Oscars Outsider - Real Housewives of Salt Lake City S05E06 & Real Housewives of New York City S15E04 Recap/Analysis

Episode Date: October 27, 2024

We want to hear your takes! Give our hotline a call and leave a message with your thoughts on what's going on in the Bravo universe at 1-833-927-0178 This week we're diving into the latest episode Real Housewives of New York City and Real Housewives of Salt Lake City. If you enjoyed this breakdown, don’t forget to hit the like button, comment below your favorite moment, and subscribe for more Bravo content! 🥂 About Bravo Outsider The Bravo Outsider Podcast offers an outside perspective on Bravo shows like The Real Housewives, unlike any other Bravo podcast! We focus on the artistic value of these shows while providing strategic analysis of the social game at the core of the Bravo docu-soap. We love thick literary references and diving into themes before diving into the drama! 🍸Featured Bravolebs: Real Housewives of New York City: Sai De Silva, Ubah Hassan, Erin Lichy, Jenna Lyons, Jessel Taank, Brynn Whitfield, Racquel Chevremont, Rebecca Minkoff Real Housewives of Salt Lake City: Heather Gay, Lisa Barlow, Meredith Marks, Angie Katsanevas, Mary Cosby, Bronwyn Newport, Britani Bateman, Meili Workman 📣 Stay Connected: Find Bravo Outsider: On your podcast platform of choice: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/bravo-outsider/ Instagram: ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/bravooutsider TikTok: ⁠⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@bravooutsider https://www.bravooutsider.com Find Dylan Ferguson: Substack: https://dylanferguson.substack.com/ Find Craig Midwinter: chess.com: https://www.chess.com/member/craigjmidwinter 📖 Credits Music by FASSounds from Pixabay #RHOSLC #RHONY #bravo #realitytv #RealHousewives

Hello and welcome to the Bravo Outsider podcast. I'm your host Craig Midwinter and I am joined by Fergie Ferg, Fergolicious. Dylan Ferguson. How's it going? Going fine. Awesome. A lot of roll. Let's hear that a bit more. Fergie's going to slap us with a copyright suit here if we play any more of that. We're talking about Real Housewives of Salt Lake City and Real Housewives of New York.

York City. I want to dive into Real Housewives of Salt Lake City because that was the most compelling for me. Do you want to give us a bit of a summary of what happened on this episode? Sure. So it's built around Angie's throwing her 25th anniversary

Who are you? I am from ancient Greece. Where does that look from? What was that? What are you? I have no idea. Clash of the Titans or something. of them. Right. So the theme of her party is mafia boss's wives, I guess.

A bit of a chaotic theme, not very clear, but carries it through with her. Adorable dork energy. And mostly this becomes a stage for Whitney to confront Lisa over this story about her jewelry being cheap bullshit that she's been overpriced, which apparently came through. through Lisa. So that's kind of the central crux of it. Oh, and of course we've got a bit of a love triangle with Brittany and her on again, off again.

Jared Osman. Blinky. Yeah. Yeah. I think that that about covers it. What questions do you have coming out of this? I mean, where does Whitney go from here in terms of like her defending her business and trying to take a full on frontal attack? against Lisa, like where does this go from here?

What's her path to victory? What does that look like? Like, what does success look like for her? Is there some way that she can take Lisa down over this and actually smear her? Or is this just something that she's going to have to end up backtracking? Because I don't know how we're going to get any kind of closure on this, I guess. Yeah, I think that's a pretty good question. I, it feels like she's just using this for gameplay.

like she does not seem like she actually cares about this being out there. She's just kind of using this as a piece to focus conflict around. I don't know. At least that's my read on it. I thought it was pretty interesting that she shifted her target to Lisa from Meredith. I think that that is probably the smart move for her socially because there's already a lot of conflict that Lisa has. She's got like a lot of balls that she has to juggle right now. And I think that it'll be a lot easier for Whitney to rally people against Lisa as opposed to Meredith, who doesn't really have the same conflict with the rest of the girls.

Yeah, I think it's interesting because I think we already saw Whitney try to play like Meredith and Lisa against each other in Milwaukee, and it didn't work. And then in light of that, it's interesting that one of the first things we see in the episode. So it is Whitney taking her information to Meredith that she's going to use against Lisa and kind of like testing the waters and being like seeing how Meredith reacts to this. And Chris Meredith's reaction is basically like, oh, you know, be careful. Like I'm not sure that you're in a sound footing as you think you are. You know, taking this to Lisa, you better be really sure of your information because this might end very badly for you. That was interesting. And then that kind of becomes reflected in the ending when we do get Lisa reacting.

very intensely against it, immediately calling her head of security and saying that she wants to go the distance with this, whatever that means. She repeats multiple times that they're a head of security. She's going to go in the distance. That kind of feels like Meredith called it. And that seemed like she foresaw that Lisa was going to take this

and make it into a big deal and make a big show of being innocent and being scandalized. these accusations and getting the police involved. Yeah, I think that Lisa was protesting a little too much. Like, it seemed like it really struck a nerve to me. But one of the things that we saw there, this security guard is one of the things that I really love about Lisa Barlow as a housewife, the way that she frames calling in her personal bodyguard. But it's like, yeah, it's my security guard.

It's my cyber security guard. Yeah. Just like this IT professional that not not. at all the way that she's like framing this. Yeah, I really like that. Yeah, she's just shouting into the phone like, wait, we need to go with the distance. We need to get you on this.

And the person at the end of the line is like, ma'am, can I have your account number, please? Have you tried turning it on and off again? Well, let's talk about how this is presented. Actually, I just want to take a quick opportunity to tell our audience about, our hotline. If you have a hot take or you disagree with anything that we're saying or want to voice your thoughts, give us a call at 1833-927-1978 and maybe we'll feature your call on the bottom.

Yeah. Dylan, tell why leave a mean comment when you could just ring us up and be like, hey guys, first time, long time. So what are you talking about Lisa Bowley? Dylan, tell us, tell us about the presentation here. What did you like about it? The thing that jumped out for me the most that I liked the most was the moment when Jared Osmond arrives at the party, which was great. That just really kicked it up to another level. I loved that.

I'm really getting into this whole subplot of Brittany continuously not breaking up with Jared. And I didn't expect them to actually come into the fold as a character. Now that he is, it just got better. And I really, really like the aesthetics in that moment because the party that we have, which is just a weird, like, awkward party. Like, nobody quite seems to know what to take of their dress code to dress like mafia wives or whatever. The cake is mostly just a black cake with the work mafia written on it. Like, the aesthetic cues are really, like, unclear. But in classic housewives party style, it's like very overlit, of course, because it exists to film a TV show and basically.

It's very white and bright and very crowded and like the high-deaf shots of everybody talking at once look like very, very harsh and chaotic. So once Jared arrives and then he goes out with Brittany to have a little head-to-head with her, we get a really stark contrast where when they're outside, at least when we're seeing Brittany, when we're seeing her side of the shot, it's black behind her. The focus is narrow enough that we don't really see anything beyond. on black and a few little like blooms of lights completely out of focus in the background. You know, those little fairy blooms of just kind of of lights blurred into just a vague points of color on an otherwise black background with nobody else around. Such a break from what we had inside, which is full of people, white, bright, to just being like blackness and stillness.

And it feels like a classic romance movie move to do that to, you know, to switch to when they're having a head-to-head to have an aesthetic break and for it to feel really like these two people are actually with each other and are actually alone and it really drives home that Brittany is entering like a different headspace when she's out there like where she's in this world that feels more personal more dreamlike but more real in a dreamlike way like more significant. That really helps the audience understand her attachment to him as this being like this romantic world that where she like, you know, enters it and embates in it. She feels like it's, it's her space. There's, there's something like dreamlike about it. And it's so different from the

bright, chaotic, crowded other world outside. Without Jared having to do much, we understand that a lot through the aesthetics. And it's a classic romance movie move, but that really worked for me. in that moment. I thought I really sold the moment and helped us understand Brittany's perspective. Yeah, I think also there's a bit of a contrast there because like you said, this grand gesture is something that we typically associate with romance. But this, in this case, it comes across as like very manipulative for him to just show up last minute to this party that she's at while she's trying to move on. It just comes across so manipulative. So the, contrast between this like presentation like you said where it's very typical of this romance movie.

And that's clearly how he envisioned this going down and how it actually feels when he arrives. It's such a contrast. And I found myself like chewing on my hands because it was so awkward. It was amazing. I mean, it is, you're right. It's exactly how Jared wanted it to go down. And it's how she wanted to go down too. And he knows that, which is why we see also.

we understand how he manipulates her because, you know, he creates this space, which is, you know, aesthetically represented by that dark, romantic outside space. He creates the space, which is the space that she wants to be in. She wants to have somebody coming to see her and being like, here, you know, let's step outside and have a moment together. But then he uses those manipulative cues, like by first making sure that she's in a position where she wants to be having this conversation with him and then saying, well, do you want me to leave? Putting her in a position where, of course, she's going to say, well, no, I don't. Like, like, that's like, right. He's, he's, he's, he's looking for those weak points to make her say, I want you to be here.

And by creating that space, he creates a place where, like, they can both kind of slip into a shared world, but also a space where he's in control, where, where he can, he can, he can make her say the things that he needs her to hear. And, and, and, yeah, we understand how, um, how we can create a world that works romantically and how he can create a world that's like his zone of manipulation at the same time. I think we understand a lot in that moment. Totally. The thing that stood up to me in terms of presentation is something that we also got in the last episode, but we got another scene between Mary and her son. And the way that the blocking on this was like worked out, I really thought that it was it was heartbreaking. The fact that we've got her son,

Robert Jr. and his wife like trying to slip into the house and sneak pass and Mary catches them as they're ascending on this staircase to get away from from her. Their backs are like kind of shifted away from her and they're very closed off as yeah. I think they're both have putties on too, right? Like they're both kind of hiding their faces and yeah. And really like was a really good visual representation of how he is like slipping away from her and the fact that there's this picture of him as a child right behind him as he's going up the stairs and she's losing her her son to presumably drugs because they seem like high as balls and you know they can barely speak to her as as she's talking and mary's clearly has like no idea how to progress in that situation yeah i just

thought that the blocking of it was was really heartbreaking because you know we saw him sneaking off and floating away from her and she's just left there stuck at on the ground like she's watching this balloon that she once loved floating off into the distance. I yeah, really heartbreaking stuff. Totally. And the like size of Mary's house like really plays into that because you really get that of like she never even knows when her son's home or not.

Like there's just these big open cavernous spaces that she's kind of sashing through and occasionally tries to catch a glimpse of her son ascending a staircase away from her at a distance, like the cavernous space really, it really sells that too. Yeah, we get those like long shots of her walking down these long white hallways. That feels very dreamlike too. Haunting them like a ghost. Yeah, yeah, like she's haunting her own life at a way. Yeah. So let's, let's, let's get a quote. Was there a quote that's a note to you here? I mean, Lisa's going off at the end. And I love those Lisa moments. I really, really love when she's like, oh, I'm going to call it real detectives, not Whitney Drew, oh, I'm connecting the dots. Honey, you did not pass art or

geometry or anything else. You should not be anywhere near dots. It's great. I just love the way she spins out that metaphor out of control and ending it on. You should not be anywhere near dots is so great. Great Lisa stuff there. There's a couple interactions here that I really like in terms of how they kind of separate the cast from the, the, real world. We get these kids that kind of stand in as as proxies. There's that moment between Angie and Elektra where Angie says like girl power and Electra is like don't ever say that again. We kind of see how out of touch Angie is. And then there's a moment where Mary sits down next to the tweens and it's like that was such a conflict. My feet hurt or whatever.

It was so funny. That was I love that moment where Mary, that was such. She felt like such like a wedding kind of moment, like just like sitting down next to some random kids and being like, hey, how about all of this stuff that's going on, right? And the kids just being like, I don't know who you are. I think one of the girls like kind of tries to engage in conversation by being like, what happened? And Mary says, women. Yeah. And it was like, okay. I think I have to go to the bathroom.

That was like, yeah, that was such a great moment. That was a great, very awkward moment, just deciding to sit with some random kids who have no business being in the shot and don't know what's going on. How about strategy? What do you think is the most interesting thing strategically? Well, I've already brought up what Whitney's doing. That's kind of the big thing that's going on here, I think. So that's definitely the most interesting one. It feels like this is not her first attempt to try to create a Meredith Lisa schism. I think that's been something she's been trying to look for a way to do from the start. and I'm not sure that's going to work out for her. She's definitely trying to go all in on this, I think.

I think bringing the information to Meredith first in advance of having it blow up at the party is showing that she's really planning for this to be a big thing. And it's a big swing. So, like credit to her for a big swing. I'm just not sure, like I've already said, like where it's going to go from here. Yeah, I think that this is interesting. I think that her going against Lisa is. is, like I said, a better strategy than going against Meredith, which is where it seemed like she was

initially trying to line the conflict up. So, yeah, I'm curious to see where this goes. I think a lot of it is going to have to do with how Lisa ultimately responds. The other thing that I think is pretty interesting strategically is how Bronwyn is operating. She really seems like she's figuring out how to move within this group really quickly. I think her decision to go and tell Angie what she has been hearing about Heather getting information around. I think that was the smart thing to do. She's picking aside here and I think she's making the right call. I like that she's not just being this passive energy in the room and, you know, she's bringing a multifaceted game here. So I'm really loving what she's providing. Yeah, Bronwyn does seem really eager to try to

get pieces of information and use them. She's like you said, she's really come here to play and I think we've seen that from the first episode. So good for her. I think she kind of got a taste of the difficulty of that. She has a couple of times, but in this episode she does when she kind of like ends up between Angie and Heather and it seems initially the crossfires, but then like Angie and Heather just kind of like burn it out on each other. Well, she's just kind of sitting at the table next to Millie or whatever her name is, Millie. Milly. Yeah, that one, that one, the other one. And I feel like in that moment she sees both that like, yeah, sharing this information is definitely going to like put me in the crossfires. But also if I don't like make an effort to ramp things up and take sides, I'm just going to get pushed to the side as soon as things get real.

Because like they have enough like history with each other that they'll just short circuit across me even if I'm the one who like who put them in contact. And I feel like that's kind of what we saw there. Like both that like the heat comes back to her. but it doesn't stick to her. It goes between Heather and Angie and she ends up just kind of on the side. I think if she wants to do something that really sticks and that really has an effect that really shakes up the dynamics in the group, she's going to have to figure out a way where she's actually implicated so that she doesn't just get pushed aside as soon as the drama gets real. But Angie did kind of need to rely on Bronwyn for backup there.

I think Angie has a lot of strengths as a housewife, but close quarters, one-on-one combat, I don't think, is her necessarily her strong suit. So she immediately kind of runs back to Bronwyn and involves her. And I think that that just brought them a lot closer and solidified the lines of the conflict a lot more. So yeah, I feel like this ultimately short up her position quite a bit. I'm curious what you think about Heather's position here and as a result of all this. Yeah, I don't know. Heather also doesn't seem to be like very deeply implicated in like the central dramas. So I'm kind of interested to see what she's planning to do going forward. I do like that she wants to kind of be a person in the know, like I'm like almost this power

broker figure when whatever his name is like Aaron or something, the guy that Brittany brings in, the guy who's not Jared. She's like immediately makes a big deal about knowing him and having kissed him. She really wants to be somebody who like knows everyone. And I think. think we maybe see a bit of her, a bit of anxiety about losing influence or losing status within the group, I think, in those moments, because I feel like she needs to kind of solidify who she is and what she's doing in this season. Yeah, but there's also conflict brewing between her and Mary, and we see it come to ahead a little bit here, which I think that Heather actually did a pretty good job of firing back at Mary and undermining her argument, because Heather is

right. Like, Mary has never liked Heather or been good to her. So, like, what does she doesn't owe her anything. I think that's, that's pretty good. Sure. And yeah, and it was the right move when Mary's like, you lie everywhere. Everywhere you go, you leave a lie. And then Heather's like, name one lie. And Mary can't do it. You know, like, she really kind of called her out and being like, okay, give an example, provide specifics. And Mary just couldn't, couldn't do it. Yeah. And I guess we didn't talk about Whitney's husband, Justin. Yeah, he, he was a bit of a puppet master here. He was the one that texted Jared in order to invite him to this party. And then we see him kind of get into it with Lisa and her husband Sean at the end in defense of Whitney. I like it when the husbands get involved

and get messy. I think that as long as it doesn't dominate the show, it adds a lot of like flavor. we're so used to seeing these women get into conflict with each other. It can almost feel like white noise at times. So once the spouses get involved, and especially if they're not as camera ready as the women, it feels a lot more real. Like their emotions take over a lot more. They're less savvy to the game and more reactive because they're taking it personally.

Yeah. Also, Lisa kind of had to drag Justin into it. I kind of was wondering like what's Justin doing here like when Lisa's going off he was just kind of standing out for the side then she went to him like Lisa went to Justin and got him involved it was kind of like hey you know wake up because this is a this is your turn to step into yeah but you're absolutely right and we were kind of left at a cliffhanger involving the husband so it's going to be fun to see what happens in next episode. Who are your stars here? Hmm. You know what? Lisa Barlow number one. It was it was classic Lisa stuff.

very quotable, like I mentioned. She also said something like, maybe if you were actually making your own jewelry, you wouldn't have time to fabricate this bullshit. Just like, like, good Lisa metaphors. Just how intense her blow up is at the end. And just like, I'm calling security, I'm calling the police. Just very, very funny.

I just thought it was a great, great reaction. Just a great reaction to Whitney. Just like, just to take it to that level and to just like refuse to tone it down. was very entertaining. So I'll give her a first star for that. I'll give Mary a second star. Lots of weird Mary stuff going on. The moment with her son was kind of hardworking. You're absolutely right to single that out. So this was a good Mary episode too. Give her a second star. And we'll do a third star for, well, I might as well do it to Whitney since she's the one making the big play here. So you got to reward her for making that big swing. Yeah, I think those

are good stars. I think they'd be my top three as well. I do want to give an honorable mention to Angie who I think she picked a theme that wasn't Greek and was mobbed related, which kind of ties into the Greek mafia thing, right? It's not, it wasn't Greek themed. It was mob themed. So she's got a lot of the things going on for her. Yeah, I, I appreciate that. I just love Angie. So honorable mention, We should also give an honorable mention to Garzai, the bearded man who shows up and post the... Oh, yeah, her associate. Did we like learn who he actually is? I don't think we did.

It was just like, this is Garzai. And he's going to be taken care of these ladies by putting wanted posters on their doors. Kind of a mixed metaphor there. But I just like that this random bearded dude named Garzai just shows up and then disappears. And we never get an explanation of who he is. And the posters were a good problem. keeping in line with Angie's love for for a physical prop yeah keeping her on call prop guy busy before we move on to real housewives of New York City just want to take

the opportunity to tell our audience to hit the subscribe button on whatever platform you are watching this on leave a little bit of a comment or a like or whatever and tell us your thoughts on our hotline it's one 833 927 0178 super easy to remember that number. 1833-927-0178. We'll feature your call on the show and talk about whatever it is that you Dylan, let's get into Real Housewives of New York. Want to give a summary of what happened here?

Yeah, everybody's planning to make food at the Hamptons for Aaron's Shabbat thing. And as various ingredients are collected and assembled, a lot of the attention's focus on Uba and Bryn having an increasingly serious conflict, which gets a little heated near the end. Yeah. I got to be honest, this was kind of a mid-episode for me. I was not like super engaged with this. I'm curious like what your thoughts. I've been really enjoying the season. So I've been happy with this one too. But yeah, it was more low event, I think, compared to like the previous couple episodes, which were a little more just studded with content. I really, really enjoyed the conflicts we got near the end, but it kind of took a long time for some stuff to actually happen,

I guess. Yeah. What did you think about the presentation on this episode? Yeah, so not like, being in the Hapthens is not as much fun as being in New York City. I've talked before on the show about how much, like, the aesthetics of New York City really give some extra juice to this franchise, and that's one of its strongest suits. So the fact that we've been in the Haptings for a little while now is not as fun aesthetically for me. It's not as much of an interesting world to inhabit. If I was going to call it just one thing in terms of the choices being made, I did really like that, I think, especially near the end, there's a lot of shots of Bryn where there's

just her in it. Like when we have them all sitting around the table, most of the shots of other people are like two in the frame, or maybe there'll be one in the frame when the camera pans over to another person, like the cameras including multiple people. Most, if not all, but the majority of shots of Bryn are just like one shots. It's like just her. So there is like a shot choice in there that isolates Bryn, that underlines the feeling that she's alone, that she's feeling separated from other people, that she's feeling not

part of the team, the way the other people are maybe part of the team. So that's one choice that that stood out to me as being well considered. Like generally is just very well shot, the stuff around the table. It feels both dynamic and also we get like to spend enough time in the characters that we see their expressions and stuff and really check in on everybody. So we have a sense of like where. everybody's at with everything. Really well done, well edited, well shot. But there does seem to have been an explicit choice to try to isolate Bryn a little bit more in the shot choices and in the edit. And that

work well for me. Yeah. And also I feel like the way that Aaron's kitchen and dining area is laid out is so great for having this depth. We see at the very end, they're able to create isolation between Bryn and the rest of the girls at the table, plus even more isolation from that group and Sai and Uba, who are back in the kitchen. Everyone is within this same space, but they're able to create different levels of isolation. And it really, like you said, it's really evocative because you can see how Bryn feels isolated from everyone else, but there's still people on the periphery that are there.

supporting her, whereas Uba and Sai are disengaged from the rest of the group after this big falling out, and they're just puttering around the kitchen. So, yeah, I think that it was really well-constructed space there. Yeah. Another thing that stood out to me in terms of presentation here is more a structural note. And one thing that I think that these shows don't get a lot of credit for is their ability to incorporate kind of game into the show for different effects. And I mean, like, we often see party games, like, never have I ever be used for the sake of drama.

In this case, it was used to strengthen bonds within the group and let us get to know the characters. But there was also another game that we saw where they were in the grocery store and they structured it like a game where they're guessing, like, prices for things. And it serves a dual purpose in terms of showing potentially how out of touch these women are from the day-to-day reality. of people who are not as affluent as, as them, but also how kind of out of step that location is from the realities of the day-to-day Americans. And, you know, there's like soy milk that is $12 or whatever. Everything is just this ultra-expensive, expensive variant. A dozen eggs for eight American dollars? That's wild. That's insane.

I'm, you know, I'm sure they're free-range farm eggs, whatever. They still should not cut half that much. Like, that's wild. Yeah. Yeah, so I thought it was like a really effective use of game in here. And I think that's something that these shows do really well. Often we'll see it used just for creating drama. They'll have a game where the sole purpose is to stir shit up.

But we see it used in a couple different ways. in this one episode and I really like that. I mean, even we got tennis as a game that didn't get really a gamey treatment. No, because nobody could hit the ball. Yeah. I'm sure it would have been used as a game

if anyone could actually connect. Yeah, I'm sure they wanted to, but yeah, Aaron's like, these bitches don't know. I don't play tennis. And Aaron looks terrible too, but she has a leg to stand it because she actually makes contact with the ball. We never see anybody else even succeeding

so much as getting a racket on a ball. which is pretty funny. Uba had a great line too where she's sitting next to Jenna and she's like, I don't think we're safe here. Just balls flying everywhere. I also really enjoyed Jessel's line where she is like, I'm British, I play cricket. And like, A, I'm sure you don't.

Yeah. And B, you're going to be really surprised when you find out where tennis is from. Yeah. There was a little bit of a thematic note, especially early on in this episode that I thought was interesting. We got Raquel talking about her relationship with her dad being non-existent and her, like, feeling of abandonment. And that resonated with Bryn because she similarly has a strange relationship with her father, who's passed away now. But we saw the, that all showing how these women and their fathers, the father-daughter relationship,

being really tense here or strained or non-existent. And then we see Jessel talking about how much she wants a daughter and everyone gathering around her telling her how much she would be a great girl mom and how the relationship between mother and daughter is very special. So I kind of like that as a bit of a contrast, kind of comparing these two different, very different parental relationships. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. It was a pretty good moment with Raquel. And it was kind of a good and harmful moment when she was saying, like, I don't want this man's last name. So I'm going to take your last name on. And she's like, no, my dad sucked too. So let's try to find something further down the family tree that we can pick from. Let's see how far back we have to go to find like one man who wasn't terrible. Let's get a quote.

What quotes it out to you? You know what? This is a bit dereliction of duty. But I don't think I didn't write down any quote. Like, Uba had some good stuff when she was getting really worked up at the end. But like any specific lines from that, I'm not too sure. What do you got? Do you have something specific?

Lots of stuff about licking buttholes was in there. Jessel talking about Raquel's vagina earrings. Jenna telling a story about a legit sex dungeon. Oh, yeah. Jenna's got, Jen has always got these great stories of being like in New York in the 90s. like I've always like just you feel like she's lived like 50

lives when she's always just like randomly like when I was dating a New Yorker staff writer and he had to do a piece on sex dungeons like we didn't get a ton of Jedda in this episode but you can always count in her to just drop in some random story where you're like damn where did that go from

oh we got jessal talking with grading shredding cheese being harder than giving a hand job so I don't know how much vigor she approaches either task with. But it was an interesting comparison. Let's talk strategy. What stood out to you in terms of strategic decisions that happened here?

The person is interesting me the most in this episode is Bryn. And I think what's interesting about what we're seeing from her in this episode is not not so much her strategy in terms of like what drama she's trying to cook up. just in terms of how she's approaching the form as like a way of just presenting yourself. And we see like how she's really trying to like give pointers to other people about how to do it. Because we in short span, we see a couple instances of that, you know, good on the editors, I think to to just include a little moment ever talking to Rebecca. And she's saying something about like advising her and like clap back at the other girls. Like, oh, if they tell you things about your wardrobe, just say like, I.

have a clothing line. Like you've got to hit back and stuff. Like she just, we see that she's like really actually seems to be interested in trying to like tell other people how they should present themselves on camera. And that leads into the discussion about the conflict that she had with Uber, uh, that Aaron was maybe a party to that we didn't actually get on camera, which I appreciate.

I like sometimes there being like conflict points that aren't things that happen on camera that just have to be reconstructed in the aggregate through, uh, the things that have. happened in later discussions combined with confessionals. I like when conflict moments have to be reconstructed instead of actually shown. But a really interesting conversation from what we can tell where she was trying to instruct Uber or give pointers to Uber about her on-camera performance. And according to Bryn herself, said something along the lines of, if you want Oliver to marry

you, you should be careful about coming off as an angry black woman, which is a very loaded and and thorny thing to say to a friend. I'm sure it came from a good place. I think Bryn is honestly, I believe that she's honestly trying to, like, try to offer pointers to other people on the show from a place of friendship and, like, wanting everybody to look like their best selves on camera.

But you see how trying to tell people how they should present themselves is like a very thorny thing to do and can like very easily be read as an inappropriate intervention into your life. interpretation of your character and your presentation. So I'm just really interesting to start to see Bryn more and more as somebody who is like very engaged with notions of how people are being presented and just engaging with the form not so much as like gamesmanship as like a PR person as as being like like you know, how are you going to come off in camera and I'm going to help coach you because I think that I have like the best ideas about how people should be presented and what plays well for

the cabread stuff. That was the thing that was like really interesting me the most, I think. Yeah, it's interesting because I saw this posted on the Bravo Housewives subreddit. And people were roasting her for this and talking about how it was inauthentic and maybe showing this on camera, this moment where Bryn gives coaching to Rebecca as being like a warning shot from production to like keep it real, keep it authentic. because otherwise we're going to give you a bad edit and show you as being fake. But I think that you make a pretty good point that it does seem like it is coming from a place where she does actually legitimately care about people, at least with the example that we saw with

Rebecca where she was coaching, that did seem like it was coming from a genuine place. I am less convinced about the conflict with Uba, whether that is coming from a place where she genuinely wants to help or if this is her kind of saving face in the confessional and it was meant to be kind of shady or inflammatory in some way. I could definitely see that being the case. And she's got plausible deniability to be like, no, I'm coming from a place like a helpful place, but it was actually because she feels hurt by Uba and wants to strike back. We saw, I think it was the last episode where Uba identifies the fact that Bryn likes to put conflicts behind her and find new conflicts where she has better footing in order to get her revenge, where she can make herself

be the victim or be like the hero as opposed to playing the villain. This could be an example of that where she has an off-camera conversation that is able to create conflict, but she has enough plausible deniability to be like, no, I was genuinely coming from a place of, of helping you. And I think that, like, I don't think that this was entirely selfless. It just, it didn't really land with me. So I thought that this was kind of like a rough moment for Brin, like that this is the central seed of this new conflict with Uba. I don't think that it's playing in the way that she is hoping. So she's going to have to kick her PR skills into. to overdrive with that, I feel like. Yeah, I think it's a rough moment for her, too. And I don't think

that her intentions are necessarily what's at issue. Like I, like I say, I'm willing to believe that her intentions are. But who cares what your intentions are? Like, it's how it lands. And I'm, not the best position to like talk about the politics of presentations among black women. But it feels like, it's not the greatest advice to be like, make sure that you're not conforming to a racial stereotype or the person who loves you will love you less. Like no, like like, totally. Yeah. You know, like, if Oliver would like Uber less because like of some racial

stereotype, that's 100% his problem and not Uber's problem. I get that it's a TV show and it's all about how you're presented. But I think using that kind of talking point when providing advice to somebody that's specifically attached to their personal relationship is, uh, is, is kind of a thorny thing to do. and is going to come off bad. And I think if Ubo was stewing about that and that kind of like kept her up at night thinking about it, that's like that's understandable. That's totally understandable.

So yeah, I do think it came off bad for Brin regardless of what her intentions are, right? They had like just, just the effect of it is more important and what the intentions are. I think that Brin gets a little out over her skis in terms of thinking that she is like a PR master, that she does like know what, what is good presentation and what isn't. I think she's maybe a little overcom. confident into her skills there. In terms of the discussion that she has with Uber, like I think everybody's right when they realize that that Uber's in the

rung for not letting Wren speak. You know, Uber says something like, I know what you're going to say, so I don't need you to respond right now, which is obviously not a healthy way to have a conversation. And Uber was doing a lot of talking over her and stuff. But what I appreciate is I've talked about this before,

is that these women really kind of smother their disputes with with love language and like we'll just kind of announce that they've decided to end a dispute by being like, but I love you and we love each other and we're going to hug and this is all coming from a place of love and everything's love. And which is, I only fight like this was someone that I love so much. Yeah. Which, you know, toxic statement by the way, but, but that's like how they tend to like just kind of announce this conversation. This dispute is over. We're no longer going to argue about this because we're just going to say that we love each other so much. And I don't think that's great because they're not following through the arguments to the end.

So the one thing I do appreciate about Uba's approach here is that she refuses to do that, right? Like as much as Britt and other people are trying to do that for the conversation, Uba keeps restarting it and keeps being like, you know, but this is why I think you're codesteading. This is why I think you actually are a stake. And this is why I said that. And I'm going to say it again. And I'm going to say it again. And I'm going to say that you hurt me again. I'm going to say that I think you're condescending again. I think she's too, she's definitely a little too intense in the sense that she's not letting Prince speak because she's making it too much of a rant and not enough of the discussion. But I appreciate that Uba is not taking the bait and being like, we're just going to say we love, love each other and bury it rather than actually dealing with it. Yeah, totally. It seemed like she came into that conversation using that language and then it immediately turned into a conflict.

She's like, oh, we're, we're so good now and we're good because I fight with people that I care about. I care about Bryn even though she's a snake. And just like immediately devolving into conflict. I really love that. Yeah. And Jenna's like, can we go back to the we, that we love each other's stuff? And Uber's like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm back to call you're a snake now, okay?

What other highlights did you have from this episode? I don't know what Jessel meant when she said that like what Jenna was wearing looked like part of a truck or something. I don't understand that. What was she trying to say? That was just, that was bad. What she's trying to say she looked like a bin bag?

Like she looked like a black plastic garbage bag that you throw in a garbage truck. Yeah, I don't know. She didn't express that clearly. Or like recycled tires or yeah, I don't know. Just the vinyl siding. I don't know. I don't know what she meant by that.

It was classic jessell like failing to land anything. Nothing she tries to do ever lands. It's just like the image of her try to. to hit a tennis ball and it going like three feet away for Paris, like most of her interactions on this show. God bless her. You know, the prank was, that prank they played, that could not have gotten better, though.

That was actually, honestly, a prank that carried out, that was carried out beautifully in the sense that you had the best possible reaction that two people are vomiting simultaneously. And, uh, Uba's actually laughing about it afterwards. When I kind of have to expect it, to want to kill everybody involved afterwards. But no, even despite puking her guts out of the sink, Ubo was like, that was hilarious.

So that's like the perfect prank reaction. You get like that kind of extreme result, but nobody wants to kill you after. They're actually laughing with you at it. Yeah, and polar extremes too, because while we've got, you know, two people throwing up in sinks, we've also got this image of Jenna lions with this fake cockroach,

like licking the cream off of it. Yeah. In this, like, latex outfit. Yeah, really, really fantastic. Like, I, when I saw the, like, fake cockroach, I'm like, oh, this is going to be the lamest thing. But, yeah, you're right. It went as well as you could hope.

Yeah. Yeah. You know what? This was a great episode, actually, because any episode, you have two people simultaneously vomiting. It's a good episode. Yeah. In retrospect, I am, you know, revising my review. I feel like this, this was pretty good.

Yeah. I think we covered most of my highlights here. Who are your stars? Yeah, I'm not too sure about this one. I've been, and the early episodes I've been really smashing those like Gen Alliance and Cy Stars buttons. Like, I've been loving them a lot, but we didn't get a ton of them this episode. Yeah, we were a little light on Cy in general on this episode, aside from, you know,

to its detriment. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe if I first start at Uber, like, I don't love the way she reacted, as I've already covered. I don't love the way she handled that conversation, but I do love her intensity, and I love her dedication to talking through it, and to try her best to express how she feels. And so, yeah, we get a lot of high energy worked up Uba, and I'm happy with that.

So I'll give Uba my first star. And I'll give my second star to Bryn because she comes off as a very interesting character for the reasons I've discussed. I think that we're starting to understand a little bit more of her psychology. And I think that the way that she feels increasingly isolated there, the way the camera shows that in that dinner scene, but also the way that we see her kind of hiding in her room, like lying in bed, like not wanting to go out, considering leaving, you know, talking to her brother and considering just leaving.

She's in a very vulnerable position. And being in a vulnerable position makes us see a little bit more of how she ticks of who she is. And that's becoming pretty interesting. So let's give a Brin a second start there. Let's give a third star to the Pavlova that Gena lines makes. Even though like we have to hear the word Pavlova a bunch of times, Pavlova is the new Shukh. This is, it's impressive that she, that she's going to like kind of like a high degree of difficulty dessert while everybody else understandably, as you usually do in like a dinner party setting, is going for like pretty like safe, easy to succeed on.

Like, oh, potatoes and sauce, rice and beans. Pretty easy to carry off recipes. And Jenna's going for like a pretty delicate kind of dessert dish. Let's give us start of her dessert there. The Pope Loeb looked pretty good. It was a little chippy. He was kind of falling apart there. But that just might have been because Aaron was too eager to bring it out with a cockroach

underneath it. Yeah. Still, it's tasty. Yeah. I feel like maybe she was used. a high degree of difficulty dessert or something that requires like a lot of attention over a long period of time as a bit of a social crutch here. I find that something as like an introvert that I will typically gravitate to something that I can, you know, oh, I'm doing this thing. I've got

this activity that I can fall back on to remove myself or use as a crutch in social situations. Yeah, I thought that that was interesting. But I think you nailed it with the stars, number one star, being Uba slash Bryn, I think 1A and 1B. I think that those are both the most compelling people on this episode, obviously. And I want to give another start to Raquel, who I think is being really vulnerable on camera. I just really appreciate that she's open to doing that. Yeah. And I do think just to jump on what you're saying about Jenna making kind of a time-conceiving

high degree of difficulty dessert as kind of a social crutch and a reason to be in the kitchen a lot. That's a great point. And I think that Brin really picked up on that and used that as a moment to have time with Jenna and to try to get closer to Jenna. Like she she kind of sees that that's what Jen is doing. And it's like, oh, well, the other girls are shopping. Can I help you? Can I hang out on the kitchen with you? Can I ask to wear your diamonds? Can I enter this like semi-private space with you? Because I see that you're kind of looking to create a semi-private space for yourself. Can I just slip in there with you? And then we can kind of strengthen our relationship. and kind of comfort each other in that space, I think Bryn really picked up on that and kind of saw that as an opportunity to draw ourselves closer. So I think that was actually a smart read by Brin's part too

to try to strengthen their relationship. Totally. Well, I think that about does it for Real Housewives of New York. Dylan, you want to let everyone know where they can find you? Yeah. As long as it's still October,

I'm still going to be talking about horror movies all the time. And I used to do a horror movie podcast. It's called Mind Over Splatter. There's three seasons that you can look up. So if you're looking for some recommendations for horror movies to watch or just want to hear some guys break down an obsessive detail, various horror movies. You should probably check out mind over splatter while it's still a spooky season. Awesome.

I'm Craig Midwinter. You can find me on chess.com Craig J. Midwinter. Add me as a friend. No one has done it yet. You could be the first. Take me down. I'm on social media at Bravo Oates. on Instagram and on TikTok.

Again, we've got our new hot take hotline, 1833-927-0178. That's toll-free in US and Canada. Tell us where you land, Uba versus Bryn. Tell us who you think is in the best position on Salt Lake City. Tell us what you like about the presentation on these shows. Tell us whatever's on your mind. We'll talk about it on this pod. It's just a voicemail.

So don't be afraid of me like picking up the phone. You're not going to have a problem. Anyways, that's that's Bravo Outsider for this week. Until next week, keep on wiping.