Back inside SUR, James confronts Jax about why he texted Carmen and the first fight of the night is underway but I’m already bored by it. Wake me when the cartilage from Jax’s nose starts flying, okay? In the meantime, Scheana, Ariana, and Tom sit down for a moment together and Scheana informs Tom that James is DJing her birthday party and Kristen is not invited. Just the mention of Kristen’s name seems to be enough to make Tom want to curl into a fetal position on the floor of SUR and start whispering safe words to himself, but I do hope he’ll pop up at some point to do his best to make Scheana understand that Kristen’s terrifying behavior lobbed at both him and Ariana – Scheana’s BEST FRIEND – should be enough of a reason to cut that chick from her life for good.
And here she is, the walking nightmare herself. Sauntering up that dark back alley, Kristen appears and Jax greets her with these warm words: “Ugh, what are you doing here?” But this is a new Kristen. She’s got longer hair! She knows her relationship with James is a joke! She views being fired from SUR as a relief! She is laser-focused on her new tee-shirt line and…I’m sorry, did she just say the line, “One of the things I’ve worked on in therapy is how not to act like a psycho”? Please allow me a moment to compose myself as balloons burst from the walls and ceilings of homes all over this great land in celebration of the fact that a crazy person has gotten herself some f*cking therapy. But after the confetti clears, perhaps we should look again at her declaration that she no longer always needs to react – because wasn’t she just on the phone telling her boyfriend what an assh*le he is? Is that not a reaction? I am so confused – and my therapist says it’s good to acknowledge confusion.
The next day dawns and we get treated to two images I never wanted to see: Jax getting out of a shower and his mother arriving at his front door. Good lord, somebody birthed this guy! It was so much easier to pretend that he was created in a laboratory by a psychopath with a meth problem, but no, Jax’s mom is here and as much as he’d love to show her a mansion in Beverly Hills instead of what appears to be a studio apartment, he also manages to get in a sweet line of horsesh*t that he would never want to live in a mansion anyway. As his mother wanders around his home, she insists upon calling him Jason, his given name. Jax/Jason sits her down and tells her about all the fun things he’s got planned for them and how he’s taking a break from girls and she responds by giving him some wise advice and my guess is that her turn on this show will be incredibly short-lived.
Over at Kristen’s apartment, James arrives with flowers because he feels badly for telling her to f*ck off the night before. Boyfriends are so silly! Honestly though, the relationship the two of them have looks beyond miserable – and that’s before they start fighting again about how Kristen shouldn’t come to Scheana’s birthday party with him. Here’s the thing: why would Kristen want to be there? She hates everyone and they all hate her and the fact that she cannot stop herself from wanting to attend so she can simply get a reaction – even if it’s negative – is a very clear sign that her therapy might not be working. Has anyone suggested a lobotomy? She’d probably need insurance for that though, right?
Across town, Jax brings his mother to Villa Blanca so they can have lunch with Scheana and her mother. Like the relatively smart girl that she is, Scheana knows not to say too much about Jax’s life to his mother because there’s not a chance in the raging fires of hell that he’s been completely honest with her about what really goes down in LA. Still, the woman’s got to watch the show, right? What more could there be to hide? Actually, please nobody answer that question.
Lisa shows up just then and greets the group warmly and asks if Jax was as bad as a child as he is now as a pretend adult and his mother reveals adorable stories about how Jax has always been a total liar who has hit on every human being rocking a vagina, including his middle school bus driver.
And finally Tom Schwartz is onscreen – and it’s a major disappointment because he’s getting a perm…an actual perm! This aesthetic choice is absolutely horrifying to me, but I will forgive him because he declares this The Year of Tom and he speaks softly and sweetly about how he’s ready to propose and really, he might actually be cute enough to pull off a perm, a sentence I never ever thought I would say.
Finally it’s time for Scheana’s birthday costume party and the guest of honor shows up as a Like a Virgin-era Madonna. Katie is dressed like a character from Clueless and Ariana seems to be channeling a brunette version of Edie Sedgwick while both Toms arrive on roller-skates. Sandoval has taken this little exercise to the extreme. He has created an entire name and backstory for his Starsky and Hutch inspired character and I’d think that level of commitment was maybe kind of awesome if I weren’t so worried that this guy would burst into tears at a moment’s notice too. Look, I’m all for a man showing emotion, but I think I’ve seen this guy cry more than I’ve seen my sister cry – and she got a nail stuck in her hand once.
Jax arrives at the party dressed like Danny from Grease in what’s maybe the lamest costume ever. He’s got his mom on one arm and he lets us know that Carmen turned him down for the party so, like the oozing douchebag he is, he just went one name down on his contact list and invited the next person who had t*ts. And besides the fact that Jax exists on the planet, everything is going just swimmingly – and that’s when Kristen shows up. I’m guessing she isn’t coming from her latest therapy session, especially when she declares, “Clearly I wasn’t invited, but I know Scheana really deep down wants me at her birthday party.” Oh, sweetheart…you are f*cking crazy.
Into the happy place wanders the monster. She is not wearing a costume (unless she’s going as exposed nipples) and neither is Lisa Vanderpump, but that’s just because she’s too fabulous to ever pretend to be anybody else. Lisa walks into that room and sees that Scheana is dressed like Madonna and nails it by saying that Scheana always has to be the focus of attention in her relationship and she’s probably really onto something considering the fact that we’ve heard her husband say twelve sentences in all the time he’s been on this show – and that includes his vows. Speaking of her husband, he’s wandering around and is nowhere to be found in what I guess is meant to be a sinister piece of foreshadowing for the addiction issues the coming attractions hinted at.
Over at the DJ booth, Kristen greets the love of her life (also known as “the guy she f*cking hates”) and he asks her if she can grab him a drink. It’s difficult to concentrate on their newest senseless battle (whether or not he should drink while he’s working) because their disgust for one another is bubbling all over the screen. Also, watching that scrawny dude bounce along to the music he’s playing while wearing a terribly unfortunate black wig has me all discombobulated. I’m gonna need to rewind to an image of Schwartz’s face before I feel well enough to continue.
On the dance floor, Sandoval is doing an entire choreographed routine in his skates while Kristen whoops with appreciation from the sidelines and videotapes the moves of the guy she no longer cares about even a little bit – and you’re a bitch if you say that she does care about him because she’s totally in love with the DJ and she only calls him an assh*le sometimes. Watching the display is Ariana and she feels nauseous about it all, but probably nobody feels queasier than Sandoval, who is told by Lisa’s husband Ken that he’d best not disrespect his wife ever again. Being confronted by a dapper Englishman while you’re wearing a fake mustache and roller-skates has to suck just a little bit, so it’s a good thing his ex-girlfriend is on the premises to make everything just a little bit easier.
As the party wears on, Lisa has a brief conversation with Kristen and gives her the very excellent advice to maybe stay away from her boyfriend while he’s working since their interactions tend to be loud and sometime involve flying glass. As that guidance makes perfect sense, Kristen chooses to ignore it. Then Jax sits down with his mother and he is rather sweet with her but the vomit starts to creep up when he talks about how much he values his friendships. See, we have watched Jax spend the last few seasons sh*tting all over those people. He has lied to them. He has knowingly deceived them. He has thrown them under the bus to absolve himself momentarily for his latest slimy sin. Sweet with his mother or not, the guy is a piece of sh*t.
Over in a corner, Kristen playfully caresses Scheana’s crimped hair and Scheana lets us know that she just has a soft spot for Kristen and she simply can’t hate the girl who has done everything in her power to literally destroy the happiness of her best friend. Maybe Scheana will develop more loyalty now that she’s hit her thirties – and she’d better do it quickly because Ariana is rightfully losing her patience.
And now it’s the end of the night, which means it’s time for James to start chugging really hard liquor directly from the bottle while slobbering the backwash all over the front of his ugly costume. The rest of them call out warnings for him to stop, but see, the guy is a f*cking moron so he goes ahead and proves it once again by leaning over to some girl right in front of Kristen to tell her that she is absolutely beautiful. But before things can get too heavy, Sandoval skates into the swimming pool and Kristen sits back and stares at the idiotic drunk guy she’s probably going to have to carry home while wishing she could hand a fluffy towel to her soaking wet ex-boyfriend instead.
Maybe she’ll mention the thread-count of her fantasy towels in her next therapy session. And maybe she can embroider the word “DIVA” onto those towels with the hair she rips from Ariana’s scalp.
Nell Kalter teaches Film and Media at a school in New York. She is the author of the books THAT YEAR and STUDENT, both available on amazon. Check out her website at nellkalter.com. Her twitter is @nell_kalter.