Season 11 of Vanderpump Rules has felt like a fever dream, and I don’t mean that in a good way. The jig, as they say, is up. This cast ceased to be a real friend group and would have gone their separate ways long ago were it not for the electric fence that is their Bravo contracts. It’s a relief to hear that the show has been put on pause, because the last three months have felt like a fruitless endeavor to get blood from a stone.
This week, the group is off to San Francisco for Kyle Chan’s whiskey line launch party. Try saying that three times fast. But first, we have business to handle in Los Angeles.
We open at Something About Her. Ariana and Katie are meeting with Lisa, who wants to know why in God’s name they haven’t opened yet. Apparently, permit issues have been nonstop, and the girls are debating whether or not to part ways with Chef Penny, who seems to want a partnership stake in the business. Lisa is worried that Penny’s dismissal will further delay SAH’s opening, which might be true. But it’s probably for the best that the woman who designed the menu that made a SUR customer defecate and vomit right there at her table isn’t involved in this venture.
The big revelation is that Ann, Sandoval’s former assistant, is helping out at SAH. Lisa jokes that Ariana stole her from Sandoval, a narrative Ariana doesn’t like. “I feel like it’s just a good fit, being a female-centric business,” she counters. Okay, girlboss.
Scheana and Sandoval are at Kyle’s store to review run-of-show for the party. Scheana is performing, and Sandoval is in charge of equipment and setup. But the real reason for this scene is a Kyle-mediated healing summit for the feuding friends.
It’s nothing we haven’t already heard. Sandoval is mad that Scheana capitalized off his pain (again), while Scheana refuses to admit that yes, she did, and that’s just how the cookie crumbles, baby (again).
They rehash everything, and it culminates in Scheana crying (again), telling Sandoval she misses him (again), and repeating that she had to choose Ariana’s side (again). The feuding friends reach a tentative agreement that they won’t throw their pasts in each other’s faces anymore, which does not seem like a fair agreement because the past in question is from 2006 for Scheana and, you know, five months ago for Sandoval, but whatever. This is also not a good friend move by ScheaShu, but she always clocks in for her shift at the reality television factory, and for that I thank her.
Lala chooses this moment to FaceTime Sandoval. She’s having her 33rd birthday party, you see, and she wants to make sure he isn’t coming. Kyle is bewildered by the etiquette of disinviting someone from an event they were never invited to in the first place, which is how I know he’s never watched this show before. Calling someone to tell them they are not invited to your party is vintage Vanderpump behavior — if memory serves, Katie was the first to pull this move, on Lala in Season 4.
Everyone rolls up to Bathtub Gin for Lala’s birthday, which gave me flashbacks to all the underage drinking I did at their NYC location back when I still liked gin. Lala tells Ariana about her FaceTime with Sandoval, and asks Scheana why she was with him earlier. This conversation could have been had during their Facetime, but having it in front of Ariana feels like a play to stir up drama.
To that end, it’s more ham-fisted than effective. Scheana explains that she wants to get to a place of peaceful coexistence (hmm). “I feel like there’s a path to friendship for you guys,” Lala chimes in (hmmmmm), while Ariana pulls every face in the book. In her confessional, she says that she’s not upset for her own sake, but because she wants better for Scheana (yeah, right).
Then, it’s time for Sandoval and his band to play the El Rey. All the usual suspects are there, even the illustrious DJ James Kennedy. Apparently, he didn’t have bigger or better things to do. Schwartz pulls Jo aside for their first conversation since they ended their situationship. “How many dudes have you banged?” Schwartz asks, and it is a mark of Jo’s restraint that she does not disembowel him right where he stands.
Jo will be at Kyle’s party, and Schwartz is excited to hang with her, but adds that “other people” have made him feel weird about saying he’s excited to see her. Jo contorts her body into a sort of standing pretzel position that looks painful and still can’t begin to capture how awkward this conversation is. (Relatable queen?) In her cross-legged confessional, Jo says Schwartz gives her “whiplash” by careening from “I love you” to “we’re just platonic friends” in the blink of an eye, and I hate to say it, but Team Jo.
Meanwhile, Ariana’s new boyfriend Dan has flown in to accompany her to San Francisco, and the two grab dinner before the trip kicks off. He seems nice, albeit not interested in moving to Los Angeles anytime soon. When Ariana asks, he makes the kind of face she used to when Sandoval would put on a pair of particularly heinous pants.
When the group arrives in San Francisco, they’re scheduled to walk around Fisherman’s Wharf, take a boat ride, then go to a 1920s-themed party. Dan has opted out of attending any of this, and instead will be going for a massage and dinner with someone named Brad. It’s odd that someone would fly across the country in order to support their partner and then ditch their partner, but you do you, boo.
In a confessional, Lala says she thinks it’s a red flag that Dan would get into a relationship with someone who just got out of a life partnership 10 days ago, and it’s judgy, but also…not no. Maybe Dan realizes this at some level, hence the face.
While the group is on the wharf, Brock pulls Ariana aside and asks how she feels around Sandoval. She says he’s just “scenery” at this point, as long as he doesn’t speak or make his presence known to her in any way. Brock, who might clock in even harder than his wife, asks whether Ariana will ever come to peaceful coexistence with Sandoval. “For whose benefit, his?” she asks. “For my wife’s,” Brock replies.
“I care more about her than to allow her to have people in her life that are going to scream at her like that,” Ariana says. (Lol, okay.)
Brock thinks that forgiveness isn’t about endorsing Sandoval’s actions, but about getting to a place where Ariana can focus on the good. That’s when America Ferrera’s Barbie monologue (Vanderpump Rules’ Version) starts. And again, I don’t mean that as a good thing.
“You 100% do not have to forgive anyone who’s traumatized you,” Ariana declares, with all the gravity of war. “There’s power to me in hurt, and anger, and female emotion, and being able to have that, and not being put in this position of, ‘You have to take the high road,’ or be stoic, or be strong at every moment in order to have power. I think there’s power in all those emotions, and I stand by that. There never seems to be any issue with male rage.”
This is all true, but falls flat coming from her. No one loves to hide their emotions and refuse to talk about them more than Ariana. Brock has no business telling her how to feel (I see you twerking for the dough, sir), but as I wrote two months ago, “I find myself wishing that Ariana would step into her power and own that not only is she bothered, she has every right to be.”
It also felt dystopian watching a blond-haired, blue-eyed woman pontificate about the liberatory power of her rage. White female rage has a nasty tendency to turn carceral, and Ariana has threatened to call the police on Sandoval twice this season for no reason at all. While Ariana waxed poetic on my television, I watched on my phone as Columbia University and City College called in the NYPD to violently assault and arrest hundreds of students who dared speak out against the Gaza genocide.
I remembered how Ariana described Scandoval as “the worst thing that could ever happen,” the event that taught her that “evil exists in this world.” In this economy? In a time of all-out assault on women’s reproductive rights, poor women, migrant women, Black, brown, and nonwhite women? Ariana might be comfortable invoking gender politics when they can be applied to her interpersonal conflicts, but there is no liberation to be found in her story, and that’s okay. I would prefer a drop of honesty.
None of this is to let Sandoval, who is even more dedicated to spin than Ariana is, off the hook. I laughed when Ariana muttered that it would be “awesome” if the famous Pier 39 sea lions attacked him. Fair. He sucks!
At the 1920s party, Sandoval reminds us just how much. He pulls Scheana aside to go over party details. Because ScheaShu is a showgirl who will get the scene if it kills her, she asks how it felt being around Dan. Sandoval says that he’s grateful to Dan because he was worried about Ariana “after everything” and thought she would be able to handle things better with a partner, which is the most patronizing thing that could have come out of his mouth.
Scheana presses Sandoval to really reflect on how much he hurt Ariana and consider apologizing so that the group might have a chance of moving forward one day. She reminds Sandoval that Ariana was committed to their life together, and didn’t go to couples’ therapy or freeze her eggs just for herself. Sandoval admits it came across that he was blaming Ariana for the demise of their relationship, and she didn’t deserve that. It’s crazy-making to watch him pretend to have this revelation as if he didn’t spend all of last season laying the groundwork to blame Ariana as the negligent partner who forced him to cheat, but here we are.
This was one of the season’s stronger episodes, which is less a compliment to this episode and more a reflection of this season’s flopdom. Really, I think I’m just exhausted by everything Scandoval. Ariana won’t get real, Sandoval won’t take accountability, and Lala, Scheana and Brock seem intent on shocking Ariana into a response. None of the pieces are fitting together, and it feels like everyone is selling a story I just don’t buy.
Next week is the finale, and after that we’ll get a three-part (I’m assuming, since Bravo will want to rake in those sweet ad dollars) reunion that’s rumored to to have ended Lala and Ariana’s friendship. Til then!
Last calls
- Ann Watch, Week 14: She’s back, and working at SAH. Good for Ann.
- Much like Katie, Schwartz immediately backslid on this season’s progress when he agreed to move in with Sandoval. They should just get married at this point. Love is love!
- Also at the 1920s party, Schwartz propositions Katie for one last night together of $150 worth of junk food and silent social-media scrolling, maybe even some sex. Katie rebuffs Schwartz — “That feels too intimate, I don’t want that” — but a little giddiness slips through. It’s clear Katie doesn’t want Schwartz back as a partner, but part of her is still holding out for some kind of recognition or respect from him, and despite her better judgment, she relishes his attentions. The Bubbas are sick in the head for this. Obsessed with each other. I’ve been waiting for Katie to get free of this demon for 10 years, and it seems like I’ll just have to keep on waiting. Oh, well. Have fun, girl!