The Real Housewives of Atlanta Recap: The Great Divide

The Real Housewives of Atlanta
Dynasty, Diamonds, and Drama
Season 17 Episode 7
Editor’s Rating ★★★★
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If the final episode of the Dallas trip shows us anything, it’s that our ladies are firmly divided into two groups. This time, it’s not the Talls versus the Smalls, but the Peaches versus the Plums, with half the group faltering at being a Real Housewife. The most surprising Plum for me is K. Michelle, but it is a disappointment that makes me truly understand why Dame Moylan’s Eileen Davidson Accords are one of the three official rules of the Housewives Institute. 

K. charmed me in her first four episodes, but by the fifth, which is funnily exactly when the Accords go into effect, I caught a whiff of some things that I didn’t love. Most egregious was her choice not to attend dinner without glam (I love how the Peaches showed up close to barefaced at breakfast; it felt like a subtle message to K. that it’s okay not to take herself so seriously). However, her declaration on the bus ride to Dallas that she wished her husband had social media so it would be easier to catch him cheating had me raising an eyebrow. While I didn’t find it worth noting then, I now see that her statement is indicative of an almost obsessive paranoia that fully develops tonight as she reacts to imagined “plots” and “take downs” against her that never really occur. 

It begins in the sprinter van as Kelli and Porsha’s argument continues, riding a wave that starts with hostile lesbian accusations — according to P, after the Grenada trip last season, Kelli caught a glimpse of Porsha’s kitty cat and declared she wanted a taste — and ends with the group’s collective appreciation for the rose vibrator. The whiplash from Kelli’s attacks about hot chili cheese pussy (maybe this insult hit too close to home, but more on that later) to joking about vibrators proved to be too much for K. Michelle, who asks the group in disbelief, “So y’all really just tag into each other ass, and then, next moment, it’s all good?” Well, yes, K. That’s exactly what we’re doing and have been doing for almost two decades. 

Once at dinner, K. Michelle can’t quite shake off the volatility of the argument. She seethes in her seat as the other women joke and make innuendos about the oysters while Porsha smells them for freshness as the group’s expert on sapphic references. Drew calls out K’s moodiness, asking why her energy is off. K. admits to what she’s been harboring for the last few episodes, saying she’s bothered because Drew “keeps” (it happened twice) bringing up that she knows Blakk. K is upset at any insinuation that she’s romantically linked to the man, although Drew has never said that. It’s the first case of K’s imagination running wild — Drew didn’t mean “know” in the biblical sense of the word; she just acknowledged that Blakk and K are mutuals, perhaps as a segue to get to know her new co-star better. 

K. Michelle reiterates how she doesn’t know Blakk, but then in the next sentence, she explains that she does know him through Instagram DMs. She’s so caught up in a hypothetical gotcha moment that she’s unable to see the inconsistency in her own words. Meanwhile, Drew doesn’t care about the DMs, reminding the group that he’s technically single. Despite clearing up the miscommunication with Drew, K. Michelle continues spiraling into the next morning. During breakfast, she comes in moping, sucking the energy out of the room. She breaks down, tearfully saying, “If I know that a motherfucker is sitting there plotting my hurt, I’m not gonna smile in your face.” The group tries to console her, although no one knows what she’s talking about. They try to pry it out of her gently, but K. keeps rambling, saying, “You know who you are!” Do they?

Porsha urges K. to identify precisely what or who is triggering her while assuring her that she’ll have her back as the one who brought her into the group. K. just sits in her tears before calling the anonymous perpetrator a “low-down motherfucker,” prompting Porsha to immediately get up from her side, frustrated by the riddles. In her confessional, K. finally explains what’s going on — well, going on inside her head, because literally none of this actually happened on camera. K. states that she heard from the streets of Atlanta that Drew, Porsha, and Phaedra are plotting her takedown and intend to do so by insinuating that she canoodled with Blakk and bringing up a rumor that her coochie stinks. Yes, you read that right. K. Michelle believes the reason Porsha joked about smelling the oysters was to reference a five-year-old statement from one of K’s exes about her vaginal hygiene. Mind you, not a single person onscreen mentioned this rumor, but as I said before, K. is obsessed with finding a gotcha moment before the moment can find her. No one was talking about her va-jay-jay until she brought it up herself, and now, unfortunately, I have “K. Michelle vagina smell” in my browser history. 

I don’t know which messy person in Atlanta gave K. Michelle this information — she says “someone” called her after dinner, telling her about the “plot” — but it’s giving Monique in season five of RHOP being so paranoid about the rumor regarding her son’s paternity that she outed it herself. K.’s breakdown completely erodes the already prominent fissure in the group, officially drawing a line in the sand between those who intrinsically know how to be a Housewife and those who are cosplaying as one. They split into their two factions for a debrief, with the Peaches (Porsha, Angela, Phaedra, Drew, and Cynthia) going upstairs and the Plums (K., Kelli, Pinky, and Shamea) going outside, a perfect metaphor for those secure in the house of Bravo and those who are trying to get in.

Outside, K. Michelle identifies specific names to the other Plums while production gives a shady edit, hilariously dramatizing the oyster footage with music that matches her paranoia. Inside, the Peaches are simply confused, with even Angela, the resident bone collector, commenting that digging into the specifics of this bone is above her pay grade. But they’re smart enough to pull up K.’s Twitter for answers since that’s the only space she seems to speak freely. Of course, there’s an ominous post from right before breakfast that reads, “If it takes a group, plot, a rumor or scheme to bring me down when I am coming in love, you already lost in the game and lost in life.” The mania continues in K’s confessionals, where she takes nasty shots at Go Naked Hair and emphasizes that her vagina has been snipped and tucked in the years since her ex made that statement. Good grief, girl! Give it (both the situation and her vagina) a rest! 

The Peaches conclude that the circumstances are a result of groupthink among the Plums and that K. Michelle is feeding off of Shamea’s disdain for Porsha and Drew. The Plums come to a similar conclusion in reverse, believing it’s the Peaches who collude and plot on behalf of Porsha. With fingers hilariously pointing at each other, the parallel epiphanies prove that the crux of this divide is merely a proxy war between Shamea and Porsha. 

Shamea can feel side eyes from enemy territory, and Angela already called her out for her stank faces at breakfast, so before the ladies head to Cynthia’s gala for her tequila, she calls for a meeting. A good Real Housewife would save these grievances for the gala to create a memorable full-glam climax for the trip, yet Shamea is a Plum, not a Peach, so she wants to make sure her thong bikini gets screen time (Cynthia said it was like sitting beneath two ass cheeks). She starts the conversation with “I’m not going to let people plot, plan, and manipulate,” before telling them not to make her the fall person just because they don’t like her. Then, Shamea opens the floor to K. to further articulate herself so that she’s no longer implicated. 

K. Michelle continues her tirade without naming anyone, then keeps kicking the dead horse about Blakk. Despite Drew reassuring K. that she never suggested anything untoward about their relationship, K. begins to truly lose it, screaming and puffing up her chest. Soon, Chi-town Drew emerges, and the two women get out of their seats with their heads bobbing and words flying. Drew steps away from the situation, though the conversation continues as the ladies finally discuss how Shamea and Porsha’s falling out rippled through the group, and that Shamea believes Drew and Angela are somewhat responsible for the demise of the relationship. I think it comes down to Shamea being upset she couldn’t have her cake and eat it too. Last season, she wanted to be able to talk shit about Porsha while still having access to the clout from their relationship, but Drew and Angela threw a wrench in her plan by forcing her hand. 

Cynthia takes back control of her trip by diffusing Shamea and Angela’s argument before sending the ladies off to glam so they can head to her gala. Once again, Mother Cynthia injects much-needed luxury into RHOA, fitting the girls with expensive jewels on loan from an eccentric old white man, dripping with diamonds and shrouded in a crocodile-skin Birkin, to complement their Dynasty-inspired outfits. The result is so extravagant that the women require a security escort to the event. Although a passing hurricane moves the outdoor gala inside, it doesn’t make a dent in Cynthia’s plans. They march inside with their jewels gleaming, ready to support their mother hen. Cynthia whips out one of her signature shady games, having the ladies compete for a “Tequila Queen” crown. However, learning a lesson or two from Ultimate Girls Trip, she has the entire cast share the tiara. It’s a great way to unite the women after a trip filled with division, though anyone can predict that when they get back to Atlanta, the chasm will grow once again.