The inaugural season of Teen Mom: The Next Chapter is finally coming to a close, but not before the moms sit down for contractually-obligated conversations with Dr. Drew and Nessa to recap all of the contrived gal-pal conversations and vasectomy talk of Season 1. 

Part 1 of the Reunion kicks off with seven of the eight moms already on stage, eager to get this filming nonsense over with so they can begin taking hoards of shameless selfies  while their professionally done hair and makeup are still fresh. Thirty minutes before filming begins, Producer Morgan lets the moms know where Ashley will be sitting on the stage (although the single open seat kind of gave it away) and Briana quickly informs everyone that she isn’t cool with the seating arrangement. 

Briana says she isn’t comfortable sitting so close to Ashley, and once she realizes her sister Brittany isn’t there on hair-pulling duty, and her mom Roxanne isn’t present with her trusty red pump, Briana gets nervous and hustles her denim-jumpsuited behind backstage.

OK before we move forward, the denim jumpsuit must be discussed. 

What in the Kelly Kapowski-looking, denim diaper butt covering ever-loving hell is Briana wearing? It looks like something moms would wear in the 1980s on a “Mom’s Night Out.” I can smell the Virginia Slims and hear the White Snake music just from looking at it.

Anytrashbag, Briana goes backstage to tell Roxanne (who must have been hogtied so she couldn’t storm the stage with her shoe) and the producers that she has too much anxiety to go out there and sit with Ashley onstage. 

Briana is kind of like the girl in high school who talks smack and puffs her chest and tells you she’s going to beat your a**, but when you agree to fight she calls her mom and says she has period cramps and has to go home early. 

While Briana is freaking out in the green room, Cheyenne’s mom, Margaret, is just sitting there, minding her own damn business while texting on the couch.  

As Briana is busy going on about not being able to keep her composure around Ashley, Jade swoops in to add fuel to the fire by pointing out how hard it will be to sit on stage with Ashley while having “all these feelings.”

Producer Morgan looks absolutely over these wretches and I would feel bad for him if he wasn’t partially responsible for keeping this outhouse-of-a-show going for 92 years.

He says they will be “pivoting” the plans in order to allow some form of garbage fire to be filmed for this reunion episode. He also informs everyone on stage that either Ashley or Briana–- or both–- will be coming to the stage, “if they can.”

What the…? The only excuse for Briana not coming to stage is that her Dr. Miami-stuffed butt physically prohibits her from walking that far. Otherwise, get on the stage and give us the drama-filled clown fiesta we deserve! 

We then see Ashley sneak onto the stage and take her new assigned seat, while Briana’s chair remains empty. 

After some intros, Dr. Drew lets everyone know that ‘Teen Mom: The Next Chapter’ is gonna look a lot like the last chapter, because these girls are still being dramatic and can’t get along.

He explains that Briana has chosen not to join the rest of the moms on stage, and if they want to “get the full story,” they will have to tune in and watch Teen Mom: Family Reunion. (Or, ya know, click here.) 

Dr. Drew decides to get a jumpsuit jumpstart on the messiness and just randomly calls out Leah about her and Jaylan’s breakup. It’s completely out of nowhere, as everyone was just talking about how old they are and whatnot and Leah looks like she just got caught in bed with Robbie Kidd. She’s shocked.

Dr. Drew asks the others if they want to “support” Leah right now (i.e. be nosy and ask questions that are none of their damn business.) Unfortunately, only Amber takes the bait. She talks about her own ended engagements and how devastating they were. (Yes, I’m sure losing Matt “I Need a Tour Bus to Hold All My Kids” Baier was heartbreaking.)

Leah just sits up there like a deer caught in the headlights on the deer cam, shocked and politely grunting as Amber complains about how hard her life is. 

Nessa desperately tries to change the subject (and the awkward cloud looming over the stage) by mentioning Ambie’s birthday Florida hoedown…and then, in a cringeworthy transition attempt, pivots to the fall of Roe v. Wade.

Then, seconds later, Dr. Drew is hocking some weird 16 and Pregnant bedtime story…or something. 

WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING HERE?!

Next, Dr. Drew gives Nessa, who is a new mom, a baby gift on behalf of the cast and crew. (Hopefully it’s just a card that says, “Get yourself off this rotting corpse of a show before you embarrass your child.”)

After the barrage of awkward moments and product pitches ends, it’s time for Dr. Drew to make some of these girls cry! 

First up in the hot seat is Cheyenne, who is still talking about her wedding. After letting Chey reminisce on her special day for a moment, Dr. Drew asks about the “car accident” (which Dr. Drew conveniently leaves out was the result of them being shot at!!!) that Cheyenne, Zach and their kids were in, and the injuries Cheyenne sustained that required her to get new breast implants.

Cheyenne awkwardly compliments her own rack and gets literally no reaction from the audience. It reminds me of the time Debz OG wore the weird purple wig and expected everyone in the audience to stand up and cheer for her and no one did or said anything for five awkward seconds.

Next Dr. Drew moves on to the girls’ hoedown trip to Florida and how uncomfortable the whole experience made Cheyenne to be around a bunch of racist cousin-humpers. 

They bring out Zach so we can once again discuss The Wedding Of The Century. 

Zach tells Dr. Drew and Nessa that married life is all themed parties and being funemployed by MTV, to which Dr. Drew follows up with a rundown of Cheyenne’s eventful season: survived a shooting, faced her assailant in court, underwent surgery for her injuries, purchased a new house, watched her fiancé head to jail and planned a dream wedding. (Zach looked increasingly more uncomfortable with each thing Dr. Drew listed off, given the fact that the majority of the things Chey had to deal with this season were Zach’s fault.) 

“How did she do it all?” Dr. Drew asks. 

After a recap of Cheyenne’s season, she and Zach reflect on everything they went through and Zach says he’s thankful they’re still here. Nessa glazes over the couple’s comments and asks more about their wedding.

That’s right, these two were literally shot at multiple times while driving in a vehicle with their two children, but Nessa and Dr. Drew would rather hear them talk about centerpieces and bouquets. Make it make sense. 

As the wedding chat continues, Cheyenne is asked about Zach’s legal issues and whether she was worried Zach would have to spend their big day behind bars. Cheyenne says “it was always a thought,” but more importantly, it was a storyline.

While attempting to “clarify the legal issues,” Zach says the issues “stem back from [his] past,” and he assures Dr. Drew and Nessa that he has owned up to them.

Um…yeah. And it only took you getting arrested at the airport in front of Cheyenne’s whole family. 

Zach also reveals that he’s no longer on probation. Cheyenne is asked to weigh in on Zach’s situation and she basically admits that she knew what she was getting into when she decided to hitch her wagon to her now-husband. 

Cheyenne goes on to defend Zach’s past, claiming he was dealing with depression and “battling all these different things” back in the day, so it’s not really his fault that he drove drunk multiple times and stole stuff and whatnot.

UM?!??!

She also confirms there are two different cases–- a theft case and a DUI case. Nessa points out that Zach is so hard on himself (umm, did we miss that episode?!) and Cheyenne says it’s because the rest of the world is so hard on Zach, notably those on social media.

Cheyenne assures everyone that Zach didn’t rob a bank, he “just made a license,” so people should really go easy on him. 

Apparently identity theft isn’t really theft in The Brain of Cheyenne? OK…

Next up in the “hot” seat (which is actually about as hot as Leah’s “midnight raviolis”), is Maci and Taylor. They’ve managed to make it out on stage without a brewski or a Things That Matter clothing item, which I think is a first for them.

Nessa says that Maci and Taylor dealt with plenty of “real world problems” this season. Taylor looks like he has no clue what’s going on (which is evident based on his current hairstyle).

We get to watch back the McKinneys’ journey through (potential) ball-snipping, school shooting chats and whatnot. Taylor reveals that he’s about to go through with the vasectomy procedure, despite Tyler‘s horrifying account of burning balls. 

Maci says she’s excited to be able to vanilla-hump her husband on the regular now without the risk of having another Oopsie Baby. 

Next, Dr. Drew slyly slips a mention of Ryan & Co. into the mix, asking Maci what’s happening with Ryan’s parents, Jen and Larry. Maci reports that no one is trying to fight each other anymore, so that’s good. 

As for ol’ Ryan, Maci and Taylor report that he’s not seeing much of Bentley these days. They seemed to be implying that Ryan’s back to getting HIGH! HIGH! (because Dr. Drew suggests Ryan’s “not in his normal states” if he doesn’t want to see Bentley and Maci and Taylor just kind of nod in agreement.) 

After basically stating that his dad may be back on the junk, they drag poor Bentley out onto the stage. (REALLY guys?! Isn’t forcing him to basically do his therapy sessions on national TV bad enough?) 

Of course, messy ass Dr. Drew has to ask Bentley if he’s seeing Ryan (even though he literally just got that answer from Maci and Taylor). Bentley shakes his head no and looks very uncomfortable. 

They move on to some mullet talk and then thankfully get the poor kid off the stage. 

Next on stage is Jade and Sean. (Every time they show Jade I keep thinking she’s topless, due to her wearing a flesh-colored top on-stage.) 

Nessa talks about how much of a trainwreck these two were the first two times they got engaged. We look back on their season highlights (which, thanks to Sean getting sober, no longer includes a game of “Whose crackpipe was that?” like other seasons have). Sean says it’s nice to watch himself this season, because seeing himself high as a kite during past seasons was not a pleasant experience. 

They congratulate Sean on his recently celebrated one year of sobriety. (All jokes aside, I am thrilled to see Sean looking and sounding so happy and healthy!) 

Jade says that it’s nice to see Sean happy, and Dr. Drew says it’s common for addicts to hate themselves.

Jade says that they are the best and happiest they’ve ever been, which is honestly nice to see. 

In an effort to muck all this happiness up a bit, they decide to wheel out Jade’s mom Christy. Out she comes, sporting brushed hair and even freshly washed clothes. (She is on TV, after all…)

Christy plops down next to Sean on the couch (after quickly scanning the set to see if there’s anything she can pocket before the producers notice.)

Nessa then comes out of nowhere to talk about how Jade and Christy are in “a great place” now. 

Jade is like, “Um…I’m sorry what?” and proceeds to let the audience know that Christy went all “Mommy Dearest” on her backstage and hit her with a hanger or something.

As you do…

Christy protests that she didn’t throw the hanger at Jade and, instead, it “fell off the wall.” 

Jesus God Leah, I love these people.

Christy says that she was upset about having wrinkles after getting ready next to Jade and Briana. Jade offers to “shoot her up” when they get home, but, luckily, she was talking about Botox.

Nessa apparently doesn’t get the fact that Jade and Christy are literally still at each other’s throats, and continues to talk about the miraculous “change” that’s happened between the mother and daughter. 

Dr. Drew slips in the fact that, you know, Christy has been known to play hide-and-go-tweak in the past, but she assures everyone that she’s doing fine.

In fact, she even states that she doesn’t “use drugs constantly” despite what we fans may think.

Um…yay?

Christy says that she and Jade are still struggling a bit, mostly because she feels Jade “pushes her away” sometimes. 

Gee…I can’t imagine why…

Jade’s honest with her, telling her, “You give off a lot of negativity and it will pour into me and my home.” Christy insists she’s working on it, and begins to cry.

Dr. Drew looks thrilled that he finally got one of these people to sob. (I think he gets a bonus– a buck a tear– for everyone he makes cry on a Reunion show.)

Christy says she’s not a fan of these Reunions because— even though she gets unlimited snacks and a free stay at a hotel that doesn’t charge per hour— she always ends up crying on national TV.

“I definitely need therapy!” Christy declares.

They scoot the trio off the stage (and hopefully confiscate any more clothing hangers from Christy), and then bring out Devoin, who is sans Briana for this segment. They are actually pronouncing his name correctly for once. (It’s pronounced “De-voyne,” in case you’re unaware that Bri & the DeJesus Coven essentially renamed him years ago for their own amusement). 

Dr. Drew immediately jumps on Devoin’s gambling addiction like Christy on a voucher for a free meal over at the TGI Friday’s. Devoin tries to change the subject, talking about how his girlfriend got into a car accident and broke her foot and was one of the “worser cases” they’ve seen. (Apparently the schools “are not well” in Florida, either?) 

Devoin admits that he’s addicted to gambling, and at the sound of the word “addiction” Dr. Drew perks up. Devoin says that he won “a year’s salary” on two occasions, which is likely how he got hooked on that one-armed bandit life. (This was apparently filmed before Devoin went to rehab for his addiction, though, because he says the only treatment he had gotten for his addiction was calling a hotline.) 

Meanwhile Briana is shown tearing up backstage as she listens to Devoin talk about his addiction. (She’s either upset about that or she finally realized what the hell she’s wearing?) 

Devoin then talks about his relationship with Briana and where it currently stands. Devoin says that they do not speak, and haven’t really spoken much since Devoin went on the podcast of (one of) Bri’s nemesis, Kail Lowry, back in 2021. Devoin says he doesn’t want to bring Briana out on stage with him, because he prefers to have her yell at him at his apartment. 

“We didn’t talk all season. Why talk now?” he says.

Because Devoin doesn’t want to share the stage with Bri, they scoot him off and bring her out. Briana denies most of the things Devoin said, but they it cut her interview off to save it for Part 2. 

That’s it for this episode! 

To read The Ashley’s recap of the previous episode of ‘Teen Mom: The Next Chapter,’ click here!

(Photos: MTV)