For a show that thrives upon rehashing sh!t over and over again, the Basketball Wives reunion of each season is the marathon end race. In preparation, all the girls arm themselves with layers of makeup and bandage dresses, ready for the worst. Jen says she’s trying to be drama free but, “This IS Basketball Wives.” For now, Jen is backstage, but we’re promised an on-stage appearance from her later. Well then.
During the last episode, Shaunie made it clear that she’s over the excessive violence of the show, but she doesn’t make any sweeping declarations about quitting. Instead, she preaches balance because she’s so damn New Age-y. In the realm of manufactured conflict, we revisit Kesha and Kenya’s friend split. Kenya’s still a little miffed, because she believes that her music career is realistic *cough* delusional *cough*.
She believes that Kesha made assumptions about her, and quickly rushed to criticize (um, stuff that needed to be criticized.) When it’s time to turn to the tension between Kesha and Tami, Tami just reiterates that Kesha needs to keep things “100%” truthful, especially when asked directly. But in a move that shows refreshing and surprising amounts of maturity, Tami apologizes for how she reacted in Tahiti. She thinks her anger management is helping, and I think it is too. Aw, WTF is happening to this show?
So let’s turn to crazy b!tch Kenya. When Evelyn threw a wine bottle at her, after Kenya kept giving weird, noncommittal answers when confronted about calling Evelyn “loose,” Evelyn now admits she wishes she could take it back. She gets teary-eyed when she mentions setting a better example for her stepdaughters. What the eff is this maturity all around? …Oh don’t worry, we’re talking about Jen and Evelyn’s beef now.
For now, it’s pretty calm, and it will remain pretty calm the entire episode–we’ll wait for Part II. Evelyn explains that Jen pretty much ruined their friendship because she wasn’t loyal, and ran her mouth all around town. She also explains, again, that Jen and Nia were friends, and that she thinks that Jen is suing for attention. In her little backstage box, Jen’s getting visibly frustrated.
When she emerges on stage, Jen claims that it’s not her fault Nia is getting sued, because she just filed the report and the D.A. is following up on that (Nia was invited to the show, but declined at the advice of her legal buddies). John Sally, our lovely calm-headed host, questions why she didn’t make a police report when Eric slammed her in the face with a drink. She proclaims that it’s not a double standard, that she just dealt with it in a different way. You can tell she’s getting flustered because her answers get more erratic. She half-@sses an apology to Evelyn, for everything that was written on her blog–but only after Tami pushes that Jen needs to cop to her mistakes. But Jen DOES NOT apologize for moving on with her life. At that comment, Shaunie butts in that they all want to see each other grow and accomplish things. Oh, Mama Shaunie.
Jen says that, because she was dealing with the divorce, she detached from her friends as she grappled with her new situation. Then, when she reached out to Evelyn, Jen claims she was met with deaf ears. In response, Evelyn says that she reached out previously, and Jen said she was busy, so when Jen reached out to her, she was over it. The whole thing is a bit dicey, and Shaunie thinks it’s all sooo stupid. Then Jen pulls the victim card and says none of her friends reached out–which Tami quickly disproves–but Jen then zeros in on Evelyn. John pipes in that he thinks they should all be better friends, and he brings a fun surprise. Evelyn has taken a polygraph test…and now Jen’s next. Is she up to it? Yup. Let the games begin.
