My favorite part of the Real Housewives has arrived! It’s reunion time. Such is the case for Real Housewives of Atlanta, season 14. After a long day of football at my house (yep, it’s back), a reunion is the palate cleaners that I need. The ladies all show up in hot pink to a Jamaican themed set. Complete with exotic birds who aren’t close enough to poop on anyone’s food. Let’s dive in to my takeaways from the reunion.
The Fashions
Ok, to me, everyone showed out. Minus Sanya Richards-Ross. What on earth was she wearing? It was like a combo of two dresses and neither worked. She had some kind of sports bra on one side and a mesh bedazzled overlay on the other. It was just as confusing as her issues with Drew Sidora, but we will get to that. I loved Marlo Hampton’s dress with he overflowing tulle. It’s definitely something I would expect from Marlo. What I didn’t expect was for her to wear her hair how she does all the time – pin straight and parted down the middle. Could she have at least gotten an updo and some showy earrings?
Sheree Whitfield looked stunning with blonde highlights and a formfitting dress, boobs on full display. Kenya Moore came with a lion’s mane of curls and I loved it. Drew had a thigh slit that was almost full exposure when she came on set. And Kandi Burruss rounded things off with a velvet and bejeweled ensemble. All in all, a fine showing.
No Bones About It
There seems to be an ongoing fight for who is the Bone Collector now. Sheree might be the original, but producers putting up a shady bone count of all the ladies in their playback montage showed that many bones were collected from all. Although no one seems to want to claim the title. Certainly not Sanya, who said she doesn’t want to fill Sheree’s shoes when it comes to bringing all the tea.
Kandi believes that Drew is the new Bone Collector and Drew uses that moment to try and shade Sanya. But much like all of Drew’s reads, it falls flat. So flat that the producers cut to a silent couch and the birds chirping. Just like crickets would be chirping if they had them. Can Drew please get some help if she’s going to stay on the show? I can’t take much more of the cringe when she tries to land a dig.
Drew Came To Play…Checkers Instead Of Chess
Speaking of, Drew was ready to rumble, even if her delivery is tragic. When it comes to her strained relationship with Sanya, all Drew can say is that Sanya is a great runner. Host Andy Cohen admits that he was bummed to see the fallout between Drew and Sanya. Which if I’m being honest, I don’t truly understand to this day. Sanya is accusing Drew of betraying her trust and Drew is accusing Sanya of being a clout chaser.
But Sanya maintained that 1) she doesn’t need clout (debatable) and 2) that she was up front with Drew about when she talked behind her back. But Drew is unwilling to move on. Sanya then goes on to say that the fun, jovial Drew that she first became friends with disappeared when she got around the women. That Drew was all about fighting and and being confrontational. Which is the only way she is going to keep her job so what is the problem here? Sanya is showing what a rookie she is and it looks like she’s in over her head.
Drew goes on to fight with Sheree over Drop It With Drew and how she represents health and wellness. She asserts that she has had 3 kids (ok, this is news to me!) and a hysterectomy so therefore, she is the perfect person to represent Drop It With Drew. I’m not seeing the correlation, but that happens a lot with Drew. Once again, we cut to birds chirping, which is what she deserves, quite frankly.
Sheree’s Big Return
Most of the season revolved around Sheree and her return to the show. She By Sheree dominated her story line and even garnered more airtime than her tumultuous break up with Tyrone Prison Bae Gilliams. Sheree admits that she thinks he was using her for camera time. And that he was big mad when she wouldn’t sign off on paperwork to get him that camera time. Oh, and that he sucked in bed. All of the things I wanted to know!
But Sheree is resilient, which I guess you have to be to pursue making a line of joggers for 14 years. Andy makes sure to ask Sheree what’s going on with her website and don’t we all want to know! The reunion is obviously taped before the finale, so Sheree is still blissfully ignorant about what’s to come. And what comes is that her website crashed immediately after launch. When it did come back up, fans were stunned at the nerve of her selling a $150 hoodie. They also noted that a lot of her designs looked very similar to what you can find on Shein. Very similar.
But if you love overpaying for things that Housewives make, you’re still out of luck. While I’m writing this, the She By Sheree website is still down. There’s a note saying that they are excited to refresh and relaunch very soon. So around 2036 then.
All About Marlo
One of the most surprising parts of this season was the look we got into Marlo’s personal life. Even though she’s been a friend of for years, this is her first turn as a housewife. And I was expecting a whole different storyline. Gone was the Marlo that was there to fight and shade her castmates left and right. Instead, we got a softer, more vulnerable Marlo.
She shared everything from her running away from home at the age of 10, to the abuse that she suffered both at home and in the foster care system. Marlo admits that she doesn’t want to be defined and has always wanted to belong. Which she explains to Andy why it was such a big deal for her to get a peach.
What struck me about this was that the rumors of Marlo not being full time have always suggested she didn’t want her private life out there. And all she gave us was her most private life. It seemed like she wanted to be on RHOA all along and confessed that she always felt like she wasn’t good enough when she got passed over.
I’m shocked that Marlo, who is always so full of confidence and bluster, is revealing just how badly she wanted to get that peach. Marlo is understandably emotional during this whole segment and her castmates admit that they didn’t realize how much she had been through. But Kenya isn’t ready to forgive Marlo for hitting her below the belt when bringing up her soon-to-be ex-husband.
It’s a shame because I think Kenya and Marlo have so much in common. They both want love and acceptance but they can’t seem to get there with each other. While I was originally against the idea of more Marlo on RHOA, maybe another season is what they need. Because an alliance between those two would be what the fans truly deserve.
TELL US – WHAT DID YOU THINK ABOUT THE FIRST PART OF THE REUNION? ARE YOU TIRED OF DREW AND HER DOGGIE BONES? DO YOU WANT TO SEE MARLO BACK NEXT SEASON? WHO WAS THE BEST AND WORST DRESSED?
[Photo Credit: Charles Sykes/Bravo]
