Cafe Disaffecto

“Café Disaffecto” was the fourth episode of the first season of Daria. It first aired on MTV on March 24, 1997.

"Cafe Disaffecto" was written by Glenn Eichler.

Summary
This episode opens with a computer being stolen from "alt.lawndale.com," the student coffee house. Much of the episode concerns the characters attempting to raise money to open an alternative venue, an "old-school," Greenwich Village-style coffee house with acts and performers and poets and the like. (On a "suggestion" Daria didn't know she was making, to "Language Arts" teacher Timothy O'Neill.) Daria is also forced to perform at the coffee house. In typical subversive fashion, she reads a story about a Cold War-era spy named Melody Powers, and starts a riot that causes the coffee house to be closed down.

“Café Disaffecto” and Fanfic
Throughout Kara Wild's Driven Wild Universe series, Café Lawndale undergoes several changes. In "The Tie That Chokes," it returns to being a student coffee house, with the added presence of armed security. In "Erin the Head," Cafe Lawndale has closed altogether and has been turned into a new "happening" venue called the Metreonopolis. Finally, in "Into the Fire," we learn that the Metreonopolis was shut down and turned into the more tasteful, sedate Café Brunoli, which caters to older clientele. In each case, with the exception of the last one, disaster befell the café, just as it did in "Café Disaffecto." In "Can I Just Have The Coffee?", Daria is convinced via a different route to read a story at the coffee house, with John Lane egging the near-rioting football players on.