Without a doubt, this season of real Housewives of Beverly Hills will go down in Bravo lore as The Brandi Season. Her various dramas and sit-downs bookended this episode, and despite Lisa’s efforts to integrate Vanderpump rules into the storyline, Brandi and how people react to her, be it positive or negative, is really the person holding the entire thing together. She’s beautiful, flawed, loud-mouthed and typically right, which is possibly the ideal recipe for real Housewives stardom. Are we sure that Brandi isn’t a robot that Bravo built in the basement at Rockefeller Center?
I really hate it when Bravo starts by forcing us to re-watch most of a scene that we already watched last week. That’s what happened at the top of last night’s episode; we were thrust back into Sur to watch Brandi and Scheana blubber at each other once again, but instead of following Scheana into Vanderpump rules like we did last week, we followed Brandi into another section of the restaurant, where she sat down to drink pink wine with Lisa and rehash what had been said mere moments before.
Brandi then expanded a bit on how she had viewed her marriage while she was still in it, and apparently there weren’t all that numerous warning signs, at least not when she and Eddie were physically together. watching her well up with emotion was unsettling (I’m not good with feelings. Ask Megs.), mostly because it seemed genuine. relationship are hard, but breakups are harder.
Thankfully, we switched away from the feelings and toward Yolanda’s own subtle variety of insanity. Kyle was visiting her at home and they talked about cleansing and only eating lemon juice for 10 days and how it makes your brain all fancy and sharp. Sugar water for 10 days! sounds super healthy and not at all like something that people who have disordered relationships with food do. Yolanda may or may not have also hinted at the stupefyingly incorrect idea that it might cure Kim’s alcoholism. Or at least “change her decision-making.” Which, when speaking about Kim and her problems, is sort of the same thing.
While Kyle was pretending to go on a cleanse in order to appease the flying Dutchwoman, Kim was having a meeting with her life coach. despite the typically scammy nature of life coaches, the conversation she had with her “coach” was about a thousand times much more sane and grounded than Kyle and Yolanda’s super-serious talk over spicy lemon water. They posited Kim’s relationship with Kyle is skewed because Kim is no longer drunk all the time and can finally see that Kyle is maybe not a good person. sounds plausible to me.
Next up was Lisa, who was trying a new special at villa Blanca that involved beef and crab risotto and personally tending to the utterly huge flower arrangements at the front of the house. Meanwhile, Ken and the household staff were constructing a flower-dotted tree swing made entirely out of pink and ribbons and loveliness in the back yard. Lisa came home and swung and continued to have the life of which every single girl on the planet dreams, and Ken pushed her and suggested that they celebrate their anniversary by renewing their vows. I would hate Lisa if I didn’t love her so much.
The show rapidly snapped back to reality by sending us straight to dinner with Kyle and that Marisa person who is not a housewife yet but might be someday if she can insert herself in enough drama over the next few weeks. Brandi was the first to arrive (and apparently hadn’t been told that dinner was on the floor because she was wearing a short, tight dress) and announced that she was about to be sued by Adrienne and Paul unless she promises, cross her heart and hope to die, that she won’t ever talk about them again. will she guarantee that? Epäselvä.
The rest of the group, including Lisa, Yolanda, Marisa’s husband, Mauricio and Kim, started arriving shortly thereafter. Marisa’s brother also showed up for reasons that weren’t right away apparent. once Kim arrived, Yolanda started questioning her about the Master Cleanse and whether or not she was going to do it, and Kim said that she no longer could because she just couldn’t, ok? She didn’t really have a good explanation as for why, so I’ll go ahead and give one for her: because cleanses like those are terrible pseudo-science BS. (That “high” people talk about? That’s an anorexic’s high. Google it.) If you’re going to torture yourself with a cleanse, at least do one that provides significant nutritional value beyond the sugar calories of maple syrup. drink some green juice or something. (Ok, fine, I’ll hop off my soapbox now. and yes, I’ve done cleanses. never AGAIN.)
When everyone finally settled into their seats, most of the group took the opportunity to complain about the restaurant’s bad service. Not Kim, though – she sidled up to Kyle to talk about reconciliation and moving forward, and she mostly did the talking while Kyle sat there and triEd sanomatta mitään vikaa tai mitään. En ole täysin varma, kuinka keskustelu päättyi lähinnä siksi, että kyllästyin.
Muualla Taylor lopetti puhumasta palvelusta ja alkoi puhua ongelmistaan treffailussa ja siitä, kuinka hän tunsi edelleen huijaavan kuollutta aviomieheään. Sitten puhui siihen, kuinka Adrienne ja Paul haastaa Brandin, ja jotenkin Taylor piti yhtäkkiä Brandin kättä ja rohkaisi häntä pysymään vahvana eikä jättämättä takaisin, kun ihmiset ihmiset jengit häneen. Taylor yritti myös köyttää Camillen koko sisar-ystävälle LoveFest, mutta hänellä ei ollut mitään siitä. Muistamme kaikki, kun Taylor oli valmis heittämään jouset Brandille kuten kolme jaksoa sitten, eikö niin? Ja nyt he ovat kaksi naista, jotka taistelevat hyvää taistelua samanaikaisesti? Mitä?
Melko pian muu ryhmä alkoi puhua pukuista ja Brandin kommenteista, ja Mauricio sai itsensä näyttämään valtavalta ääliöltä tästä aiheesta uudestaan. En ole vieläkään tajunnut, miksi hänellä on niin oikeus olla viimeinen sana Brandi-Adrienne -konflikteista, mutta hänen savun asenteensa siihen on nopeasti kulunut paljon enemmän tai vähemmän kaikki siihen, mitä olen rakentanut hänelle Kahden viimeisen kauden aikana. Hän ei lopeta käskyä Brandin soittavan Adriennelle, eikä hän edes sulje siitä, vaikka Ken (oikein) ehdotti, että kun pukuuhat on heitetty, kuka tahansa puolivälissä kunnollinen asianajaja kertoo, että sinun ei pitäisi ottaa yhteyttä toinen henkilö. Miksi? Koska se on hyvä tapa saada häirintää lisäykseen oikeusjuttuun.
Mauricion fantastinen neuvo? Huomaa asianajajasi. Minun täytyy olla samaa mieltä Brandin kanssa tästä: Hänellä olisi hyvä sulkea eff. Oikeudenmukaisuuden vuoksi Brandi olisi myös hyvä sulkea eroon siitä, oliko Kimistä sanottu epätodellinen vai yksinkertaisesti virheellinen. Jos aiot olla itsekuvaama ”totuuden tykki”, on parasta myös pystyä myöntämään armollisesti, kun olet mennyt todellisuuteen.
Kaikkien huutamisen keskellä ja kaikki ylimääräiset ihmiset illallisella, olisi voinut olla helppo menettää yksi jakson mielenkiintoisimmista yksityiskohdista: Lisa ja Ken tunnustivat, että Brandi oli totta. Se oli eräänlainen yksityinen syrjään heidän kahden välillä, mutta Bravo -kamerat kiinni siitä ja tuottajat varmasti sisällyttävät sen. Joissakin tapauksissa saan tunteen, että Bravo -tuottajat puhuvat meille ja vievät puolia editointivalintansa kautta, ja se oli yksi niistä hetkistä. Näyttää siltä, että tiedämme missä verkko seisoo Brandin kommentteissa.
