"The O.C." Moment: Your Friendly Neighborhood Seth Cohen

“I’m from Southern California. I’ll melt,” Seth tells Ryan in the opening scene of “The O.C.” episode, “The Rainy Day Women.” It was pouring the rain, and no one was really sure what to do. In fact, Seth, since he didn’t own a raincoat, wore a Spider-Man mask outside to protect himself. The mask didn’t really make sense at first, but its purpose would soon become awesomely clear…

Summer was at the airport, preparing to fly to Italy with her new boyfriend, Zach. She was going to be a bride’s maid in Zach’s sister’s wedding. Seth, realizing the implications of the trip, made one last attempt to get Summer back. But when it failed, he left a message on her cell phone, wishing her a good trip.

As Summer listened to the message at the airport, she saw a little boy, who looked like Seth, playing with a toy horse (like Seth’s). Realizing she was with the wrong guy, Summer tearfully told Zach that she couldn’t go and took off.

Meanwhile, Seth, discovering that the satellite dish was out at his house, donned his Spider-Man mask and went up on the roof to fix it. But Seth slipped and ended up hanging upside down from the roof, with the dish cord wrapped around his foot.

It was obvious by this point what the purpose of the mask was, but that didn’t make the moment any less special…

When Summer arrived at the house, she found Seth, still hanging. “What are you doing here?” Seth asked her. “What do you think, Cohen?” she replied. Then, of course, she peeled back the Spider-Man mask to expose Seth’s mouth and gave him a kiss—just like in the movie.

The song in the scene was the matt pond PA cover of “Champagne Supernova,” recorded specially for the show. This was a bit of an echo of Seth and Summer’s Valentine’s Day dance to another Oasis cover, Ryan Adams’ “Wonderwall”…

On the DVD commentary for this episode, Creator/Writer Josh Schwartz said he fought hard to keep FOX from using the kiss in the previews, because he wanted to keep it a surprise. I’m glad he won…

If you’d like to relive my other “O.C.” moments, just click on the label below. And be sure to post your own memories.

“The O.C.” airs Thursdays at 9 p.m. on FOX…