Can I speak for the men of American by saying, "Thank God I'm not married to any of these women?" Why yes. Yes I can. And with that: let's relive the magic and wonder of the Real Housewives of New Jersey: Episode 2!
Before we begin, I've made the executive decision that I can't keep their fucking names straight — which is why henceforth I'm going to refer to them as PROSTITUTIONWHORE! (Danielle), HalfAForehead (Teresa), ThePoodle (Dina), Sharon Osbourne (Caroline), and Mom (Jacqueline). I mean no disrespect to Jacqueline by not coming up with a trashy nickname for her, but to this point she's been (by far) the most levelheaded individual on the show… kind of an everymom (or a superrich Jersey equivalent thereof) who provides some modicum of common sense to the otherwise near-relentless insanity of her peers.
Alright? Alright. Let's begin.
• PROSTITUTIONWHORE! is selling her house, and gives her realtor (and us) a tour. The tour includes a visit to her kitchen, her bedroom, and… uh… a bidet. Wonderful. PROTITUTIONWHORE! on a bidet is exactly the image I want haunting my dreams for the next week. Thanks, Bravo!
• ThePoodle – who hateshateshates PROSTITUTIONWHORE! – expresses pity for her rival, because she needs to sell her house because blahblahblah. This sympathy is unexpected, and therefore we can only conclude it is completely fake.
• Mom and Sharon Osbourne meet with the massively pregnant HalfAForehead for lunch, who mentions within the first minute that her insatiable horndog husband loves her big ass, and then describes how he can't stay off her despite the fact that she's about to explode. Stay klassy, New Jersey. Then… HalfAForehead asks if Mom has heard from PROSTITUTIONWHORE! which, of course, she has. The other two women are horrified by this revelation, and by the betrayal this contact intimates. Sharon Osbourne takes a moment to note that PROSTITUTIONWHORE's children have dead eyes, presumably because she's such a bad mom and constantly exposes them to terrible terrible things. Even for this show, that constitutes a low blow. Poor form, Sharon.
• Which leads way to…. A MAJOR PROSTITUTIONWHORE! REVELATION! Kidnapping! She held a kid for ransom! 10 kilos of cocaine! This, apparently, is the rotten past that PROSTITUTIONWHORE! was trying to hide during the table-flipping fiasco of the Season 1 finale. Mom tries to write it off, saying "It was many, many years ago…" Sharon Osbourne calls bullshit, and then points out "If you hang out with garbage, you start to stink." I hate to say it, but she may not be wrong.
• Back at Chez Sharon Osbourne, her bad children are having a ham fight. I don't mean this in the sense of the Nippon Ham Fighters, but rather in the sense that they're throwing meat at one another. Sharon is not amused. "There's nothing funny about the ham game. No more ham game."
• Speaking of her bad children… one of the boy's best friends – named Vito, of course – is dating Sharon's daughter. This contributes to some tensions between them and… uh… yeah: I couldn't care less. These kids are spoiled and dull. Let's get back to 10 kilos of cocaine and table-flipping, please.
• Mom's daughter drops by her house and attempts to convince her that – at 18 – she's doing a great job of living on her own. She's not. The daughter comes off as a 100% pure selfish spoiled bitch; Mom, by comparison, comes off as completely sympathetic. Lesson learned: Mom… you're too good for this show.
• PROSTITUTIONWHORE'S! older daughter is being recruited as a model, via someone named Ivan Bart. I think. As PROSTITUTIONWHORE! breathlessly notes, "He only handles people who will become supermodels… Christie Brinkley… I'm super-excited to be going through this with her." The daughter seems relatively nonchalant about all of this, and the younger daughter is rolling her eyes… meanwhile, PROSTITUTIONWHORE! is getting whipped up into a frenzy by the idea of living vicariously through her daughter. Creep factor: 8.
• Mom talks to ThePoodle about her daughter. ThePoodle suggests "a good old-fashioned Italian beating" to knock some sense into her. Having just seen the daughter, America agrees.
• HalfAForehead takes her 8yo daughter to a modeling agency to audition for fashion week. Or something. I'm a guy and have no fucking clue what any of this stuff is. HalfAForehead seems really excited about it. The 8yo talks about being in pageants in front of hundreds of people and how she likes to do modeling and acting and… Creep factor: 14. Meanwhile: PROSTITUTIONWHORE! breaks in to comment that she doesn't know if the 8yo has "what it takes to be a supermodel." Creep factor: 35.
• PROSTITUTIONWHORE'S very beautiful and much much much too smart older daughter goes to her first modeling shoot and, to be honest, seems much too reasonable to be dealing with all of this silliness. She admits to being a little nervous… meanwhile PROSTITUTIONWHORE! is basically having a vicarious orgasm while she watches. Awkward awkward awkward. Adding even more to the awkward factor is the constant flip-flops between shots of the older daughter's face – who is beautiful in a natural way – and PROSTITUTIONWHORE, who looks entirely plastic. When the famous photographer asks her to jump onstage for few photos with her daughter, she tries to pretend she's surprised… and then, of course, does it and subsequently can't stop talking about how she wouldn't mind getting back into modeling.
• I, for one, am looking forward to PROSTITUTIONWHORE! being nominated for mother of the year. I hope she wins, too, if only so that she can deliver an acceptance speech in which she fails to mention either of her children.
• Another interlude with Sharon Osbourne's boring children. The clock. Ticks. Slowly.
• Back to PROSTITUTIONWHORE, whose daughter's first photo shoot results in a cover shot on some fashion magazine, plus a 5-page spread. The modeling management team talks things over with her, and seem to be a lot less sleazy than I'd expect. Good for them. That said… PROSTITUTIONWHORE! is clear a LOT more into this modeling thing than her daughter. How do you spell "trouble brewing?" Oh, right. Trouble brewing.
• Are you getting the feeling this episode is more about setting up future big things than anything else? I sure do. That's fine; exposition is important.
• A puffy chucky. Thank you, HalfAForehead for… I don't even know what we're talking about, but I'm both amused and uncomfortable. Which, I think, summarizes the importance of this show pretty neatly.
• Do I really have to work tomorrow? I shouldn't be expected to work when I'm up late typing about RHoNJ. This should qualify me for a sick day or something.
• Sneak preview of next week. Fashion week! Dischord! PROSTITUTIONWHORE acting evil!
• Interesting scene between PROSTITUTIONWHORE! and her daughters. It's incredible how much more reasonable and intelligent they are than her. They encourage her to reach out to the other housewives to invite them (gently) to a luncheon to celebrate her daughter's modeling success. So she does… leading to a very awkward conversation with Mom, who tells her that she can't come because her husband won't let them be friends. Awkwardawkwardawkward.
• Meanwhile, HalfAForehead gets a call that her daughter can be a model at fashion week. She tries to tell her husband about it, and he has no fucking clue what she's talking about. He's also far too busy working the slap chop to listen. Spectacular product placement, Bravo. Well played.
• PROSTITUTIONWHORE! hosts her luncheon, with guests that include her backstabbing, boutique-owning "friend" who totally threw her under the bus during Sharon Osbourne's fundraiser in the previous episode. They all sit around and look rich while paying proper homage to… well, whatever. As her daughter/model says, "This is more about my mom than it's about me." (That's paraphrasing, but close enough.)
• Oh, wait. We're not done. PROSTITUTIONWHORE! points out – to everyone – that she left two seats empty for ThePoodle and Mom, who did not attend. Way to downplay their non-attendance and keep the focus on the positive thing that's happening to your daughter, which this luncheon is supposed to be about. That's some great mothering right there.
This segment offers two telling quotes from PROSTITUTIONWHORE!: "I need friends!" Yes. Yes, you do. Also: "I'm not going to get pooped on any more." Yes. Yes, you will.
• Okay. Show's over. And despite the promising beginning with the bidet… this episode ended up being more depressing than trashy and fun. It's hard to feel good about hating PROSTITUTIONWHORE! – who is a legitimately hissable villain – when you see her with her two daughters, and you end up just feeling bad for everything they're dealing with in having her for a mother.
Dear Bravo: STOP MAKING ME FEEL BAD.
Love,
America. And possibly Canada.
. . . . .
TwoBusy does not own a bidet.
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