Below Deck Down Under Season-Premiere Recap: Hot and Bothered

Ahoy, mates! Welcome to the third season of Below Deck Down Under, now aboard an enormous yacht called the Katina, sailing the turquoise waters of the Seychelles. I am thrilled to be here; much like the American auteur Steven Soderbergh, Below Deck is my Bravo franchise of choice. This season’s preview promises plenty of crying, throwing up, injuries, strong winds, intra- and interdepartmental fighting, firings, and general distress. We are once more under the guidance of the mulleted Captain Jason, and besides Chef Tzarina (now a brunette!) and deckhand Harry, the Alain Delon of the Bravo universe, the crew is mainly brand new to the series. They are:

All crew duly aboard and introduced, Captain Jason calls a meeting and emphasizes he’d like to run the boat as a family; from this point forward, they are all “brothers and sisters,” even though they all met mere moments ago. The deck and interior crews also meet and state their good intentions for the season (no bitchiness), though we all know how little it takes for this initial confidence to fall apart. While Lara and Captain Jason try to figure out the logistics of service — the kitchen is all the way at the bottom of the boat, three flights of stairs from the sundeck, and running food up will involve stairs and the elevator — Tzarina and Anthony discover a truly vile infestation of weevils and maggots in the kitchen drawers. Captain Jason rallies the whole crew to help sanitize the galley. Once they’re done with that disgusting job, they can move on to their first preference-sheet meeting. The primary charter guest is Mark, an investor from Brisbane with a vegan girlfriend named Megan, and their requests don’t seem too out of the ordinary: They want water toys and a global tasting menu. But before the guests can arrive, the crew must eat lunch, the preparation of which is Anthony’s responsibility. Tzarina suggests a way for him to cook the fish, which he takes as “micromanagement,” another ridiculous overreaction.

The guests arrive, and they are immediately sweating. In fact, everyone is constantly remarking on the Seychelles’s heat and humidity, except for my girl Marina, whose stifling hometown has earned the nickname Hell de Janeiro among locals. Mark and his entourage look like run-of-the-mill rich people. The first sign of their being disturbing is that they have the stews unpack their stuff even though they brought sex toys in their luggage. Poor Brianna has to handle their “anal beads,” which she places next to some nausea medication on the primary’s bedside table, according to Lara’s suggestion.

In anticipation of dinner, Tzarina and Lara rehash some of their former trouble, which predictably comes down to a fight for control: They both want to be in charge, and as heads of their respective departments, they both have legitimate claims to it. It’s imperative that they work together, which, in reality TV–speak, means they’ll never learn how to work together. For dinner, Tzarina has conceived of a four-course menu that will feature not one, not two, but three different kinds of soup, the ideal meal for 87-percent-humidity weather. The problems with the disorganized dinner service start here: Lara doesn’t catch on to the fact that the guests will be eating soup for three hours, so she doesn’t line up the cutlery accordingly. On the one hand, she should have asked Tzarina if she didn’t know what tom kha gai is, but on the other hand, she is not crazy to assume it’s not soup given the two other courses are also soup. 

While the interior is getting ready for dinner, Johnny gets stranded on a Jet Ski without a key or his radio, and as the sun starts to set, he drifts farther and farther from the Katina. He has no other option but to whistle and hope that someone will notice he is gone. It’s dark by the time Harry wonders if Johnny should be back by now. On the way to rescue Johnny in the tender, Harry doesn’t miss the opportunity to remark that it was “Mr. Lead Deckhand” who forgot to check whether or not he had keys before untying the Jet Ski, a rookie mistake. Captain Jason will “let it slide as long as it doesn’t happen again,” and when he makes it back onboard, Johnny is embarrassed. To cheer himself up, he checks his biceps in the mirror of his cabin. Still there!

Dinner service is quite the workout for the crew, especially Marina, who is tasked with bringing 400 different kinds of spoons up and down the stairs. Though the cutlery problem introduces some delays to the service, particularly as they are rolling out the tom kha gai, the food is a success with the guests. Lara apologizes to Tzarina for being snappy, who concedes it’s only their first night — they’ll find their groove. By the time dinner is over, the only unhappy crew member is Anthony, who does the dishes all night.

The guests all go to sleep before midnight, which seems like a good thing until they are all up at 7 a.m. and wanting things. The previous night, they agreed to an 8:30 a.m. breakfast, a fact they have forgotten before the clock has struck eight. A couple of things here. You are on vacation on a superyacht. Why are you up before 9 a.m.? Secondly, if it is 8:15 a.m. and you have already had one or two coffees, why can’t you wait 15 minutes until the agreed-upon breakfast time? Why must you suck? The guests are waiting for the food to be set on the table before coming up for breakfast, and the crew is waiting for the guests to set the table. As things quickly begin to spin out of control, Lara is stuck in the elevator holding a vanilla latte. Flustered, she takes everyone’s egg orders before announcing the specials, which is very annoying for Tzarina, who had already made the specials and was not planning on making personalized egg plates — the chef had explained to the guests that she usually sets out a spread along with a few specials for breakfast, but that was before they had collective amnesia. Overwhelmed, Lara cries in her room after the rush of the meal.

After Tzarina has hustled to fill all the egg orders, Anthony questions why she didn’t put him to use. I hate to admit this, but he’s right. While she struggled, he was just standing by. Tzarina doesn’t like it when he makes the suggestion — she calls him a twat — and though he could work on his delivery, he is being communicative and proactive, and she could definitely use his help. Tzarina is a “If I want it done right, I’ll do it myself” person, which is understandable, but for the vibes in the kitchen to improve, she’ll have to be a bit humbler.