Below Deck Mediterranean Recap: The Final Supper

Below Deck Mediterranean
Guestzilla On Board
Season 11 Episode 3
Editor’s Rating ★★★★
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For the first 15 or so minutes of “Guestzilla On Board,” I was worried about what the animosity between Joe and Nathan would mean for the season. Their drama is already stale, and between Nathan’s touchiness and Joe’s mistreatment of women, their fight over who is a better guy, a better seaman, a better worker, a better boyfriend is disengaging at best and aggravating at worst. Thankfully, though, there are plenty of other personal and professional entanglements to share in the spotlight. The competition between Kayley and Genevieve has an old-school reality television flavor that is delectable to the Below Deck palate. They are both competent, which makes their race for the second position all the more interesting to watch. Blessedly, boatmance stuff is at the bottom of the totem pole of relevant storylines, at least for now, with Luke poised to cause some trouble.

When we pick up this week, Nathan is still angry at Joe for saying that he and Gael don’t get along. Despite his overreaction, Nathan does the right thing and leaves before the situation can escalate any further. At home, he tells Gael what happened, and she worries about the prospect of Nathan spending six weeks with Joe on the boat. She says that Joe was never able to articulate what his problem with her was — she didn’t give him the kind of attention he covets — but to be fair, this panic about Joe’s mere presence feels a little overzealous. Joe’s ways aren’t contagious; it’s within Nathan’s power to keep himself in check. Then again, Nathan’s emotional nature is his albatross. At the club, Aesha checks in with him over text and hopes that he can get back on the same wavelength as Joe, “if only for the sake of the boat.” 

For his part, Joe doesn’t seem to be thinking about his issues with Nathan half as much as Nathan or Gael are. He laments to Aesha that things between them will never be the same, but mostly he lets off some steam from a stressful day by flirting with Kayley, who demonstrates a lot of interest. Back on the boat, Aesha advises Kayley that with Joe, it’s never serious, but that doesn’t bother Kayley, who is not looking for a boyfriend, so she makes out with him by the hot tub. It’s hard to tell what excites Joe more: The fact that they kissed or that Kayley told him she doesn’t want any strings attached.

For the first time in ages, then, it’s not Joe at the center of a precarious love triangle: It’s Luke, who should definitely know better. He is experiencing that age-old misogynistic dilemma: He likes Gen because she is “hot and full of lust,” but he likes Joy because he “could go home with her.” This tells me all I need to know about how a guy views women, as if you could separate them into two categories: sluts or keepers. But we’re getting to know Gen fast, and it’s obvious that she’s not used to not getting what she wants. In the van on the way back to the boat, Gen tells the girls that she has her eyes on Luke. Joy, no fool, chuckles: “I can tell…” But back on the Akira One, it’s Joy’s cabin Luke wants to “chill in,” and it’s Joy who gets to tell him to try again another time.

Meanwhile, Kat and Cooper continue to have wholesome fun together. Cooper tells us in a confessional that his last relationship lasted two years and only ended because he went into yachting, and that he’s taking it slow with Kat because he prefers to be careful. Kat seems to appreciate it — she says that being around Cooper makes her feel giggly, like a schoolgirl. I’m rooting for them and hoping they don’t go down the Harry-Bri path, though they seem to have much more chemistry than that fated couple ever did.

The next morning, the crew gets ready to tackle their second charter. Nathan arrives from spending the night with his family and immediately pulls Joe aside for a talk. He maintains that he’d appreciate it if Joe didn’t bring up Gael’s name, but mostly, and surprisingly, he wants to apologize for his overreaction. Nathan makes a commitment not to let their history affect their work, especially when Joe has been “super on deck.” Now that is maturity, not throwing a fit because Joe is around. It’s a good thing they got themselves back on track, because on this charter, it won’t be Joe testing Nathan’s composure. He will have his hands full with Josef, a guest of co-primaries Johnny and Michelle Damon. Johnny is a former professional baseball player, which is exciting for Coop, who comes from a family of ball players. Aesha and Sandy have had the Damons on charter before, and they’re happy to welcome them back until they learn they brought the Devil along.

During the preference sheet meeting, the major difference in Kayley and Genevieve’s attitudes is perfectly illustrated. The scene is set by a little primer on their relative experiences: Kayley hasn’t been in yachting for long, but she has been working in hospitality for years, while Genevieve has four years of yachting experience and one stint as a chief stew, which she did before she was 20. For a person of 22 years of age, though, Gen acts like she’s seen and done it all. When they read on the preference sheet that Michelle and Johnny are requesting an escape-room experience, Gen groans that she has had to do that before, and that she “hated it.” Kayley, meanwhile, says that she can’t wait to research the theme. It makes Gen roll her eyes. I get it, but it would really help her case if she could demonstrate just a little enthusiasm.

Gen speaks a lot about her yachting experience, but she has yet to apply that experience to benefit the team. Kayley, on the other hand, knows how to leverage her experience in similar fields, like wedding planning, to become an indispensable member of the interior. It’s very little surprise that Aesha chooses Kayley as her second. Aesha praises her “humble, head-down, what-is-best-for-the-team mentality,” which, whether she meant it that way or not, is a perfect summary of all the qualities Gen needs to work on. Worse, Gen can’t keep her irritation contained, and she never congratulates Kayley on earning her promotion. Gen tells Kat that she would rather let her “work speak for itself” than be a “suck-up,” but her bad energy is getting in the way of her work actually speaking for itself. If she spent half the time she did complaining about being in housekeeping, killing housekeeping — going above and beyond to demonstrate how well-equipped she is for the job — maybe Aesha would have moved her to service. Aesha is a perceptive chief stew; she is as quick to praise a job well done as she is to catch onto a mistake. In a confessional, she says that you can’t always rely on the resume to delegate positions, and that Kayley has proved herself to be an excellent team player. Sandy is happy with the decision as well.

Kayley immediately worries about what her promotion will mean for her already-fraught relationship with Gen. She tries to get ahead of it, telling Gen that she doesn’t want there to be bad blood between them, and that she knows she still has a lot to learn and will be happy to ask for Gen’s input. Gen doesn’t give her even a pretend smile. She doesn’t show appreciation for Kayley’s initiative or openness. Kat says in a confessional that Gen has shown a “lack of respect,” which seems to come from a sense of entitlement: As Gen herself put it, she expected to be a “shoo-in” for second stew. To be fair to Gen, though, I don’t totally believe Kayley when she says that Gen’s attitude is making her doubt her fitness for the job. No one who is that good at their job doesn’t know they’re good. As they’re getting into their whites, Aesha asks Kayley how it went with Gen, and Kayley brushes it off: “I just left it.” Later in the day, Gen distracts herself from the perceived slight by pursuing Luke, leaving him a flirty Post-It note with his laundry. Kat is relieved that she has at least found a positive outlet, but it seems like that’s not going to last very long, either: It’s pretty obvious that Luke is really into Joy. He’s in the galley a hundred times a day!

The tensions in the interior and exterior departments are nothing compared to the fight Josef is having with his girlfriend, Adis, when they arrive. Within one second of being onboard, Josef — who, Michelle tells Aesha, was already being obnoxious (probably drunk) at the restaurant they were at before they even got to the dock — has a problem with the way Nathan politely asks him to clear the deck while they undock the boat. It’s funny how it’s almost never the paying primary who is the problem; it’s always some arrogant, insecure, emasculated yahoo. Even after he joins the rest of the group on the sky deck (where anyone who has ever been aboard has waited for it to anchor), he’s still raging about Adis, going on and nauseatingly on about being worth I don’t know how many dollars and having a plane. Adis does the right thing and asks to leave the boat. When they anchor out at sea, Joe brings her back to the shore while the rest of them have lunch.

Adis saved herself — the rest of us, audience, crew, and guests, are trapped in the middle of the ocean with the worst type of guy. After lunch, he asks to drive a Jet Ski. When Joe asks him how many drinks he’s had, he says only the one he is drinking at that moment, but in reality, he’s had six cocktails. Aesha radios Nathan as much, and Nathan bars him from driving the Jet Ski. Josef doesn’t like that, so he tells Nathan they will be nemeses. “Tell me I’m wrong,” he provokes, and Nathan shoots back: “You’re wrong.” When Josef starts to bitch about Nathan, Aesha steps in and asks him not to disrespect the bosun. She is a masterclass in how to stand up to a drunken, unreasonable guest without letting the situation get personal. She alerts Sandy to Josef’s behavior, and Sandy comes down to ask him to respect her crew. He listens to her, but the problem doesn’t end there: Sandy and Aesha don’t trust Nathan to not let his emotions take over. He nearly spun out when Joe mentioned Gael’s name; it’s hard to see how he could keep his composure facing a guy talking shit to his face.

As Sandy maintains, though, it’s part of the job to learn. Or, in Aesha’s words, yachting is all about “placating rich and arrogant people” –– knowing how to keep a guy like this in check is part of the skill set required to be a leader. In a way, Josef’s shenanigans are another test for Nathan. Things calm down a little before dinner. Josef drunkenly passes out on a couch, but that only means he’s refreshed and rested to resume his obnoxiousness at their Roman Empire-themed dinner with Captain Sandy. When he tells Joy that he would rate her a 9 on a scale of 1 to 10 because “no one gets a ten,” Sandy asks him again not to disrespect the chef. After everyone has gone to bed, he rolls up to the bridge to provoke Nathan, who is on anchor watch. First, he plays loud music on a speaker, which Nathan asks him to turn off because Sandy’s cabin is right there. Then, he goes on the bow and talks on the phone with his “lawyer” about “the tour guide” he “hooked up with” in Croatia, only to come back to the bridge to tell Nathan that he’s “a bit of a prick.” Cut to Nathan’s confessional: “I’m about to get fired.” I know Nathan has to learn how to manage his emotions, but I wouldn’t blame him if he went at it with this guy. I’d be kind of glad, even. Let him have it!