Love & Hip Hop Atlanta Season Five Premiere Recap: Mimi Must Have Been Lonely

After a break lasting just long enough for us to realize that Stevie J and Joseline’s fantasy of youth and relevance could NOT carry an entire show, Love and Hip Hop Atlanta returned for a new season Monday night. Our favorite ATL-based urban drama premiered with promises of paternity stunts, tragic weaves, cat fights and even a little taste of the rainbow. (Insert extreme side eye.) More on that last bit of foolishment later!

The ratchet hour opened with the customary frienemy meet-n-greet. Aside: Does anybody but me miss when reality shows used to at least give the characters something to do, like a paint party or something? Now they just have them show up to janky club events or meals — which never have food but somehow always have drank — and lob shady comments until we’re clearly updated on who’s still wack and how. Girl I guess. Anyway, we learn quickly that Karlie Redd has opened more “stores” in Atlanta and now in Los Angeles. The eff is she selling? Despair? Tammy Rivera, aka Waka Flaka’s boo, lets us know that she’s playing house wifey while Waka is away doing important music shit (?) and we discover that Rasheeda and Karlie have mended their damaged “friendship,” with Rasheeda announcing that she’s glad Karlie has decided not to be messy anymore. Which is a messy thing to say.

After a few strategic comments to let us know Joseline and Stevie J remain in California and Mimi has a new boo — who’s not so subtly referred to in gender unspecific pronouns — in walk the newest additions to the LAHHATL enterprise, The Kings. Karen “KK” King and her doobie-sportin’ sons Scrapp and Sas are “notorious” around the A for nothing less than a stint on America’s Most Wanted. But no shade, the only thing they need to be wanting is some Edge Control for them unruly-ass man buns they be rockin’. But I’m not one to gossip.

Also in tow is Scrapp’s girlfriend Tommie, a Lil Mama lookalike who KK immediately pulls into some gossip of the “I’m not trying to meddle but my son is layin’ up with his baby mama and iown fug with her cause she killed my dog that time so girl gwan straighten it out” variety. When the hell will these mothers learn your son is your son, not your man? Let his penis be great and mind your business!

But Mama KK doesn’t. And so we find Tommie in yet another one of those bar meet-n-greets, this time with Karlie and Jessica Dyme. Oh Dyme. I want so much better for you than that Charo hair. Anyway, they’re just shooting the breeze, you know, completely not staged, when Tommie reveals her true reason for this little excursion is to spy on Scrapp’s baby mama, who happens to work at said bar. And who do you think is their waitress? Scrapp’s baby mama. I’m not gonna front: Iown remember the girl name. But I do remember she sexy and brown and her breasteses sit up nice. Does anything else really matter? I’ll save you the trouble: Nawl.

On to the guys. When we left off last season, Scrappy was busy havin’ a thick, slave neck, while Yung Joc was “snoring on people’s couches” as Karlie Redd so astutely reminds us. This season the cousins have united in ain’t shittery, getting a bachelor pad where they can do ho shit in peace. I’m confused because Scrappy ain’t had a hit since Obama was a Senator and Yung Joc judged a soapbox derby in the city last fall, so there’s his career. In short, what do you gain from sleepin’ with either of these cats? IJS if you’re a Yung Joc or Lil Scrappy groupie in the year 2016, you probably didn’t have a prayin’ grandmother.

Tucked into this episode was some weird geriatric beef between Mama D and Rasheeda’s moms that involved husky voices, an ill-fitting bodycon dress and somehow, a bag of hay. I’m just gonna lay that on the altar.

Perhaps the biggest hook of this episode was the unveiling of Mimi’s new boo, which happens about 15 or so minutes into the episode. Bae is go karting. Bae takes off helmet. Bae is a woman. Bae is Stud Bae.

Stud Bae is rockin’ a Lightskint and looks to be roughly 10 to 20 years younger than Mimi. Stud Bae has been under wraps for a year because Mimi didn’t want her business out in the streets. Ma’am, you gargled a man’s balls on camera while swinging from a shower curtain. The time for coyness has passed. After some cringe worthy commentary about her being “gay for” Stud Bae, Mimi announces plans for a big birthday party and coming out fiesta. Can I just take a second to clarify that you are not now a lesbian because you got desperate and wifed up some chick who took you to two-for-one pasta at Maggiano’s? I just needed to put that out there, ‘cause this is gonna piss me off all season.

And so the episode closes with an all-white party, where Mimi pulls Stud Bae onto the stage and lets everyone know that at the tender age of 61, she’s decided to taste the rainbow. Stud Bae, whom Rasheeda points out has shifted from a Lightskint to a Frankie Lymon/Bruno Mars, is like “Ying Yang in this thang!”

And it becomes apparent that this is gonna be a long, long season.