Chuck Bass

Chuck Bass
Gossip Girl character
Ed Westwick as Charles Bass
First appearance	Novel: Gossip Girl Television: "Pilot" (episode 1.01)
Created by	Character Cecily von Ziegesar Developed for Television Josh Schwartz Stephanie Savage
Information
Full name	Charles Bartholomew Bass
Nickname(s)	Chuck (by everyone) Bass
Aliases	C Henry Prince
Occupation	Television: Entrepreneur High school student (at St. Jude's; graduated) Shopkeeper (former)
Title	Television: CEO of Bass Industries
Family	Television: Bartholomew "Bart" Bass (father; deceased) Elizabeth Fisher (mother; alias: Evelyn Bass) Lillian "Lily" Humphrey (adoptive mother; née Rhodes) Rufus Humphrey (adoptive stepfather) Serena van der Woodsen (adoptive sister) Eric van der Woodsen (adoptive brother) Daniel "Dan" Humphrey (adoptive stepbrother) Jennifer "Jenny" Humphrey (adoptive stepsister)
Relatives	Celia "CeCe" Rhodes (adoptive grandmother) Jack Bass (paternal uncle) Carol Rhodes (adoptive aunt) Charlotte "Charlie" Rhodes (adoptive cousin)

Charles Bartholomew "Chuck" Bass is a fictional character in the Gossip Girl series of teen novels and the television series of the same name. He is portrayed by English actor Ed Westwick. Although he is a secondary, antagonistic character in the original book series, in the television series Chuck is one of the main characters. The television series character is noted for his financial ambition, hedonistic lifestyle and personal style.^[1] Since they were children, Chuck has been best friends with Nate Archibald, Serena van der Woodsen, and Blair Waldorf, who were boyfriend and girlfriend in the past. In the TV series, he is the adoptive brother of Serena and Eric van der Woodsen and step-brother of Jenny and Dan Humphrey.

Novel series

In the Gossip Girl novels, Chuck has a series of flings with male and female characters across the course of the series. Chuck's role is initially that of an antagonist to the main characters. Chuck resides with his family at the Plaza Hotel on the Upper East Side and attends school at the Riverside Preparatory School for Boys on the Upper West Side, along with scholarship student Dan Humphrey. Chuck is largely friendless, but is tolerated by the others because of his family's enormous wealth. He is described as having flamboyant fashion sense, with a penchant for scarves, and has a pet monkey named Sweetie whom he carries around with him everywhere. Lazy and vain, Chuck's only interests are sex and money, and he is frequently chided by his father for lacking ambition and performing poorly in school. Following flings with numerous females and males, his only serious relationship comes near the end of the series, when he begins dating Blair Waldorf, a self-obsessed luxury loving teenager. In the twelfth book in the series, Gossip Girl: It Had To Be You (2007), Chuck is rejected from colleges because of poor grades and is sent to military school by his father. When next mentioned in Gossip Girl spin-off The Carlyles (2008), it is stated that Chuck never showed up to military school, and his whereabouts thereafter are unknown. In the thirteenth Gossip Girl novel, I Will Always Love You (2009), it is revealed that Chuck went off to Deep Springs College in California and returned a changed man, and to have dated main character Blair Waldorf in Oxford, England for a year.

TV series

Constance Billard school is an exaggerated version of Gossip Girl author Cecily von Ziegesar's alma mater, the Nightingale-Bamford School. It was revealed in preparation for the 2007 TV series debut, Josh Schwartz hired recent graduates of Ziegesar's alma mater to retool several characters.^[2]

Chuck Bass was then reconfigured as a more central character, an antiheroic heterosexual playboy whose on-off relationship with Blair Waldorf serves as one of the show's major ongoing storylines. Chuck is the resident "bad boy" of the Upper East Side, and like Blair is both vengeful and manipulative; the two often scheme elaborate plans together. As the show progresses, Chuck develops a softer side, specifically towards Lily, Eric and Serena, his adoptive mother, brother and sister, Nate, his lifelong best friend, and Blair.

Season 1

Chuck grew up on the Upper East Side with his three best friends and fellow elites Nate Archibald, Blair Waldorf, and future-stepsister Serena van der Woodsen. His father is Bart Bass, a self-made billionaire, which is irregular, compared to the Bass' old money friends. Chuck is often described as the "bad boy of his circle". Chuck is a playboy who sees women as recreational tools. Chuck frequently skips class and smokes marijuana.

In the pilot episode, Chuck attempts to rape both Serena and Jenny Humphrey. His depiction as a sexual predator was abandoned in subsequent episodes, where his flaws were watered down to being a womanizer and manipulating those around him.

In episode seven, "Victor/Victrola", Chuck purchases a burlesque club, Victrola. After Nate and Blair break up, Blair visits Chuck at Victrola where she ends up performing on stage, and she later loses her virginity to him in the back of his limousine. Though she tries to deny the encounter, Chuck buys a necklace for her and admits that he feels "butterflies" in her presence, leading to a clandestine sexual relationship. Despite this, Nate and Blair rekindle their relationship, leading to a jealous Chuck revealing to the anonymous "Gossip Girl" that Blair and Chuck had a sexual relationship. This leads Chuck to have a temporary rift with both Blair and Nate.

As Bart Bass and Lily van der Woodsen's relationship progresses, they decide to move their families in together. Chuck and Eric van der Woodsen, Lily's son and Serena's younger brother, become especially close. When Serena begins receiving mysterious packages (pornography in the mail, alcohol delivered to her at school), she automatically blames Chuck. Bart subsequently forces Chuck to move out of the family home. Serena discovers that the culprit was actually Georgina Sparks, a past classmate of both Serena and Chuck. We later discover that Chuck lost his virginity to Georgina in the sixth grade. Chuck and Blair join together to prevent Georgina from further harming and embarrassing Serena. This process rekindles their bond, and they succeed in getting rid of Georgina.

At Bart and Lily's wedding at the end of Season 1, Chuck apologizes and confesses to Nate that he was in love with Blair. During the wedding reception, Chuck gives a speech about forgiveness that is implied to be directed towards Blair. She accepts his apology and the two kiss. However, as they are about to embark on a trip to Tuscany together, Chuck gets cold feet. Blair leaves for Tuscany without him.

Season 2

In the season premiere, "Summer Kind of Wonderful", we learn Blair has stayed in Europe. Chuck regretted his actions but told this to Blair too late as she was already dating Lord Marcus Beaton. Blair asks Chuck to tell her he loves her, but his fear of commitment stops him.

In order to gather material for a story, Dan tags along with Chuck for a night, ending with the two of them in jail after a fistfight. While in jail, Chuck tells Dan in confidence that Chuck's mother died while giving birth to him, and that his father blames him for her death, which explains their icy relationship. When Chuck later discovers that Dan was using him for a story, he feels betrayed and tells Dan that he was lying about all of it.

Chuck's storyline throughout season 2 mainly deals with his inability to tell Blair that he loves her. Eventually, his father is killed in a car accident. Lily adopts him so that he's able to own Bass Industries, making Serena and Eric his sister and brother. When Blair begins dating Nate again, Chuck realizes his true feelings for her. The two team up to take down Poppy Lifton, and Blair realizes that she still has feelings for Chuck as well. She breaks up with Nate. In the final episode of season 2, Chuck admits to Blair his true feelings and the two finally begin a relationship.

Season 3

When Season 3 returns, Chuck and Blair are very happy and very much in love. Chuck struggles to run Bass Industries to his deceased father's impeccably high standards. He opens up a hotel, The Empire. Halfway through the season, Chuck meets a woman claiming to be his mother. Hit with a sexual harassment suit at work, he temporarily signs over The Empire. She betrays him and signs the hotel over to his sinister uncle, Jack Bass, who has previously attacked Lily and slept with Blair.

Chuck and Blair agree to team up to take down Jack, but Chuck ends up offering Blair to Jack in exchange for his hotel. When Jack tells Blair this, she breaks up with Chuck at Dorota and Vanya's wedding. Chuck tries desperately to win Blair back, doing everything from banning all of the other Upper East Side men from dating her to asking her to meet him on top of the Empire State Building. Blair decides that Chuck is her true love and she's going to meet him, but Dorota suddenly goes into labor and she ends up being late. Chuck, thinking she is finally over him, leaves the building heartbroken and nearly suicidal. When he gets home, he sees that Jenny Humphrey has arrived looking for Nate. The two drunkenly sleep together, heartbroken that their true loves don't return their feelings.

Blair appears later in Chuck's suite, apologizing for being late, and the two reunite. Chuck is about to propose to Blair at the hospital, as they visit Dorota and her new baby, when Dan appears and rashly delivers a punch to Chuck's face. He then forces Chuck to tell Blair what happened between him and Jenny. Blair breaks things off with Chuck and informs him it's for good. She also threatens to ruin Jenny's life if she doesn't leave Manhattan immediately for good. Chuck then travels to Prague to escape New York for a while, feeling as though he has nothing left. He gets robbed by three muggers who insist on taking the ring that Chuck intended on proposing to Blair with and when Chuck puts up a fight, he gets shot in the stomach. The last shot of season 3 is him lying in an alley, presumably dying.

Other story lines for Chuck in season 3 include a feud with his sister leading to him trying to break Nate and Serena up, as well as a phony sexual harassment suit filed against him by the staff at The Empire.

Season 4

In the first episode of season four, we find that Chuck is alive and well, having been rescued by Czech girl, Eva (Clemence Poesy) who has no idea of his wealth or of who he is. He creates a fake name and persona as he no longer wants to be the manipulating Chuck Bass. He eventually reveals who he really is and returns to New York with her, at the request of Blair and Serena. Blair insists she no longer loves him, but still schemes to undermine his new relationship. He eventually falls for one of her schemes and breaks up with Eva. He realizes his mistake and begs her to take him back, but she refuses, saying that he showed his true feelings by continuing to believe Blair over anyone else.

Chuck then declares war on Blair and sabotages various aspects of her life by making her lose internships, inviting Jenny Humphrey back to town, and generally trying to make her miserable. They soon blossom into an enemies-with-benefits relationship.

In the "The Witches of Bushwick", Chuck accidentally tells Blair that he loves her during sex and, not knowing whether his words are true, Blair chooses to gloss over the moment. Although Chuck and Blair spend the episode striving for different ends which will eventually alienate each other (Blair to become the face of Anne Archibald's charity, Girls Inc, and Chuck to increase the revenue of The Empire by returning to his bad boy persona), Blair makes the decision to attend Chuck's Saints and Sinners party in order to confront him. Chuck confesses that he loves her, and the pair kiss in front of everyone after the curtain concealing them is pulled down. Anne tells Blair that she can no longer be a part of Girls Inc just as Chuck's publicist KC tells Chuck that she thinks Blair will be good for business. Blair re-thinks her decision to sacrifice it all for their relationship, and she and Chuck break up once again. Chuck promises he'll wait for her, and both affirm their belief that their love will reunite them in the end. On thanksgiving Chuck and Blair run into each other at Serena's house, Chuck offers to leave but She tells him that she was heading to JFK anyway and came to drop off the traditional pie and that they should get used to this. They hear about Serena being hospitalized and while they're sharing that maybe nothing can change between them, Jenny walks in and their conversation interrupts. While driving Blair home, Chuck tells her that he showed up only for Serena. When she told him that what happened with Serena made her question what she told him after the Saints & Sinners party; Chuck tells her that he cannot be her friend now as much as he wishes he could. After that Blair still sends him her traditional pie, saying that even if they can't be friends it doesn't mean that they aren't.

In "The Townie" episode, It was revealed that Lily was going to sell Bass Industries instead of giving Chuck the company back. So he sets off to New Zealand, where his uncle Jack Bass is currently living. Chuck returns to the Upper East Side with revenge for Lily. Chuck's new love interest Raina and her father, Russell Thorpe, a former rival of Chuck's late father Bart Bass. Chuck, however, manages to save the company after it is reveled that Russell accidentally killed his wife in a building fire that Bart was originally accused of. Later, Blair is kidnapped by Russell, but Chuck saves her, and the two go to a Bar Mitzah. There, the two are seen dancing and smiling happily, disapproving the idea that Chuck cannot make Blair happy. The two have sex, and Blair decides she is going to leave Louis, but Chuck stops her, telling her that she needs to be with Louis because he makes her happy. At the end of the episode, Chuck decides to spend the summer traveling with Nate, and it also revealed that Blair may be pregnant with Chuck's baby.

Controversy

Further information: Blair Waldorf

Following the 20th episode of Season 4, Safran spoke on behalf of the series regarding the scene in which Chuck became violent with Blair.^[3]

“

The way we viewed it, I think it's very clear that Blair is not afraid in those moments, for herself. They have a volatile relationship, they always have, but I do not believe—or I should say we do not believe—that it is abuse when it's the two of them. Chuck does not try to hurt Blair. He punches the glass because he has rage, but he has never, and will never, hurt Blair. He knows it and she knows it, and I feel it's very important to know that she is not scared—if anything, she is scared for Chuck—and what he might do to himself, but she is never afraid of what he might do to her. Leighton and I were very clear about that.

”

In response to these comments, Carina MacKenzie of Zap2it stated, "We're left wondering if Safran missed the part where she went home bleeding because Chuck was using physical intimidation to release his own emotions."^[4]

While reviewing the episode, Tierney Bricker of Zap2it remarked that there were "really no excuses for Chuck Bass anymore."^[5] MacKenzie concluded that Chuck's behavior throughout Season 4 fit the signs of an abusive relationship, citing examples from HelpGuide.org, a non-profit health resource. She noted Chuck's public humiliation of Blair, his attempt to pawn her during a business deal, and his use of physical intimidation. MacKenzie also called the show's explanation "disturbing, particularly given the young, female target demographic of Gossip Girl and The CW."^[4]

Reception

Entertainment Weekly named Chuck Bass and Blair Waldorf number one in their "Best Dressed TV characters of 2008" list, as well as in their "Best Performances" list for Ed Westwick, alongside co-star Leighton Meester.^[6] The character also made the "Forbes Fictional 15" ranking at number 13 with an estimated $1.1 billion fortune.^[7]

References

1. ^ http://definitivetouch.com/features/20-distinguished-male-characters-tv-history
2. ^ Walper, Simone (02 Septembre 2010) "Spécial trading, entrez sur le Forex avec l'euro/dollar." MoneyWeek. Numerous 096.
3. ^ Arrow, Jennifer (2011-5-3). "Gossip Girl Boss: "Chuck Has Never, and Will Never, Hurt Blair"". E! Online. http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/watch_with_kristin/b239902_gossip_girl_boss_chuck_has_never_will.html. Retrieved 2011-5-10. 
4. ^ ^{a b} MacKenzie, Carina (2011-5-3). "Gossip Girl: Is Chuck Bass abusive? E.P. says no; we beg to differ". Zap2it. http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethebox/2011/05/gossip-girl-is-chuck-bass-abusive-ep-says-no-we-beg-to-differ.html. Retrieved 2011-5-10. 
5. ^ Bricker, Tierney (2011-5-3). "Blair catches Royal Wedding fever". Zap2it. http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethebox/2011/05/gossip-girl-the-princesses-and-the-frog-blair-catches-royal-wedding-fever.html. Retrieved 2011-5-8. 
6. ^ "The Best & Worst of 2008". Entertainment Weekly. http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20162677_20164091_20243883_9,00.html. Retrieved 7-9-2009. 
7. ^ Richest Fictional Characters Opinions Weatlh Retrieved: 2010-06-20.