Why The Vanderpump Guidelines Season 12 Reboot Is Already A Failure

“Vanderpump Guidelines” is again, kind of … but it surely sucks now!

I will again up. “Vanderpump Guidelines” began its life as a spin-off of “The Actual Housewives of Beverly Hills,” largely attributable to two issues. One, housewife Lisa Vanderpump occurred to personal just a few restaurant hotspots in West Hollywood the place all the younger, lovely workers had been always preventing, sleeping collectively, and preventing about who was sleeping collectively. Two, a kind of workers — Scheana Shay — had an affair with the husband of certainly one of Vanderpump’s fellow housewives (particularly, Brandi Glanville’s always dishonest husband, Eddie Cibrian). As soon as producers like Alex Baskin discovered that Vanderpump’s restaurant SUR Restaurant and Lounge — the complete Christian title of which is Attractive Distinctive Restaurant Restaurant and Lounge — was a hotbed of drama, they picked up cameras. The remaining is historical past.

This is the issue: after 9 seasons, the messy unique solid of “Vanderpump Guidelines” began rising up. A bunch of them have youngsters. All of them principally stopped working on the attractive and distinctive restaurant. This was good for them, however horrible for folks like me who love drama and mess. Then, famous fool and unique “Vanderpump Guidelines” solid member Tom Sandoval cheated on his girlfriend of 9 years, Ariana Madix, with their shut pal Rachel Leviss, and the scandal often called “Scandoval” introduced this near-dead present again to life!

This is one other drawback, although: due to Scandoval, all people within the unique solid selected sides, and no person of word sided with Sandoval. Add this to Madix’s comprehensible aversion to filming along with her ex, and the present’s eleventh season completely flatlined. Bravo’s response wasn’t to cancel the present, however to recast it with totally new “SUR-vers.” This sucks, and this is why.

Should you’ve by no means watched “Vanderpump Guidelines,” I’m jealous of you. This can be a present I genuinely and passionately want I might erase from my mind, “Everlasting Sunshine of the Spotless Thoughts” model, and watch in its entirety for the very first time. A part of it’s because, not like the long-running “Housewives” franchise, there’s an natural nature to “Vanderpump Guidelines” that proves irresistible — all the folks working at SUR had been already courting and mates, so the cameras walked into actuality TV gold after they began filming their dynamic. 

Proper off the bat, SUR newcomer Scheana Shay is met with abject cruelty and admittedly insane prejudice from the restaurant’s younger queen bee Stassi Schroeder, a girl who unironically tells her deeply evil boyfriend Jax Taylor “I’m the satan, and do not you neglect it” within the present’s very first episode. Katie Maloney and Kristen Doute flank Stassi, the previous being a girl always dragged down by her dopey boyfriend, Tom Schwartz. The latter begins the present courting the aforementioned Tom Sandoval and spends the remainder of her time on the collection, absolutely dropping her grip on actuality. Additionally, Lisa Vanderpump is there to yell at everybody for the way gross they’re being at any given second.

That is all unimaginable to look at. I can not stress that sufficient. Earlier than the present began dropping vitality in season 9, “Vanderpump Guidelines” proved itself as probably the most action-packed and scrumptious actuality TV reveals in historical past, from Doute’s notorious inexperienced costume to DJ James Kennedy screaming “It is not in regards to the pasta!” exterior of an L.A. eatery at Lala Kent. No person can ever prime these folks, and the brand new solid members positively aren’t as much as the duty.

Not solely are the brand new servers at SUR totally too self-aware about being on a present, however they’re pale imitations of the unique solid members at their finest (Natalie Maguire, for instance, is a Scheana Shay knock-off, full with ill-advised pop star goals). Different very important archetypes are merely lacking. There is no Jax Taylor right here, which is each a curse and a blessing; his antics on the “Vanderpump Guidelines” spin-off, “The Valley,” had been so overtly abusive that he bought kicked off that present, however additionally, a brand new model of “Vanderpump Guidelines” kind of wants its token sociopath. Even when the brand new solid members enterprise into the again alley behind SUR — a ravishing place that is been host to many, many wonderful screaming fights and will frankly develop into a UNESCO World Heritage website — it is boring. 

These new solid members are messy and weird, however they’re additionally wholly uninteresting. Half the drama within the new “pilot” of kinds is about some man in his 50s named Paulo, and he would not even seem on-screen. When Jax toyed with the feelings of a number of girls, he at the least had the decency to indicate his face. It seems like producers are manufacturing dramas, and whereas that is not precisely new in the case of actuality TV, the perfect reveals on this style really feel fully pure, and that is exactly why the unique “Vanderpump Guidelines” was so particular. No person on this new present would have the questionable wherewithal to inform their supervisor to “suck a d***” whereas chainsmoking, as Kristen Doute as soon as infamously did. Sorry, Bravo; you possibly can’t put lightning again within the bottle. The brand new “Vanderpump Guidelines” is DOA.

“Vanderpump Guidelines” airs on Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on Bravo and is on the market to stream on Peacock the following day.