‘The Real Housewives of Atlanta’ recap: ‘Unmoved’

It turns out that Zen Kim disappears the moment Kim bumps into an actual challenge, and that challenge this season is moving out of her dream house and (gasp!) back into her teensy little 7,000 square foot townhouse. The horror! How will she survive? Anyway, while she tries to process this LIVING HELL, she demands that Kroy go upstairs with her to have sex. Although she phrases it a little less delicately. In front of Sweetie, who announces, “This is so disgusting” to no one in particular. I’m with Sweetie. Kim slobbers all over Kroy’s face, then announces she wants to videotape everything. Not like that; get your mind out of the gutter. Since she’s being evicted, Kim wants to make sure she documents exactly how they leave the house, lest Kendra trash the place, then tweet fake footage. Wow. That’s an angry landlord, or Kim is a really crappy tenant. Or wait! Maybe they’re both crazy people! That makes sense. 

“I am so confused and thrown off by this eviction that”s not an eviction,” sighs Kandi. “This is Kim.” Kandi smiles and shrugs, as if this explains everything. Oh, that Kim! She’s so wacky! She has a persecution complex and might be delusional, but that’s just part of her charm! 

?Meanwhile, Kandi has also moved. She apparently sold her old house, bought a new one, and no one had to evict her and she didn’t have to threaten to tear out the landscaping. Huh! Anyway, Kandi’s only real issue is that her mom may want to move in with her. Well, I see a storyline on the horizon, but otherwise? Kandi’s just having a pleasant, normal, non-violent moving experience. Unlike Kim. Who, as we continue through the episode, is coming more and more unscrewed.

To wit: how dare the movers come into her house and pack the weird, random assortment of crap she has in her basement in boxes labeled “basement”? HOW DARE THEY? For $35 an hour! Sweetie tries to explain to Kim that no matter how much she pays the movers, it”s not proper to call them nasty, nasty things. Kim doesn”t care! SHE IS ANGRY AND SHE CAN YELL EXPLETIVES AT ANYONE SHE’S PAYING $35 AN HOUR! SHE’S PREGNANT, DAMMIT!

I would also like to point out that Kim, as she wanders around the house screaming at people, never once picks up an object, puts it in a box, or moves anything. Apparently pregnancy renders you incapable of doing anything except complaining. 

And boy, can Kim complain! It”s a haunted house! It”s an evil house! Or, as NeNe says, it was Kim’s dream house until she couldn”t get the credit to buy it, in which case it suddenly wasn”t such a great house anymore. Zing! I suspect NeNe”s on to something here. It”s not that Kroy and Kim don”t make a lot of money – I just suspect they spend even more.

Next, we’re on to Phaedra’s storyline. Little Ayden is going to the barber shop for a rite of passage — a haircut! Phaedra wants him to look like a Southern gentleman for his second birthday, but he is crying and whining and WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, PHAEDRA? He looks fine. Don’t torture the kid. Luckily, Apollo is a master barber, so he pushes aside the barber and gives Ayden the haircut, which he could have done at home without trotting him in front of a bunch of scary strangers and making him cry on TV. This is just the beginning of Ayden’s crappy birthday experience, though. Phaedra wants his birthday party to be held at the aquarium, and Dwight will make it fabulous. “It”s not a party; it”s an experience,” Phaedra promise-threatens us. Apollo points out that Ayden will NOT remember this, but Phaedra doesn’t care! He’s her little prince! Which means she gets to make him miserable as often as she wants until he’s big and strong enough to fight back!

In other news, we see Porsha make breakfast for Kordell, her husband. This, except for a quick outtake of her going rock climbing with her sister, is all we see of Porsha. Porsha, who seems to struggle with using, like, um, big words and stuff does not seem a likely candidate to be an integral part of this show. Or at least I hope not. 

Kenya, our other new housewife who seems like a lot more fun, takes her target, I mean boyfriend, Walter out to meet her Aunt Lori, Uncle Mark and cousin Che. Kenya is worried that they won’t like him, and when Walter describes himself as the “Martin Luther King of towing,” I hope they won’t. Still, Lori forges ahead and asks Walter why his marriage broke up. “I loved her but I wasn’t in love with her,” he says, explaining that he wants to make sure he’s really really ready before he jumps in again. “Me and Kenya, we’re dating. You can’t just rush marriage or anything else.”

If I were Kenya, I would hear “I’m not ready to get married, and if you push me, I’ll leave.” But I am not Kenya. She thinks Walter is just shy with her family. He wants to get married, though! He knows he’s going to ask her! Like, soon! Kenya is not listening. Well, maybe to the voices in her head or the loud clanging of her biological clock, but definitely not to Walter. 

Later, Kenya lures poor Walter to her home. She nukes a bunch of pre-made stuff she bought at Trader Joe’s, slops a little into a pan so it appears that she cooked this stuff, and gives Walter a big smile. She’s going to do whatever it takes to get that ring, she tells us. Except cook. Or tell the truth. 

After she and Walter say grace and she isn’t immediately struck down by lightning, she purrs, “This is a little preview of what it will be every night.” Frozen food from Trader Joe”s! Yay! She actually has the gall to tell him that, because it was important to her, she took the time to marinate the chicken, boil the pasta and make sure the flavors came together. He seems to love his frozen food, so maybe he doesn’t care that she’s lying like a cornered criminal. Anyway, she decides it’s the perfect time, having stuffed him with Chicken Marsala a la Trader Giovanni, to inform him of her agenda. Again. “I want a baby, like, yesterday,” she says, not seeming to notice he isn’t saying much. And then, “I”m not trying to put any pressure on you,” because she”s not ovulating at that exact moment. But when she is, look out! She wants three kids. AND she wants to get married first. And she wears a five and a half size ring. Walter is doing the math in his head, and to get Kenya to pump out three children and pull off a wedding befitting a former Miss USA with an oversized ego before she hits menopause or loses her mind, he needed to pop the question, oh, about seven years ago. Walter smiles nervously.  “Just keep drinking, boo.” I’m thinking Walter is hoping she’ll pass out so he can get out of the house without her clinging to his ankles, begging for a sperm sample.

More crazy is happening at the aquarium. Kandi knows Phaedra and Ayden are going to make a big, crazy entrance, but she just shrugs. “It’s Phaedra, so you can’t question it.” Really? You can’t? I beg to differ, because Phaedra is treating her kid like a luxury handbag, but okay. Whatever, Zen Kandi. 

After Phaedra, Apollo and Ayden enter the room on a tiny locomotive following a marching band, Kandi binder clips a $100 bill to his collar. Poor Ayden. I know Phaedra says this is a Southern tradition, but it kind of makes him look like he’s been sold to the highest bidder. 

Anyway, after Kim calls to cancel, it’s time for the private dolphin show, which scares Ayden and makes Kandi fall asleep. Congrats, Phaedra! You’ve managed to annoy your friends AND terrify your child! Good going! 

Hey, you know who wasn’t in this episode? NeNe and Cynthia! So by dumb luck, we get to watch them have lunch together. NeNe makes fun of Kim and her house and then informs Cynthia, oh, by the way, a friend of mine was butt dialed by Phaedra and she doesn’t like you, so there. Cynthia blinks. But our husbands made nice! How could this be? NeNe produces the horrible audio evidence, in which Phaedra admits she doesn’t give a bleep that Cynthia couldn’t come to Ayden’s birthday party. That’s it. Not all that damning. But Cynthia is gravely insulted. Phaedra acts like she doesn’t swear, and she TOTALLY does! And she acts nice to her face but she’s TOTALLY fake! I’m thinking this entire plot line is totally fake and totally boring, but hey, it gives everyone a chance to have lunch.

Cynthia takes Phaedra to lunch, she confronts Phaedra, Phaedra says it doesn’t sound like her, Cynthia offers to play the tape, Phaedra changes the subject to a bug bite on her boob, blah blah blah. Oh, and Cynthia give Phaedra a gift for Ayden. Is this middle school? Because I’m pretty sure middle school was a bit less ridiculous than this. Phaedra probably does realize she’s been caught dropping the F-bomb, but given that she says ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about Cynthia, I don’t see why this is a big deal. But Cynthia is thrilled that she confronted Phaedra, and Phaedra… didn’t do anything. Yes, it’s very dramatic. If you also thrill to the thought of coupon clipping, napping or watching cloud formations. 

Really, instead of watching this non-event, we could have gotten a little more time with Crazypants Kim, who eats half a box of donuts in a pregnancy-induced frenzy and demands some guys go back to her rental and rip out the plants. Seeing a truckload full of sad, torn-out landscaping, Kim and Sweetie laugh maniacally like evil, angry, fairly ineffective mad scientists. Ah, Crazy Kim. How we’ve missed her.