Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Seniors Episode Five: Last Chance by R. L. Stine

**This blog contains adult language.**

Warning: Spoilers Ahead!!!  This is a recap blog which means I read the book and tell you everything that happens (or doesn't fucking happen) so you don't have to read it yourself.  Do NOT continue to read unless you want to know who the bad.......fuck it.  Nothing happens in this book.

Tag Line: Take it or die.

From the Back of the Book: Caught!  Mr Morley is so nice when he catches Mary O' Connor stealing a test.  He doesn't tell.  He doesn't fail her.  She just has to do him a favor....But helping Mr Morley isn't as easy as it seems.  In fact, it could kill her!

This book was published in 1998 and this is my first time reading it.  It's the fifth book in the series and there's no way I'm going to review four stupid books so I'll be linking my recaps instead.  Enjoy.

Book One is here......
Book Two is here.....
Book Three is here.....
Book Four is here....


The beginning of each book gives us a “yearbook” with all the characters. I'll summarize.

Trisha – lists her likes as shopping and her dislikes as “rich girl jokes

Clark – lists his likes as Debra and his dislikes as garlic

Jennifer – lists her likes as basketball and her dislikes as being a Fear in a Fear-hating town

Jade – lists her likes as cheerleading and her dislikes as ghosts

Gary – lists his likes as art class and his dislikes as cops

Kenny – lists his likes as Jade and his dislikes as kids who torture camp counselors

Debra ๐Ÿ’€ (RIP) – lists her likes as Clark's poems and her dislikes as possessive boyfriends

Stacy – lists her likes as sports and her dislikes as pyscho killers

Josh – lists his likes as Debra and his dislikes as funeral homes (uh oh, that's two for Debra)

Josie – lists her likes as standard goth fare and her dislikes as being compared to stepbrother Josh

Mickey – lists his likes as partying and his dislikes as studying

Marla – lists her likes as writing and her dislikes as goth girls

Mary – lists her likes as running and her dislikes as rich girls

Dana – lists her likes as boys and her dislikes as “private cheerleading performances

Deidre – lists her likes as mysterious guys and her dislikes as “being a good girl” (Dana's twin BTW)

Will – lists his likes as clubbing and his dislikes as the clinic

Ty – lists his likes as cheerleaders and his dislikes as Valentine's Day

Clarissa – lists her likes as art and her dislikes as Mira

Matty – lists his likes as computers and his dislikes as “people who can't take a joke

Phoebe – lists her likes as cheerleading and her dislikes as liars

Mira – lists her likes as band boys and her dislikes as psychics

Greta – lists her likes as football players and her dislikes as ceramics

Danielle ๐Ÿ’€(RIP) - lists her likes as dancing and her dislikes as being cold

Justin – lists his likes as The Beastie Boys and his dislikes as having his face shoved in the toilet

As you can see, Stine cheated and added people to the stupid yearbook just so he could cross them off later.  I call foul.

In the last book, Clarissa used a telephone psychic and clues from a ๐Ÿ‘ปghost๐Ÿ‘ป to solve the murder of her sister Justine. Debra knew too much and was eliminated but no one really seemed to care. Mira turned out to be the bad guy. She murdered Justine because Justine was dating Will who Mira was obsessed with. In the end, Mira ended up in a mental institution and Clarissa ended up dating Will despite her admitted crush on Josh.

We begin with Mary in the guidance counselor's office. She's been having some troubles in school lately but Mary says it isn't that bad. As long as she does well on her midterms, she'll still pass her classes. The GC brings up Mary's shoplifting hobby and Mary tells us that she's on probation for stealing a pair of jeans and a pair of earrings during the summer. According to the terms of her probation, she has to check in with the GC once a week.

After she leaves the office, she runs into her best friend Stacy. Stacy suggests they go to the mall for the afternoon but Mary is reluctant. She hasn't been to the mall since the shoplifting incident. Stacy says she needs to face her demons so she eventually agrees to go. She's a little paranoid about going back to the scene of the crime (a store named Rage) but Stacy seems really intent on going.  She's a very supportive friend, y'all.  \\sarcasm font//  There are some ribbed cardigans or something in Rage that Stacy is really drooling over. Mary finally agrees to go in and check them out.

Mary finds a black cardigan that she thinks will look smashing with her red hat. She thinks that Gary will be sorry he dumped her if he sees her in that sweater. So I guess Gary the Cheaterpants has finally made his choice. Honestly, Mary, you're better off. Stacy finds two different cardigans and goes to try them on but Mary decides not to bother trying on hers. There's a long line and she's sure the sweater will fit so she skips the dressing room entirely. She's standing around waiting for Stacy when she feels eyes on her. Standing just outside the store is a gorgeous blonde guy. She's so taken with him that she heads his way, completely forgetting she hasn't paid for the sweater. Luckily a salesperson stops her before she actually shoplifts again.

Unluckily, the salesperson who stopped her is the same one who caught her shoplifting a few months ago. She recognizes Mary and Mary panics. She's throws the sweater at the lady and goes running from the store. As she's turning a corner, she runs directly into the blonde hottie from before. He seems startled and goes racing off before she can say anything to him.

We skip ahead in time and suddenly Mary is at school again. She needs to stay after to talk to Mr Morley. She tells us that Morley is extremely hot and all the girls have a thing for him but her relationship with him is special. They talk about all kinds of things and he always knows what to say to make her feel better. She could use a little bit of 'feel better' right now so she's going to get her fix. Along the way she comes across Gary the Cheaterpants making out with Trisha right there in the hall. Mary is crushed.

She goes to Morley's room and tells him she's having a bad day. He's all kind and understanding and she soaks it right up. He mentions her struggles with school and tells her that he hopes she's prepared for his midterm tomorrow. She isn't. He says it will be a tough test but he feels like they'll be up for it. She's isn't so sure. Then he leaves to go get a cup of coffee and she notices a folder labeled “Midterms” right on his desk. Quickly she takes one and then hears a noise at the door. Morley is standing there and she's sure he saw her.

{{{GASP}}}

I don't know if this one is a LOLZ or not. I assume not but Morley comes in playing like he didn't just see her take the test. He asks her a question about Gary and Trisha who I assume he must have seen making out in the hall just now. She ducks the question, telling him that she really needs to rush to track practice. She slips the test into her bag and then beats it the hell out of there.

We're several days in the future now and it's time for the midterms to be handed back. Mary is surprised when hers doesn't have a grade on it. It just has “See me” across the top. She prepares herself for the worst. Sure enough, Morley tells her that he knows she took one of the tests from his desk. At first, he's very sympathetic and tells her that he understands that she's been under a lot of stress and pressure lately. Mary starts to relax. Then he asks her for a favor.

He gives her some big story about the physics teacher borrowing a jacket from him months ago. He never returned it and, in fact, wears it practically every day. Morley tells her if she gets the jacket back AND writes two makeup papers, he'll forget about her stealing the test. She agrees because she's dumb.

Odds that the jacket really belongs to Morley: 10%

Seriously??? Could that have been any dumber? All he would have to say is “Yo, physics teach, give me back my heckin jacket.” It doesn't make sense that he'd need a student to steal it back for him.

Morley tells Mary that the physics teacher is busy with a club meeting and now might be the ideal time for her to steal his jacket back. Mary trusts this and heads right for the physics classroom. To no one's actual surprise, there is no club meeting and the teacher catches her trying to steal his jacket. She immediately tells him that she's just taking it to back to Morley since it belongs to him and the physics teacher is having none of that. He says he knows about Mary's “little problem” and stealing from a teacher is a very serious offense. Since it's after school has ended on Friday, he tells her to meet him in the principal's office on Monday. She says that Morley can clear everything up, but when they go to his classroom, Morley is gone and all the lights are out.

Mary runs home to look up Morley's name in the phone book.


He lives on Fear Street, naturally. She calls him and tells him everything that happened. She asks if he'll back her up when the physics teacher reports her to the principal. He says he isn't sure that would help. He's known to have students' backs when it comes to quarrels with the faculty and the principal is likely to think he's just covering for Mary who is a known shoplifter. Mary insists that he tell the teacher and principal that she was doing it at his request and Morley changes tactics. He says that he could lose his job over this and Mary is horrified. She doesn't want him to lose his job. She laments that they need to come up with some kind of plan and he asks her to come to his house the next morning so they can discuss it.

Mary, sweetie, this is one of situations that they do after school specials warning people about.


We skip to the next morning. Mary takes a bus to Fear Street so she can meet with Morley. Along the way she's thinking about her father who she hasn't seen for five years. I have no idea if he's related to this story or not.  (((Note from future me: He is not.  This was garbage filler to pad Stine's word count.)))  When she arrives at Morley's house, she knocks but no one answers. She notices the door is ajar and just goes right in which is how 65% of horror movies start. She hears movement in the house and is shocked when the blonde boy from the mall appears down the hall.

The boy's name is Rob and he tells Mary that he works for Morley doing odd jobs and errands. Morley had to step out but he's expected back in 5-10 minutes so Rob invites Mary to wait inside. She mentions seeing him at the mall and he apologizes for running away like he did. He was late for work and Morley doesn't tolerate tardiness very well. Rob graduated from high school last year in another city but hasn't figured out what he wants to do with his life. Morley is a friend of the family and he offered to let Rob stay in his guest cottage in exchange for being his lackey.

Wow......a teacher has a guest cottage?  I want to teach in Shadyside.

Mary and Rob flirt a bit and then Rob asks her out. They make arrangements to meet at Pete's Pizza at seven to eat and then they'll go see the new Mel Gibson film. Mary says it's supposed to be “really funny” and I was curious so I went to Internet Movie Database and looked up the Mel Gibson film for 1998. It was Lethal Weapon 4. I only watched the first one in the series and it was kind of funny but more of an action movie. Maybe the 4th one was just a barrel of laughs. Anyway, they're talking about the date and suddenly Rob gets ominous because the end of the chapter is approaching. He tells her that Morley might not like them going out together and then he leans really close to tell her a big, dark secret about Morley.

{{{GASP}}}

LOLZ

We find out nothing. They hear a key turning in the lock and realize that Morley has returned. Morley tells Rob to get to work on something out back and then he takes Mary into his office. He tells her that he's given the matter a lot of thought and he thinks they just need to tell the truth. Mary is instantly distraught. She's scared Morley will be fired and she protests that she doesn't him to suffer for this. EVEN THOUGH IT WAS HIS IDEA IN THE FIRST PLACE. Morley says it will complicate things because there is another “matter” that is plaguing him.

Mary presses him to tell her his troubles and he eventually says that he's having problems with the other Social Studies teacher Ms Wilson. Wilson hasn't been very chummy with him since he arrived and refuses to share lesson plans or something equally stupid. He said that she's written a letter to the Board of Education requesting that he be terminated immediately and she's holding it in her room just waiting for him to slip up. He's afraid this little incident with the jacket may just give her the incentive she's been looking for to mail the letter. Mary is horrified. She tells Morley that he needs to get that letter so she can't send it. Because she'd never be able to write a second one, obviously. In Mary's mind this letter is a one-time thing that could never be reproduced. Morley tells her he can't get caught going through another teacher's desk and Mary volunteers to get it for him.


Morley makes a big show of telling her that it's not her job to save him and he'll just hope for the best and then he ushers her out of his house.

This is so stupid.  How is Mary falling for any of this?  These have to be the stupidest scenarios I've ever heard.

We skip to that evening. Mary meets Rob at Pete's and tries to get him to finish telling her the big secret about Morley. Rob brushes it off, though, and pretends it was nothing important. They have first date chatter about their lives and families and it's pretty boring so I'll spare you. Pretty much the entire class is there – including Gary and Trisha – and Mary is happy for them all to see her with Rob. She spots Stacy having dinner with Ty and excuses herself for a minute to say 'hi'. I'm not really sure why, though because she only spends about 30 seconds at their table.

Oh, I know why.


When she gets back to her table, Rob tells her they're going to pull a "dine and dash" and he yells at her to run. Startled and dismayed, she begins to run after him but the waitress screams at her to stop. Mary is sure she's been caught stealing again.

{{{GASP}}}

LOLZ

The waitress just wanted to give her the jacket that she left behind and Rob actually paid for their pizza while she was talking to Stacy. It was just a joke. She forgives him because he doesn't know about her shoplifting arrest and they end up kissing on the sidewalk outside of Pete's.

Now we've hopped to Monday morning before school starts. Mary is there so early that the hallways are completely deserted. She goes to Morley's room first to ask him what they are going to do. Morley tells her that he talked to the physics teacher and cleared everything up. He's still worried that Wilson will use this as an opportunity to send her letter and get him fired but he implores Mary not to think about it. This is very good manipulation on his part.

Mary is super worried about Morley getting in trouble so she decides to steal the letter from Wilson's room. She pours some orange juice on the floor outside of her locker but I honest to God don't know why....


.....and then she goes into Wilson's room. It takes her awhile to figure out where the letter is but she eventually finds it and stuffs it into her bag. She leaves the room and then a voice yells out to her from down the hall saying “I know what you did!

{{{GASP}}}

LOLZ

It's just the janitor pissed off about her spilling the orange juice. Honestly I am too because I can't figure out why she did it. Mary apologizes to the janitor and then takes the letter back to Morley. He reads it and tells Mary that they have a bigger problem. It's apparently the third in a series of letters of supposed “evidence” against Morley. The other two are apparently in her house. He tells Mary that she's going to have to break into Wilson's house to steal the other two letters. When she balks, he tells her she has to do it or he'll report her for cheating and tell everyone that it was her idea to steal the jacket and he just covered for her.

Mary is shook, y'all. Stealing the test will get her expelled and kicked off the track team but stealing the jacket actually violates her parole and it's a serious offense. Morley tells her that Wilson will be at a faculty meeting from 7-8:30 that night so she'll have an opportunity then.

Odds that Wilson will really be at a faculty meeting in the fucking evening: 10%

I mean, seriously. Those bitches happen either before school, directly after school or on inservice days. I might buy that it's a PTA/PTO meeting because those are actually in the evening and a teacher representative always attends but no school has staff meetings in the evening. Teachers would revolt damn fast.

Mary gets there a little before 7:00 and she can see someone moving around in the house. She tells herself that she just needs to wait until Wilson leaves the house and then she can go in and get the letters and get out. I don't know how she expects to find the letters in this house. There's no telling where they might be and the number of hiding places in an entire house is way bigger than the number of hiding places in a classroom. This is a futile mission from the beginning and Mary is too stupid to even realize it.

As she's hiding out in the bushes like some kind of creepy stalker, Rob comes up. He says Morley told him about Mary's little assignment and he's come to stop her. She argues with him for a bit, insisting that she has to do this or she'll go to jail. He gives up trying to talk her out of it and simply says he's going to come with her. She doesn't dissuade him even though she knows it's a risky thing for him to do. She doesn't want to be alone.

Wilson leaves and the two of them gain entry into her house through a basement window. Somehow, Rob seems to know that she has an office on the second floor and he leads Mary pretty much directly to it. This seems suspicious to me.

Odds that Rob is in on whatever this is: 60%

They start to go through the office and Mary eventually finds a folder that has MORLEY written across it in big letters.


She opens it up to find two different typed letters that are both addressed to the State Board of Education. They both say that Wilson has no proof but she believes that Morley killed two students at his previous school in cold blood. Mary is horrified.

Odds that the letters were planted: 60%

Mary and Rob are standing there pretty much in shock at what they found when they hear the door open downstairs and voices come into the house. Mary was expecting her intel to be accurate and Wilson to be gone for an hour and a half so she's shocked that Wilson is home early. They try to climb out the window because the front porch is directly under it and they think they can get down safely that way. Mary gets through but Wilson comes into the room before Rob can get through. He's caught and yells at Mary to run away. She does, hearing police sirens screaming down the street. Wow, Shadyside has a VERY responsive police department. I call #Bullshit. There's no way Wilson even had time to dial 911 and give her address that quick. Nice try, Stine.

Mary is hiding in some bushes by the fence waiting to see what happens with Rob when Morley rocks up wearing a trench coat. He says Rob called him from jail and asked for bail money and I call #Bullshit again. Barely any time has passed. There's no way they arrested him, booked him and put him in a cell already. Mary begs Morley to bail Rob out and Morley says he'll consider it after he has the letters.

Unfortunately Mary dropped the letters in Wilson's office. She doesn't have them. She tells Morley what they say and he isn't too surprised. She begs him again to bail Rob out and he tells her he doesn't need to do a damn thing to help either one of them because they were too incompetent to do the one thing he asked them to do. Mary is afraid he might actually kill her now that she knows the big secret.

Morley tells her he's going to give her one last chance. If she'll meet him at noon in his classroom tomorrow, they can discuss what she can do to make this all up to him. I'm sure it's not supposed to sound pervy but it sounds VERY pervy.


Mary goes home and tries to fall asleep. At some point in the middle of the night, the phone rings and it's Rob. He says he's in jail but Morley told him that he'll bail Rob out tomorrow afternoon if all goes well. Mary takes this to mean that Morley will bail out Rob if she does what he asks during their meeting.

BULL FUCKING SHIT

If Rob is really in jail, AND IT'S A BIG FUCKING IF RIGHT NOW, they would not have allowed him to make a random call in the middle of the night. Is he even really in jail? We only have his and Morley's word for it and I'm not sure I trust either of them. For all I know, Wilson is in on the whole thing too.

Then again, maybe Stine is just stupid.

Odds that Stine just doesn't know how jail works: 50%

Odds that Rob isn't really in jail: 50%

It could go either way.

The next day Mary goes to her meeting with Morley. He has her shut the door and then he explains that he has this sister who is very irresponsible. She leaves her two kids (age 7 and 3) home alone so she can go to the bar every night. He's spoken to her but apparently CPS doesn't exist in Shadyside because he hasn't done anything else about it. He wants Mary to teach her a lesson. Tonight when she heads to the bar, he wants Mary to go get the children and take them to an abandoned house nearby so that their mom thinks they were kidnapped.

I mean, they WILL be kidnapped. By Mary. Which is hella illegal.

Morley gives her a key to his sister's house and a key to the abandoned house that he has apparently rented. Mary protests that this is a felony and Morley again threatens to expose her and leave Rob to rot in jail. Mary decides the only thing to do is go to her guidance counselor and lay out the whole story.

Actually, Mary, the thing to do is record all your conversations with Morley and I can't even believe that hasn't crossed your fucking pea-sized mind yet.

Also, the guidance counselor doesn't believe her. Did you think she would? Of course you didn't. This isn't our first rodeo in Point Horror land.

We skip ahead to that night. Mary goes to the address that Morley gave her. She rings the bell and a little boy answers. He says his name is Jimmy and he's taking care of his baby sister Judy. Mary tells them her name is Laura and she's there to babysit them. She offers to take them to her “playhouse” and Jimmy is heckin stoked. She picks up Judy and leads Jimmy to the rental house. It's empty but they find a box of children's books in one of the closets which is super fucking suspicious but Mary doesn't pick up on it. She sits down to read to them and casually asks them if their uncle Donald (Morley's first name) comes to see them often. Jimmy says he has no uncles.

Are these Morley's kids? Did he lose them in a custody battle or something and just get Mary to kidnap them for him?

Odds they're Morley's kids: 59%

Mary hears a siren and realizes a cop car is headed right for the rental house. She knows Morley has set her up. She tells Jimmy to wait right there until the nice policeman comes to get them and then she runs out the back of the house and into the woods. She runs all the way to her house trying to figure out what she's going to do about Morley.

When she gets to her house, the bushes in her yard whisper her name. It turns out to be Rob. I guess Morley went ahead and bailed him out after Mary took the keys but it seems dumb because there's no way he could actually know that Mary went through with the kidnapping then. Either Morley is an idiot, Stine is an idiot or Rob never really was in jail. Even odds on the three of them. Anyway, Rob says that Morley told him that he was going to have to get rid of Mary and Rob because they know too much.

WHY DID MORLEY FUCKING WARN HIM OF THIS? Why didn't he just take Rob out right then and there and then go after Mary. It makes no sense that he would give them this warning unless Rob was in on it and gaslighting Mary.

Odds that Rob is in on whatever the fuck this is: 85%

Odds that Stine is just writing an INCREDIBLY stupid story: 100%

I know they don't add up. Fight me.

Rob says the only way they can keep Morley from killing them is to kill him first.

THIS IS A STUPID FUCKING STORY AND I DON'T KNOW HOW IT GOT PUBLISHED!!!!!!!

Mary wants to go to the cops but Rob says they'll never believe them.

Oh.

I get to bust out one of these.

MC decide not to call out the police for some lame reason? Check

I want to know where our required creepy anonymous call is. That bitch has gone missing. Doesn't Stine know it's LAW in this land? I think he wrote the fucking law and here he is not even following it. He should lose his job over this. This and many more crimes against the poor innocent readers of these craptacular books.

I may be having some kind of mental break here, y'all. I blame Stine and this FUCKING USELESS EXCUSE FOR A PLOT.

Rob pulls a bottle out of his pocket and tells her that he found it in Morley's house the first week he worked there. Somehow he knows it's an “instant poison” and “a few drops will kill someone in minutes”. What the hell does Morley have in his medicine cabinet? Cyanide? Mary continues to protest that she doesn't think she's capable of killing anyone and Rob continues to assert that they have no choice if they want to live.

Rob gives her the bottle and says she's the one who will have to do it because Morley doesn't trust Rob anymore and won't let him get close enough to administer the poison. Mary takes it reluctantly. The next day is a school holiday but Rob says Morley will be there working on a special project. Mary has track practice so it won't look unusual for her to be at the school. Rob encourages her to go see Morley and to slip the poison into his ever present coffee thermos. Mary still says she can't actually kill anyone but Rob encourages her to sleep on it and decide in the morning.

That night Morley calls. He's pissed because Mary bungled yet another assignment. He tells Mary that she has one last chance to make it up to him but she “owes him big”. He wants to see her in his classroom at 1:00 the next day and he vaguely insinuates that her life depends on it. Mary is shook and knows that she has to kill him after all. It's the only solution.

The next chapter is essentially just Mary fretting over whether she can kill Morley or not and a description of track practice. At the end of the chapter she finally gets to Morley's room where she discovers a notebook full of all the things Morley made her do for him. I don't know why this matters but she acts like it's the nail in Morley's coffin. She runs home really quick and then comes back. Morley still isn't in the room.

Mary puts the poison in Morley's thermos of coffee and sits back to wait for him. I mean.....she thinks she does.

Odds Rob actually gave her poison to dose Morley with: 2%

Morley arrives for the meeting and Mary tries to stall him by asking him for help studying or something stupid like that. Morley is a smug bastard and in the span of about a minute and a half, he manages to drink two full cups of coffee (the entire thermos). WHO DOES THAT? Fucking hell, Stine. Anyway, he gets up to go brew another pot and then grabs his throat. He croaks out that Mary poisoned him and then he falls to the ground.

Mary drags him behind the desk and sits down to wait for Rob. And then the big twist happens. I guess. Sigh. Rob comes in and asks if Morley told Mary everything. She thinks about what she read in the notebook and says yes. Rob comments that it's “pretty wild” that it was all just a “big psychological experiment” and Mary had been set up from the very beginning. The physics teacher, Wilson, guidance counselor and the mom with the two kids were all in on it. Rob notices the thermos on the desk and, for some fucking reason, pours himself a cup out of it. Mary just watches.

Rob apologizes for using her as an unwitting guinea pig but says he had to do it. He's Morley's assistant and this experiment is part of his thesis. WHAT COLLEGE FRESHMAN IS ALREADY WORKING ON HIS THESIS????????? Stine. Seriously.

DO BETTER!!!!!

Rob tells Mary he feels strange and then asks where Morley is. Mary tells him to look behind the desk. Rob freaks out. He screams that the bottle he gave Mary was just full of water.


Mary says she knows that. She read the outline of the experiment and all the details in the notebook, ran home, got some poison from her mom's medical kid (mom's a nurse and apparently brings poison home in some kind of kit) and put it in the thermos. Rob freaks out and then he passes out too.

Stacy comes in at this point, harassing Mary about going to the mall. She sees the bodies and screams. Mary tells her to relax. They've just been dosed with sleeping meds and they'll be fine in a few hours.

Then the book ends.

I seriously hope Mary reports him and all the teachers who participated in this to the school board and to whatever place he's doing this experiment for. This is highly unethical and illegal. Fucking hell, Stine.



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