Pop Culture, Television

The Hills: That Was Then, This Is Now

It’s been 10 years since The Hills taught me that moving to a city in your twenties is equivalent to being a celebrity. It left out the part about not being able to afford an apartment with a pool, staying in with network TV on a week night instead of hitting the clubs, and having friends that DON’T give you diamonds for your 21st birthday. Whatever. The Hills MIGHT have given me unreal expectations about post-college life being as fancy-free as a Natasha Bedingfield song. That’s why I’m not sure why I’m so surprised that they duped me once again. LC made her big announcement about a month ago about The Hills “reunion” for all the fans that stuck by her side (Me, obviously. I buy all her clothes and still quote her daily.) They revved us up with an all day marathon of the reality TV glory (pre-Kardashian days.) And then what they delivered was a one hour special with LC, her parents, her husband and a couple of producers…talking about her life. They promo’ed both clothing lines, her charity work, and showed us how gr8 her life is now. I KNOW HER LIFE IS GREAT. SHE’S LAUREN F’ING CONRAD! And it wasn’t until that final credit rolled last night that I realized I had eaten that shit right up. I was tricked and yet I still watched it and tweeted about it and now I’m writing this recap. You done me good, MTV. But know that I’m disappointed.

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Since I’m assuming the majority of the world chose the ChadBear pooping his pants on Bachelor in Paradise over this snoozefest, here are your highlights. But seriously, I accept Dunks gift cards as a form of thank you for DVR’ing this then sitting two inches away from my TV taking ratchet pictures and videos to enhance this recap.

 

Things That Are The Same:

  • LC still rolls around Laguna in her black convertible, top down, blonde locks blowing in the ocean breeze. Gawd I wanted this to be fake but she’s just such a casj cool Cali girl. Her parents also still live in a kickass house with an infinity pool that looks across the ocean.*(see “things that are different.”)

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  • Thirsty ass bitches are friends. Left on the cutting room floor: Heidi telling Kimmy K at her housewarming party, “We’re the only people in American who have jellyfish.” This interaction EXPLAINS EVERYTHING and I can’t believe it’s been buried for this long.

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  • Audrina is like, really pretty. No seriously, LC talks about meeting “their very pretty neighbor.” It means she’s dumb, guys. Also this is pure bullshit because everyone knows Audrina auditioned to be in The Hills.
  • Brody and LC have 0.0 chemistry. Their first date banter about LC’s Cheshire cat smile and how it pretty much seemed like it was going nowhere was just the tip of the iceberg. Obviously producers fabricated the LC/Brody drama and now we have the proof! Like a couple of seasoned actors, they played along with: I like your smile, no I like your smile! *closed mouth kiss.* END SCENE.

Things That Are Different:

  • *Except now Mr & Mrs Conrad’s house is a shrine to LC’s magazine covers.

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  • Bitch intern Emily might’ve once shamed LC for being so uneducated in the world of flowers but LOOK AT HER NOW, she knows what garden roses are and runs a fashion empire. Where did you end up, Emdoggz?

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  • We now know that Jason was a RAGING alcoholic during his early reality TV star years. This is key as now we can unearth the real reason LC dumped his ass and a BTS peek at him hammered when they force her to “recreate” their breakup for the camera. LC was actually crying because it was morning and Jason was three sheets to the wind, or like a freckle past a hair? This scene alone is hilarious and then LC adds a very generic & monotone, “Jason had a happy ending and is sober and married.” Good for you, Jason. Sucks that LC didn’t get enough credit for telling ole spiky hair, BOY BYE because she was sick of dragging his dead booze weight out of Les Deux on a Monday night.

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(PS what a Dick for being drunk and saying LC isn’t acting normal.)

  • LC is a businesswoman now and realizes that MTV bought her Teen Vogue “internship.” Whereas back in the day she actually thought she was interviewing for it. Oh, honey.

Things That Deserve Their Own Reality Show:

  • William and LC. Seriously these two cannot be any cuter. LC babbles about fashion and William looks at her like this:

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He even attends her clothing line board meetings. RELASHE GOALZ.

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  • LC yelling at MTV for putting her and Spencer in the same room. These two HATED each other and seeing LC be like wtf, guys every time they snuck him into a scene would be all the entertainment.

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  • The amount of guys that Hills producers paid to chat/kiss/be LC’s boyfriend for the night. Seriously, the way they mic’ed up dirty Parisian guy before he even walked over to LC is impressive. Then they pulled the puppet strings to get him to kiss her. TV MAGIC. I guess this is technically the premise for Unreal but I’d still like to see more of their blatant producing of this show. LC was tipped off this guy was going in for the kiss so she ran away. I’ve never been more proud. That kiss would’ve been like a hit of dirt and nicotine. Stay clean, LC.

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But actually think about what it would be like to be 23 and out at a bar where every guy who chats you up has already spoken to your producers and signed a waiver. YIKES.

  • LC’s cat eye. No f’real. Her business savvy is impressive, her charity work is honorable but the most important thing is that winged liner. I will worship all day at the altar of her perfected Persian eye.
  • This house.  I think I actually wiped up a little drool just from an establishing shot of her yard. Holy MTV money.

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Noticeably Missing:

  • Segment on where Justin Bobby is today. What his spiritual beliefs are, if he’s washed his hair lately, if he still sweeps chicks off their feet with just one burp. You know, the important stuff. I would’ve even settled for LC giving us an unfiltered commentary on a classic JB scene.

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  • An apology from Lisa Love. She’s gotta feel like a real asshole now for Paris-shaming LC when she was just trying to check her 18-year-old boyfriend into rehab.

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  • A shoutout to William’s days in Something Corporate. Sigh. Tween girl in me is disappointed. HE USED TO BE A PUNK HEARTTHROB! HE WAS ONCE FAMOUS TOO! Give us that backstory!
  • A live look at Heidi and Spencer as aunt/uncle to Holly’s baby. Does Uncle Spence rub crystals on the little homeboy?

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  • Whitney’s reaction to a shocked face montage.

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  • An in-depth discussion of current events and politics with Audrina.

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  • LC mocking her worst fashion moments of The Hills. Cough cough, plastic black headband, cough.

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And finally, it wouldn’t be a real rundown on The Hills without mention of the most ridiculous couple. As a reaction to being iced out of the special, Speidi took completely different approaches, both with the goal of attention. Let us observe. Spencer went full Kanye:

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Heidi opted for the kill ‘em with kindness tactic. Hey Heidi, LC will never be your friend again. Stop trying. It’s been 10 years. Let it go, girlfriend.

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*Cue acoustic version of “feel the rain on your skin….no one else can feel it for you….only you can let it in.” 

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JUice

Weekly JUice

Week of 5/30/16

I feel bad that we haven’t JUiced together in a while (if that sounds disgusting to you, pls know that I laughed while typing it.) And although there were only a couple noteworthy news stories this week, I still decided to post, y’know FOR ALL MY FANZ.

1. Tayvin is dunzo.

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After a little over a year…or as every news media outlet feels the need to point out FIFTEEN MONTHS (as if their relationship was a newborn baby that goes by age in months until they turn 5) T and C have broken up. It is rumored that Calvin ended it, and the two broke the “silence” about it a day after the announcement with:

So like, it’s over. They probsicles won’t get back together and the world will keep turning. Were they a hawt AF couple? Duhs. Since I’ve built a blog on my snarky hot takes I’m just going to throw it out into the breeze that not too long ago Taylor decided to chop all her hair off and bleach it real hard, also changing her look to 90’s grunge in the process. I’m not SPECIFICALLY saying that this was the cause of the breakup but like… come on. Liam Hemsworth and Miley Cyrus ended their engagement rrrriiiight around the same time that Miley buzzed her head and started dressing like an off-duty stripper. Jus sayin. Tossing it right out there and you can feel free to toss it right back. I look forward to whatever hunk Tay snags in the future and hopefully an entire album full of All Too Well’s.

2. Zay-Gi is dunzo. (Did we ever even have a couple name for them? Whatever.)

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After seven months of dating and a suuuuper weird music video for Zayn’s solo debut, these two have also called it quits. I mean, they really crushed the Met Ball red carpet but other than that I pretty much had no investment in this relationship. Zayn’s kind of a turd for leaving 1D just so he could release a couple songs with F bombs in them that hint at bedroom times. GiGi’s a smokeshow and realistically Zayn was outkicking his coverage in the first place. Guess that means the SQUAD IS SINGLE (please read in WOO girl voice). Selena, GiGi and Tay about to be out wrecking dick this summer. Was that too graphic? Good. SQUAD SUMMER COMMENCE. (Hey girls, give me a call if someone’s out sick one night and you need another single lady to hit the town with.)

3. The Hills is 10 years old.

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10 years ago this week, we were introduced to a few 19 year olds who were juggling “work” and play in LA. That means 10 years ago I was dreaming of the day, when I too, was old enough to live by myself in the city and party hardy. Joke was really on me when I learned that young adulthood bloooows IRL when you don’t have a producer paying for everything. Anyway, usually the first to pretend The Hills didn’t exist, LC addressed the anniversary and announced a special to air August 2nd on MTV for the fans. It will include BTS stories and answer fan questions. YAAASSSSSSSS. Thanks for my belated bday gift, LC. THIS IS ALL I EVER WANTED. Then they took it one step too far and are supposedly shopping a movie idea around (which LC has yet to sign on for…good call.) The rough plot is modeled after a Sex & The City movie and will catch up with the ladies in their marriages/baby life. NO. THANKS. That literally sounds HORRIBLE. Following a bunch of morons around as they navigated their 20’s on “reality” tv? Gold. Following a bunch of moms for a 2 hour movie? Dirt. Here’s hoping that never happens and instead we get a kickass special where Stephanie Pratt finally tells us she’s learned the difference between a hamster and a guinea pig.

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4. Put your muffs away, ladies.

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OH IF IT’S FOR A GOOD CAUSE. BY. ALL. MEANS.

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This isn’t cute. This is junderwear. Junderwear is when Daisy Dukes get so short and tight that they basically just morph into your undercarriage and you’re essentially rolling around in a jean diaper. To be clear, this isn’t me body-shaming. I have a pair of jorts that slowly over time (100 pizzas and donuts later) turned into junderwear and I acknowledge the fact that they are such. IT DOESN’T MAKE THEM SEXY. IT JUST MAKES THEM JUNDIES. Regardless, this is it’s own headline on the JUice because I’m sick of famous ladies being like hey check out my RB curtains, IT’S FOR FEMINISM or IT’S FOR GUN CONTROL! LoLzzzz! Seeing a lady’s basement does not make me think harder about problems facing our world, and then influence me to take action. And that’s just a fact. THESE ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH REASONS TO SHOW OFF YOUR BITS. And that seems preeeetttttyyyyyyy obvious. End. Rant.

5. Here’s a music video that made me confused.

Timeflies released a music video for their catchy jam Once in a While. Except it’s pretty weird. Either way I didn’t have five things to talk (type-yell) about this week so just enjoy this beat, feast your eyes on Cal and wonder what the motive was behind having a girls’ eyes spazz out and wink one at a time for a music video. That pool party looked fun though…my invite must’ve gotten lost in the mail.

PS Happy National Donut Day! I waited until I was safely in the confines of my vehicle to go to town on my frosted treat. Unfortunately, I was still technically at work and was caught red-handed taking a donut selfie. Whoops. Sometimes bragging to others is more important than actually enjoying the donut. Which I did. Real hard.

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Television

The Hills Drinking Game

53a05077d50a8_-_cos-01-lauren-conrad-the-hills-cast-xl It’s no secret I have a thang for Lauren Conrad and another thang for trashy reality television…which comes together quite nicely to make The Hills a re-watchable series for me. Except instead of sitting down and binge-watching, I’ve found that it’s best consumed during a gal pal wine night as a way to feel nostalgic for a time when thick headbands were in style oh, and also to get hammied. I hope that sharing this very official drinking game with all of you will fulfill the overwhelming desire that you once had to booze every time Justin Bobby’s greasy locks and open mouthed burps graced your TV.

Take a Sip When:

-You see LA Traffic or the Hollywood sign

-Brody or Spencer uses the term homeboy or homie

-Audrina/Heidi talk to Chiara/Elodie about their personal lives that these “co-workers” are certainly not a part of.

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-Justin Bobby’s hair looks greasy

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-LC touches her hair

-“Lisa wants to see you in her office”

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-Audrina has a blank stare that displays minimal brain activity, usually directed toward the ceiling.

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-Spencer’s sister is referred to as the “She-Pratt”

-Whitney ends an “ing” word with the “k” sound instead

-Anyone starts a sentence with “It’s like…”

-Heidi admits that she has no friends, just Spencer

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-The phrase “Be Careful” or “Be Cautious” is uttered about anyone wanting to buddy up to LC’s shady ex-friends

-Spencer calls Heidi “my dear” and sounds like he wants to wear her skin as a suit.

-LC preaches an inspirational quote about love or friendships

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-JBobby calls Audrina “dude” as a term of endearment. Swoon.

-LC or Steph are in class to remind us all that they actually go to college

Take a Shot (or Gulp) When:

-LC is hammie sammied

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-Whitney’s surprised

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-LC cries

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-Justin Bobby burps up everything he ate that day (and possibly that week)

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-Jen Bunney is shady AF

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-A character says something off camera that is very obviously a voiceover dubbed in

-Audrina says she’s DONE with JB…DONE.

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-Audrina is over being DONE with JB and takes his “hairstylin” ass back

-Whitney gives LC feedback that is really just repeating what LC said in an advice tone of voice

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-An up and comer is introduced on the show like they’re in a garage band and they’re now a huge superstar (i.e. Lady Gaga)

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-“ARE THEY TAKING SHOTS?!”

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-LC insults Audrina and she’s too stupid to notice, usually referring to her taste in men or Heidi using her to get to LC

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-The gang announces that an event or trip will be drama free…and then there’s drama.

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Take a Knee & Chug Your Drink When:

-The single black tear rolls down LC’s sad losing-another-BFF face

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-LC doesn’t go to Paris

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-LC does go to Paris

-Audrina pretends to be friends with Sean Kingston and his crew and has a poster of him in her cube at work

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-Trashcan bar-slut redhead kisses Justin Bobby in front of Audrina but when confronted claims, “I didn’t kiss him. I didn’t NOTHING him.”

-Three 22 year olds buy a Hollywood mansion with a built-in pool

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-She-Pratt describes the life cycles of pet rodents

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-Spencer compares the bickering of basic betches to world conflicts. “It’s like trying to tell Iran and Israel to get along.”

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-Spencer hooks up an IV of tequila to Heidi and then convinces her to marry him in Mexico

-Brody goes to Las Vegas reality show jail for dramatic effect

-LC makes her grand exit (Finish all the drinks within reach. It’s the end of the series.)

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Pop Culture, Television

The Hills-Top Heidi Moments

Hey guys, I’m BAAAAACK with some very important gossip, as always. Did you hear that Holly Montag is preggers? You didn’t? Oh, that’s probably because she’s not famous except for the time The Hills outed her as an alcoholic. Fingers crossed she’s sober now.

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Anyway, I’ve decided to celebrate the good news with her more “famous” sister’s best moments on The Hills, in no particular order. (Pre-Surgeries) We all remember Heidi as this top-heavy monster with blowfish lips who married Spencer the flesh colored beard, crystal lovin’ maniac. However, I think it’s important to be reminded of wholesome, good girl Heidi back when she had natural A cups and freshly moved to LA to pursue her dreams of working in PR and partying for a paycheck. Here are the best Heidi moments before she went full-on dark side.

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5. Dating Jordan from North Carolina with the most outrageous haircut known to man.

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Heidi and Jordan had their ups and downs—their up was when Jordan gave her a dog for Christmas (that mysteriously disappeared after season 1) and their downs were obviously the rest of their relationship. Jordan called himself passionate and would commonly tell Heidi to shut up because apparently his passions of hating his girlfriend were just too much to hold in. Inevitably, this led to the breakup, which was QUITE dramatic with tears from both parties…seriously bro, pull it together.

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I’m going to assume that Jordan was crying while getting dumped because the jig was up and Heidi finally realized that Sonic the Hedgehog was wildly outkicking his coverage by getting to sleep with her at all. And that was the end of dum dum Jordan and damn it did we all miss him and his weird creepy friend Brian who stalked Audrina in attempts to date her.

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WHAT IS THIS PHOTO.

4. Quitting school after the first day.

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Heidi’s claim to fame was being a quitter and boy did she commit to it. After going into her FIDM interview and announcing that she did not even glance at the curriculum, admitting, “I never went to school, I never did anything. I just like went shopping and hung out.” It’s no wonder they didn’t just offer her a full scholarship for her hard work right on the spot. Good ole Heids put in a half day at school after that and played solitaire waiting for LC to finish classes. By chance, or a scripted run-in, Heidi meets Brent Bolthouse and he gives her an interview for an assistant position. It’s her dream job, guys. She starts the next day and once he tells her she’ll be getting lunch and stuffing envelopes she backtracks real quick and says she didn’t understand that this was a full time job and she’s more into partying so could we speed up the process and put her in charge of the door at a nightclub already? Brent politely tells her to stop being such a self-righteous asshole with a sassy eye roll and Heidi calls LC to vent: “It’s so boring I’m stuffing envelopes. This is my nightmare of a job.” She promises to give it one more day before quitting. Atta girl.

3. Wearing jeans, boots and a turtleneck sweater tank to her first interview.

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(Sorry for the bootleg pic, I’m sure you still get the idea.) Although this is fully related to the last Heidi shining moment, it deserves a separate shout out because it is actually suuuuper baffling that someone going on their first full time job interview would think it’s acceptable to wear this outfit. She got the job though, so clearly I’m doing something wrong here. Her first day of work outfit was equally as appalling with jeans, pointy heels, a black button down and her hair in a bun with a headband that can only be described as one that girls wear when their hair is dirty.

2. The pregnancy scare with Playboy Spence.

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Hey everyone remember the early days of Spencer when he was also porking Audrina? Yeah, definitely not a red flag or anything. Heidi continues dating him even though she catches him with Audrina and whoopsie she runs right into a pregnancy scare. After taking the test and seeing that she’s not preggers (we can all agree that the best thing Speidi has done for this planet is to NOT procreate), Heidi wants to run a little test by Spence to see how he’ll react. She puts on her best serious soap opera face and calls him up asking him to drop by work because they need to talk. Homeboy pulls up in his beamer and she lays it on him that she might be pregnant. Playboy Spence breaks a sweat, takes a sip of what I assume to be vodka in a water bottle to calm his nerves and romantically declares that he’s on Team Heidi. That’s exactly what Heidi wants to hear and she casually replies with ok well I’m not pregnant tralala thanks for stopping by. Playboy Spence declares, “I’m a little bit irritated that you had me thinking you were pregnant,” to which Heidi replies, “Oh boo hoo.” This marks the only time I’ve ever wanted to fist bump Heidi.

1. Orchestrating the Great Jen Bunney Betrayal.

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This is probably my favorite Hills episode to date, and to be clear; I’m 100% team LC on this one. LC goes out of her way to make Jen Bunney’s 21st birthday the best it could be, even going so far as getting her diamonds via her MTV paycheck and Jen repays her by calculating a hookup with Brody like mere minutes after LC and Brody dated. Heidi truly shined when she turned into the conniving birthday fairy granting booty like wishes. She coordinates Brody to attend Bunney’s party and then aggressively pushes the two of them together to mate like real world cast mates in a hot tub. Obviously Bunz leaves with Brodz and LC finds out and lays down the hammer on both idiots, but not Brody, cause he’s too pretty to yell at. Since getting video clips of The Hills is like getting security footage from the White House, for whatever reason, I can only suffice the best scene of the episode with some shitty pictures. I like to call this exchange: two drunk white girls repeating words.

Honorable Mention: Being cutthroat at Bolthouse snaking a promotion from Elodie.

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(Technically this is post-surgery since Heidi clearly had already gotten her first boob job, but we’ll let it slide.) Elodie mentions casually that there’s a promotion in the works and Heidi goes behind her back to get it. Oohh Kill em Heidi, get your dream job and rise above the ranks of stuffing envelopes. Elodie, the unfortunate looking elf who is forced to listen to Heidi talk about Spencer and how she has no friends 24/7, gets her revenge swiftly. Heidi’s first event falls on the same night as the anniversary of the first time Spencer and her banged in a club before he probably then took Audrina out for ice cream or something, and she asks Elodie to cover her undeserving of a promotion ass. Elodie sneaky quits that day and tells Heidi that she’s all set before she heads back to the North Pole, screwing Heidi over royally. Don’t hate the player, hate the game, Heidz.

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This is Elodie’s biz casj cami.

And there we have it. The party girl from Colorado with a heart of gold (or something…) won her way into the best friend Hall of Fame of miss Lauren Conrad and for that and so much more (repeated appearances on various reality TV shows with Spencer) we will never forget her. A friend has informed me that if you miss our little Heidi whose boobs have grown six sizes since the early days, you can catch her and Spencer on Marriage Boot Camp this season, undoubtedly discussing true love and crystals.

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