You know homemade skin flicks are becoming commonplace when there's a sex tape controversy on a reality show, and it's not even the biggest storyline of the episode.
That was the case on Tuesday night's episode of Vanderpump Rules, in which Kristen Doute's amateur p0rn was overshadowed by Jax Taylor undergoing one of the most severe midlife crises ever caught on camera.
Jax's meltdown began with something even more innocuous than someone else's sex tape -- namely, a beach clean up.
Yes, newcomer Max (some day we'll stop referring to him as a newcomer, we swear) hosted a party that involved picking up litter.
Sure, it's a smidge pretentious, and as Katie Maloney pointed out, he apparently decided to host this shindig on the cleanest beach on the planet, but his heart was in the right place.
Still, for some reason, Max's invitation was met with a flurry of rage texts from Jax.
"I don't think you understand we'll be driving for 4 hours," he wrote. "You have to cancel this dumb idea. This is dumb and pointless. Nobody cares. It's frustrating."
"After your [sic] done showing everyone my text like a little girl you can answer my question," he wrote. "Why don't you skip my pool party Friday don't like tattle tales."
Yes, Jax was so irate that he uninvited Max to his pool party.
Did we mention this guy is 40?
"WOW!! You're really crying to my wife because you can't come to my house??? REALLY?!? Wow dude!" he wrote Max. "You aren't coming!!! Cry all you want! STOP TEXTING ME!!!"
Jax later offered a half-hearted, "woe is me" apology.
"I'm going through some mental problems right now, some mental issues and I'm angry all of the time," he explained.
Thankfully, no one was fooled.
"90% sure he's full of sh-t and trying to spin this around to create pity for himself," Tom Schwartz said in a confessional.
Jax promptly proved just how full of sh-t he is by exploding at Kristen over allegations that she "hooked up with this guy, there's a video and Carter saw it."
After learning that Kristen was less than truthful about the timing of the footage, Jax stormed out of her party, declaring Doute "such a f--king liar" and claiming Kristen "lives in her own delusional world."
Again, it's unclear why Jax cares about the tape at all, but Scheana has a theory that might go a long way toward explaining Jax's recent furies:
"The wedding's over. No one's paying attention to me, so I'm just going to fight with all of my friends," she reasoned.
If you're a longtime fan of the show, you know that the "Jax is a changed man" storyline is a common trope these days.
His friends need to believe it in order to convince themselves that they haven't wasted all these years placating a demented sociopath.
His wife needs to believe it in order to have any faith in the future of her marriage.
And Vanderpump viewers need to believe that they're tuning in for something slightly more interesting than the slow self-destruction of a 40-year-old narcissist.
The problem is, it's getting harder and harder to convince ourselves that Jax is actually headed in the right direction.
"I hear something, I get triggered, I have super highs and super lows," Taylor explained during Tuesday's episode.
"I smoke a lot, then I gain 20 pounds and I'm like, f--k I gotta lose weight, so I take a f--king Adderall. I can't win."
It sounds like he's got some serious issues to work out.
But when we see Jax harassing fans on Twitter for diagreeing with him about a hockey jersey, it's hard to feel any sympathy for the guy.
We hope he's able to find the help he needs, and we hope he realizes he needs to do so ASAP for the sake of his loved ones.
Maybe he should start by putting the Adderall aside for the time being.
