How has no one created the fake Twitter account @KylesStye? The slowly increasing red volcano on Kyle Cooke’s face has gotten more screen time this season than Luke, who only shows up to ask if he can make a fire, then makes a fire, and then no one sits around it. This unsightly lesion that Kyle says is the result of too much stress with his and Amanda’s business and wedding is a cross between the time Bob Costas got pink eye at the Olympics and the all-seeing, burning eye of Sauron. (The reason that eye was burning? It got chlamydia from a Fire Island hot tub.)
My poor lover Kyle is having quite the week, though, as he and Amanda start their own show called Alone With the Bickersons. It begins in the very first scene when Kyle tells Amanda he’s stressed out at work because he’s working his eye off while she is sitting around watching TV and looking at her phone. Oh, Kyle, my only love, this conversation does not end well for you in any of the alternate universes explored in Spider-Man: Tom Holland’s Ass Through the Multiverse. As soon as he says this, Julie the wedding planner marches up and says, “Hey, guys!†with a sweetness that would rival the Hawaiian Punch you get at Popeyes. The room has not been read.
Julie then gives them a to-do list that includes basically all the fundamentals of throwing a wedding. Step 1: Meet each other on Tinder and sleep together for like six months while you both pretend you’re not in a relationship. Step 2: Get into a summer share together and then yell about how your partner isn’t fun. Step 3: An engagement and stuff. Step 4: You know, just invitations, seating chart, finding a caterer, picking a cake, securing a venue, wedding dress, tuxes, officiant, singing an Alanis Morissette song so it won’t rain on your wedding day, speeches, getting someone to pay the $200,000 because it’s going to be on a reality show, list of songs for the DJ’s no-play list.
While the couple starts stuffing envelopes as soon as they arrive in the Hamptons, they are throwing passive-aggressive barbs at each other the entire time. Amanda keeps telling Kyle to keep his drinks away from the envelopes and not get too wasted. Kyle tells Amanda, “In my world, it’s always about you. Not by my choice.†Kyle also calls her a “she-devil†and tells her everything he has been doing to her is annoying. They go out that night, and Kyle spends no time with Amanda, who chastises him when they’re home to the point that Kyle has to go wilding about the house in his underwear eating cheese balls and Triscuits like he’s Hank the Tank terrorizing a California town.
Their dynamic is summed up in this exchange when they wake up Saturday morning. Kyle is off to the post office to mail the invitations and asks Amanda, “Were you dreaming about how I’m the best thing to ever happen to you?â€
“No, I was dreaming about how at tonight’s party you might actually hang out with me,†she replies.
“I was dreaming about how you’ll maybe be nice to me,†Kyle mutters while dragging his flip-flops toward the bedroom door.
That’s it right there; it’s both of them just being preternaturally annoyed by each other, something every couple feels but most of us just choke down for a week or two until the annoyance passes and you can be nice together again. To be fair, this is a very stressful time in a relationship. My husband and I were at our worst in the months leading up to our shotgun wedding; imagine what it must be like for them living through this for three years. There is enough blame to go around, though. Amanda gives Kyle shit about his drinking; Kyle gives Amanda shit about her work ethic. Kyle forgets Amanda’s birthday; Amanda nags at Kyle for ridiculous reasons that seem almost manufactured. Kyle tells Amanda she’s annoying; she mutters his name repeatedly like it’s the new “June, June, Hannah†until he appears, and she yells at him for not coming sooner. This isn’t anyone’s fault; it is a screwed-up dynamic that they need to get out of like a Nickleback-themed escape room.
To make it even worse, they work together, so they have normal couple shit and work shit. I have always said that they shouldn’t have this venture together, that they both need outside interests to keep things balanced, but Kyle thinks the business is the only thing they have in common. He tells this to Danielle in the process of calling Amanda a bitch and not answering whether or not he’s happy. This is, obviously, not great, but it is something nearly every guy has said to his friends about his partner at one time or another. The difference is Kyle says it in front of a camera so his now-wife will eventually hear. Also he says it to Danielle, who is given Lindsay’s role as pot-stirrer while she is off at a wedding, so she tells all the girls in the house, making it not just Kyle venting but another instance of why they shouldn’t get married. We’ll get much more on this next week, though.
For all the squabbling going around, it sure is a pretty sexy episode. As they all sit around at dinner on Friday night, they talk about their craziest sexual experiences. Kyle says a girl tried to stick her thumb up his butt but he clenched so hard it didn’t work. Oh, lover. There is a magical spot up there that you will love if you just grab some lube and give it a whirl. Trust me. Instead, he has the knee-jerk homophobia Andrea also showed when they blindfolded him and Kyle planted one on him. These things can all be fun, dudes. Go for it.
Going around the table, Mya tells us she screwed in a plane; Alex the fun sucker tells us that his high-school girlfriend bit him on the neck and sucked his blood because she was really into vampires; and Luke tells us about a girl who poured hot wax on him, soothed him with ice cubes, then gave him a hummer so long and awesome it was basically one of those Humvee limousines. Andrea says he has tons of stories, but one time he did anal, and afterward, there was just diarrhea everywhere. What he didn’t tell you is that he was the one on bottom. HEY-O!
The next night, they have a bondage-themed party, and it is the best theme party they have ever thrown, mostly because everyone looks absolutely slamming in their black latex, vinyl, and leather outfits. I don’t care what you’re into, but this is the most attractive cast on Bravo, and I think I needed a fetish party to really understand that. Even better, the party actually looks like a good time with a fair number of attendees and everyone letting loose without having too much drama.
All of the girls understand the assignment when it comes to dressing, especially Mya, who looks killer in a sexy version of Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman. The guys, well, not so much. Andrea and Alex sure do, looking like two Muscle Marys headed to the black party as they are all harnesses and abs. All they are missing are some poppers and an extra Truvada tablet. Carl is giving us Nasty Pig fantasy realness in a pair of leather shorts and a cutoff football jersey with the number 69 that says “Tight End.†Not only am I entirely confident that Carl has a big fat hog, but also that he is no stranger to a pinkie or two in the back door.
The two who really miss the mark are Luke and Kyle. Luke is shirtless but has on a fedora and something that looks like a length of rope as if he’s in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Dude Where’s My Car. It is an utterly inexplicable choice that has nothing even tangentially to do with the theme. Kyle is dressed, essentially, as Lieutenant Dangle from Reno 911, which, well, tickles my particular fantasy but is not the brief. I can see how Kyle thinks it was a sexy costume party, but it is not. It is clearly a 50 Shades of Grey scenario, and he should have gone more black and shiny than brown and mooseknuckle-y. (That’s the male version of a cameltoe, and Kyle enhances his with, what else, a can of Loverboy.) But, hey, no matter what he is wearing, it is ridiculous enough that we stop looking at his eye for an evening.