The Hills: After Paris, LA Is A Letdown for Lauren

Monday night we got two episodes of The Hills with very little action.

After last week's romantic Paris premiere, it was a bit of a letdown to see Lauren come home and immediately start moping over Brody. For all her talk in the "previously on The Hills..." narration about how getting away changed everything, Lauren's non-relationship with Brody didn't seem all that different. After half-heartedly proclaiming how excited she was to be single and "ready for trouble," her night out at Les Deux with Audrina resulted in more moping after a confrontation with Brody and Frankie, where the boys freaked out over their chilly reception from Lauren. Brody denied having a girlfriend (as Audrina reported last week), but stormed off without really explaining himself. Lauren tried to vent to Lo over lunch the next day, but was wisely cut off. "I just feel like we have this conversation a lot," Lo told her. "About how we need to find you a nice boy." I couldn't agree more.

The status of Heidi's relationship with Spencer remained just as unclear. Although we never saw them reach an agreement about their relationship in Crested Butte last week, Heidi seemed assured that although Spencer was moving out, they'd remain committed to each other. She was shocked to hear from Spencer's sister/new roomie, Stephanie, that Spencer had mentioned seeing other girls. She confronted Spencer about their new rules when he came to pick up his stuff, but only got, "I'm giving you your space, remember? Lots of it," as an answer. And since this is Heidi and Spencer, who are completely incapable of being straightforward with each other (or anyone else for that matter), she didn't press him for any more of an explanation. All Heidi/Spencer communication seems to be relayed through Stephanie at the moment, and I can't say I'm sad to see these two kids apart.

Whitney, ever the smartest of the group, stayed out of the drama in order to focus on her career. She made good on her promise to leave Teen Vogue to pursue greener pastures, which came in the form of a new job at a "Fashion PR" firm called People's Revolution, where she was immediately giving the ominous warning from her new boss, Kelly, that "...you basically made a deal with the devil." And here's where Whitney proved how much more sense she has than Lauren. Instead of smiling away her concern, she asked, "Why do you say that?" Kelly's answer: "Because you have to give up your entire life. But you'll be getting a whole new one." If only Lauren could follow her example.

The night's second episode took us with Whitney on a trip to New York's Fashion Week where she helped out at a show. The only real difference I saw between her new job and her old Teen Vogue responsibilities was that she got the chance to weigh in on the outfits the models would be wearing in the show, instead of just lining them up for the runway. She received a lot of praise for some advice she gave on a pair of tight pants. We'll see if Whitney continues to succeed when she gets back to L.A. next week.

The great majority of this episode dealt with the shocking development that Stephanie is in Lauren's computer class. Text messages were sent, and apparently both Heidi and Audrina, and their respective co-worker friends, had nothing better to do that day than to talk about this. (I wonder if these girls get paid by MTV to act interested in the lives of their co-workers' friends?) At first I was convinced nothing interesting was going to come of this storyline, but then Stephanie approached Lauren and apologized for yelling at her the first time they met. And suddenly, Lauren was defending Stephanie to Lo and Audrina and calling her "a nice girl." Heidi and Spencer were both none too pleased with Stephanie for speaking to their enemy, and loyalties were called into question.

When Stephanie complained to Spencer that he wouldn't share his feelings with her, he rightfully called her out as being untrustworthy, and smartly observed that anything he said to her would probably be relayed back to Heidi or Lauren. I'm not sure what kind of game Stephanie is playing with the three of them, other than that she may figure the more time she spends with any of them, the more likely she is to get on TV. Maybe she's out to finally put an end to the Lauren/Heidi war, or maybe she'll just make things worse. Either way, that lunch scene with her new buddy Lauren at the episode's end felt a bit ominous.

Coming up next week: Heidi and Spencer feel betrayed when Stephanie attends Lauren's birthday party! (All right, so worse it is...)

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