Back in Business With The Hills

One of the casualties of the last couple of weeks' hectic pace has been The Hills. God forbid I miss Gossip Girl, but The Hills has just taken a backseat to the greatness that is The X-Files and I've just gotten around to catching up on the past three episodes.  Now, I'm not going to torment you all with a War and Peace length blog entry recapping all three of these episodes, but a quick rundown of the first two should get us all caught up to speed. 

In episode four of the season, "Boys Make Girls Cry", we see absolutely NO WHITNEY!  Note to The Hills producers?  This is unacceptable, and the show felt all the more empty and hollow for this omission.  Anyway, the crew flies down to Vegas for Frankie's birthday (also known as The Guy Who Is Brody Jenner's Friend, and has gotten more screen time in this season than he did in the previous three combined--at this rate, that random girl who's always hanging around him might actually get a couple of speaking parts and MAYBE even her name on screen with a caption!), Brody is mean to Stephanie (thereby giving the episode its title as he does, in fact, make her cry), tensions between Audrina and Lauren mount, and at the very end of the show we find that Doug and Brody have somehow landed themselves in jail.  Back in L.A. Holly, Heidi's sister, has moved in with Heidi and Spencer which elevates Spencer to new heights of assholery and douchebaggery.  Although, I don't know if I can really blame him--if someone deleted a bunch of shows from my DVR, I'd probably go postal too.

In "Something Has to Change" we discover that surprise, surprise, that whole jail thing got blown a little out of proportion, and in fact, Doug and Brody were just in the casino jail pressing charges against some drunk guy that punched Doug in the chest.  Ugh.  Whatever.  We return to L.A. to find WHITNEY! busy at work and ready and willing to act as Lauren's therapist regarding the Audrina situation.  Whitney gets an opportunity to work as the main stylist for one of People's Revolution's clients, and that's about all the Whitney we get.  Would someone please give this girl her own show!  Meanwhile, Spencer spitefully tells Holly that Heidi wants her to move out which of course crushes Holly, but in the end the sisters talk it over, hopefully both realize that Spencer is evil incarnate and then they hug it out.  In the final moments of the episode, we finally see the teardrop heard round the world as Lauren and Audrina finally have it out once and for all and actually seem to reconcile.  I have to be honest, that made me cry.  I mean, what girl hasn't been at that place with a friend, where it would be so easy to just give up and go your separate ways but instead you both decide that your friendship is worth it and you decide to give it another go?  We'll see how it turns out in the end, but it was a nice, rare moment of reality television sincerity.

The next episode, "You Always Miss a Best Friend", opens in Heidi and Spencer's kitchen as Holly bemoans the fact that she knows nobody in L.A. aside from Heidi and... dun dun DUN... Lauren.  At this, Spencer glares evilly from below lowered eyebrows and deadpans, "Yeah, you should totally hang out with Lauren, she's really cool."  Heidi asks if Holly has spoken to Lauren and Holly says no, that they've lost touch.  Heidi then goes on to drop the bomb on the viewing audience that apparently Holly and Lauren were once "really close"--could anyone fill me in on this?  Holly wasn't in Laguna Beach, was she?  Heidi kind of mumbles and stutters about how she can't tell Holly who she can and can't spend time with, but Spencer pipes up joyfully with an "I can!" as he lays down the law about how there will be no Lauren socializing or "fraternizing" while Holly is living under his roof.  Um, okay then, good luck with that you blowhard.

People's Revolution: Lauren and Whitney are eating... something... and Lauren passes on the news that she and Audrina are back together and then receives a "random" text from Holly saying that they should get together.  Lauren, who is apparently suffering from some kind of laryngitis, hoarsely whispers that she feels conflicted about whether she should hang out with Holly, to which Whitney responds with an encouraging nod and big eyes.  But then Lauren waffles a bit more and Whitney points out that it never hurts to have another friend in a big city.  Yeah, but do those friends really have to be Montags and Pratts??

Epic Records: Audrina is clickety clacking away (And OH, she has an INCUBUS poster in her cubicle!  Have I ever talked here about how utterly obsessed I was with Incubus when I was in late high school and early college?  This was in stark contrast the the Backstreet Boys phase that I had only recently exited.) and then receives a phone call from her boss who calls her into her office to tell Audrina that she will be her right hand at a very big concert for one of their bands in L.A.  I suppose Audrina will be able to fit this in between her tearful reconciliations with friends and filming scenes for the epic film, Into the Blue 2.

Amandine's Patissierie: I tell you what, if I ever go to L.A. I have a list about a mile long of all of the restaurants this show has featured that I am dying to try.  Anywho, Holly is waiting at an outside table as Lauren comes running toward her and they embrace warmly each trying to outdo the other with gushing compliments.  Holly does indeed look a zillion times better as she's taken out those awful extensions, and she gives Lauren the news that she is living with Heidi and Spencer and she hopes that won't come between them.  Hm, maybe she and Stephanie Pratt should have a chat about this.  Okay, Holly gives us some back story that apparently she and Heidi and Lauren were once like "The Three Musketeers".  Seriously, when the hell did all of this happen?  I am so lost right now.

Amalfi Ristorante: Justin (Bobby) and Audrina are at dinner being utterly boring as they once again recap the drama between Lauren, Lo and Audrina.  I am so ready to move on from this.  Audrina (unwisely?) invites Justin to her work event/concert the next night and he accepts.  Why do I feel like this is just not going to end well?

Lauren, Audrina, and Lo's House: Lauren and Audrina are in the kitchen and Audrina invites Lauren to the work event and the after party and then asks about Stephanie.  Lauren uses this to segue into the news that she had lunch with Holly and Audrina has the sense to look skeptical, but then mentions that Holly is a good influence on Heidi.  So, okay...

Roosevelt Hotel, White Tie Affair Showcase:  I think for the first time in the history of the show, Audrina is shown doing something that could actually be construed as productive as she meets with her boss and the label president for a preshow pow wow, and then looks adorably proud of herself as things are kicked off.  She sees Lauren, Lo and Stephanie across the room and goes to greet them.  But not so surprisingly, Justin is still nowhere to be found and isn't returning any texts that Audrina sends.

Heidi and Spencer's Apartment:  Heidi enters the room wearing a hat that is probably the very same one that I thought looked so adorable on Whitney in Paris, but looks utterly stupid on her pointy blonde head.  Holly confesses that she went to lunch with Lauren, and Heidi acts all betrayed by this but Holly tells Heidi, "You're both like little sisters to me" to which Heidi responds, "But I AM your little sister!"  Ouch!  Unintentional hilarity at its finest!  Point 1 goes to Heidi, I think.  Heidi does look truly hurt by this turn of events however, and I suppose I can kind of understand that, but Holly manages to sneak into the conversation that she knows Lauren misses Heidi and she doesn't think things are so bad that they can't be repaired.  Uh.  Apparently Holly doesn't watch The Hills.

Roosevelt Hotel, White Tie Affair Showcase: Stephanie is chatting with the guitarist of the White Tie Affair about their various piercings and tattoos, and as riveting as this convo is, I think I'll leave it to your imagination.  Lo asks Audrina about Justin who is still MIA and there are lots of sad faces all around as Audrina comes to the sad, sad realization that he's not going to show.  You know, just like every other time this has happened.

Epic Records: Audrina reports back to Chiara that the event went smashingly but that Justin didn't show up and she never heard anything from him.  Then she goes on to cliche about how she just "gives, gives, and gives and he never gives anything back" and that they have great chemistry but he never acts like he cares about her.  That's a pretty amazing sign of awareness from Audrina, but we'll see if she actually does anything about it.

FIDM: Lauren and Stephanie are whispering at the back of the classroom as per usual, this time about Lauren's lunch with Holly.  Stephanie looks completely terrifying, like some kind of goth Pippi Longstocking as she nods sympathetically and asks appropriate questions in response to Lauren's story.

Toast: Heidi is having lunch with Kimberley, who I think is someone she works with, and again is talking about Holly having lunch with Lauren and then comes an outpouring of regret over the whole situation between her and Lauren.  She even goes so far as revealing that she said a lot of things she didn't mean and that she had never had a best friendship like the one she had with Lauren.  Ugh, this is really hard to watch too, because it is hitting just as close to home as the Audrina/Lauren storyline.  Heidi has big tearful doe eyes as she opines that maybe Holly will help her and Lauren come back together.

FIDM: Then, in case we needed an anvil dropped on our heads about the foreshadowing going on right now, we're back at FIDM where Lauren is waxing nostalgic about her friendship with Heidi.

The final lines of the show set things up pretty patly:

Heidi:  Maybe one day, by, like, a miracle, we'll be friends again.

Stephanie:  Didn't seeing Holly again make you miss Heidi?
Lauren: Yeah, you always miss a best friend...

Heidi:  Who knows, maybe one day...

Okay, and on that note, I'm going to go cry into my pillow for a little while....

Comments

[katelin]

this show is driving me nuts.

the end.

[Jessica]

Oh yes we are suffering from a lack of Whitney goodness in our Hills lives. Spencer was on camera enough to be his usual douche-self and that was enough for me. The Justin Bobby drama drives me crazy.

[CurlySue]

Do you own any of The Hills on DVD? If so, do you have Season 3?

[A Super Girl]

As I was watching this week's episodes, I found myself making the same mocking observations you do each week. Your recaps must really be having an effect on me!

[slynnro]

Lauren's little sage tidbits on life just crack my shit up. "You always miss a best friend." "Never cry about someone who wouldn't cry over you."

She's like fucking Confucius or something.

[Heather B.]

I was going to comment something about how although I didn't get to watch, with this recap I feel like I was there and able to witness Lo's vacant stares in real time. But then I read Stara's comment about her being "like fucking Confucius or something" and promptly started to crack the hell up. And now I have nothing intelligent left to say.

[Brittany]

This entry cracked me up, especially about Whitney's big eyes, I too have noticed that.