411’s Total Divas Report 10.12.14

Do you like Ryan’s exasperated ranting about Total Divas? If so, check out his exasperated ranting about numerous other wrestling-related topics on Twitter.

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to 411mania’s Total Divas Report! I’m Ryan Byers, and, for once, I’m feeling good about reviewing the show this week!

Wait a minute, what’s that noise? It’s an incoming transmission from my 411mania boss, Larry Csonka . . .

Ryan, we have learned that the E Network intends to run two consecutive episodes of Total Divas this week. You must review them both, back-to-back and with no stopping.

Oh, fuck me.

Seriously, a Total Divas double feature?

Wait a minute . . . Total Divas . . . Double Feature . . .

Total Divas . . . Double Feature . . .

Nattie Neidhart was vexed ‘cuz TJ didn’t want sex
But she still slapped Summer Rae
And Nikki Bella was there sans any underwear
JoJo was the invisible Offer-man
Then something went wrong for Gail Kim and A. Kong
They got caught up in TNA’s jam
Then at an awful speed it came from NXT
And this is how the message ran:

Bunim Murray – Double Divas
Vinnie Mac will stroke his creature
See Brie Bella fighting Daniel Bryan
And there will be some awkward cryin’
Oh-oh-oh at the late night, double divas, reality show.

I knew Eva Marie’s dad was excessively mad
When Jonathan wasn’t Catholic
And Ariane got hot when she saw ‘Licia Fox
Fight Melina in a five star classic
Rosa Mendes said booze gave her the blues
And rehabbing them cost lots of bills
And when we get on E!, said Carrano to Vinny
The show will be some terrible swill, like a:

Bunim Murray – Double Divas
Vinnie Mac will stroke his creature
See Brie Bella fighting Daniel Bryan
And there will be some awkward cryin’
Oh-oh-oh at the late night, double divas, reality show.
I wanna go, oh-oh, to the late night double divas, reality show.
There’s no RKO, oh-oh, at the late night double divas reality show.
Trin and Jon Uso-oh, at the late night double divas reality show.

We open in San Diego, where the Bella Twins are WALKING~! (TM, CRZ.) They grab some early afternoon drinks, like you do. They argue over whether their wine is Spanish or Mexican, and John Cena shows up in an obscenely flashy sports car. He tries to have a conversation with Brie about how her newly married life is over, but this quickly devolves into their making fun of a patron the next restaurant over, who has avocado smeared all over his face. Given that they don’t know the difference between Spain and Mexico, or, based on past episodes, what a bon bon is, the Bella Twins are really not that much more advanced than the man who lacks the fine motor skills necessary to handle his sandwich. They have very little room to make fun.

Ariane arrives at a WWE TV taping, where she reports to Stone Cold Seamstress Sandra that she is back from her training run in NXT. There are two problems with this: 1) the remainder of this episode has zero to do with Ariane’s return to the main roster and 2) those of us who actually watch WWE programming are well aware that Ariane never actually went anywhere.

Rosa Mendes and Summer Rae participate in a photo shoot, during which Summer busts out the line, “The higher the hair, the closer to Jesus.” I assume that is not an original line, but I like it. Rosa expalins that she has been getting along with Summer lately because they feel like the outcasts of the women’s locker room, the two girls that all of the others talk about behind their backs. Much like Ariane’s return from NXT, this has jack and shit to do with the rest of this episode.

At the same show in catering, Nikki, Ariane, Nattie, and Eva Marie meet up. Nikki puts Ariane over for her “passion for the business,” and Ari not-Bernstein shows off some of her bruises, presumably from the NXT ring ropes. This is the second episode in which she has done that. Why does nobody else on the show have these bruises? Are the NXT ropes harder than the main roster ropes? Or does Bill DeMott just bull whip everybody? Discussion turns to Eva Marie’s bachelorette party, which, like her wedding, she is going back and doing since she never had a proper one. Instead of just going out to a bar, the party is taking the form of a vacation to Curacao, a tropical island that I had honestly never heard of before. I’m guessing their tourism board financed this episode.

Cameron has her first match back from NXT against AJ Lee, and she’s doing a new gimmick where she applies makeup in the ring. In the clips, Ariane busts out the CATTLE MUTILATION of all moves. Given that we have evidence that signature holds can be sexually transmitted (see Brie Bella pulling out the Yes Lock), does that mean Ariane and D-Bry had an affair? If so, was it before or after his affair with his physical therapist? And, speaking of the affair with the physical therapist, when will that be chronicled on this show?

In Tampa, Nattie and TJ once again meet up in a restaurant, because it worked out so well for them the last time that they did it. Nattie is at a point where she wants to reconcile with her husband, so she invites him to come along on the bachelorette trip. They also establish in the scene that Rosa and Summer were not invited to come. Trinity doesn’t show up either, but it’s not explained why.

Ariane makes it home to Vinny and talks about how it’s so long since she’s seen him. They were just in California together last week to deal with Ariane’s brother, weren’t they? Rather than greeting each other, they immediately start talking about how full their apartment is with crap, and Vinny wants to buy a house. Fortunately, they know super-realtor Nikki Bella. Unfortunately, they’re doing this twenty years too late, because back in 1994 they could’ve just entered a contest and been awarded a house by Todd Pettengill. Ariane complains that Vinny is trying to rush her into talking business even though she just got home, then she turns around and runs off to a hair appointment with her mother, and Vinny is the one complaining about how they haven’t had any time together. I’ve criticized this show for inconsistent characterization before, but rarely does it happen within the same conversation.

The majority of the cast assembles to head down to the bachelorette party. Nattie says the word “about” in a decidedly Canadian manner. Nikki hatches a diabolical plot to party with her sister like they did before they hooked up with D-Bry and John Cena.

Everybody arrives at their hotel rooms, and Nattie and TJ are disturbed when they hear the people next door having cartoonishly loud sex. TJ’s response is to feign his own sex noises into the wall to screw with their neighbors (not literally), though his “sex noises” sound more like a baby crying. Hey, I don’t know, I guess some people are into that. Nattie wants to change their sex impersonation into actual sex, though she does it in the least alluring way possible, by saying to TJ, “Hey, let’s go to the bedroom,” in the same tone that she would use to say, “Hey, we’re out of milk.” TJ is, unsurprisingly, not aroused and doesn’t want to go through with it. I’m with him on this one.

The next day, the crew gathers for brunch. Things get super-awkward quickly, as apparently Eva and Jonathan were the Neidharts’ noisy neighbors, and they were under the impression that TJ’s fake sexy times were real sexy times. I was going to say that nobody could possibly believe that performance was legit, but we are dealing with Eva Marie here, so the bar is low. For reasons that I still don’t understand having watched the rest of the episode and all of the following episode, Nattie buys bathing suits for all the party guests and is accused of wanting to see the men’s packages because their suits are a bit skimpy. (Or at least it’s said they’re skimpy. In reality they just look like wrestling trunks.)

Jonathan, Eva, Ariane, and Vinny go rock diving off of a rock that is explicitly labeled as not being an appropriate place to do so. I’m pretty certain that’s not how that works. Despite the sign, everybody does it and nobody is injured. The scene in no way drives the plot, so, again, I’m guessing a hotel owner in Curacao paid a pretty penny for that one.

Speaking of hotels, the Bellas are in theirs. Nikki is frustrated because Brie does not want to have fun with her and instead wants to lay in bed and look at pictures of her recently painted house. I love that this show, more often than not, portrays growing up as a bad thing.

TJ is excited because he’s taking Nattie on a mystery “excursion,” a word he uses 500 times as though he just learned it yesterday. They are driven across town and arrive at . . . an ostrich ranch. They take turns feeding the ostriches, which Nattie is terrified by. I cannot say that I disagree with her on that one. I give this show a lot of crap, but I will say that if you wanted to create a wacky, over-the-top reality show scenario, an ostrich ranch was a pretty darn funny route to go. On the ride back from the ranch, Nattie voices her displeasure to her husband, indicating that the excursion was not nearly romantic enough for her. TJ then does the one thing that is bound to push Natalya over the edge . . . he takes the name of Loius Vuitton in vein. That creates enough tension to get us into a commercial break.

When we return, the Bellas are beach-side in matching yet obviously differently sized bikinis. Vinny and Ariane pop in and, in a true meeting of the minds, we have a conversation between VINNY and NIKKI BELLA. If you have ever watched this show and visualize what a conversation between these two would be like, there are no surprises. The topic is that Vinny wants some alone time with Ariane but she isn’t letting him. Nikki suggests that maybe he should put his foot down. Nattie arrives and tells everybody about the ostrich ranch. She’s clearly disappointed in it, but Vinny says, “Ostrich farm?” in a tone that indicates he is going to be calling a taxi to go there within about thirty seconds.

Later in the evening, the Bellas are dressing to go out. Brie has to borrow one of Nikki’s dresses, and a bra stuffing scene ensues. The entire group meets up at dinner, with Eva and Jonathan getting there late because they have been making like Scotty II Hotty and bangin’ it, bangin’ it, bangin’ it. They make fun of Brie’s chest again, and the scene is over.

Later in the night or possibly the next day . . . I really have no idea . . . the twins take a trip to the spa for a massage. Again, Brie’s boobs are made fun of. She wants to talk about her house, but Nikki is having none of it and tells her to shut up. Brie in a confessional says she just wants to have a conversation with her sister because she values Nikki’s opinion more than anybody else’s. I’ve made jokes about Nikki being a moron, but I think the bigger moron would probably be somebody who values the moron’s opinion. Congratulations, Brie, you’ve “won.”

At some other point, the group picks up Eva and Jonathan for a cruise, and the gimmick is that they’re all wearing red Eva Marie wigs. Late in the evening, Vinny mentions wanting to buy a house with Ariane, but she thumbs her nose at the idea. This would normally devolve into an argument, but Vinny is a doormat and bottles it up until they get off the boat, at which point he starts to tear up. Ari asks him what’s wrong and he says they should be spending more time together. Her response that this is not the time or place to have this conversation, and he sighs out the word “Fine,” continues to cry, and walks away.

Ariane stops them and he explains that he’s upset because it seems like he’s invested in the couple’s future while she is not. Didn’t they already do this storyline and reconcile it during the BriBry wedding? Ariane says that she’s going to work on it and take baby steps, which she demonstrates by literally taking baby steps. Apparently Ariane was the inspiration for Drax the Destroyer.

At the crew’s final dinner of the vacation, everybody toasts Eva Marie, talking about how much they love her. Ariane does a complete 180 on the house situation, telling Nikki that she’s going to hire her as a real estate agent. I can’t believe that they have the balls to continually break up that horrifically phony storyline, though I guess I have to give them points for continuity. Also, this reinforces my Drax comparison from the last paragraph, because Ariane demonstrates zero understanding of what the idiom “baby steps” actually means.

Three seconds later, Nikki gets on Brie to drink again, and this escalates quickly into a very catty argument about whether Brie is old and boring. Jonathan has a shit-eating grin on his face, thoroughly enjoying all of this. The hounding continues throughout the evening as the cast hits the bars. Vinny appears to be legitimately drunk and attempting to shoehorn himself into the scene even though the storyline that they’re highlighting has nothing to do with him. This is not the first time he’s done this when alcohol has been involved. Brie decides that she’s going to turn in early and everybody tries to talk her out of it, particularly her sister. She gets huffy and walks off, though this is one of the few times in the history of the series where the patented huffy walk off feels justified in my book, because they should just leave the woman alone and let her do what she wants. You’d think that at least Eva Marie would stick up for her, given that Eva had her own storyline about not wanting to drink at a bachelorette party about a season ago.

Nattie and Eva go the bathroom together, and the FemAnvil breaks down and starts crying on Eva’s shoulder about her marital problems. Way to ruin her party. She feels unwanted because her husband will not get physical with her, and it drives her to tears. Eva’s stellar advice? “You guys are good people. It’s going to take care of itself.” Eva is right. History has proven that bad things never happen to good people.

The next morning, the Bellas have a heart-to-heart. Brie says that she’s angry because Nikki was attempting to force her to drink. Nikki denies doing this, even though there is actual, definitive television footage of it. In fact, based on the clips we’ve seen on this episode, I’m guessing that there’s probably eight to ten hours worth of footage of it. Brie says that one of the reasons that she doesn’t drink anymore is that Bryan isn’t a big fan of it, and Brie asks if her man his controlling her. Brie explains that, no, it’s actually a lifestyle change due to the fact that she’s maturing. Nikki still blames Bryan but decides that she needs to accept the change regardless.

Okay, this set a new low for the show. Normally, people have one conversation and the one conversation resolves their problems in an unrealistically quick manner. This time, they didn’t even HAVE a real conversation that involved one person explaining her position to the other and the other person understanding the explanation. Instead, they had the conversation, Nikki didn’t understand Brie’s position, and yet she still decided to drop her side of the argument for no real reason. This was infuriating.

Overall: Who puts together these shows? I mean, seriously? Have the people who put these shows together ever taken a creative writing course, critically watched a successful television program, or done anything else that would give them a basic grasp on how to structure a story? To tell a story, you generally have some form of tension that rises throughout the body of the story, then peaks and reaches a climax, after which it is resolved. These shows build tension, but it never escalates. It just runs at the same level for about forty minutes, never climaxes, and just sort of peters out when the writers have realized that they’ve filled enough television time with bickering. Also, there’s a little concept called Chekhov’s gun, in which you don’t introduce something into the narrative unless it is going to serve a purpose in the story. This show, even though it always feels like two hours of television crammed into a one hour package, always includes multiple scenes that go nowhere and have nothing to do with the greater narrative, with examples in this episode being Cameron’s return from NXT, Rosa and Summer’s photo shoot, and the insipid cliff diving.

I cannot believe that I have to do this a second time in the same night.
Do you like Ryan’s exasperated ranting about Total Divas? If so, check out his exasperated ranting about numerous other wrestling-related topics on Twitter.

Episode two begins with Nattie and Rosa meeting up to head to TV. Something in Rosa’s luggage begins vibrating loudly. Seth Rollins’ electric razor? No, on this show they actually go all the way with the gag and Nattie produces Rosa’s vibrator from the bag. Natalya gets out of the passenger’s seat and grabs the toy to turn it off, with Mendes mentioning that she just used it earlier in the day. Why in the world would Nattie not send Rosa off to deal with her own sex toy? C’mon, people.

After the opening credits, Nikki Bella is getting her hair did because she’s headed to the premier of an indy flick that she and Brie starred in. John Cena is also going, and he is wearing a bright blue suit that would goes Vince McMahon to pause and say, “Whoa, I think that’s a bit much.”

We see some footage from the movie. It appears to be a sex comedy written by somebody who understands sex but not necessarily comedy.

At Nattie and Rosa’s hotel room, they pick hair off of each other. Nattie criticizes her travel partner for not wearing enough clothing, though the reality of the situation is that they both wear much less on national television on a weekly basis. The two drive . . . somewhere . . . and talk about how Rosa is on the prowl for a man. However, she wants a real relationship, not just casual sex. Nattie says that will be difficult, because men in their thirties, “Don’t just want to play Monopoly.” Well, that’s true for men in their thirties except for Nattie’s husband. Rosa is afraid that, if she become sexually active again, it will cause her to relapse and return to drinking. Buh? How does that work?

Post-premier, Nikki and John are out at dinner. They adjust her cleavage. It’s a rough job, but somebody has to do it. They discuss their supposedly burgeoning acting careers and Cena in the most suspicious manner possible asks what Nikki would do if she were asked to perform a nude scene.

Nattie and Trinity meet up for lunch, which is grate for Nattie, because this gives her a new partner for her perpetual kvetching about TJ. They do an incredibly bizarre flashback in which Nattie says she’s frustrated with her husband before cutting to a scene of her running away from an ostrich. It was structured in such a way that, if this were a viewer’s first episode of the show, said viewer would be left wondering how an ostrich managed to break up the marriage of this couple who has been together for twelve years. Trinity, who is the most consistent voice of reason on the show, suggests that TJ and Nattie go to therapy.

Now Cena and Nikki are driving and talking about the new Judd Apatow movie that John is appearing in. He mentions that it’s about the life of Amy Schumer and that he will be playing one of her boyfriends. Wait a minute . . . Amy Schumer dated professional wrestler Dolph Ziggler and now, in a comedy based on her life, a boyfriend of hers is being played by professional wrestler John Cena. Please, please, PLEASE tell me that John Cena is going to be playing a character based on Dolph Ziggler, because that would be the best unintended burial of Dolph all time, all my life, and I love it when Dolph Ziggler gets buried.

Anyway, that’s not the actual point of the scene. The point is that Cena apparently has a “comedic sex scene” as part of the movie, and Nikki is disgusted that he could do something like that. As is par for the course on this show, the argument escalates rather quickly, as in about thirty seconds we’ve reached the point that Cena literally says out loud that he may not be with the right woman. Yowza.

After a commercial break, Cena blames Nicole’s reaction on her own insecurities. Yes, that is correct. Naturally, she does not react well, mainly because she wasn’t asked in advance and was only told about the scene after the fact. I suppose I can see that, but, Jesus, we’re talking about the guy whose biggest film credit to date is playing The Marine getting an opportunity in a movie produced by one of the biggest names in modern comedy. He was going to be taking it regardless of her opinion and, if she tried to stop him, she would be completely in the wrong. It would be like my significant other trying to prevent me from getting a paid gig writing about pro wrestling for ESPN because I might have to see some of the models for the swimsuit edition.

Rosa goes on a date with a Gary Barnidge, who is allegedly one of the Cleveland Browns. He is not to be confused with Gary the Barn Owl of the Submission Squad. They talk about eating healthy, which he does and she doesn’t. They have all the chemistry of Pat Patterson on a date with Paige.

The Bella family is gathered and John and Nikki’s home, and this is the first time that Bella mother Kathy and Bella brother Dot have seen the place. Nikki tells them about John’s sex scene and, before she even completes the sentence, Kathy says, “Comes with the business.” Kathy is, as the Iron Sheik would say, a professional. Nikki is still the only one who sees a problem with what Cena is doing.

Marriage counselor Dr. Gina Midyett, who appears to be a real human being based on a cursory google search, meets with Nattie and TJ. Nattie in a confessional says that she booked the appointment and that she convinced TJ to come with her. Yes, that is typically how marriage counseling works. They discuss the fact that Wilson has largely been laid up with his injury lately, and he says that, if he never goes back to WWE, he could see some good in that. That seems like a healthy attitude to have, because his career could be ended by an injury at any time, but TJ still gets played as the bad guy because his not having a burning desire to get back on the road is seem by both Nattie and the counselor as an admission that he does not want to be with her. Boy, this guy cannot win for losing.

We don’t get to see the end of the therapy session, as instead Nattie and TJ show up at NXT after a commercial break. RYAN KATZ~!, who I will forever mark out for because he had a prominent role in the criminally underrated WSX (and was also GQ Money in XPW), pops up for a split-second , as does (I think) Corey Graves. Within five seconds of this happening, Nattie name drops Lou Thesz. That was the most bizarre yet enjoyable ninety seconds of cameos and references in the history of this show.

From there, we head to footage of the angle in which Brie Bella’s Summerslam match with Stephanie McMahon was booked. Remember what I said earlier about Chekhov’s gun? Yeah, this had nothing to do with anything.

At the same show, Rosa Mendes brings NFL Gary backstage, and we learn that he’s a friend of the Miz. That doesn’t play well for him. Some WWE production geek, who looks like Kyle Kallgren’s stunt double, pulls Rosa way for an interview, leaving Gary to have a conversation with Summer Rae. They discuss Summer’s prior career in the Lingerie Football League, which she spins as her having something in common with Gary. That would be like Ron Jeremy saying he has something in common with Christian Bale because he played Bruce Wayne in a pornographic parody of The Dark Knight.

Nikki Bella goes out on the town with Nattie, Eva Marie, and Ariane. She asks them for their opinions on the sex scene. None of the like they idea. I don’t know how much I would value the opinions of the three least mentally stable characters on this show. (And think of the territory that covers, by the way.) Nattie wants to ask how Nikki would feel if Cena got an erection while filming, but she’s too prudish to even say the word “erection,” so she settles on stating that Cena should keep his mouse in the house. How does that relate to settling his tea kettle?

Back at the WWE Performance Center, Rosa and Summer are stretching and clearly doing it in the most sexually provocative manner possible. They talk about Gary, and Rosa believes that he is playing hard to get because he has not returned a text message of hers for thirty minutes. If this is how women really think in 2014, I am so glad that I am not on the dating scene.

At WWE catering, the Bellas share a cookie with Nattie, and I don’t mean “cookie” in the Trinity sense of the word. Brie says that part of Nikki’s problem with Cena’s sex scene might be related to the fact that she has trust issues with men, because she’s been cheated on the past and because her father left her when she was a teenager. First of all, I love that it took Nikki the length of the entire episode to seek the opinion of her identical twin sister, going to everybody else that she possibly can first, including the brain trust that she had dinner with the night before. Also, note that she put Brie so far down on the priority list even though, in the last episode, Brie claimed that she valued Nikki’s opinion more than anybody else’s. Second, you know what that means? It means that Nikki’s objections to the scene RESULT FROM HER OWN INSECURITIES, namely EXACTLY WHAT JOHN CENA SAID WEEKS AGO. In other words, we spun our wheels for an hour here to get to the exact same point we started at.

In Tampa, Nattie has moved back in with TJ. Well, that came out of left field. Nattie has booked another appointment with the therapist, but TJ does not want to join in because he thinks it would be redundant. That is not how therapy works. TJ thinks that everything is fine, and Nattie starts crying. Dude, your wife hasn’t lived with you for a month and just moved back in for no real reason, apparently at some point within the last ten minutes. That’s about as far from “fine” as you can get without somebody being physically injured.

Rosa and NFL Gary go on their second date, and the subject of alcohol comes up. Rosa comes clean about the fact that she was in rehab, and she mentions that he it something to do with the fact that she had some “problems in her relationship.” If you know the real story, that is putting it insanely mildly. Rosa also over-shares in terms of her feelings on relationships, saying that she’s not looking to play around for the time being. The scene is edited in such a way that, as soon as Mendes finishes her monologue, Gary asks the waitress for their check.

Much of the cast is gathered in New York for what Nattie refers to as a “WWE Mommy Blog Event.” WWE . . . Mommy Blog Event? What does that even mean? Anyway, Nattie meets up with Darren Young, and they go out to dinner after their PR work is done. An obviously planted paparazzo asks Nattie where TJ is, and her big comeback is, “We’re not divorced yet.” This results in some controversy, but shouldn’t the real controversy come from the fact that Nattie Neidhart was seen out on the town with a young, single wrestler who was not her husband? C’mon now.

Nikki Bella is meeting up with her beau to explain her epiphany regarding his Apatow movie. Cena admits that he may have handled the situation improperly, and Nikki admits that her reaction was based on her prior dealings with men. Perhaps to avoid Cena saying, “I told you so,” she suggests makeup sex. Naturally, he has no problem with this, though he’ll probably be thinking about Amy Schumer when he does it.

Summer Rae is headed out for a date with . . . NFL Gary. If you didn’t see that one coming, you’re as naive Sting being asked to team with Ric Flair against Arn Anderson and Brian Pillman. The date scene consists of literally one line of dialogue, so it’s either building into something for next week or is yet another one of this show’s patented wastes of time.

Nattie returns home from New York, and TJ confronts her about her line tho the paparazzi, which apparently made its way back to him even though anybody who follows this show knows that episodes air on a several month lag from where they were taped and at no point in the last several months was there an actual paparazzi report on marital issues between the Neidharts. TJ asks Nattie point blank if any part of her wants a divorce right now, and she dodges the question like Trish Stratus bridging under a clothesline. She turns the question back around on her husband, asking him what he wants, and TJ says that he’d just like whatever will make Nattie happy, even if it is a divorce. Nattie locks herself in a closet, presumably with R. Kelly and John Travolta, and the show ends.

Overall: Yup, this still sucks.

Do you like Ryan’s exasperated ranting about Total Divas? If so, check out his exasperated ranting about numerous other wrestling-related topics on Twitter.