Why Are You Threadening Me?
Bravo: the official network of diabolical Jesses
Because morbid curiosity and loving mess are my two most dominant personality traits and because the Bravo calendar is a little light, this week I found myself deep in a new rabbit hole: learning about cursed rollercoasters. Not ones that are cursed in a physical danger way or a civil liability way, but cursed in a why did you ever think this was going to work given the parameters of the physical world way.
Am I otherwise interested in rollercoasters? Of course not. I can trigger a migraine by leaning back in a recliner too quickly and developed motion sickness the minute I turned 34. Is my hatred of amusement parks one of my primary reasons for choosing not to have kids? Absolutely. Do I know anything about engineering? God, no. But there is something so hilarious about an obviously bad idea proving itself to be terrible multiple times in several different ways over the course of many years. Someone should invent a drug that replicates the sensation of opening a Wikipedia link and seeing an “incidents” subsection.
THIS WEEK IN BRAVO
RHOA
Bravo friendship breakups always bum me out, but the deterioration of Porsha and Shamea’s decades-long relationship is making me extra sad as someone who’s only made four new friends since high school. It seems like the show is making it difficult to avoid long-standing tensions rather than the show tearing apart an otherwise solid bond, but still! Sad!
Love Hotel
Ashley Darby, the menace that you are. I am sick of her shit-stirring on Potomac but her dropping the “I’m horny for Ralph” bomb at the end of this week’s episode is a gift to this otherwise laid-back program. A neurotic Shannon meltdown about vegetables is fun to watch, but it can’t carry the show.
BDDU
Call me crazy, but I just do not think I would lay topless on a bed next to my boss.
The Valley
I hate to make this the “Jesse is diabolical” corner every week when this show gives us so much more than that — Danny’s long-lost Gemstone sibling vibes, Zack rebounding to become my season 2 MVP, pilled-out Mariposa — but Jesse is diabolical. You will never convince me he hasn’t pickled his brain in Andrew Tate videos, sorry. I suspect his obsession with whether Michelle cheated on him will turn out to be projection, but I also think it’s a manifestation of his inability to cope with the reality that she didn’t leave him for another man who has some kind of status he lacks, she left him because he sucks ass and her life would be better without him in it.
Summer House
Jesse is diabolical!!!!!!! And stupid! Why would you think your roommates on a reality television program aren’t going to talk to each other about the things you say?
FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS
RHONY is on pause, or not, but it sounds like they’re not casting Julia Fox, so who cares, really? (Btw, have you all read her memoir Down the Drain? It is as wild and funny as you’d imagine, but I also found it quite heartwarming — Julia’s perspective is kind and hopeful in a way I did not expect.) Rumors are also circling about RHONJ’s return, but no real news sources have picked them up; it’s just Instagram gossip accounts still treating the old cast as credible sources and the cast still holding fast to their delusion that they can control Andy Cohen by manipulating The Blogs.
TALES FROM THE CRYPT
Carole Radziwill, they could never make me hate you. Revisiting S5 has solidified my long-standing unorthodox opinion that Carole in her early years is one of the best to ever do it. Maybe this is narcissistic — I, too, am a child-free professional writer with a vinyl collection, left politics, an impractical sofa, and a penchant for observing but not engaging in drama — but I just don’t think there’s ever been a better audience surrogate, because Carole, like the audience, loves watching these freaks. I know Bravo won’t let our woke queen lib out on screen again, but they should establish a mandate that every Housewives city must have a voice of reason who’s having fun.
MISCELLANEOUS GOSSIP CORNER
How could Tucci do this to a single mother with a Chapter 11?
Please let every word of this be true.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: If we do not get a full season run for Southern Hospitality S4, I will riot.