Gossip Girl fans: We have some major news for you.
Chuck Bass and Blair Waldorf were never supposed to be the most 'shipped couple on the cult series. In fact, they were never even supposed to hook up at all.
Co-creator and writer Josh Schwartz (who also created another show you might have heard of — The O.C.) talked to Vulture about his initial intent for Ed Westwick's iconic character, and why the show diverged from the plot of Cecily von Ziegesar's books to make Chair, as they were nicknamed, a TV couple for the ages.
"None of that was expected," Schwartz told the site. "Chuck came into the show as the villain." And Blair, of course, was a villain too. However, once Schwartz and the writers saw the two characters in a scene together, he realized the potential of their chemistry. "You get an actor like Ed Westwick and see the chemistry he had with Leighton Meester, and their scenes just crackled." Blair and Chuck's unrelenting (and often unstable) union proved that two wrongs can make a right. Or in Schwartz's words: "They were drawn to each other’s dark sides, but then found happiness and enlightenment and love because of that."
As the romance between Chuck and Blair evolved (hello, that limo scene), viewers started to fall deeply in love with the couple, and the pair became a core part of the show. Schwartz is thankful for that, even though it was totally not part of his original game plan. "In a way, that love story between those two characters was always one of the overarching stories of the whole show, and we knew that," he said. "As far as we pushed them, we always had to be able to find a way to bring them back together.”
Long live Chair!
Giph via Giphy.