We can carbon date this week’s trip to Chelsea because the action happens during Fashion Week. This isn’t signalled by the presence of actual fashion in the episode, but the obsessive, breathless cries of ‘You know, it is Fashion Week!’ which is spoken with the same fervour as an actor in a period drama yelling ‘Don’t you know there’s a war on?!’ at a colleague who has just said ‘Might I have another spoon of sugar in my cocoa to celebrate the start of 1942?’ Anyway, the one hot, up to the minute style tip advocated by both the models and the denizens of Chelsea is that we must stop washing our hair. Clean, brushed locks is totes 2015 - if you want Insta likes, it has to be greasy and straggly, like a tasseled cushion abandoned in a flood damaged shed.
Rosie praises the show the gang have just see for its ‘really cool location’, which is the fashion version of seeing your friend’s terrible play and pointedly admiring the scenery. Fred and Liv are now so horrified by the idea of models wearing clothes that they decide that Fred will have his photograph taken with nothing on. You do not have to be Poirot to deduce that they both hope this leads to sexy sex times. Proudlock has a trendy new jacket which looks as though it might be filled with cut price DVDs for him to flog down the Phene, and we learn that Victoria doesn’t think brown is a colour, and she changed clothes between show and bar because her outfit was ‘itchy’. Oh love, Pringle bits in your bra again? We’ve been there.
Jess offers her styling services to Mytton, who, when we think about it, really is starting to look like a young Jeremy Clarkson on the first day of his archeology course. JP, wearing a Jess-approved shirt which Bridget Jones’ Mum would describe as ‘Like something out of Chairman Mao, darling,’ is already whinging about Ollie, which is a bit much before the first ad break. Boulle is looking dashing in a labcoat, and is trying to make cider in test tubes. ‘As you know, I love apples’ he tells a sceptical Sam, explaining that he used to eat rotten, fermented ones when he was ‘a baby in Paris - we had an orchard.’ What? WHERE? Did Boulle grow up among the tombstones in Pere Lachaise? Surely the only time there has been an orchard in Paris is when they did a pastoral window in Galeries Lafayette.
Mytton tells Jess that he wants to ‘keep having fun’, which, translated, means he will keep seeing Emily until she has sex with him, and then he will hide from her until the Christmas episode, where she will turn up with a load of cleavage and a mask on a stick, and scream at him in full view of a string quartet. Steph is back, and gatecrashing dinner with Ollie, Nick and Julius. Ollie is delighted, the others look as though the waiter has just informed them there’s no lobster thermidor left, so they’ll be eating a fart in a chafing dish. Ollie lets Steph know that she has plans for Binky and Julius, while Steph immediately asks Julius if he’s gay (‘Are you on their team?’) and just stops short of saying ‘Well, if you like vaginas, you’ll love mine!’
Fred’s photo shoot is essentially a recreation of a mid nineties Davidoff Cool Water ad, which is apt because the set up is so cold that his balls appear to have retracted all the way up to his throat, for warmth. Liv warns Julius off Binky, and he promises ’If it if it ever ends in tears I'll be there to be a mate.’ Do! Julius, do not take your eye off the ball, just go and wait in a Pret around the corner because this is all going to blow up in JP’s stupid smug face in seconds. Make sure you get a takeaway cup.
Meanwhile JP and Binks are on a date with Scrumble, frequently pausing to say ‘Isn’t this fun! What a lovely time we’re having!’ when it looks about as enjoyable as spending the weekend having a boiler installed. JP is more in love with hating Ollie than he is with Binky. ‘Have your opinions, but don’t be a dick’ is her response. ‘I am having such a lovely time with you, I am over the moon,’ insists JP, while sounding like he’s trying to process the news of the death of a close family member. Binky bears the face of a person who has just been given a fresh urine sample and told it’s gluhwein.
Nosy Akin forces Jess and Mytton to talk about their ‘lovely little flingus’ (EH? WHAT?) in front of Emily. He might be the new boy, but he was definitely hired to make things awkward. Mytton takes Emily to one side and tells her he doesn’t want to get serious before going in for a snog. Urghhh, why are boys?!
Boys abound at Proudlock’s model casting, to Biscuits’ distress (‘It’s a men’s brand!’ explains Proudlock, who is quite chilled about the fact that his best friend doesn’t seem to know what his job is. Fred reveals all about revealing all to Liv, in a strangely stilted way. Julius runs into JP, who confronts him with his arms folded. There’s obviously a bit in The Art Of War about upsetting your enemies by making your body into a solid barrier, but JP just looks as though he’s had a big lunch and feels slightly self conscious about it. Julius drops a bombshell - apparently at camping, Binky said she thinks JP isn’t the right guy for her. Because he isn’t! I have Twitter enemies who’d be too good for him.
Akin shows Jess his ‘Look, I had Sonic The Hedgehog skinned especially!’ loafers, and Jess reveals that Mytton has been sending her panicked messages in the early hours of the morning. Akin says it’s a booty call, Jess points out that a message saying ‘help, I’m drunk’ is many things, but not sexy. What’s weird is that when Jess shows the message, there’s nothing else in the text chain. It’s as if Mytton and Jess never have text conversations, but he sent her the message to move the plot forward and ignite a bit of dramatic fuel. Hmmmm, surely not!
Jamie is in a bad mood, because having given Proudlock some free, model choosing labour, he’s now picking apples for Boulle. He gets his own back by implying that Liv is on the brink of having it off with Fred, and Boulle flushes to his roots - not the Parisian orchard ones, either. JP has a chat with Binky about Julius’ revelation, and she says ‘it’s a very different situation, you’re the one who's fighting to get me back,’ which is absolutely true! Yet JP takes exception to it. You can tell she’s pissed off because she calls him Josh. ‘You wouldn't want the attention from another man if you appreciated what you had in front of you,’ he says, sulkily. OK, what does Binky have in front of her? We see a sulky, posh, entitled man who seems to be spending most of his time in the gym. Binks, run! Run like the wind!
Time for the final fashion show of fashiontastic Fashion Week! Steph complains that whenever she tries to see her old Chelsea pals, they’re ‘out of town’ and Mark Francis pretends not to know who Kanye West is. Fred’s model shots are circulating, and they’re so Eighties Athena that we’re surprised he’s not accessorising with a newborn baby. Akin calls Mytton out for messaging Jess, and Mytton tells Emily that he’s ‘a bit freaked out by girls at the minute’. To prove his point, he’s come dressed as a priest. Binky is sad that Ollie is being a bit monsyllabic, text wise, and JP tries to say ‘but I hate him, and I want you to hate him too!’ It’s getting quite annoying, then Julius turns up and they have a big chat about Binks, in the third person, while she’s there! Urghhh, how can we stop the JP juggernaut? Surely this is what Kickstarter was invented for.
Hero of the week
Let’s give it to Rosie and Proudlock, who were the calmest, least stressed people in the episode even though they were the ones working the hardest and most fashionably.
Villain of the week
I want to make an example of people who go around snogging people and then saying ‘Oh no! So confused!’ because it’s attention seeking, misery making, toxic behaviour - so Mytton it is.
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Made In Chelsea 12, Episode 2: Mummy Felstead Guards Binky’s Place, JP Makes A Face, And Fred’s Back
Follow Daisy on Twitter @NotRollerGirl
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.