When most people vacation in Jamaica their only drama is drinking too many Red Bulls and doing some embarrassing twerking in a wannabe sexy swimsuit. When the Real Housewives Of Orange County go to Jamaica they turn into psychologists dealing with Shannon Beador‘s break from reality TV. I mean, both sound delightful in their own way!
It’s the day after Shannon’s eruption and she’s nowhere to be found. Not that anyone minds – they actually don’t like hanging out with Shannon, but they do like talking about what a salty nut Shannon is. So while they’re frolicking in waterfalls and belly flopping into ankle-deep water, Shannon was sitting in her un-air conditioned villa living a perpetual hot flash.
The waterfall hike was just too funny! It was essentially an SNL skit about middle-aged women attempting to film a Sport’s Illustrated Swimsuit Edition. First of all the erupting boobs on Kelly Dodd‘s plunging one-piece. Listen Kelly – that is a FDO swimsuit: For Dates Only. That is for lying on the beach, looking sexy as you sip Pina Coladas. That is not active-wear. Of course, Kelly would probably wear this to take Jolie to swim lessons, thinking it’s modest. But the poor hike instructor got a lot of free peeks that day! And probably has subsequently filed a sexual harassment complaint against Bravo – I hope!
Then there was Vicki Gunvalson… Oh hell. She’s done twerking, and is instead flopping, flailing, wailing, and in general, a fish-face out of water. The instructor had to literally shove her up the falls similar to the way I have to shove my cat into the cat carrier. I hope he got a bonus for all the Gunvalson butt he touched! Only Gina KirschenGodYoureBoring and Emily Simpson wore proper attire. That’s because these two don’t “get” Housewifery. The point is to look ridiculous and act as over-the-top ridiculously, like a Sesame Street character suddenly dropped out there in the world. The point is not to actually enjoy a vacation moment. Like duh – did they do no research?!
Tamra Judge wasn’t able to hike because of her broken foot. So she got to do what Tamra does best: sit by the sidelines and make ruthless judgmental comments. With alcohol. Hey, I have that job too, so I am not judging!
Despite all the incidents and accidents, everyone is good spirits. Which was nice. Gina observes that it’s because the dark cloud of Shannon had not stolen their sunshine. She’s probably right, but everyone recognizes that they should be worried, so they act like they are. In reality, they’re all just feeling a little guilty that they don’t actually feel bad that Shannon isn’t with them. Back at their nice, cool villas enjoying wine, cheese, and charcuterie, Kelly and Tamra admit they don’t feel sad, they feel MAD! Tamra can’t believe that Shannon’s selfishness has once again made everyone upset and wasted their time. Nevermind Tamra’s own culpability in using Gina to do her dirty work. And Kelly is pissed that instead of having fun they’re wiping Shannon’s emotional ass by having to worry about her constantly, and then be called shitty friends, but Vicki is pretend to be a good person, so she cares. Or she at least pretend-cares enough to call.
First Vicki tries calling Shannon’s room but gets no answer, then she finally – FINALLY – makes contact on Shannon’s cell. Vicki was so nervous about Shannon’s whereabouts she almost alerted the Jamaican police and put a “missing person” ad on the side of a Red Stripe bottle!
No surprise Shannon is furious at the other women for their attempted intervention. She heard exactly ZERO of their concerns and instead made it all about how they were so mean and horrible and don’t understand how much frozen fishy cream cheese she has on her plate! Oh, sister, we get it – trust us. And this time it’s your fucking plate! Vicki convinces Shannon to come to dinner, then goes to Shannon’s new room – which has AC! – to pick her up. Shannon looks a mess and immediately spirals into one of her negativity tirades about how all the women she believed were her friends JUST DON’T UNDERSTAND WHAT SHE GOES THROUGH and are trying to make her feel bad about a normal process for dealing with your divorce. Mmmmkay.
Even Vicki, trying her best to have real human emotions, is basically like Shhhhhhhht – get your purse. Don’t you need lipstick? Oh, look food! FOOD is coming. And wine thank god! The beach dinner is beautiful, but there is, alas, an elephant in the sand and that elephant is named Shannon! Shannon who isn’t chasing waterfalls. Because Shannon is happy! Can’t you tell?!
Kelly, after several drinks (and this is why we love her!), has no qualms about jumping in with both working ankles to insist that Shannon actually apologize to HER for making everyone worry and acting like a vacation-ruining ass. The equivalent of food poisoning from drinking water instead of Red Stripe. And this trip, graciously, is sponsored by Red Stripe! So Shannon apologies hollowly, Kelly hollowly accepts, and then Gina cries that she just wanted to be Shannon’s friend and like her divorce is like her journey and like on that journey there will be shattered ornaments of a life lived in a beige track home decorated like a Big Lots commercial, and also the scattered remains of blue eyeshadow on every single one of Matt’s pillowcases. WHATEVER Gina, Gina-ME-DIVORCEN-A. This touchy-feely moment is not for Tamra who basically ignores Shannon completely and actually pulls a Shannon by sulking in the corner and rolling her eyes a lot. Was that intentional to teach Shannon a lesson?
The only person who believes this dinner was a success is Vicki: she only gagged once, no one fought, people kept begging her to twerk again (she’s popular!), and she got free cocktails. I believe the expression is “Woohoo!”
The next morning Shannon is all by herself in her villa, staring at her lonely plate of eggs, thinking she sees the miracle of David’s face in them when she texts Tamra “to talk”. Tamra plays hardball by demanding Shannon come to her instead. Because Kelly isn’t allowed to wait in her own villa for fear she may interrupt this touching ShanRa Moment, she goes to wait at Emily and Gina’s villa. While doing weird things with mangoes, they talk about how Shannon is a hot mess of selfish entitlement.
Emily has this A-Ha moment where she recognizes her unstable, depressed mother in Shannon and she could see Shannon going down that same path if she never gets over the divorce. This is for real, and I do believe Emily was being genuine not mean. Emily cries recounting a childhood where she was the parent to both herself and her sister because her mom refused to get help. Today Emily barely speaks to her mother, who is still dealing with untreated depression. Kelly is just like, yeah that sucks, but can Shannon stop destroying my vacations with her rich white girl problems?! Like soup kitchens save!
Tamra sits Shannon down, feeds her lies about how she never talked crap to Gina – especially not while they were on this very vacation; Gina just confronted Shannon all by herself, using her own powers of observation to decide that Shannon is not a good friend! Shannon huffed and puffed that she is POSITIVE and LOVES HER LIFE, but does no one understand that she has a lot on her plate!!!! Then Tamra squelches an apology out of Shannon, so now it’s all fineeeeeee.
Tamra Calls Shannon “Exhausting;” Says It’s Hard To Be Her Friend
At the beach, Gina and Emily immediately ditch the other girls to go have lunch. (Didn’t they just eat?! Who cares!) Coincidentally Gina’s mom calls and they have such a great relationship that overhearing their conversation causes Emily to burst into tears thinking about her own absent mom. That was sad, but as Gina said, Emily is doing better for her own daughter and will not make those same mistakes.
The other ladies laugh, swim, get salt scrubs and drink rum from fresh coconuts (yum!) – “don’t forget to lick the rim!” (life advice from Vicki Gunvalson!). They were truly having fun. Until Gina and Emily showed up and Tamra immediately scuttled into the water to tell Gina about the morning’s conversation with Shannon in which she really really stood up for herself – for once! (#sarcasm). Then Kelly does backflips on the water trampoline without losing her bikini, shutting everyone up! You just know Kelly was one of the original MTV spring break girls back in the early 90’s.
At the final dinner they’re all sun-kissed and glowing; happy and refreshed, looking years younger. The drama-less day at the beach bringing out the best in all of them. Tamra is feeling like she got away with all the crap she spewed to Gina and Emily, so she gushes that her favorite moment from the trip was her very honest conversation with Shannon, which cemented what good of friends they are. Gag me with Vicki’s cauliflower soup!
Shannon is so revived by the sun and the positivity that she even apologizes to Gina. Which was cute. It was the first moment of Fun Shannon they’ve ever spied. Then Vicki caved to peer pressure and twerked, with Shannon by her side, while horrified diners look on and laugh, but it was actually a very endearing moment.
TELL US – DID TAMRA REALLY FORGIVE SHANNON? WERE SHANNON’S APOLOGIES SINCERE?
[Photo Credits: Bravo]
