KFC

I agree, not one of my favorite seasons either. Vincent was a terrible designer and a creep. Keith won the first unconventional materials challenge using FABRIC! I enjoyed Laura but her design repertoire was pretty one-note. That woman was a smart cookie, but her designs were always one sequin short of a bedazzler. Even Uli, whom I loved, grew a bit tiresome with her flowy print (albeit beautifully made) maxi dresses. Jeffrey's final collection was pretty underwhelming to me (although I did enjoy his couture challenge piece). I just rewatched the pageant episode and was reminded of how awful Angela was. From bothering Kayne during the sketching session to throwing the one-on-one with Miss USA, there was something so bottom-feeder about Angela. I've always disliked the contestants who play-not-to-get-eliminated rather than playing to win. See S2 Marla.

I am choosing to believe Meredith was throwing actual shade at Matt. ;-) I WANT TO BELIEVE, MEREDITH!

She was painful to watch, yes, but I did feel bad for her in the way I'd feel bad for anyone who comes across that tightly wound and awkward. I personally don't get entitled vibes from her, more like she's just carrying a lot of emotional baggage on her shoulders that she doesn't know how to deal with or express properly. She just seems SO up tight and self-conscious to me, almost like she's suppressing a lot. It's probably best that she's gone, but I still feel sympathetic to anyone who comes across as so burdened and in a prison of their own making.

S3's Laura Bennett was a great guest judge. I wish they'd bring her back. Her critiques were always very articulate and sound. She seemed to understand the eternal PR struggle between ideas vs. execution. I also kinda liked Emmy Rossum when she was a guest judge, although I suppose that doesn't really answer the question of having more fashion bigwigs involved. My guess is they probably could get more reputable fashion people to guest judge, even despite the diminishing cache PR has, but I suspect it has more to do with Lifetime wanting to reach a "younger"/"hipper" audience with all the bloggers.

I know, I was so hoping the minimal airtime meant he'd emerge from the pack later on. Is All-Stars still a thing? If so, I hope he considers doing that show. I'd love to see more of his work in front of a different set of judges.

Personally I don’t see Amanda winning this. The conspiracy theorist that I am, it just seems like a rehash of when Kate was brought back. They’ll laud her work in order to make it seem like her coming back was justified, but then eventually the judges will blindside her with an aufing for doing the exact same stuff she’s been praised for in all the previous challenges. Sandhya reminds me of a more petulant Patricia Michaels. And the judges’ praise of her is equally reminiscent of it. On the one hand, I appreciate that Heidi seems to want PR to help give voice to non-Western/Eurocentric aesthetics with Sandhya’s Indian and Patricia’s Taos Pueblo backgrounds influencing their designs. BUT, especially in the case of Sandhya, OF COURSE you can be “different” when the judges aren’t really holding you accountable for form and function. For all the talk about Sandhya having “new ideas” and a signature look, I just think, well yeah… because the judges don’t make her adhere to the construction rules that everyone else does. Pull away all the wickety whack on her garments, and the basic construction falls way, way short. I always thought the whole idea behind PR was that, sure, you should present a new idea, but since the contestants are responsible for sewing their own garments (as opposed to a show like “Fashion Star,” where seamstresses worked in conjunction with the designers) because you have to demonstrate an ability to synthesize your vision with the realities of basic design skills. Sandhya might have atypical ideas, but to me it’s ridiculous that she isn’t being taken to task for the lack of design underneath all the props.

Word. Especially when they say they're the ripe old age of 22. It's interesting seeing Andy shift from being a pervy old man (with the blond Calvin Klein[?] model) to dismissive and rude (with the black Ralph Lauren[?] model). He's not real skilled at maintaining an acceptable medium in his behavior with them, is he?

If Ramona really IS being demoted, might be the best thing for her image. I hated Luann until this past season, and now she seems to be almost universally loved. Granted, Luann has never been as unhinged as Ramona, but on the flip side, there have been plenty of moments when Ramona's unfiltered brashness rings all too true. So maybe in smaller doses Ramona might come across as the truth cannon in next season. All Vicki Gunvalson had to do on RHOC is stop siding with Tamra, and suddenly she's the voice of reason on that show. And arguably, Vicki is way slimier than Ramona.

It pains me to say this, but I'd sooner take Jill back than have Kelly as a returning HW. While mental instability certainly hasn't stopped Bravo from giving a HW the golden apple, there was an added layer of crazy and condescension from Kel that made it painful to watch. Especially in the aftermath of Scary Island, it was irritating to watch Kelly unravel when no one could really take her to task for her bad behavior. She certainly wasn't the only HW to look down on other women whom she viewed as her social less-thans, but at least people like Jill were taken down a peg or two by the others. With Kelly, there was no reasoning with her because everyone seemed afraid of picking on the nutbag, even though she was every bit as insufferable as someone like Jillzy. It was always supremely uncomfortable watching Kelly interact with Alex, for example. At least Bethenny (who, for all of HER crazy, totally had Kelly pegged as being part of the "fabulosity crowd" who couldn't bother to remember Beth's name) could call out Kelly's elitism/convenient amnesia. But in any event, I sure as hell wouldn't want to watch an entire season of Kelly sucking up to Carole or trying to tell Kristen she's not a REAL model. Actually, I take that back. Watching Kelly give Kristen the "you're a cook not a chef" third degree about her modeling would be kinda funny.

Sweet Jesus was the girl from "Girls" irritating tonight. She suffered from the same affliction as Demi Lovato: Overestimating the importance of her answers and kept rambling in some misguided attempt to sound more interesting than she actually is. Also, Andy was oddly dismissive of the male model bartender. But I guess he's only nice to the ones he wants to sleep with, so maybe not all that surprising.

Perhaps it was a combination of both? Again, all speculation here, but if Danielle were upset about Tamra (or anyone else) making jabs about her husband's sexuality it seems logical that the agreement could have been, "we'll edit out your warts, but you're not going to be a full-time HW anymore and are taking the pay cut instead." Although, on the flip side, I agree it's weird... Luann was demoted on RHONY this season, and they featured her just as much as the official HWs. So if the big issue for Danielle was something in Bali, yes it is strange they hacked her to shreds in every other episode. Especially when it seems like her added presence in other episodes would have serviced the storylines instead of made them even more convoluted.

And the other thing I kept hearing was that Tamra really got into it with Danielle. My guess? In Bali, Tamra said something about the husband's sexual orientation, and the shit hit the fan. It matches with the timeline of pre-airing gossip and accounts for why we get cardboard cutout Danielle by the time the season actually aired. /totalspeculation

How has Heather been two-faced to Tamra or Vicki? She's prissy and pretentious, sure, but she's been quite loyal to both Tamra and Vicki. It's easy to speculate about their real motives, but I've yet to see her actions indicating that she is befriending them for airtime. She's never said anything rude about Brooks, for example. And she wasn't really sucking up to Tamra in Bali, she made a point of calling out Tamra on badmouthing Lizzie's dress via text. Heather spins things around and harps on non-issues (let's down a flute of champs every time she says "yelled"!), but she's been fiercely loyal to her friends on the show. (Or "friends" if you prefer. Although weirdly enough I also think her friendship with Tamra is real off-camera.) As for the Shannon apology, on WWHL she explained that Vicki brought up the "Terry is mad at David" issue during the dinner, which is why Heather was discussing it with Shannon. Given how choppy the editing was during that part of the episode and how random that conversation was, seems plausible enough to me.

I am still dying of curiosity about why Danielle was edited to shreds. I'm hoping loudmouth Tamra will spill the dirt on what happened to make the editors reduce Dani's role. I, for one, don't think it was her being boring, RH conspiracy theorist that I am. I'm totally on board with those who think the actual dinner fight was between Danielle and Tamra, not Tams and Lizzie. There was some utterly strange chopping in that whole scene.

See, now I didn't get the impression that she was blaming the other women on WWHL. It seemed more like she was explaining that a lot of the arguments that occur on the show are a result of production whispering things into people's ears to stir the pot. (Well, no kidding, Heather.) She carefully avoided saying who was responsible, but it seemed pretty obvious she was referring to crew/producers as being the source behind a lot of the comments people were hearing, both in the case of Tams and Terry's silly freakout at David.

And wasn't there a rumor early in the taping that Danielle was being brought on as ally for Heather? Because reportedly, everyone was ganging up on Heather? Also, there was some sort of statement issued from Danielle about her husband not being gay, contrary to all the rumors. A woman of mystery she is indeed.

I'm looking forward to the prospect of so many guest players/friends-of-the-housewives. I think these shows function best when you have a lot of the guest players coming in to stir the pot, as opposed to the main HWs being the chief instigators.* Atlanta benefits from having a lot of crazy side characters, Luann on NYC was more entertaining this season in her demoted role, and even on BH, the most legendary of episodes (the dinner party from hell) was largely due to Allison DuBois. With Adrienne, possibly Camille and Taylor in supporting roles, maybe they'll add interest without bogging things down the way they might have as official wives. *The Morally Corrupt Faye Resnick notwithstanding.

I don't like Tamra, and it certainly does seem like she got the boot. BUT... I could see a situation where they bring her back at the 11th Hour and on a very tight leash. She certainly gave Bravo a lot of bargaining power with her latest stunt(s), so I could see her being desperate to play ball and taking whatever lowball offer they throw her way at the last minute. With Aviva being edited out of the NY credits for several episodes, Luann being demoted on RHONY, and even Alexis being brought back last minute on last season's RHOC, I'd have to think there's still a possibility Tamra might not be gone from the show. She's a loose cannon, but she does bring the drama, so I guess it's a question of whether they like her on-screen antics enough to put up with her off-screen ones. She seems slightly more willing to fall in line than a Jill Zarin, so I would never say never when it comes to Tamra returning to this show...

I'm sort of amazed at how many one-and-done HWs this particular franchise has had: Kim Bryant, Quinn, Peggy, Lydia, and now (based on her FB post) Lizzie. Plus, the failed "friend of" experiments with Fernanda and now Danielle. Seems like OC has much more of a turnover than any of the other HW series.

Oh, I totally agree the name-change party was about rebranding and not her family or her love of the doctor. That being said, I thought it was rather... clever? No RH episode is complete without a meaningless party, so why not stage one to reestablish your stage name if you're a former actress looking to get cast again? Most all these women are on the show to foist some useless career-advancing product on us, so I can't blame her for trying to promote hers.

Yeah, there's actually a great foundation for next season here: Shannon and Tamra becoming friends and turning on Tamra. I, too, am surprised there hasn't been a gang up on Tamra in all the seasons she's been on. Although I suppose it's not that hard to stay one step ahead of a Lynne, Gretchen or Alexis. In Heather's blog, she actually confirms what you said. She basically said that she was reluctant to put Tamra on full blast because she knew she and Shannon were already at odds, and so she wondered if Shannon was setting her up so she could go running back to Tamra to say Heather tattled on her.

Shannon's surprise visit (well, as much as a surprise can be when you have a production crew and camerapack strapped to your back!) to Heather's house to confront her isn't exactly friendly. Direct, yes. But it isn't likely to win Shannon any of the sympathy points she seemed to be wanting from Heather. If all she really wanted was confirmation that Tamra spilled the beans to her, why even go to Heather's house at all? Why not call? Or if they had to meet for the purposes of the show, Shannon would have been wise to meet at neutral location. They've never really been friends anyway. They've had moments of civility at best, so it's not like Heather had much reason to protect Shannon. And considering we didn't actually see Heather's lunch where the secret was spilled (and was it even a secret, per se?), I'm not sure we can say her gossiping about it was done out of spite or just her recounting the lunch with Tamra. Tough to say without actually seeing it. We've seen both Shannon and Heather spin the facts to fit their narratives, so I'm inclined to agree with whomever said their fight is pretty two-sided as opposed to one picking on the other.

That’s what I’d like to know, too! I wonder if one of the producers must have fed David the info. Although if we pretend for a moment that there isn’t producer-induced manipulation going on, I still think Tamra deserves more of the blame than Heather for that information getting out. Clearly Shannon and Heather aren’t friends, so it’s not like Heather has much loyalty to protect Shannon’s secrets at this point, especially not when Tamra is telling her this information in front of a camera crew. Assuming there’s a S10, Shannon’s definitely got her HW spot secured (assuming she wants it). Andy was pretty effusive in his praise of her during the WWHL after show. It was pretty clear he thinks she’s a great addition to the cast and would want her to come back. Which I agree. She manages to bring the HW hysterics with just enough self-awareness to be likable but not boring. I’m also in the minority who is liking Lizzie. I appreciate her directness, and I agree with MatildaMoody that it’s a nice reprieve to have at least one drama-free wife. Plus as we’ve already seen, she’s not afraid to defend herself without going shrill, so I think it bodes well for her interactions in future episodes. I already enjoy her more than Lydia, whose feistiness could be amusing but her arguments usually consisted of “lalalala, I’m gonna talk louder and one-up you with one last dig to win.”

I haven't decided if she's playing up her hoity-toityness for the cameras or if she really is that uptight. It always feels so forced and put-on for the cameras when she pulls the pearl-clutching act around the other wives, I kinda just think it's her playing a part for the show. While she's definitely been an unpleasant one this season, I still like the dynamic she brings to the show. Her shocked, above-it-all demeanor is sort of a fun contrast to Vicki and Tamra.

Thus far, I think it's been a pretty successful recast with the two new OC housewives. Shannon's pretty self-aware about her quirkiness, and I find her less smug than, say, other first-seasoners like Lydia (although I would have been curious to watch Lydia interact with everyone this season). And Lizzie knows how to defend herself better than Alexis or Gretchen ever did, so it's kinda fun watching her go toe-to-toe with Vicki (and later on, it appears, with Tamra). The stakes have always seemed lower on RHOC than the other franchises; there's less wealth and the fourth wall/social media aspect isn't as much of a factor the way it is on RHOBH, so watching the OC wives interactions might be less glamorous but it also feels less... dark?