The Jaw-Dropping ‘Below Deck’ Episodes Should Change Reality TV

Everything we can’t stop loving, hating, and thinking about this week in pop culture. [Manage newsletters]( [View in browser]( [The logo for Daily Beast's Obsessed] Everything we can’t stop loving, hating, and thinking about this week in pop culture. with Kevin Fallon Everything we can’t stop loving, hating, and thinking about this week in pop culture. with Kevin Fallon   Advertisement     This Week - A [disturbing, game-changing episode]( of reality TV. - There’s [so much]( [gay stuff]( this weekend! - The most relatable Beyoncé has ever been. - A really funny Missy Elliott visual. - A photo I will never forget.     Still Shocked Over Below Deck: Down Under Typically, we think of reality TV as a distraction. We wind down at night with a glass (or seven) of wine, watch grown women argue over [whether a cheese board is tacky](, laugh at how silly it all is, and cringe because we know that we’ve probably had an argument before about something as inconsequential as a cheese board. We gawk at grown adults who seem to think it’s a good idea to get engaged to a stranger after just weeks of [blindly dating them in a pod](—fiercely judging them on the first pour, wishing we were them by the time the bottle empties. (We love love!) It can be jarring, then, when the “reality” of reality TV confronts its audience. It’s not that reality TV, even something like the [Real Housewives]( or [Love Is Blind](, ignores the dark truths of the world. Sure, when these shows reflect our lives, we like to think it’s through a funhouse mirror. But the appeal of these series is getting to know the people in them, and that means following them as they deal with heartbreak, death, legal issues, depression, bigotry, and so many other, well, realities. Even a means of escapism, like these shows, can force us to contemplate certain truths of society—and our own moral compasses. While that may be a tradition of the genre and one of its most redeeming values, it was still a shock to watch the two episodes of Below Deck: Down Under that were released this week on Peacock. The episodes were disturbing and triggering, yet inspiring and refreshing. The way the incidents in the episodes are handled by the crew, on camera and off, should change how we view reality TV and what we expect from it going forward. For a genre that made its name on exploitation, these episodes could be a turning point in terms of what is now demanded: accountability.   (Warning: This piece discusses sexual assault.) Below Deck: Down Under is a spinoff of the [Below Deck franchise]( that takes place in Australian waters, following a team of deck crew and stewards as they serve demanding guests vacationing on a luxury yacht—and then as they unwind together when a charter is over. In a jaw-dropping sequence at the end of the first of this week’s new episodes, “All Wrong,” the crew comes back from a night of countless tequila shots. Margot Sisson, one of the stews, is escorted to bed by chief stew Aesha Scott, who is concerned over how drunk Margot is and how keen bosun Luke Jones seems to be about hooking up with her. Aesha stays with Margot until she falls asleep, and then leaves her room. Soon after, the power in the boat goes out, and Luke is seen in the dark sneaking into Margot’s room while the rest of the crew is occupied dealing with the outage. Margot is in a deep sleep when Luke takes off the towel he was wearing and climbs into her bed naked. Immediately, a producer darts from his position behind the camera and starts trying to get Luke out of the room, as Luke tries to rouse Margot into saying everything is OK. The producer won’t relent, despite Luke’s attempts to close the door in his face. Aesha then comes running in to check on Margot, as Luke storms off and locks himself in his room. After making sure Margot is safe, Aesha immediately goes to Captain Jason Chambers’ bunk and tearfully fills him in on what happened; Aesha is a survivor of a non-consensual sexual assault, and is distraught that a similar incident nearly occurred at her place of work. Captain Jason springs to action, removing Luke from the ship immediately and firing him the next morning. He gives a speech to the remaining crew about the expectation for boundaries and safety, emphasizing the need to rally around Margot in the wake of what happened. When stew Laura Bileskalne, who we had watched over previous episodes sexually harassing deckhand Adam Kodra, bemoans to Margot that Luke’s firing was unfair and makes her feel guilty about it, Captain Jason fires Laura as well. It’s an astonishing sequence of events. It’s horrifying, upsetting, and deplorable, in terms of the behavior witnessed. But it’s staggering how it was handled. The swiftness and the urgency with which Aesha and Captain Jason acted was remarkable; they showed a sense of nobility and understanding of the gravity of the situation—for the crew but also perhaps even for the viewers who would be watching at home—that we don’t instinctively associate with reality TV stars. There’s a much darker version of events that could have happened, had cameras just been allowed to continue rolling, sans any intervention. That’s awful to think about, but not hard to imagine happening, according to how we have been conditioned to understand how reality TV works.   Whenever something veers more unpleasant than frivolous on a reality series, we as viewers get that icky feeling: How complicit are we in this? Was it juicy to watch Real Housewives like Erika Jayne and Jen Shah navigate their legal woes? Of course. But what’s the true entertainment value of that when there are real-life victims involved? We giggle uncontrollably as reality cast members devolve into foolishness while guzzling alcohol. But is a drunk Luann de Lesseps falling into a rosebush as funny in hindsight when she’s later arrested and embarks on a complicated, still ongoing sobriety journey? There’s a classic hypocrisy in the reality TV fanbase where we bemoan certain cast members for being “monsters,” while rooting on their monstrous qualities because it makes for good TV. Across seasons, we constantly see stars calibrating their behavior—their level of monstrosity—based on what’s working or not working for the audience. A Below Deck crew knows that the outlandish partying is a major appeal to fans; but what is the repercussion of that? These episodes of Below Deck: Down Under, and the outpouring of reaction from viewers [who were so impressed]( with how they were handled, show what was no longer working: the pretense that these stars don’t deserve dignity or protection, just because the show is something they signed up for. Reality TV isn’t just entertainment, neither for the cast nor the audience. It is reality, and when it’s finally treated as such, as was the case with how the incidents in these episodes were handled, it proves a new value to the genre. This is a reality-TV turning point.     Red, White & Royal Gays There’s something that I find very cool about a weekend that has multiple options if you happen to want to watch some gay people fall in love. (Or out of love. Or however it is you want to describe the deliciously complicated dynamics taking place in [Ira Sachs’ Passages](.) The big release this weekend is [Red, White & Royal Blue](, a new movie about the son of the first female president secretly falling in love with the prince of England. It’s notable because the book was a blockbuster hit, among the “I’ll read this in a weekend while on vacation” set. (I was one of those people; can confirm it delivers.) It’s also notable for how innocent it is, generally—a version of those Hallmark and Netflix “royal rom-coms,” but with queer people instead—and how pissed off that tends [to make some people]( who demand content be more challenging, diverse, and realistic about the queer community. You will certainly find a film that satisfies the [latter desire in Passages](, a movie about a toxic love triangle that will make you want to have sex immediately, never have sex again, marry the first person you meet, and never date another day in your life—and which somehow makes all those contradictions make sense. It is, in a point I will never stop harping on, one of the goddamn hottest movies I have ever seen, with [phenomenal sex scenes]( that prove why sex scenes belong in cinema. Go see Passages! Also, see Red, White & Royal Blue, which is now on Prime Video. It delivers everything comforting, silly, mindless, swoon-inducing, and aspirationally romantic as those aforementioned Hallmark and Netflix movies. But you know how (and this is a safe space to admit it) you watch those and there’s just that one chaste kiss under the mistletoe at the end, and you may think, “Actually, I would like to see these people have sex”? Red, White & Royal Blue has you covered! They’re not Passages-level sex scenes, but they exist. Which, for a movie like this that very easily could have omitted them entirely, is kind of astonishing.   It’s like a “Choose Your Own Adventure” Gay Movie Weekend. You could even add the very [sweet Netflix series Heartstopper]( to that mix. I wouldn’t call it a “diversity” of content, considering that these are all projects about (mostly) hot white people with an average of six-to-eight abs. (The character of Alex in Red, White & Royal Blue is half-Hispanic.) But, hey, progress moves slowly, I guess.     Beyoncé, I Get It People have long been fascinated with what ridiculous, extravagant, or even petty things celebrities [put on their “riders”](—the list of things that must be present for them in green rooms and hotel rooms when they travel. I think it’s because we like to judge these people, of course, based on what wild demands they may make. But also, I think some of us wonder what we would do. If someone told us that anything we wanted, no matter how specific or peculiar, could be procured, how outlandish would our requests seem? I mention this because this week I stumbled upon news of what I think is the most rational, reasonable, and, yes, luxurious, tour rider request I’ve seen in a while. [According to The Sun](, Beyoncé has her own toilet seats shipped around the world while she’s touring, so that she never has to sit on one that has been used by someone else. Now, I don’t know if this is really true or not. But…try and tell me that, if you had all the money in the world and someone told you this was possible, you would not entertain the thought. And truly, the thought of Beyoncé deigning to sit on a toilet seat that one of our plebeian tushies has touched? It should be against the law.     Behind the Music It’s a really cool time to be a music fan right now, as the 50th anniversary of hip-hop has been widely [celebrated this past week](, with some of the genre’s greatest artists talking about the legacy of the music in [several]( [pieces]( that [came out](. By pure coincidence, one of the greatest hip-hop artists of all time gave some interesting color to one of her iconic music videos. After Missy Elliott’s “The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)” was ranked the best hip-hop music video ever by Rolling Stone, she offered an anecdote about filming it. If you remember, Elliott wore a giant, cool-as-hell blow-up suit in the video. Well, as she just revealed, getting to set wasn’t so easy. The funny thing is, the New York and Brooklyn that I know, at least then, probably wouldn’t have even batted an eye.     A True Birthday Gift I cannot speak to whether or not this photo of Andrew Garfield is real, or new. However, I can say that no less than a dozen people sent it to me on my birthday last weekend, a true gift for which I am so grateful.     More From The Daily Beast’s Obsessed Inspired by the Barbie movie, longtime collectors are literally freeing their own dolls. Here’s why unboxing valuable Barbies has become TikTok’s latest trend. [Read more](. After Meg 2, shark movies are clearly in crisis. Who will save them? [Read more](. It’s about time there was a good Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. Here’s what Mutant Mayhem gets right about our pizza-loving shell pals. [Read more](.     [See This]   - Red, White & Royal Blue: Finally, a queer rom-com that lets its gays [just be plain dumb](. (Now on Prime Video) - The Eternal Memory: The must-watch documentary of the year so far. [Bring tissues](. (Now in theaters) - Painkiller: An appropriately [furious new drama]( about the opioid crisis that takes aim at the Sacklers. (Now on Netflix) [Skip This]   - Heart of Stone: Gal Gadot, have your agents ever [heard of a good movie](? (Now on Netflix) - The Last Voyage of Demeter: What if we stopped making [movies about Dracula](? Just a thought! (Now in theaters)   Like our take on what to watch? Check out our see skip newsletter! 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