We’re treated to serious Denise again, as she half-assedly tries to connect this week’s two disparate sub-themes (all plots are subservient to the overriding theme of this show: Like Denise. Like her. Find her, if not lovable, then likable. If there’s anything you don’t like about her, remember: It’s complicated ) That is, her aborted dog walk in pursuit of calorie loss has made her realize that her dogs are badly behaved and to worry more about her father’s (toothless, as we’ll see) threat to put them in a kennel for the week she’s in Hawaii. Which, I cannot stop stressing, is not unreasonable.
And so a dog trainer is summoned, for the kind of interaction that The Girls Next Door do much better in my view because they don’t seem to mind looking stupid in front of strangers. And oddly enough, they’re all a lot more polite than Denise.
Douchbag dog trainer Jeff shows up. I dislike him on sight because of his long hair, straw fedora and general demeanor. He also appears to be utterly humorless, but then again, so is Denise. But I end up feeling sorry for him simply because Denise treats him shabbily for no reason. Denise poses the problem as one basically of appearances – she wants to make her father believe that the dogs are responding to training so that he won’t board them. Trainer Jeff outlines his technique. He doesn’t use “force” which is a nice contrast to all those professional dog trainers who beat dogs senseless when they disobey. He says, clearly (well, sort of clearly) “To get something, just so your dad says, wow, something is maybe happening I can create that…illusion”. I mean, he talks like a douchebag , too but I think he’s pretty clear when he lays out the parameters of this ridiculous “train the dogs in one day” project. Emphasis on the word illusion. He gets off to a bad start, with both me and Denise, by offering her a bracelet of karma beads. With a wooden insincerity that rivals Denise’s normal mode of speaking he says “It’ll bring love to the session.” Denise interviews that he’s kind of weird.
Jeff the trainer asks her to give him a dog that is “food motivated”. Dan and Denise have a serious discussion about which dog will fit the bill. Seriously, have none of these people ever encountered a dog? They’re all food-motivated. Jeff asks Denise if she has any pit bulls, which comes off as a total non-sequitur, but we never get to hear his reasoning so perhaps he finds them easier to train. I don’t know why I’m defending someone who’s wearing that hat.
She then offers him coffee or water and he asks for tea and says that any kind of tea that’s not caffeinated will do. Denise and Assistant Dan exchange looks like he just asked for a steaming cup of pig’s blood or something while a goofy musical riff punctuates the moment. I don’t get it. Herbal tea. The man would like a cup of herbal tea. Is that really so weird? And anyway, I pegged him as an herbal tea drinker the minute I saw that annoying hat.
They head outside to the pooping yard part of the farm, where Jeff the Trainer offers up his training techniques as somehow radical, though they seem pretty normal to me. Get the dog to do something you want and then give him a treat. I guess the radical part is supposed to be that he uses hand commands exclusively, and though I don’t train dogs that seems a little bit stupid. I mean, why not use voice commands, if you have a voice to use? Denise isn’t going to be herding sheep with these dogs, she just wants them to sit and stuff. Actually, what she really wants is them not to shit in the house but no efforts are made in that direction.
Denise, who apparently has the memory of a goldfish, is annoyed that she needs to use food to get the dogs to do what she wants. She has apparently forgotten what Jeff said about creating an “ illusion” (or was not listening). She thinks it’s unreasonable to expect her father to carry food around all the time to get the dogs to obey and it is, but that’s not really the trainer’s fault. I mean, someone set this scenario up, someone who wasn’t Denise and then, I guess, threw her into it to film the resulting hilarity. But does anyone think these things through in the slightest? The whole incident doesn’t make any sense at all, so I guess it makes as much sense as anything when Denise, rather obnoxiously, interviews that the dog trainer didn’t work out. In spite of standing there rolling her eyes throughout the entire encounter, she gives him a robotically warm hug and insincerely thanks him for the bracelet as he leaves. Because Denise knows how to behave on reality television, she just waits until her interview so that she can shit on him behind his back. Fortunately between the hat, the beads and the herbal tea I think it’s reasonable to assume that Jeff doesn’t have a television, so I expect he’ll be spared the indignity of watching this episode. Though maybe that would encourage him to cut his hair.
Next: An animal communicator. Oh crap. Sometimes I think some of these people exist purely to appear on reality television.
Evening at the Richard’s farm. Irv has prepared a dinner of fried chicken and biscuits. I’d like to believe that Irv cooks, because he seems like the type and I like him, but I’m suspicious. Denise demurs, because, if you haven’t heard (and apparently Irv hasn’t) she’s on a diet. He appears to have “cooked “enough food for all her “friends” so I, for one, would be really annoyed if they refused to eat it. But since it was probably cooked by some production assistant I don’t feel that bad.
“Hey our dinner’s here” Denise says as Kim arrives enters stage left with a prop bag of groceries.
“This looks like some crazy-ass diet stuff” says Irv as Kim pulls an enormous bag of lemons from the bag. “It’s the lemonade diet cleansing” she says. Oh. That’s all right then. Kim explains that the mixture is “lemons, cayenne pepper and syrup.” The girl cut up lemons while I Google this diet, which does apparently exist. Apparently, in addition to starving yourself, you’re also supposed to take laxatives. Is this really something you want to grab a bunch of girlfriends to come over and do together?
They measure and prepare the ingredients using a set-up on the kitchen island that resembles a cooking show. “This cannot be a healthy way to lose weight” reasonables Irv, worrying that they’re going to get sick. Well, um, that apparently is the point. Little dog Sugar take advantage of Irv’s inattention to jump up and grab some fried chicken off his plate. Instead of smacking him hard and dragging him bodily outside, like any sane person would do when a dog did something like that, Irv just grumbles about the kennel again while Denise laughs. It really is a mystery why these dogs continue to misbehave.
The ladies pour their concoction into wineglasses and Denise offers a particularly grating toast “To tight asses and skinny bitches” after which they offer up a forced “whoo hoo!” before downing the nasty beverage. They all make faces as they drink it. I wonder if the friends knew the show was going to be so much like Fear Factor? I guess it depends on how well they knew Denise before they got hired to pretend to be her friends. “I think I’d rather be fat than drink this shit” says Denise. Substitute “be fat” for “get liposuction” and we’re getting closer to the truth.
Day at the Richard’s Farm and Apple Stand. Denise interviews that the dogs are still misbehaving, even after spending half an hour with a hippie dog trainer, so since “time is running out” she decided to have Dan call a “pet communicator” as a last resort. I wonder how this idea got pitched by the producers? You have to know that any show idea that is most naturally concluded by saying “Just like Kendra did, on the Girls Next Door” is a lost cause before it’s even begun.
Everyone, and several dogs, answer the door, Irv holding one of them again. If he hates the dogs so much, why is he always carrying one around like he’s going to breastfeed it on demand?
The pet communicator (and “medium”, because, as she says, she also speaks to animals who have”crossed over”) is a predictably flaky-looking older woman named Catherine Olsen, but the segment is thankfully short. I briefly wondered why, if they’re stealing things from other E! reality shows already, they didn’t copy Kathy Griffin and meet with Cesar, the Dog Whisperer, but then I realized that, from the little I’ve seen of that show, he actually seems to hold owners accountable for their dogs behavior and compel them to work hard to help the dogs unlearn it. That wouldn’t work for Denise, who obviously is seeking the “lemon-cleanse” solution to her problem. Something ridiculous, that you try for a little while and then, when it doesn’t work, get annoyed and give up on the whole project and go get plastic surgery.
It’s confusing why Denise even agreed to meet with the woman, because it’s clear that she thinks the whole thing is nuts. The dog-communicator is predictably useless, opining that the dog that eats its own poop does so because he “just likes it. It’s tasty.” Bob the pig is next, and he tells Ms. Olsen that he humps the dogs “because it feels darn good.” I’m sensing a trend here. Lucy, the one who pees all over the house, prompts the communicator to ask if there’s been changes in the household. Denise says “excuse me?” and laughs in a way that implies she feels like the communicator ought to automatically know what the dog is talking about but I remain confused. Does she mean the divorce? Didn’t she get divorced like three years ago? It’s very Denise to assume that everyone else knows the details of her life. Granted, she’s gone out of her way to share them with the world, but that doesn’t mean that everyone else has paid attention or cares. Also, Denise needs to stop hiring people who clearly don’t watch television. Then again, if they did, they might not be willing to come on the show. The communicator shares that the disruption in schedule has stressed Lucy out. Denise shows the woman to the door, sweetly thanking her and saying goodbye while rolling her eyes about her in her interview. Denise is not doing a good job of making people like her.
They discuss the pet communicator’s results with Irv who says “I can’t believe all this stuff.” Word. Denise insists that since the dogs can understand them, he should threaten them with the kennel verbally. I actually feel like Irv’s been doing that all episode. Since the dogs are clearly the only ones on the show that aren’t taking direction, I trust their reactions more than anyone else. And they know they aren’t really going to a kennel, no matter what anyone says.
The women do a montage of disorganized-looking exercise on the lawn. Somebody uses one of those spring things with a handle that you attach to your feet. It’s all very thigh-master-looking. Denise gives up on some half-assed sit-ups and says “Okay girls, let’s pack it in and weigh in”. This persistent reference to these grown women as “girls” is starting to get on my nerves. Denise interviews that they’ve been working hard all week and we are treated to some recycled footage from 10 minutes ago of the Pilates and the lemon cleanse, etc. Remember the lemon cleanse? Those were good times. They head upstairs where Denise asks who’s going to weigh in first. They “girls” say that since its Denise’s “mission” she ought to. Denise is delusional as she claims that it’s been a “group effort” which makes me think this isn’t the first time she’s paid people to hang out with her so she could believe her own lies. We are treated to some dramatic music as she steps on the scale and discovers that she’s lost: one pound! Someone predictably reassures her that muscle weighs more than fat and Kim asks if she wants to work out again tonight. Denise abruptly decides that she doesn’t care what the paparazzi think, and claims she’ll wear her “fat jeans and a sarong.” Since we get to see her topless in a bikini in the next episode, what she actually means is “I’m just going to go get lipo like I should have in the first place.” She waves a hand airily and says “[Bleep] it! Let’s go eat ice cream.” She exits the bathroom and the girls march after her in an awkwardly formal-looking line.
Cut to the kitchen where a variety of sundae-making supplies are spread out across the kitchen island. The other women pretend to eat ice cream (in fact, Trish appears to be just holding an empty bowl because really, her abs of steel didn’t come from eating ice cream on demand) while Denise licks a large cone and asks if they want to make cookies later. Someone agrees enthusiastically. Liar.
Dan is pretending to work and Denise is Googling herself on a laptop in the office. The front gate calls and announces that the pet taxi is here. Irv is outside lining up a ridiculous number of pet carriers and shoving dogs into them. Denise runs out and they argue, Irv insisting as he has the whole time that he’s sending the dogs to the kennel for the week, Denise saying that she doesn’t want that to happen. I feel like they’ve discussed this several times already, so I’m not sure why Denise is surprised. “Dogs die in a kennel!” whines Denise. One assumes they didn’t get product placement for a kennel this week.
Irv interviews that “Denise is really laying out the sympathy card on this, but I’m not going to break.” Oh really, Irv?
It is unfortunate that pet taxi is a black van with shirred white curtains on the rear windows like a hearse. They argue some more. Denise’s dead mother is mentioned. Denise feels like she would hate the dogs being taken to the kennel, Irv believes that she wouldn’t care. That’s not an argument that anyone is going to win unless we get the dog medium back here. The dogs bark cheerfully from inside the van while Denise urges her father to “look at their faces”. After a few seconds of this, Irv does break and points at Dan and says that he better help him take care of them for the week. Um, somehow I doubt that’s going to happen. Irv gripes that now he’s got to pay the pet taxi guy for coming out and Denise bitches that “everything’s about money”. I guess they didn’t get product placement for the pet taxi service either. Irv starts lugging the pet carriers back out of the van. Dan doesn’t help. Denise celebrates with her dogs and says “Grandpa’s got a soft spot for you.” Denise claims that Irv will be in charge of the girls (by which I assume she means her daughters and not the 3 grown women that she pays to work out with her) and Dan will be in charge of the dogs. Irv says that he knows if anything happened to the dogs, he would feel terrible. Irv then claims that the dogs are still “not out of the woods” and repeats his now, even emptier, threat that he will call the dog guy again if they don’t behave. Denise hugs him and tells him that she loves him and promises that as soon as she gets back she’s going to get a trainer. A “real trainer” she clarifies. Oh Jeff! Snap! The dogs run around the yard and Denise coos over them as one of them begins to eat the pig’s poop.
Next time on Denise Richards. They go to Hawaii. She complains about the paparazzi (though someone ought to tell her that the singular form of that word is paparazzo, because that would be more accurate.) In spite of the presence of a lone photographer the girls take their tops off on the beach and Denise gets angry at him. It’s complicated.
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