The Real Housewives of Orange County

Loose Lips and Relationships Season 17 Episode 9 Editor’s Rating 2 stars **

The Real Housewives of Orange County

Loose Lips and Relationships Season 17 Episode 9 Editor’s Rating 2 stars **

Shannon Beador is an inherently frantic person. It’s a trait that’s ingrained in her very being, and no amount of feng shui or visits to Dr. Moon could ever quell it. As this week’s episode begins, we see her as we’ve come to know her: running around in a frenzy and waving her fingers in the air. This time, it’s because Tamra told her that Heather has been spreading potentially disastrous information about her relationship, which she’s certain will end it. Vicki, meanwhile, is just happy to be back on television and hates to see her friend’s life crisis interrupt her whoop-it-up time.

While Shannon feels completely betrayed and blindsided, Tamra reminds us that this isn’t Heather’s first time getting in trouble for talking about Shannon’s relationships, but alas, she hasn’t learned her lesson yet. “People in glass houses …” a furious Shannon begins to say, and since the Real Housewives have never met an idiom they couldn’t butcher, Vicki finished the line with, “Shoot the stones at them.” Maybe they don’t shoot stones, but they do shoot tequila — and a little meltdown won’t keep the Tres Amigas away from one last shot.

Our whooping-it-up ends as quickly as it began when we cut to a scene of Emily and her family at a pumpkin patch. It’s scenes like this that make me wonder if this franchise should adopt an age minimum for Housewives like presidential elections have. Older women arguably make for better, more complex Housewives — and they also don’t make us sit through scenes of them parenting a herd of young children. Granted, every once in a while we meet a child with innate star quality, but not every kid can be as entertaining as a young Milania Giudice or Jagger Kemsley.

What this scene does provide us, though, is Emily and Shane butting heads. Not literally, of course, that would be physically impossible without a step-ladder. When their son repeats a story about a Halloween monster that won’t kill people if they’re in costume (Shannon would be safe), they disagree in front of the kids on how to correct him. The interaction leaves Emily crying in a pumpkin patch, much like myself on a haunted hayride, and even calls for a sit-down dinner between the two of them later to hash things out. Emily desperately tries to air her grievances over their differing parenting styles through a barrage of Shane’s bits and awkward jokes. The entire conversation is reminiscent of a ventriloquist act where the puppeteer (Emily) plays frustrated straight-man to their mischievous dummy (Shane).

Meanwhile, Heather’s primary storyline for this season (in addition to tormenting Shannon) is clearly meant to be the long-awaited return of famed actress Heather Paige Kent. We’ve litigated her IMDb, seen her turn down a role in Taylor’s little movie, and now she’s even bought a home in Los Angeles to be closer to the industry. Yet no roles have actually been booked. Nary an audition! I understand that she’s above auditioning for Taylor’s film about a serial killer who targets young piano players — but is Heather Paige Kent really offer-only? And if so, where are the offers? Are we waiting for a Malibu Country reboot?

Well, it turns out that all of Heather’s eggs (apart from her etched-glass embryos) are in one basket, and that basket is being carried by Mark Cuban of all people. No, you didn’t sit on the remote. The Shark Tank starlet has made his way to Bravo, not because he was inspired by his friend Bethenny Frankel, but because he has a new business venture that Heather plans to be a part of. It’s an interactive streaming platform called “Fireside” that he co-founded with Falon Fatemi. Heather sees this Quibi-like venture as a new opportunity to be on camera, given that she says that she’s been “thwarted” from scripted television for so long. Thwarted! But what does an interactive streaming platform actually mean? Well, this groundbreaking new invention seems to finally answer the question: What if Instagram Live were called Fireside? And for that reason, I’m out.

It’s unclear why she needs a home in Los Angeles for this gig, so it still seems much more likely that the new L.A. real estate is a desperate bid to play Wife Swap with Taylor Armstrong and ascend to RHOBH. After all, that’s the show for women who don’t act but still identify as actresses.

But not only is she buying this new place, but she’s also considering selling their OC house. Yes, the same massive compound that we watched her painstakingly build one refrigerated champagne drawer at a time over what feels like decades. All of that work, just to sell it a few years later for $65 million after getting a cold call from Million Dollar Listing’s Josh and Heather Altman (synergy!). With her children starting to leave their colossal nest, the family is now outnumbered by the house’s staff — never a good position to be in in the event of an inevitable uprising — and Heather’s sick of being the building’s “GM.” As the “GM” of a studio apartment, I can commiserate with Heather Dubrow; it’s grueling work. Plus, I’m sure the Dubrows want to sell before Gina gets her real-estate license to avoid any risk of her being their agent.

Luckily she already has her L.A. digs lined up, and she breaks the news about this new “pied-a-terre” while taking a workout class with Tamra and Jenn, who are newly friends again after their make-up. Tamra’s intent on repairing that friendship and gaining back Jenn’s trust, which she’ll need in order to collect new information to use against her later.

Speaking of which, Tamra uses this meeting to put Heather to the test, tempting her to trip up and speak ill of Shannon and John Janssen’s relationship on-camera. But Heather is a heavy hitter that can go toe-to-toe with Tamra any day of the week and remains completely unruffled. “Tamra and Shannon are really close again, and Tamra has a big mouth … if I had an opinion on Shannon, you think I’m telling Tamra?” Heather tells us in a confessional, masterfully covering up her tracks like a serial killer whose name we don’t even know because they never got caught.

While Heather is unruffled, Shannon remains ruffled — but won’t let this looming cloud keep her from going on a triple-date boat outing with Tamra, Jenn, and their respective P90X partners, Eddie and Ryan.

Historically, putting the Real Housewives on a boat is never a good thing — that’s why Bravo keeps doing it. There was the Cartagena boat ride from hell that almost wiped out the entire RHONY cast before Bravo had the chance to do it themselves. There was the blowout Amsterdam boat fight on RHOBH that culminated with Brandi Glanville slapping Lisa Vanderpump. And just the other week, the OC ladies were all screaming at each other while at sea. So naturally, here we are again, with the ladies taking John Janssen’s boat to dinner because Orange County suddenly turned into Venice when I wasn’t paying attention.

Shannon’s on edge about the John Janssen bomb going around, which she’s not telling him about until she knows exactly what was said. Tamra’s on edge because she hasn’t seen Ryan since her campaign against him. And I’m on edge because Ryan’s wearing the craziest jacket I’ve ever seen.

They awkwardly set sail before docking at the restaurant, where Ryan finally breaks the ice by bringing up his own dick pic — or, as Shannon calls it, a “penis picture.” As if that wasn’t weird enough, he then offers Eddie an apology. But for what? Is he copping to one of the accusations against him? Nope, he apparently is just apologizing for the fact that Eddie had to hear these lies in the first place. Ryan speaks like an AI chatbot that hasn’t quite gotten a solid grasp of human conversation yet, because, in the same breath as this apology, he tells them that he was also hurt and betrayed by them talking about him.

Tamra and Eddie tell him that what they’ve heard has been concerning, sitting across from him like parents meeting their daughter’s douchey prom date for the first time. But despite what they’ve heard, they see this dinner as an opportunity to clear it all up. And poor John Janssen has to sit through it … couldn’t Shannon have brought him an iPad to play games on in the meantime?

Eddie takes the lead, sorting through the muddled mess of accusations and hearsay by quizzing Ryan with a lightning round of questions that need clearing up. Did he cheat on his last wife? Yes. Did he say that he wanted to fuck Tamra? No, but he did say she was hot. Did he cheat on Jenn? No, they were on break, but Jenn still feels like she was cheated on. Honestly, at this rate, Eddie would make for a great reunion host because, just like that, everybody has said their piece and they’re all toasting their glasses. Until the next accidental dick pic, at least.

The Real Housewives of Orange County Recap: Boats and Woes