Gen’s penchant for misreading the social dynamics on the yacht finally catches up to her.
Photo: Fred Jagueneau/Bravo
Another update on Nathan’s domestic violence case, before we get to this week’s episode: He has been convicted of assault occasioning actual bodily harm, intentionally choking a person without consent, and common assault. He failed to appear at his court hearing in Sydney, and there’s a warrant out for his arrest. It also appears that his victim, who was unnamed in the police report, is Gael; she hasn’t responded publicly. Police in Sydney have encouraged those with any information on his whereabouts to alert the authorities, but not to approach Nathan. A Bravo spokesperson told the New York Times that they do not “plan on working with Nathan in the future,” and also clarified, to the Los Angeles Times, that they do not intend to remove Nathan from the current season.
The stale drama between Nathan and Joe was getting on my nerves before we learned of Nathan’s crimes, but in that context, it’s doubly relieving that this week’s episode shifts the narrative focus away from their petty grievances. And to think that their friendship fell apart because Nathan, who “wanted to be a better man” for Gael, felt like Joe’s immaturity was holding him back. In past seasons, Joe’s immaturity was directed towards women; this time, it’s channeled into his relationship with Nathan, who acts even more immaturely. Joe expects Nathan to recruit the new deckhand into his ranks; Nathan expects to do the same.
Our new deckhand is an Italian called Massi with 10 years of yachting experience. He has been a deckhand, bosun, and even a captain. “I don’t have blood in my veins,” he tells us, “only espresso, cigarettes, and stress.” Love him immediately. Massi — with whom Joe feels Nathan is being too friendly — notices the tension between Joe and Nathan right away. He appears to have zero interest in it, which is another reason to love him immediately.
Gen readies herself to welcome Massi, though we know before she meets him that he’s not her type. Despite being an apparently nice and hard-working person, Massi doesn’t meet Gen’s requirements, which, if you’ll remember, amount to “Connor Storrie from that hockey show.” Gen is the protagonist of this week’s episode; it’s tough to watch someone go through a teachable moment like this. I recently engaged in a minor argument with my little sister, who is Gen’s age, that ended with her telling me: “Let me make my own mistakes!” Fair enough. Gen makes older sisters out of all of us.
We’ve watched Gen back herself into a corner all season — unfortunately for her, she got here all by herself. She is so consumed by her unmet needs that she fails to see the context around her. For example, everyone on the boat and probably innocent citizens in Dubrovnik can tell that Kat and Cooper are still an item. Not only are they bad liars, but they are constantly giggling with and at each other. Besides, if you just ask them — like Aesha and Kayley do — they will say that they are “just friends” with the biggest smile on their faces. Coop even admits to Aesha that they are “mean” to each other in front of other people so others won’t suspect anything. If Gen just woke up to her surroundings for a moment, or dared speak with any crew member about Kat and Coop, she would find out that they never really broke up.
Instead, she tells Kat that she’s “glad things didn’t work out” between her and Coop, and rushes back to their cabin to say that she touched Coop’s nipple in the laundry room. Kat, who is quickly reaching her limit, asks if she has to “watch out for” Gen, which should set off Gen’s alarm bells; but she retorts, simply: “I thought you weren’t into that anymore.” Then, in a confessional, Gen says that she hasn’t clicked with the crew, with the exception of Kat… and Coop. That makes her behavior all the more egregious. If she knows Kat is her only friend, why not be more considerate?
To make matters worse, Gen is slacking at her job. She still purports to have a sore wrist, but she refuses to wear her brace or get it checked. She also hasn’t reported the issue to Aesha, or if she has, we haven’t seen it. As the guests enjoy Joy’s truffle gnocchi at their apocalyptic grunge/Mad Max-themed dinner, Kayley radios Gen with a request to vacuum the primary cabin. Gen immediately passes the task onto Kat, citing wrist pain. Kat asks Gen to wear her brace and mentions that it’s a problem for the team if one of the stews can’t vacuum. When Kayley brings up the brace later, Gen says that she doesn’t want to wear it because people will ask questions and she doesn’t like “fussing,” a dog-ate-my-homework level excuse for getting off easy.
A DJ arrives after dinner to put on a dance party for the guests, who have a blast. Since being allowed to drive a Jet Ski, Jeff has been so seized with a lust for life that he cries while making a birthday speech for Kasandra — the same Kasandra he told to shut up on a rainy day. It’s ironic that, in the first episode of the season, Sandy and Nathan were cursing party boats, and now they are the party boat — by the time the guests go to bed, it’s past 1 a.m. The boat is at anchor, so it’s at a distance from other vessels, but even then, the police show up.
What a deflating reveal this was. The police come by to say that music is not allowed after 11 p.m. Gen and Massi are the only ones up, and Massi wakes the captain, who swears to the police officer, in a grade-school-like tone, that this will never happen again. The officer lets her off with a warning, and then everyone goes to bed. They’ve been teasing this police incident for so long that I was expecting a much bigger deal. That said, between Max’s ordeal and Nathan’s conviction, I’m glad this was just another Below Deck red herring. By the way: we hear from Max this week. He sends Sandy a video of himself with his father and a small dog driving through the desert. They made it! …right?
The next day, Kasandra, Jeff, and their friends leave very happy with their experience. They tip $26,000, which comes out to $2,000 per person. The drop-off day is also the anniversary of the passing of Kayley’s little brother, Ewan. Knowing that it’s tough to be away from family at times like these, Joe schemes with Aesha to get Kayley some flowers and candles. She is very moved by the gesture when he calls her to the sundeck after the tip meeting; they put the candles in the water. It’s impossible not to think of a similar scene from last season, when the crew held a small memorial for V’s late boyfriend, Bon. Despite his several shortcomings, at least Joe is in a better position about women now than he was then.
It’s a nice moment, but it’s all downhill from there, vibes-wise. Gen feels left out of the interior team, which, again, is her own doing — since day one, she’s been alienating herself from the other stews. Seeing Kat and Kayley do their make-up together in the crew mess gives her the perfect opportunity to ask shirtless Coop for a consoling hug. In the water taxi, Coop tries his best to make her feel included, but at dinner, he sits next to Kat, with Gen a couple of chairs over. The slight distance doesn’t stop Gen from embarking on a Flirt-a-Thon. She tries everything, from talking about Coop’s biceps to — I’m sorry to subject you to these words again — calling him “Massive Cock Coop.” This last one is met with stunned silence by the rest of the crew. When Gen gets up to go to the bathroom, Kat confronts Cooper about not shutting Gen’s advances down. He’s not as concerned as he should be, and his negligence makes Kat cry. Over the course of the night, they realize that this whole secret relationship thing is making things more, not less, complicated.
At the club, after Gen and Coop have been dancing, Kat asks Cooper again why he’s not being clearer with Gen. Frustratingly, Coop responds that he “struggles to say no,” which has to be the worst of all the responses he could’ve come up with. Somehow, Kat presses on. She even asks him, “like, what are we?”, which makes them laugh. I’m glad they find humor in the absurdity of their situation, but it’s also a way for Coop to skirt his responsibility in drawing a line with Gen. Worrying about what other people think is overrated! Another lesson for our young yachties. When they get back to the boat, Kat is so aggravated that she decides to sleep outside, where she has an unobstructed view of Kayley and Joe’s make-out session in the hot tub. Happily, they take their business to a guest cabin.
Another thing that happened at dinner was that Aesha gave Nathan a subtle bit of advice, which is that it’s important for a manager to adjust to their subordinates’ communication styles. Instead, in the morning, Nathan gathers his team to tell them that he has reorganized the anchor watch shifts: rather than having two three-hour shifts, they will now have one six-hour shift, starting with Joe, who will be at the bridge from midnight to 6 a.m. Nathan’s stated reasoning is that it’ll be better for them not to have to wake up three times during the night; the real reasoning is that the new schedule will significantly limit his interactions with Joe. Of course, that only throws more fuel on Joe’s fire.
In the laundry room, Gen asks Kat if things are okay between them. Our season MVP, Kat doesn’t miss a beat. She is firm and direct: “I’m done being disrespected and stepped on.” She says that it was “a joke” that Gen asked her to vacuum the day before, and that she’s sick of Gen flirting with Cooper in front of her. Gen is basically speechless; she mentions that Kat and Kayley are acting cliquey, but she knows she messed up. She apologizes weakly and leaves the conversation without trying to make amends. Now she really has no friends.
Gen’s day gets worse. After the preference sheet meeting — primary Karen is bringing her girls (including Michelle, on a carb-only diet) and one blow-up doll (“careful, Joe”) to the Akira One — Gen receives some flowers that arrive on the boat. “Perhaps our paths cross sooner than we think, ma reine,” reads the grammatically alarming, unsigned card, which causes a commotion. Joy had been getting texts from Luke calling her ma reine throughout the hour, and he told her to expect “a little surprise” soon. Joy reveals that the flowers are from Luke just as she’s taking the vase from Gen. The camera stays on Gen, The Office-style, to get the full scope of her reaction. “I’m standing here holding it,” she tells herself, in disbelief. Then Kayley asks if she’s okay, and Gen storms off, saying, “fuck this charter season.” It’s kind of an amazing moment. Everyone looks at each other awkwardly. I’m sure we’ll get more into this next week, as it looks like Gen will double down heavily, but she needs to remember that she and Luke broke things off even before he left the boat. I still maintain that he did not act right with her, but from the looks of next week’s episode, Gen might blow it out of proportion.
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