Summer House Season 10 Will Go Down as a Fascinating Reality TV Experience

On Tuesday, Summer House will close out its tenth season with the third and final episode of its most dramatic reunion yet. This has been a huge season for the Bravo series, which scored its highest overnight ratings ever for part one of the reunion. That’s a clear result of the scandal that shook the fandom earlier this year, when cast members Amanda Batula and West Wilson posted a cryptic Instagram statement on March 31 affirming the recent rumors about their romantic connection.

It makes sense that viewers would turn out in droves for this reunion. After all, Amanda and West have a lot to answer for. I’m not referring to Amanda sleeping with another man while married; she and her husband, Kyle Cooke, had already separated by the time she and West allegedly hooked up. In fact, this time last year, many fans might’ve even cheered at Amanda getting some side dick for once. Kyle has put her through a lot over the years, including several cheating rumors both substantiated and unsubstantiated.

No, everyone can agree that Amanda’s real sin here was getting with her close friend Ciara Miller’s ex — and West’s sin was getting with his ex’s close friend. Sure, Ciara and West only technically dated for a few months over two years ago, but the context is important here. Not only did West lead her on in Season 8, ignoring her disinterest in quick flings and ultimately succumbing to his chronic inability to commit to a real romantic relationship, but he spoke about her repeatedly in the press afterward and clammed up at the reunion instead of offering a single convincing apology or explanation. It took roughly a year for her (and us) to tolerate his presence again while he tiptoed around as a funny side character, then another year for her to open up and admit how badly she missed him as a friend. Amanda was there for Ciara through it all — and Ciara more than returned the favor by supporting Amanda through every step of her marriage’s slow-motion collapse.

So viewers are curious to hear Amanda and West share their points of view and try to justify … all of this. When exactly did they first become romantic (whether that means the first time they kissed, the first time they had sex, or the first time they confessed feelings for each other)? Is this really worth sacrificing many of their closest friendships, not to mention their public reputations and potentially their careers? (It’s very possible both will be fired from the show before next summer, as is sometimes the case when a cast schism runs too deep.) What makes Amanda think West will treat her differently than he did any of the other exes he dumped before things could get too real? Also, what was with that weirdly unapologetic and vague Instagram hard launch?

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Fans might want the villain perspective, but they also crave the vicarious thrill of an inevitable verbal lashing from Ciara, Kyle, and basically everyone else on stage, host Andy Cohen included. That’s certainly what they wanted following Scandoval, the infidelity scandal that revitalized (and ultimately destroyed) Vanderpump Rules. Many Bravoholics have pointed out the similarities between the two scandals. Both occurred in their respective shows’ tenth seasons and involved shocking new friend-group-incest couplings that tore the ensemble apart. In both cases, behind-the-scenes drama came to light while the show was already airing, leading viewers to mine every scene for early signs of fishy behavior and develop conspiracy theories about how far back these affairs went. (It helps that some of the episodes were clearly reedited to play up the foreshadowing.)

Think of how strange it felt to watch Amanda and West interact throughout the second half of Season 10 — to notice every time they shared a long hug or even just exchanged glances. West frequently called out Kyle for the way he talked to his wife throughout this season, but he and Amanda also just seemed to naturally gravitate toward each other. Of course, friends in Summer House tend to get very intimate and touchy fast, as Amanda pointed out in the reunion this week. Many dynamics in the house blur the lines, like Ciara’s flirtatious friendship with Jesse Solomon. But when you watch this season through the lens of the recent news — something that won’t land in the same way for viewers who binge the show after the fact — it’s impossible not to watch a little closer every time Amanda and West are in the same space.

People thought this meta element would kill the series for good, and it’s still too early to say it won’t. (If the show repeats Vanderpump‘s mistakes, Season 11 will be its last.) But what once seemed potentially destructive to the Summer House viewing experience — the knowledge that everything we’re seeing on screen happened last summer and is woefully outdated compared to the shenanigans playing out this very spring off camera — has also become the season’s greatest asset. Amanda and West’s ill-advised fledgling relationship has lent a powerful dose of dramatic irony to the show, as well as the new spin-off In the City.

I’d go so far as to call Summer House Season 10 one of the most fascinating, emotionally complicated reality-TV-viewing experiences I’ve ever had. The extratextual element forces you to watch the show with two brains: the version of yourself who already knows about Amanda and West, and the version of yourself who has no idea. One brain wants to yell at West whenever he appears on screen, especially whenever he flirts with Ciara, a relationship we know is doomed to fail; the other brain gets taken in by their easy chemistry all over again. One brain tells me that West is using Ciara for screentime, once again careless of the ever-present racial element that plays into his visible prioritization of Amanda over Ciara; the other brain sees real emotion on both sides when Ciara and West finally make real amends and agree to be “best friends again,” a moment that brought tears to my eyes.

Like I said, watching this season is a weird experience — a “mindf—,” to use West’s wording in that reconciliation scene. And in most of these cases, neither brain is entirely right or wrong. They’re two different takes on a set of characters we’ve gotten to know fairly well over the years, people who remain stubbornly human no matter how much the fandom wants to flatten them with blind valorization or uncompromising condemnation. Every week of this season following the Amanda-West revelation, I’ve seen fans flock to social media to sh—talk the two new villains and often praise Kyle Cooke, the original would-be villain of the season — only for the show to air and remind us that all three people are far more complicated than we might want to believe, in both positive and negative ways.

Scandoval might remain the peak reality TV scandal when it comes to delicious, brain-breaking dramatic irony (though Russell Armstrong’s death overshadowing Season 2 of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills offers a darker, equally fascinating example). But what’s happening between Ciara, West, and Amanda is also quite a bit sadder than what happened between Ariana, Tom, and Raquel. Ariana and Tom were together for a long time, but they were rarely framed as cute together in the same way as Ciara and West, whose arc has often felt rom-com-esque. And Ariana’s friendship with Raquel never had the depth and mutual adoration of Ciara and Amanda; Ariana’s famous reunion performance is beautiful and raw (“f— yourself with a f—ing cheese grater”), but it’s not painful to watch like this reunion. The probably-permanent dissolution of Ciara and Amanda’s friendship hurts.

Tuesday’s final reunion episode should offer more entertainment and more schadenfreude, but what will linger for me is how complicated this journey was as a viewer. I keep thinking back to the finale of this season, when Ciara and Amanda shared a goodbye hug before leaving the house for the last time that year. Looking at and holding each other, they both started crying; neither needed to say how thankful they were for each other this summer. It’s painful and yet oddly illuminating to watch that scene with both brains, to witness the realness of the moment and marvel that a friendship like this could break down so easily. But it happens every day, because people are complicated and messy. Some just have cameras on them.

Part 3 of the Summer House Season 10 reunion airs Tuesday at 8/7c on Bravo.