Vanderpump Rules, for all intents and purposes, should be a vapid exercise where a fleet of interchangeable young people work “restaurant jobs“ as a front for the opportunity to appear on a Bravo Television show. Instead, it's become something much deeper, because much of the original cast remains. How do 20-something hunks become 40-something yearners for the past? Apparently, as we found out this season, by messing around in the shadows and compensating for their inadequacy. What theoretically was a “kids just wanna have fun“ spinoff a decade ago has now featured several deconstructed marriages, dissolved friendships, and one stolen pair of sunglasses, and 2023 was its darkest, genre-bending year yet.
- Adam Weinrib
FanSided Content Director
Best fan moment of the year
The drop-everything moment of the reality season came in March when it was revealed post-production that Tom Sandoval (a “worm with a mustache“) had carried on a months-long affair with the much younger Rachel Leviss, unbeknownst to his decade-long partner, Ariana Madix. She's now dancing with the stars, but even seven months later, some among us haven't stopped daily rabbit-hole dives into who knew what when and whose necklace symbols meant what and what's going on in Jax's brain.
What we’ll remember about this fandom a decade from now
I'll remember how everyone hooked up with everyone else ad infinitum. The cast was comprised entirely of universal archetypes of “detestable people“ and yet somehow the show still managed to stay engaging and shocking by transcending “reality“ and enduring real trouble when the cameras stopped rolling.