When everyone has competing agendas, things are bound to get messy for everyone and their adjacent stories. That’s the best way to describe this week’s UnREAL as the final two Everlasting contestants were revealed, Coleman and Yael continue scheming, and Madison and Jay continue working for that bonus.
Yael and Coleman scheming and manipulating to bring Quinn and the showdown brings up a surprising sentiment throughout the hour. While I’ve spent most of the series thinking these people behind the show are terrible and their actions even worse, there’s just something about how Yael and Coleman have manipulated the situation that makes me actively root for Quinn, Rachel, and the show. This sense that they are bringing these people to justice may be right but it feels disingenuous from the pair of them because it’s so their ulterior motives are so blatant, with Yael looking for a big story and Coleman looking for his next big project.
He certainly doesn’t help his case throughout the episode as everything he does, every decision he makes comes off as self-serving and manipulative. This becomes especially true when he decides to work with Yael on the whole Mary situation and decides to not only join in on the illegally recording conversations (like Yael did with Jeremy) but also, decides to hook up with Yael despite his relationship with Rachel. He’s somehow adapted all of the annoying “good guy” characteristics that make one roll their eyes.
With competing agendas, things were bound to get messy. With Jay designated Quinn’s number two after getting Darius back at the end of last week’s episode, he’s struggling to get Quinn’s respect while also trying to keep Darius happy while on the show. Things get complicated once Darius lets him know that Jay needs to find a way to get Chantal to bow out gracefully because he doesn’t want to embarrass her. Of course, Madison is not about to let that happen as she has kept her eyes on the prize (and that bonus) and tries to work things in her favor with the two remaining girls she has in the running.
While they may have thought it was just the two of them they had to worry about, they were completely wrong as Rachel comes back in to prove she’s still got it. Her attempt at adding drama and some action to the show led o one of the meanest and humiliating things Everlasting has done to the ladies. After hearing about how close Yael and Coleman were that morning, Rachel has no problems using “hot Rachel” for the drama and decides to lace the food she would be eating on her date with Darius with some form of laxative. The result is definitely peak humiliation as the show is “live.”
Meanwhile, Chet’s decided to take it upon himself to find ways to keep Tiffany all to himself and that whole series of developments has been weird to watch.
Elsewhere on UnREAL, we see another emotional side to Quinn. Since meeting John Booth, one of the most personal stories for Quinn has been her seemingly random decision to contemplate children. Quinn is eventually confronted with bad news about her chances of having any and she quickly spirals into one of the most emotional moments for the character. Constance Zimmer did a phenomenal job letting out that frustration about not having children and emphasizing that she just “wanted a choice.” It was a powerful moment for the character and despite how this topic felt like it came up abruptly, it was a solid one for Quinn especially considering we’ve never seen a truly emotionally volatile moment before.
That emotional moment is cut short when Rachel not only offers comfort to her mentor and they share a moment but also comes clean about how much of a terrible person Coleman is. Quinn’s response? Time to take the “asshole” down. Cannot wait!
Catch the season finale of UnREAL next Monday, August 8 at 10 p.m. on Lifetime.