head for the hills

Even Lauren Finds The Hills Exhausting

Remember that time when you worked on the sorority carnival for like two months straight and it totally consumed your life? And you would cry and stress about it and you made enemies with the girl who didn’t show at the final meeting? And then years later, you’re like, why the hell did I stress about that stupid thing so much? It was a sorority carnival for god’s sake! Hindsight is 20/20, and you suddenly see how narrow-minded about life you were at that point. That girl who was your enemy is now a doctor and married, and why was it you hated her, anyhow? We think this is how Lauren is feeling about her run on The Hills. Like, how could she ever have cared so much about these situations and people? It’s kind of funny, but kind of frustrating for viewers, since we’re supposed to be the ones judging The Hills characters, not Lauren! But anyway, we feel for her. She’s so ready to move on.

We open with Lo, Lauren, and Audrina, getting drinks and discussing Lo’s new job in Culver City at Smashbox with something called Davis Factor. None of that makes sense to us. Isn’t Smashbox a makeup line? Is the Davis Factor a person or a mathematical method? If we lived in L.A., would we know the answers to all these burning questions? Aud mentions that Justin Bobby heard about how she “fell asleep” in Brody’s bed. Lo and Lauren grimace at her. “As long as I don’t see his face, I’m okay,” says Aud. Good luck with that, according to the previews.

So let’s cover Heidi and Spencer first, as usual, since they’ve been stuck in the same plotline for roughly a century. Or maybe two weeks. We can’t tell, and we really don’t care. We find out that Stacie the bartender — the shrew who maybe made a move for Spencer — texted Heidi and asked her to come meet at the bar. So Heidi and her breasts confront Stacie; Stacie and the permanent bubble in her throat try to make nice, but Heidi’s not having it. “You’re a homewrecker, you’re rude, and you’re a slut,” yells Heidi. Oh god, this is embarrassing. “You’re crazy, I feel bad for you, and you’re boyfriend’s a dick— good luck!” Stacie counters. Point Stacie, we think. Then these two lovely girls part ways. Back at the apartment, Heidi tells Spencer (who’s Twittering!) what went down. “I took care of it,” says Heidi cryptically. “Who are you, Tony Soprano?” says Spencer. Funny! You know things are bad when we start to side with Spence. “I dare you to find another Stacie and wait till what happens with that,” she taunts. Very scary, Heidi. And obviously very effective, since Spencer rolls his eyes.

And now to the good (eh, better) stuff. Somewhat inevitably, JB has called Audrina. “Hey-O, Justin,” she greets him. Well, that’s weird. They meet up the next night, and Audrina’s wearing seriously sparkly shoes and Justin’s hair looks crazy in a bad way, almost like a bowl cut. They rehash their standard drama. Audrina wants out, Justin’s not having it. He follows her out of the bar. “You know how many times you say ‘serious,’?” he asks her. Good point, JB. “Don’t go snapping at me,” he says. Then Audrina actually snaps at him, like, literally, which is cute because she’s dumb and that’s not what he meant. She tries to walk away through a gate. “Go through your little gates!” JB says. Ha! Her little gates! Anyway, she leaves, and we cut away to a sad shot of JB’s bizarre striped socks and capris.

Oh, Stephanie, where do we start? She and Lauren have lunch and she confesses she’s scared of Kelly Cutrone. “I need to take a break from stressing about work and go on a manhunt,” says Steph. Lauren looks dubious. Steph dishes about her new guy, “Robert! Roberto! Bert!” Stephanie has really come into her own bizarre, word-repeating personality these last few weeks, and we think we like it. Lauren tells her to concentrate on work instead of guys, but Steph’s staring off into the distance, and LC has to wave to get her attention. “I’m trying to picture the guy right now. I really like him. Work, work, work, work!” says Steph. Seriously, Steph? We’re starting to worry; someone should call her sponsor. Back at People’s Revolution, Stephanie’s still acting crazy and doesn’t pay attention when Lauren tells her to make sure to pack up the clothes for the shoot at Smashbox with Lo (so that’s what Smashbox is!). Obviously, Stephanie forgets to do this, distracted by her “No Diggity” ring tone, which we’ll admit is very awesome. Over at Smashbox with Davis Factor (he’s a person!), Lauren discovers Steph’s mistake and angrily calls her. Steph is lunching with Roberto, who looks like a wax statue. When Lauren returns to the office, Kelly is p-i-s-s-e-d. “You seem awfully happy. I’m not so happy,” she bitches at Stephanie. Kelly tells LC that she is going to have to fire Steph, and then draws her finger along her neck. “Think guillotine; clean,” Kelly instructs Lauren. Whoa. We have to wait till next week to see her execute that, though. Sad.

And now, our Unequivocal Hills Reality Index:

As real as Kelly is apt to fire an intern who sucks:
• Audrina and Justin’s inane bickering has all the trademarks of immature love. We’re buying it.
• Spencer’s Twitter account. We found it, and it’s just as annoying as you’d hope.
• Lauren’s lack of “Fall Neutrals” at the Smashbox shoot. If fashion-reality TV shows are to be believed (and why wouldn’t they be?), someone always forgets something at those shoots.

As fake as Lauren’s tolerance for any of her friends other than Lo:
• Roberto. He’s straight from Madame Tussaud’s.
• Justin Bobby’s interest in Audrina. Why does he keep coming back after blowing her off?
• This is up for debate, but Stephanie was way too stupid about work, even for her. We think there was some definite MTV meddling in that situation. Thoughts?

Even Lauren Finds The Hills Exhausting