Gisele and Wendy Target Angel in “High and Dry”

As Angel’s journey falls apart, Giselle smells blood in the water. Photo: Andrew Webers/Bravo

Friends groups can have very complex dynamics. People like to argue otherwise, but not everyone gets along with the same level of camaraderie or intimacy when socializing with the same five or more people on a regular basis. Some people only chat in group chats and never spend time together one-on-one. Because while they may all love each other, their individual personalities don’t mesh. At best, natural friction manifests itself in competing meme battles on WhatsApp or arguments over who gets to Venmo. But the only way this delicate ecosystem will survive is if everyone agrees to be on the same page. Once the mastermind decides you’re expendable, everything escalates quickly, something Angel Massey is learning the hard way.

Angel started this trip on the back burner. As she revealed in a recent interview and on Bravo’s After Show, the trip was originally meant to be a couples trip (which is part of the reason we’re bombarded with so much nonsense about the romantic lives of single women). However, with most of the unmarried couples gone, production and Angel re-strategized, leaving only one house left to house both the cast and production staff and equipment during the popular touring season. These logistical factors may have been unavoidable, but they provide an important opening for Gisele, Wendy, and Ashley to launch the final attack and, through a series of legitimate claims, render the Angel persona superfluous within the group. Water pressure is unstable, if not completely non-existent, in your home. There are few services in remote areas. They are isolated from virtually everything, and their drive home at night looks like the beginning of another movie in the “IT” series. All of these complaints are valid, but they are fairly expected problems for someone who is used to spending long periods outdoors or in remote locations. However, after numerous conflicts between her, Gisele, and Wendy, Angel was long past the point where she could demand the benefit of the doubt from the group.

It’s a shame that the planning for this trip turned out to be so haphazard, as Angel’s House itself is a real gem, a very chic property set on vast grounds. I watched a tour of the Masseys’ home on the popular channel Homeworthy, and it gets even more amazing when you dig into the details of the property. Given where she lives and the recent revelation that she just finally bought a house in Potomac, it’s entirely understandable that she’s insulted by false statements about her family life and finances. It’s clear that she has the most money of them all, but unfortunately she can’t properly showcase it outside of small talk, instead addressing rumors that she tried to pay $1,000 a month, which isn’t enough to rent an apartment in Montgomery County, much less an entire house in Potomac.

However, instead of us being able to truly enjoy Angel’s beautiful mansion, her failures in fostering companionship within the group begin to take effect. The girls barely acknowledge the amazing spread they are given at dinner, as they can only confide to Angel how far away they are. There’s little mention of a day trip to Aspen on a private jet (which Angel recently said he paid for himself) because they all decide the breakup is Bobby’s fault. Aside from a brief intermission where Tia and Stacey bicker again over the most inconsequential white lie they’ve told since the first person they decided to say to a passing acquaintance at a party, “Yeah, we should definitely get coffee sometime,” Angel can’t escape the never-ending nudges from the women who have spent nine years on one failed trip after another. I don’t mind the ladies expressing their dissatisfaction with the hospitality, but I can’t forget that on one trip to Nevis, we spent a decade overlooking the Potomac, which gave us a grand tour of all the Ramada Inns on this side of the Mississippi River. When I bring up Ashley’s trip to Austin, I can’t help but break out in PTSD hives as they party next to literal chicken shit.

But none of that matters in the end. Angel’s trip to Kemo Sabe next week might go perfectly – we know it won’t – but she’ll still be exposed to this gang. While they’re right that Angel should have accepted the certain sacrifices that come with a cast trip and adjusted accordingly, I’m frustrated that this group of women keeps falling victim to the same tropes over and over again. We are once again targeting the cast member with baseless speculations about her marriage. I don’t know exactly why being recently divorced qualifies you as a relationship counselor, but Monique has clearly decided that her role as a friend is to group resident Iyanla VanZant. I hope she chooses another hill worth dying for. Instead, I get to watch Gisele and Ashley intensely ponder the health of their marriage. It’s all because the grizzled former footballer would rather hang out with his male friends than his wife’s annoying, catty, cheap coworkers. If this is all they come up with, I’d rather go back to making lame catfish puns.

To no one’s surprise, Gisele finally smells blood in the water and attacks, creating a play that completely takes over Angel’s journey after the trip to Aspen, to be released next week. See you all again!

• No matter how hard they try, no one is going to make me care if Stacey and Chris are dating. It’s unfortunate that Monique is receiving threatening letters from her lawyer, but I’m sure that’s due to her decision to return to TV as much as the rumors being spread.

• I love the outdoors, but when Angel started listing all the lions, tigers, and bears in the neighborhood, my eyes widened like saucers. Are you trying to tell me that people in Denver live comfortably at Pride Rock?

• I’ve mostly been trying to get a feel for Tia, but I’m starting to realize that she’s more of a pot-stirring presence than a show-off, especially when it comes to giving Gisele ammunition to use against others. I have my eye on her!