Why The Vanderpump Rules Season 12 Reboot Is Already A Failure

"Vanderpump Rules" is back, sort of ... but it sucks now!

I'll back up. "Vanderpump Rules" started its life as a spin-off of "The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills," largely due to two things. One, housewife Lisa Vanderpump happened to own a few restaurant hotspots in West Hollywood where all of the young, beautiful employees were constantly fighting, sleeping together, and fighting about who was sleeping together. Two, one of those employees — Scheana Shay — had an affair with the husband of one of Vanderpump's fellow housewives (specifically, Brandi Glanville's constantly cheating husband, Eddie Cibrian). Once producers like Alex Baskin figured out that Vanderpump's restaurant SUR Restaurant and Lounge — the full Christian name of which is Sexy Unique Restaurant Restaurant and Lounge — was a hotbed of drama, they picked up cameras. The rest is history.

Here's the problem: after nine seasons, the messy original cast of "Vanderpump Rules" started growing up. A bunch of them have kids. All of them basically stopped working at the sexy and unique restaurant. This was nice for them, but terrible for people like me who love drama and mess. Then, noted idiot and original "Vanderpump Rules" cast member Tom Sandoval cheated on his girlfriend of nine years, Ariana Madix, with their close friend Rachel Leviss, and the scandal known as "Scandoval" brought this near-dead show back to life!

Here's another problem, though: thanks to Scandoval, everybody in the original cast chose sides, and nobody of note sided with Sandoval. Add this to Madix's understandable aversion to filming with her ex, and the show's 11th season absolutely flatlined. Bravo's response wasn't to cancel the show, but to recast it with entirely new "SUR-vers." This sucks, and here's why.

If you've never watched "Vanderpump Rules," I am jealous of you. This is a show I genuinely and passionately wish I could erase from my brain, "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" style, and watch in its entirety for the very first time. Part of this is because, unlike the long-running "Housewives" franchise, there's an organic nature to "Vanderpump Rules" that proves irresistible — all of the people working at SUR were already dating and friends, so the cameras walked into reality TV gold when they started filming their dynamic. 

Right off the bat, SUR newcomer Scheana Shay is met with abject cruelty and frankly insane prejudice from the restaurant's young queen bee Stassi Schroeder, a woman who unironically tells her deeply evil boyfriend Jax Taylor "I am the devil, and don't you forget it" in the show's very first episode. Katie Maloney and Kristen Doute flank Stassi, the former being a woman constantly dragged down by her dopey boyfriend, Tom Schwartz. The latter starts the show dating the aforementioned Tom Sandoval and spends the rest of her time on the series, fully losing her grip on reality. Also, Lisa Vanderpump is there to yell at everyone for how gross they're being at any given moment.

This is all incredible to watch. I cannot stress that enough. Before the show started losing energy in season 9, "Vanderpump Rules" proved itself as one of the most action-packed and delicious reality TV shows in history, from Doute's infamous green dress to DJ James Kennedy screaming "It's not about the pasta!" outside of an L.A. eatery at Lala Kent. Nobody can ever top these people, and the new cast members definitely aren't up to the task.

Not only are the new servers at SUR entirely too self-aware about being on a show, but they're pale imitations of the original cast members at their best (Natalie Maguire, for example, is a Scheana Shay knock-off, complete with ill-advised pop star dreams). Other vital archetypes are simply missing. There's no Jax Taylor here, which is both a curse and a blessing; his antics on the "Vanderpump Rules" spin-off, "The Valley," were so overtly abusive that he got kicked off that show, but also, a new version of "Vanderpump Rules" sort of needs its token sociopath. Even when the new cast members venture into the back alley behind SUR — a beautiful place that's been host to many, many amazing screaming fights and should frankly become a UNESCO World Heritage site — it's boring. 

These new cast members are messy and bizarre, but they're also wholly uninteresting. Half the drama in the new "pilot" of sorts is about some guy in his 50s named Paulo, and he doesn't even appear on-screen. When Jax toyed with the emotions of multiple women, he at least had the decency to show his face. It feels like producers are manufacturing dramas, and while that's not exactly new when it comes to reality TV, the best shows in this genre feel completely natural, and that's precisely why the original "Vanderpump Rules" was so special. Nobody on this new show would have the questionable wherewithal to tell their manager to "suck a d***" while chainsmoking, as Kristen Doute once infamously did. Sorry, Bravo; you can't put lightning back in the bottle. The new "Vanderpump Rules" is DOA.

"Vanderpump Rules" airs on Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on Bravo and is available to stream on Peacock the next day.