This year has brought a lot of change to all of our lives. But what’s not changed is that Total Bellas continues with its banal look at the lives of (now WWE Hall of Famers) Brie and Nikki Bella and their insipid families. So many things cancelled, and not this show? Well played, 2020. The season premiere shows the twins dealing with the pandemic, their simultaneous pregnancies, and includes more poop jokes than an entire season of South Park. Join me for the (baby-) bumpy ride.
In the first scene of the new season, Nikki gets freaked out by how her pregnancy has distorted the shape of her hoo-hah, so she decides not to shave it. Yep, this is going to be a long season.
The girls recap their current situation: both of them are pregnant, they’re awaiting the release of their autobiography, and the pandemic has sent Nikki and Artem back to Phoenix from LA where they were staying when Artem’s stint on Dancing With the Stars got put on COIVD pause. Now the girls are keeping busy with Tik-Tok videos, online shopping, and obsessing over each other’s bowel movements. Did I already say that this is going to be a long season?
The book is being released in a week, and the girls are afraid of what Kathy (their mom) is going to say when she reads it, since Nikki has told a couple of big secrets in there that Kathy wasn’t aware of. They talk about whether they should tell her about it first, or let her read about it, and decide on the latter for no good reason. [Here’s SlamWrestling’s review of the book.]
Later, Nikki and Artem are planning to move to LA, where Artem can get back on Dancing With the Stars. But Brie wants them to stay so they can ride out the pandemic together. Also, Brie doesn’t think that Nikki will be able to manage a baby without her around, which is probably true based on how her practice on baby dolls are going. You’d think that Artem is maternal enough for both of them, but apparently he’s just as bad.
Brie shares her concerns with Bryan, who’s on the road. He misses her and Birdie, but someone’s got to pay the bills.
The girls call Kathy who’s recovered quite a bit from her bout with Bells Palsy, but isn’t 100% yet. Nikki tells Kathy that she may be surprised about some of the stories in the girls’ book, but doesn’t share with her the details – that she was raped twice when she was younger.
Bryan is back home, and he gets sucked into doing baby impressions, which Brie thinks will help acclimate Nikki and Artem into parenthood. She runs a bootcamp where Nikki and Artem can practice baby-management skills, including feeding, changing, and putting them down to sleep. Artem takes to motherhood like he’s a woman trapped in a man’s body, so like Artem. Nikki is predictably useless, like when she’s wrestling. So, no surprises on either front.
Later, Nikki comes home from the health clinic, where she got some bad news about the baby’s heart. The heart machine tech told her that the baby (Matteo is what they’re going to name him, btw) has a speck in his heart, and they’re both understandably concerned. Nikki wants to go to their primary doctor, Doctor A, who’s in LA.
Nikki heads next door to visit Brie, and tells her what the technician said about the baby’s heart. Brie says instead of driving to LA, check with the doctor here and not rely on the words of a mere heart machine technician. But Nikki says she’d feel more comfortable going to her doctor in LA.
A couple of days later, and it’s book release day. All of the headlines are about Nikki’s rapes, which she knew was going to happen (not the rapes… the coverage of the rapes), so there’s a series of clips of her talking to various media outlets about it.
Kathy calls her, and she’s ticked because she had to find out about the rapes through the headlines. And that all of the coverage makes it seem like she was no help at all to Nikki at the time. She says she’ll read the book and then they can all talk about it. In a talking head segment, Nikki says that it was customary when they were growing up to keep things to themselves, so she didn’t feel comfortable telling her mom about the rapes at the time. It doesn’t explain why she wouldn’t give her a courtesy heads-up about it being that it was going to be in a book, but maybe we can chalk that up to pregnancy hormones, I guess.
Nikki and Artem pack up for their trip to LA, and poor Artem has to put up with those pregnancy hormones for a 6-hour drive. I’d feel bad for him, but he seems to like the opportunity for the two of them to have some girl-time.
In LA, Dr. A tells her that the heart speck is a normal thing and in all likelihood won’t be a problem, so that’s good. They debate whether or not they should go back to Phoenix or stay in LA where the insurance plans make it easier to finance the baby delivery operation. Then more bowel movement talk, because this show.
Kathy calls Nikki after reading about the rapes, and is heartbroken about what happened back then. Kathy apologizes for not being someone that Nikki felt she could confide in at the time. But Nikki explains that she was too ashamed and depressed to tell Kathy about it when it happened. But she’s stronger now and she hasn’t let those experiences hold her back in life.
Back in Phoenix, and the girls are out with Birdie who is the voice of the viewers when she loses it at the twins’ yammering and tells them to shut up. That’s a smart kid. Nikki tells Brie that she’s going to have the kid in LA, and Brie is disappointed. Nikki explains that since Artem is an unemployed dead-beat, she has to save her pennies, and having the baby in Phoenix will cost too much. They’re both sad. Not as sad as me, though, as there are still several more weeks of this season to go. Hang on a little longer with me, won’t you?
