNY'S DEMISE?
Look at these photos of Taylor Momsen, the 16-year-old actress who plays little sister Jenny Humphrey, and tell us those outfits don't make it look like her character this season is going down the road to prostitution. Like, seriously. We have never seen that many outfits totally inappropriate for a girl who wouldn't even be a high school senior in the real world ... and we've got Social Services on speed dial.

Written by Express contributor Roxana Hadadi
Photos courtesy The CW