The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills
“Lucy Lucy, Apple Juicy”
February 12, 2019
Welcome, darlings, to a new season of The Real Housewives of Beverl— and what’s this? We’re already fighting? Lisa is VanderScreaming at Kyle and Kyle is screaming at Lisa but we don’t know what they are screaming about and then Kyle is saying that Lisa cares more about her VanderImage than their friendship which is apparently THE LAST VANDERSTRAW and Lisa orders Kyle to get the VANDERFUCK OUT OF HER VANDERHOUSE. And Kyle obliges as one of Lisa’s VanderDogs, Floofy or Plooby or Clumpy, whomever, watches sadly through the large glass doors.
What the VanderHell?
~TWO MONTHS EARLIER~
We begin in everyone’s houses first damn thing in the morning as Kyle texts everyone to invite them to her new house for a pool party to close the episode. Kyle’s making breakfast; Rinna is screaming at her children about yoga; Lisa is feeding her VanderDogs out of her VanderChina; Dorita and her insufferable husband are playing “rocket ship” with their insufferable children in their insufferable bed; Teddi is obsessive-compulsively scrubbing her kitchen counters; and Erika, God bless her, she’s in bed when the text comes in and instead of responding to it, she pulls the covers over her head because SHE IS THE ONLY ONE WHO IS WORTH ANYTHING.
We also learn that the counters that Teddi is furiously scrubbing are in the new house that she and whatever her husband’s name is bought with their brand new Real Housewives money. Not the money she earned directly from being on the show, silly, that’s not how any of these women make their money. No, instead, she bought it with the money she made at her business now that every dummy in Southern California has decided they need a Real Housewife to send them mean texts about how they haven’t done enough burpees for the day. She brags about how well her business is doing: she has 30 coaches working for her and over 500 clients and that’s great! Congratulations to her! Get that money! But let’s not pretend that this is an organic development that had nothing to do with her newfound Bravoness.
Elsewhere, Rinna and her two daughters Not!Gigi and Not!Bella, do some goat yoga and try to act like this is one of those wacky “only in California!” kinda things, but bitch, please. They do goat yoga with country music in Friendswood, Texas, y’all. FRIENDSWOOD. Try again.
We also learn that the one daughter, Not!Gigi, has given up on living in New York City because TOO HARD. She’s totally going to get her own apartment in Los Angeles and not live with her parents, with whom she is currently living, indefinitely. Totally. Absolutely. Totally.
Over in Lisa Vanderpump’s VanderWorld, things have been VanderSad. Lisa’s brother, Mark, committed suicide some three months before filming began. According to some British tabloids, he was having money issues and problems in his relationship with his fiance, and he overdosed. Lisa says in an interview that it was a cry for help that went terribly wrong, which is understandable as he had tried to kill himself the year before. However, the coroner determined something else. In the end, it doesn’t matter: Lisa lost her brother, and she is understandably depressed about it and maybe she shouldn’t be filming right now.
Oh, and also Giggy is deteriorating, requiring doggy CPR and incubators and … I just don’t think we should be bearing witness to any of this. To be a voyeur of these people’s lives is obviously the appeal of any reality show, but this feels like too much. It’s too close to the bone, too real.
Elsewhere, Kyle gives Teddi a tour of the new house while reminding us that they were burglarized weeks after moving in. It’s boring.
Erika hosts Dorit, who reveals that she, too, has been burglarized, everything of value taken but an ugly-ass necklace that her insufferable husband gave her for Valentine’s Day one year.
And the lesson here is that it is very sad when multi-millionaires who are insured out the hoo-ha lose their collections of $20,000+ purses. My heart goes out to everyone involved.
(But I do have a kinda funny story to go along with Dorit’s story of the burglars rejecting her ugly-ass necklace. In college, one of my best friends returned to his apartment to discover that it had been entirely cleaned out — and by entirely cleaned out, I mean not just his stereo and TV, but all his furniture, his kitchen utensils, clothes, everything, but for one thing: his collection of Woody Allen films on VHS. True story.)
And then we get to the heart of the episode and everything that goes down this season: The VanderDoghazi Scandal.
First thing to know: During the offseason, Teddi had been doing charity SoulCycle classes to raise money for VanderPets, and as a result became friends with the guys who actually run the joint.
Second thing to know: Also during the offseason, Dorit and her insufferable husband adopted a dog from Vanderpets, let’s call her “Lucy.” Lucy wasn’t a good fit with the insufferable family — she had a tendency to bite insufferable people like Dorit’s insufferable children, but when she bit Dorit’s insufferable husband he HAD ENOUGH, and they found a new home for the dog.
Third thing to know: This new home apparently was also populated with insufferables, and the next thing you know, Lucy was dumped at a shelter.
Fourth thing to know: VanderPets don’t fuck around. 1. There is a $5,000 fee for pulling some dumb shit like dumping a dog adopted at VanderPets at the shelter instead of bringing it back to VanderPets. 2. All the VanderDogs are VanderChipped and the shelter is a SNITCH.
Fifth and final thing to know: Teddi’s new best friends at VanderPets told her alllllllll about Dorit and her insufferable family being shitty dog owners because they are VANDERPISSED.
And you already know that Teddi and Dorit hate each other, so I don’t need to tell you that.
Right, so, this is the situation an unwitting Kyle walks into when she and Portia meet Teddi and her kids and Lisa at VanderPets ostensibly to play with puppies or some shit. After plopping some puppies into the kids’ laps, one of the VanderPets dudes, John, flashes a dog around, asking the women if they recognize this one, before hissing that it’s Dorit’s dog. “Oh, is she being groomed?” an innocent Kyle asks, before being told by Lisa that it just didn’t work out and she doesn’t want to talk about it further. But soon Lisa spills the VanderBeans, telling Kyle the story as outlined above and insisting that it was just an honest mistake on Dorit’s part.
But then, later, Lisa gives Kyle some VanderGrief about not coming to the opening of her new restaurant, TomTom, AS SEEN ON VANDERPUMP RULES, and Kyle takes it less as good-natured ribbing and more as Lisa vanderCriticizing her again, and begins yelling at Lisa that she is NOT GOING TO DO THIS. SHE HAD JUST LANDED FROM AN INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT THAT DAY AND IT WAS 4 A.M. FOR HER AND ANYWAY LISA DIDN’T EVEN INVITE HER AND SHE IS TIRED OF BEING HELD TO A DIFFERENT STANDARD THAN DORIT WHO JUST THROWS AWAY A DOG AND ALL IS FORGIVEN BUT KYLE MISSES ONE STUPID EVENT THAT SHE WASN’T EVEN INVITED TO AND SHE’S THE GODDAMNED VILLAIN? NO. MA’AM.
As Kyle begins to stomp off, Teddi serves as a Lisa whisperer, explaining that Kyle didn’t read what Lisa said as a joke, but instead a criticism. So Lisa Vanderpologizes to Kyle, and begins crying that things have been VanderHARD lately, before remembering that she’s being filmed. She tries to shoo the cameras away, but the cameras ain’t going nowhere, filming the three women as Lisa VanderSobs about being an idiot and depressed. TOO REAL. GET OUT OF HER VANDERFACE, YOU GHOULS.
Oh, also, too, apparently Kyle bought the same Porsche as Lisa Vanderpump, but in a different color. Lisa still accuses her of “copying” her, because Porsches are so rare in Los Angeles.
Later, Lisa and Grandpa Ken and Dorit and her insufferable husband go to dinner, where Grandpa Ken, despite being 70% android at this point, still manages to put on a sports coat, while insufferable husband couldn’t be bothered to put on something other than a Laundry Day t-shirt. Said the woman who typed this while wearing yoga pants riddled with holes, a sweatshirt, and no bra. Then again, I’m just on my couch, not at some fancy L.A. bistro about to get my ass chewed out by Lisa Motherfucking Vanderpump for abandoning my dog with a sociopath.
AND BEFORE WE MOVE ON, I NEED YOU TO KNOW THAT WE ESTABLISH IN THIS SCENE THAT DORIT’S INSUFFERABLE HUSBAND SHAVES HIS HANDS AND ARMS FOR REASONS THAT COMPLETELY DEFY ME. Is he a professional swimmer? Does he have an arm hair phobia? Does he cosplay as a dolphin?
WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH THE SHAVING?
Alas(?), that’s a mystery we will have to go to our graves never answering because what we are here for is to passively aggressively let Dorit and her shaved obese dolphin husband know is that 1. what they did with the dog was BULLSHIT and 2. TEDDI KNOWS.
Dorit:
Over at Lisa Rinna’s house, it’s time to meet our newest Housewife — although if you are as familiar with Captain Carmen Ibanez as I am, YOU NEED NO INTRODUCTION. Denise Richards arrives and we are told that she and Rinna have known one another for 30 years — otherwise known as three lifetimes in Hollywoodese. Dorit and Erika join them, and soon they are all drinking tequila and reminiscing about that time Charlie Sheen sucked on Rinna’s toes for a shitty movie.
Finally, Kyle’s big pool party. It’s very boring and nothing really happens, the end.
OH FINE. Kyle wears a formal mumu; Rinna eats a hamburger AND a hot dog; we learn that Kyle has known Charlie Sheen since she was 13 and that she used to date C. Thomas Howell; Dorit’s son is kinda a jerk to Teddi’s son and says his face is weird; Grandpa Ken passes out in a chair and Not!Bella posts a video of it on Instagram; we learn that Dorit unfollowed Teddi on Instagram; Teddi makes a “WINNING!” joke right in front of Denise Richards and everyone is all, “OOOOHHHHH NOOOOOOO” as if Denise Richards has never heard anyone mockingly refer to all the crazy shit her ex-husband said ten years ago; and everyone knows what Dorit did to the VanderDog but no one is talking about it.
Yet.
The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills airs on Bravo on Tuesdays at 8/9 p.m.