The Ringer waits in the wings for her time to strike.

That saving grace means that this week’s episode, “A Nutcracker in Paradise”, wasn’t the series finale after all, but a “summer finale” marking the end of the season in an astronomy sense rather than the TV-standard sense. I’m unused to this approach to TV time-marking since I’ve never watched any other ABC Family shows, unless you count the old reruns of Whose Line Is It, Anyway? that they dropped long ago, or one time our family visited the set of The 700 Club in Virginia Beach even though we weren’t fans. (Long story.) I look forward to the “winter premiere” when its time arrives, but one has to wonder if the summer season and winter season will together comprise the eventual Season 1 DVD set, or if Summer 2012 was Season 1 and Winter 2012-2013 will be Season 2, or if the DVD manufacturer will avoid “season” divisions and opt instead for “volumes” like some animated shows do.

I’m taking a DVD release for granted, of course. Now that the specter of cancellation has dissipated for the moment, unbridled optimism is the order of the day. While we’re dreaming big, let’s also wish for more fun cameos for the benefit of you Gilmore Girls fans, maybe a few higher-profile guest stars, and something involving the word “Emmy”. Call me a lunatic, but it feels a lot better than living in a constant state of fear and chanting, “Six seasons and a movie! Six seasons and a movie! Six seasons and a movie!” as if the Beetlejuice summoning method will make it so.

Regardless: we can breathe more easily, knowing that the show didn’t end permanently with this week’s cliffhanger. I knew the show was headed somewhere dark as soon as I realized that the first half-hour had far too many happy moments in it. Too much happiness always means doom and gloom are bound to arrive and restore much-unwanted balance to the scales. First happy event: the previous week’s feud between Ginny, Melanie, and Boo over the date-ability of icky Charlie and dashing Carl was forcibly negotiated with a gum-wrapper treaty and no small amount of badgering from an annoyed Sasha and a tentatively promoted Michelle, clearly high on the first of many power trips yet to come.

With everyone friends again, love was truly in the air! (Well, not for Truly, hereby dubbed Lady Not-Appearing-in-This Episode.) Michelle and Godot the bartending stud moved past the googly-eye stage and shared tender public moments, to a lot of bemused head-turning from the other tables. Fanny and Michael seemed happier than ever, and in talks for some extended quality time in Montana. Boo gave the most achingly self-deprecating speech of the season, threw herself on the mercy of the Nutcracker fundraiser, and won back the heart of Our Hero Carl at last. Hurray for happy endings that will certainly stay very happy forever and sure not be ruined by any horrifying turn of events or anything!

Not even Sasha was immune to Cupid’s well-oiled scattergun. Despite her wish for lesbianism to save them all from guy trouble, Sasha met-cute against her will with a potential suitor of her own at the Oyster Bar’s fundraiser. He begins the episode as Tyler, star of a sad basketball team on a Charlie Brown losing streak, and ends the episode as Roman, newborn rebel transformed by thirty-year-old goth-rock. I’m fine with the costume department’s eclectic decision — grateful, even, that they went with something besides ’80s hair metal or up-‘n’-coming corporate-rock product placement. I’m not sure how well “Bela Lugosi is Dead” would lend itself to modern dance, but they’re certainly welcome to try. (If that doesn’t work out, might I suggest “Detonation Boulevard” by the Sisters of Mercy?)

Outside the subplots of love, Sasha once again nabbed a solo routine, this time in a satirical anti-Wall Street number accompanied by the descendants of the dancers from Madonna’s “Material Girl” video. Michelle enjoyed a rousing musical moment, a dream rendition of “Maybe This Time” from Cabaret. Boo and Carl shared a blissful makeup dance to “The Rainbow Connection”, as covered by Weezer with Hayley Williams of Paramore. Hopefully the winter season/volume/session/whatever allows opportunities to shine the spotlight on Ginny, Melanie, or even twelve-year-old Matisse, who by my reckoning is owed something for enduring Ginny’s frantic will-I-or-won’t-I rapid-fire blathering that seemed to be fueled by one too many gallons of Red Bull. (Fun trivia: this episode isn’t actress/dancer Matisse Love’s first time performing The Nutcracker.)

Alas, everything came crashing down in the episode’s fateful second half, in which Michelle wreaked untold havoc with six of the deadliest words in the English language: “I was only trying to help.” After earning so many smiles from Fanny in the first thirty minutes, she found it was all frown-hill from there.

First she attempts to play Doctor Love for Fanny and Michael, now falling out over Michael’s alleged plan to move to Montana permanently and possibly solo. When Michelle tries to talk Michael out of doing what she thinks Michael is doing, Michael apparently accelerates his plans and vanishes ahead of schedule. Handy tip: when a schmuck of a male is trying to avoid commitment, telling him his Signficant Other’s surprise commitment plans may not be the best way to change his mind. Who knew.

And then there was the big night, The Nutcracker in all its intended glory, Paradise Dance Academy’s biggest show of the year, the one that keeps them solvent and on the map. It’s like tax season for H&R Block, or the Indianapolis 500 for the town of Speedway, or the annual Marvel crossover event. This. Was. Very. Important. And all of it came crashing down in an initially funny, suddenly terrifying sequence in which an inattentive Michelle reaches for some refreshing misting water for the overheated cast and instead whips out her can of “pretty mace” on all of them, even testing it on herself like a true Stooge. Hijinks, eye damage, and “Marco! Polo!” ensue. As blinded teens body-slam each other or crawl offstage to safety, The Nutcracker transforms into Rise of the Ringer as Sasha’s usurper seizes the day, takes the stage, and delivers the performance of her career to an appreciative audience of zero.

Yes, behind all this madness and mayhem lurked…the Ringer. The first-ever super-villain ballerina was cordially invited to infiltrate the dance studio at Fanny’s behest while Sasha was still under the spell of Bring It On. Though Sasha was obviously freed this week from the Cult of Sue-Sylvesterology and ready to assume the role of Clara per Paradise annual tradition, the Ringer was nonetheless unstoppable by the adults and unflappable in the face of Sasha’s attempt to fire her. The nameless Ringer was a lean, mean, dancing machine undaunted by multitasking, untempted by human niceties such as courtesy and emotion, and completely oblivious to everyone else’s constant movie references. “I don’t have cable!” she whined in pain as she revealed her one weakness and her secret identity in that moment: she’s obviously a Nielsen viewer. Expect this supernaturally talented adversary to become Bunheads’ answer to Sideshow Bob in the seasons/volumes/sessions/whatevers ahead.

Beyond a bittersweet yet enigmatic dream reunion between the widow Michelle and her departed one-time husband, the episode ended with a wrenching walk down the hospital’s White Mile, accompanied by the echoes of Fanny’s fury and the sounds of Paradise parents demanding something between justice and litigation. The final Dead Poets Society tribute may not have been original, but it was no less heartbreaking, especially when Michelle had to remind Blockbuster’s best customers how that particular movie ended. (Seriously, is there so little to do in Paradise that all the kids spend their entire lives sitting through eighteen hours of cable movie channels every day, memorizing them wherever possible, maybe even taking notes on index cards just for small-talk prep? Remember the time when Melanie cracked wise about Martin Scorsese’s Kundun? What human does that? Watch Kundun, I mean?)

In these next few months without Bunheads, many questions will haunt us. Can the parents of Paradise ever forgive Michelle? Can our queenly quartet devise a clever way to restore Michelle’s honor and somehow blame everything on the Ringer? Can Fanny forget that free-love cad of hers and move on with her life and heart? Even if she does, can the studio afford to go on? And is there some way Ghost-Hubbell can become a regular?

Until Bunheads returns, we bid farewell for now with this closing number — that Weezer/Williams cover of “The Rainbow Connection”, one of the best Oscar-nominated songs of all time, a close personal favorite of mine since childhood. Kermit’s fragile banjo hook strikes a nerve for me every time. This version opts instead for ethereal strings that don’t achieve quite the same authenticity, but a TV season/volume/session/whatever that included both this song and They Might Be Giants holds a pretty astronomical ranking in my book.