This season has been less about who is right or wrong in any argument and more about the tactics they use to fight each other. Just like Guerdy was totally right in her fight with Julia, especially after she threw water at her, but the tactics she used to publish Julia’s texts made her behavior unseemly to the women. The same is happening with Stephanie and her fight with Marysol and Alexia. (Marexia? Alesol? But also, how do these two not have a friendship name like “The Green-Eyed Bandits” or “Frick and Frack”?) They are entirely right that Stephanie is seeking too much control in her interactions with the women and is using her money to exert that control, but they were also entirely wrong to skip the trip on her plane without a proper explanation.
It starts the day they’re supposed to fly to Marbella for the afternoon so that Julia can ask only one of her friends, Derek, the world’s foremost Elton John impersonator, if he and his husband will be her new sons’ godfathers. Julia breaks it to the group that Marexia isn’t coming. They told her that they needed a day to rest away from the drama of the group, but also that they were worried that Stephanie would leave them behind in Marbella with no way to get home if they behaved in a way Stephanie didn’t like.
They send Stephanie a text saying they won’t be flying with her, but they say that they need a break from the craziness. That’s the problem with this tactic. First of all, they’re lying. Second, this is so passive-aggressive that it’s begging for a conflict. It’s setting it up so that when Stephanie finds out that she will have to confront them, it makes her look like the bad guy when they’re the ones who are misbehaving. Additionally, when that confrontation occurs, they will have to discuss their lie, and then they’ll appear not only rude and meddlesome but also dishonest.
This is all a trap that Stephanie walks into like it’s a room-size Birkin. It starts on the bus on the way to the jet when Julia tells Stephanie that she is a bit bossy. “You clearly don’t think I’m that bossy if you’re about to get on my plane to go,” she tells Julia. This is precisely the problem. Stephanie thinks that because she’s generous, she can treat people however she likes, and if you accept her generosity, it is a tacit approval of how she behaves, even when she’s also using that generosity to control people. Julia describes it perfectly, saying, “You don’t offer something, then point it out in a kind of belittling way.”
They get on the plane, and Stephanie decides to daub her eyes and turn the party up for the 22-minute, $44,000 trip. We get the shades lowered, the disco lights flashing, the music cranked up to 11, though production probably couldn’t clear the song, so we just hear generic dance tracks. Now, if we saw more of this Stephanie and less of the one who wants to lay down the rules like a too-strict substitute teacher, then maybe the women would like her even without a PJ. Even still, Stephanie trash-talks Alexia and Marysol, which is just what they want. But she thinks they’re not getting on the plane because she has lots of rules about her “jet-iquette,” like they have to take off their shoes and not scratch her seats. It’s her plane, she can make the rules, but that isn’t the reason they’re not there. The reason they’re not there is that Stephanie is using the plane and the threat of taking it away to try to tell the women what they should and shouldn’t do. Considering her whole fight with Alexia started when the Cuban Barbie tried to order her around, she should be a bit more aware of that.
Stephanie does say something with which I agree: “[Marysol and Alexia] cared more about making me look bad than being here for Julia.” That’s what I don’t like about this stunt. They’re hiding behind the notion that everyone’s behavior is too much, but what they’re trying to do is force a discussion about Stephanie and the way she treats people without bringing it up themselves. They’re trying to exert their dominance, because if they refuse to go, it puts them in a position of power and Stephanie on the defensive. While I agree with Alesol’s position, this is the coward’s way out.
They go to Villa Moana, named after Derek’s favorite Disney movie, and have a lovely dinner with a bunch of English gays who seem enchanting and rich. So rich that Lisa has to keep talking about how rich they are, doing rich-people things, and serving rich mustard and drinking out of rich flutes. You would think she never lived in a giant rich person’s house on a rich person’s island in a rich person’s town. Everyone keeps pretending like this is the biggest day of Julia’s life, but Derek’s partner isn’t even there and neither is Martina. This doesn’t seem like that big of a deal, honestly.
While at the villa, Julia has a conversation with Derek about how her two daughters aren’t talking to her and Martina at the moment because Julia never told them that they were adopting two human children before those children were moved into the house. I’ve been holding off on discussing this all season because, while I respect people’s families and that not everyone does things the same way, this is totally weird. What do you mean Julia and Martina never mentioned it? They were just like, “Surprise, you have two new brothers!” That’s not something you spring on someone. That is something you discuss, even the potential of, before going through all the steps, the Byzantine bureaucracy, the countless reams of paperwork. Yes, as Julia says, it might have happened quickly, but they couldn’t give these girls even the slightest heads-up, let alone let them have some input into the composition of their family? I’m sorry, that’s strange, and I feel like we’re not getting the full story.
Also at the villa, Adriana says that she didn’t mean to call Kiki “ratchet,” she meant to say “wretched,” and she mispronounced it. I’m all for Adriana wanting to make amends, and I’m glad that she and Kiki quashed their animosity by the end of the episode, but I’m not buying this for one second. English isn’t Adriana’s first language, but have you ever heard her mess up this badly or mispronounce a word? Adriana is essentially an AI chatbot who is pursuing her Ph.D. at Harvard. She is a deeply intelligent woman. She would not make this mistake. Also, no one, including Adriana, would ever say, “Stop being wretched.” That’s wild. I think Adriana made a mistake, thought she was cute saying “ratchet,” didn’t fully understand its implications, and is now looking for an out without saying she was wrong. But she apologized; I believe she didn’t mean any harm, and it’s over, so whatever, Bev.
Back in Seville, they all put on their flamenco dresses and head in carriages to the giant plaza with a palace by it. It’s time for Stephanie’s birthday surprise, which is a flamenco band singing “Happy Birthday” in Spanish, and luckily, that weird guy who sang to Alexia on their first night has been put into musical prison and we don’t have to see him again. Stephanie is thrilled by this surprise; what is the first thing she does? FaceTimes her husband, talks to him, and makes him watch it. I’m sorry, but never do this to me. I don’t want to watch the grainy video and shitty audio of your singing birthday surprise. Also, those are roaming minutes. I know she has a jet and all, but AT&T is not getting any more of my money. Just enjoy the moment with your friends. Lock it into your memory rather than ignoring it, so you can be on your phone with your husband, who has better things to do than not fully hear people singing to you.
Stephanie is so touched that Julia and Marysol arranged this for her birthday that Marysol is now off the hook for not making the plane because she did something nice for Stephanie. Okay, got it. Stephanie then pulls Alexia aside and asks her what was up with the plane yesterday, making sure the Cuban Pinkie and The Brain’s plot comes to its inevitable conclusion. Alexia says they should get Marysol in on the conversation, because they both decided not to go. This is another tactic I hate. Like other friendship duos that turn into alliances, they act as if they are constantly in the right because they always have a lieutenant to back them up. They never have to stand alone in their decisions, so they feel forever justified even when they’re wrong.
Stephanie confirms with Alexia that they were afraid that if they broke a rule, she would leave them in Marbella. “What kind of human do you think I am?” she asks Alexia. Um, the kind who said, multiple times, that if people didn’t behave, she would kick them off the plane and make them walk back. They believe the kind of person that Stephanie said she was. If she didn’t want them to think that, maybe she shouldn’t say it repeatedly and not use spots on her plane like they were bribes. Stephanie then says that she wanted to include everyone on the plane, and Alexia wanted to kick people off. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. She needs to back up. We all saw the footage. We all saw Stephanie, out of the blue, ask Larsa if she thought Lisa should get booted if she would make her feel uncomfortable. Alexia and Marysol never had any part in that. That is a plot she hatched herself.
When Alexia storms off and they join the larger group, Marysol gets to the point Alexia was trying to make earlier in the argument: that Stephanie can’t control them. This is both a fight for autonomy and for dominance. The problem is, Stephanie is now calling Alexia a liar, but it’s unclear what she’s lying about. Stephanie tells Lisa that Alexia and Marysol didn’t want her on the plane, but that is, in fact, a lie. Stephanie, somehow, has the story all twisted, and her admission to Lisa has her and Larsa going at each other like a plastic dog trying to eat its own tail. Suddenly, everyone is sniping in the middle of this gorgeous plaza in their polka-dot dresses, and nothing is going forward except for Guerdy and Kiki’s embarrassment that they’re once again lumped in with these relentless squawkers.
The fight doesn’t end so much as it’s abandoned, with all of the ladies going back to the hotel and going to their separate locations. Stephanie and Larsa head to Stephanie’s room; Guerdy, Kiki, Marysol, and Adriana head (where else?) to the bar; and Julia, Alexia, and Lisa check out the hotel’s roof. While they’re assessing their fights and skirmishes, Julia, Alexia, and Lisa hear the banging of drums and smell the acrid pall of smoke coming from the street. They walk over to the edge of the balcony and see a funeral procession with crowds of people, priests, and altar boys, icons, and reliquaries hoisted above the crowd. They see the plumes of incense swirling up, past the windows, past the suites, headed toward the clouds, trying to find their way to heaven. They look down, and the eyes of the corpse in the casket are looking up. Their gaze somehow meets in the middle, joining each other, contrasting each other, the eyes of the dead pleading through the smoke and the drums and the wailing for all of the women to release themselves to the universe, to merge with everything around them, to coalesce what little love and affection they have left for each other into something unstoppable and eternal. But they won’t, they’ll just let the procession pass until the loudest of drums fails to resonate at all.
