The Real Housewives of Orange County Recap: Flag on the Play

We’re missing explosive drama, but it’s fun to have dumb, petty arguments like old Housewives seasons.

While this episode was a little bit lackluster, it had plenty of first-wave Housewifery. Katie is getting mad that not everyone is being nice to the new girl? Classic! A husband lumbering around the house with a ubiquitous Big Gulp. So old-school! A fight about which particular woman “owns” a gym. Is this the glory days of 2009? That last fight is so petty, so stupid, so wonderfully low-stakes that it’s the kind of Housewives we don’t get anymore (except for Miami). These days, it’s all divorces, court cases, and lawsuits. Please, please, please let us get back to only fighting about who owns a gym.

According to Shannon Storms Beador, she took John Janssen to her gym when they first started dating, and he started using a trainer there. He continued using that trainer even after the breakup and then started to bring Alexis JJ Bellino there when they started dating. Shannon tells us that the trainer told John and Alexis that they didn’t want any drama at the gym, and John freaked out and said he would never come back. To hear Alexis tell it, Shannon hasn’t been to the gym in six months, which is more of a dig at Shannon’s size and fitness than it is about who owns the gym. Alexis even calls it “my gym” when she’s talking to Gina about it.

There are a few issues going on here with Alexis, and I don’t like any one of them. Someone says that she’s trying to Single White Female Shannon, referencing the classic ’90s noir where Jennifer Jason Leigh becomes roommates with Bridget Fonda and steals her whole life. (If you have not seen it, I can’t recommend it highly enough.) I feel like this is true to some extent. Shannon says that she sees John taking Alexis to the restaurants they used to go to, riding on the boat like they used to, him love-bombing Alexis like he used to do to her. I don’t think that’s SWF-ing; I think John only has a handful of tricks and he trots them out for every new girl he’s dating. That’s not Alexis’s fault; that’s John’s.

However, Alexis’s new dog, Biscuit, is basically a fraternal twin to Shannon’s dog, Archie, the only good cast member on this entire damn show. That Alexis went after Shannon’s man, showed up on Shannon’s show, and is claiming to be a lot closer to Shannon’s friends when it seems like they only started talking to her again recently? That is some SWF bullshit if I ever saw it. But I don’t think Alexis wants to be Shannon; I think she just wants to be a Housewife, and Shannon is her easiest target.

One detail about this whole discussion perfectly illustrates why I have always hated Alexis Bellino. “You can’t call it your gym unless you own it. Did you buy the place?” she says in confessional. This is both a stupid and easily disproven argument, like everything Alexis lobs at us. We call lots of things ours. I bet Alexis goes to “her church” every Sunday. Did she purchase it from our lord and savior, Jesus H. Christ? Can she call it “her” church even if she doesn’t own it? Is it still “her” church if she hasn’t been in six months? No, it’s hers because she frequents it, just like Shannon’s gym is hers because she frequents it (though not as much as Alexis would like). It would also really piss Alexis off if one Sunday, Jim Bellino’s new girlfriend showed up with Jim in tow, trying to pass it off like she had been at that church the entire time. If I were a judge, I would award Shannon the gym and I would cut Alexis Bellino in half. That’s how that famous story about two women fighting over a baby ends, right?

This whole conversation goes down at Emily’s flag-football event, which is one of the most curious events in Housewives history. No one knows the rules, no one really wants to play, and they’d rather spend their time working on their team jerseys and talking shit than they would passing a football on the sand. The only person who is enjoying herself is Heather Dubrow, who was designated the referee. You know that Heather’s ideal afternoon is blowing a whistle and making sure everyone follows the arbitrary rules she has set for the group.

After the two teams take each other on, all of the ladies (minus Alexis, who had to leave early to try to purchase a church) sit down and actually facilitate a great conversation between Gina and Jenn. Well, it was great except for when Gina called Jenn a squatter, which is technically true but a little mean. (The best part was Tamra’s reaction when it came out of Gina’s mouth, which was a combination of glee and also something like, “I love when they do my job for me.”) Gina says that she wished Jenn had called her and given her a heads-up or thought about how this might affect her, which was valid. Jenn says that when she signed the contract, she had no idea she wouldn’t be able to pay the rent, which is also valid. Gina says that if she had thought there was even a possibility she couldn’t pay the rent, she should have gotten a little house she could afford rather than a monstrosity that her daddy is paying for.

However, the most valid of all the points is that Jenn is putting herself right back in the position she was in with her ex-husband. She says she married him young, and he took care of all of the finances, and now she is living with Ryan and driving his car. She says she will have no place to live and no car if he breaks up with her. She’s basically singing the chorus to a Kandi Burruss classic, “Can you pay my bills, can you pay my automo’ bills?” Tamra and the other woman say they want Jenn to figure out her own shit and get in the driver’s seat, as long as that seat is not behind the steering wheel of one of Ryan’s cars. Gina also tells Jenn that she’s just coming out of the scary place that Jenn is in right now, figuring out how to afford your life now that the ex is gone, and that is why she overreacted. They seem to have successfully squashed the beef, but I have a feeling, just like a beef burrito you bought on the street in Mexico City, this beef will come back and come flooding out of them sometime soon.

The episode ends with three great vignettes that don’t add to the overall drama of the season but definitely help us establish the individual women’s characters. First, let us discuss when Sutton Stracke of RHOBH joins Gina and Katie for lunch and debuts her adorable new French bulldog, Junebug Carter Cash. Katie says that Heather ignored her several times in the past, even though Sutton introduced her (and seemingly after she was cast on the show but before filming started). She then says that Heather has been nothing but nice since the cameras have been on, and she doesn’t know which is the real Heather: the cold, bitchy one or the warm, welcoming one. Um, it is clearly the cold, bitchy one. We have all watched Fancy Pants long enough to know that if she is anything, she is phony. The real deal is the one Katie saw at Sutton’s, not the pretty face she’s putting on for the camera like she’s the ever-grinning mother in Coraline. Still, Sutton is not wrong to warn Katie about taking on Heather. Even I’m not that dumb, and I like to blow-dry my hair while I’m still in the tub.

Next, we’re on to Emily, who is doing a lingerie shoot for her and Shane’s anniversary and also to celebrate her new body. I want to start by saying that while Emily has never been the sort of thin we are supposed to accept as our ideal, she has never looked bad. In fact, Emily looked a lot happier and more natural than many of the other Housewives who were half her size. But now that Emily has gotten thinner, I’m happy that she is being honest about how she got there. She copped to the Vitamin O usage, but she also is copping to the fact that she’s in the gym every day, feels like she’s becoming a little bit obsessive, and how her dedication to the gym and healthy eating habits are negatively affecting her marriage.

So often, we see someone starring in a Jenny Craig commercial, and they make it look easy and seamless like there’s something wrong with us that we’re not all showing off our visual abdominals and wearing a size 4. Looking “TV good” is fucking hard, it’s fucking expensive, and it takes a fucking toll on your personal life and everyone around you. I’m happy that Emily seems happy with how she looks, but I’m also happy she’s not making everyone at home feel bad about it, either. Naturally, during her photo shoot, she looked the best, wearing an outfit similar to a one-piece bathing suit. If there is one thing Emily will do, it’s rock a one-piece. I don’t know what the opposite of Kryptonite is, but it might just be Emily in a swimsuit.

Finally, there’s Gina. Oh, man, Gina. She’s watching her boyfriend Travis pack up all of his ties and work clothes as he’s moving out of the house. I thought this was a stupid idea. Sorry, I still think this is a stupid idea. As Tamra says, she’s never heard of someone moving out after four years and the relationship surviving. But I think I finally understand Gina’s rationale for this. She says that now that she’s out of the “scary place” post-divorce and that things are going well for her and Matt, she doesn’t want to be dragged down by Travis’s drama with the ex. Also, she says she’s starting to earn a bit of extra money and doesn’t know whether she should spend on just her kids, spend on all six kids, or just not do anything extra to maintain the status quo.

While I think Gina’s idea to salvage this relationship is dumb — and based on his face and demeanor during this whole scene, so does Travis — I also think she’s right. She needs to put herself and her three kids first. She needs to make sure that she stays in the driver’s seat, just as everyone was telling Jenn she needs to be. So she stands in her driveway in front of the casita that used to house eight people but has now cut its occupancy in half. The rare rain drizzles down as Travis drives his Nissan Leaf noiselessly away and Gina waves with her hand, her hair getting wetter and wetter. She waves like Betty Draper seeing Don drive off to work; she waves like this is a commute, and he’ll be back in ten hours with a too-folded newspaper and a little bit more money for everyone. But it’s not. This is a hard good-bye, this is a forever wave, this is the kind of salute that ends with Gina in bed all alone, trying to dry her hair and cursing that no matter how much money she makes, her extensions are gonna look like shit on-camera.