Three reunion episodes, an “aftermath” special and his own podcast apparently weren’t enough for West Wilson to say all he needed to say about everything that’s happened since news broke that he was dating his Summer House costar Amanda Batula, so he sat down with The Broadcast Boys for one of the series’ definitive breakdowns.
West has previously appeared with content creators Lucas Brody and Nelson Vergara in their whiteboard-and-marker breakdowns of reality TV, including one featuring Lindsay Hubbard where she mentioned recommending West be cast on ‘Summer House.’ This time, though, he was the focus.
“We became brothers learning about the despicable antics of reality television only for you to get caught up in the same exact bull s*** we’ve been teaching you about for years,” Lucas said in the first of two videos that were posted to Instagram Wednesday and as a single YouTube video on Thursday. “Do you know how painful it is to open my phone, see a kill, f***, marry with Tom Sandoval, Jax Taylor and West Wilson?”
During the videos, Lucas recapped the past season of ‘Summer House’ and the Amanda/West scandal with Nelson adding in his commentary and both pressing West for answers. One of the first things they asked about was rumors that a video exists showing him and Amanda in a “compromising position.”
“I haven’t seen it but I’ve heard from credible sources it does, and it’s very illegal, I’d like to note,” West confirmed. He later added, “From what I’ve been told it was Amanda and I canoodling in my apartment, from one of my neighbors across the street. … I’d say that’s kind of what kicked everything off into panicked, rushed mode, you can’t really figure out your own plan when that exists.”
The threat of that video being released lead West and Amanda to post their joint statement confirming their relationship. He said that neither of them wrote the much-criticized statement but that they did give notes on it.
“You put out this statement to the public when the only people you need to answer to are the people that are affected by the situation,” Nelson said. “F*** that statement, y’all should have just reached out to Kyle [Cooke] and Ciara [Miller].”
West replied, “I, actually, looking back, am so embarrassed by it, it was kind of unnecessary, to be honest. Partially, it was rushed because lying was also weighing us down. It clearly didn’t help anything at all.”
The topic later moved to the conversation West’s ex/Amanda’s former friend Ciara brought up on ‘Summer House’ about the challenges of being a Black woman on a reality TV show with a predominately white cast.
“I think on reality TV, especially with women of color, it’s kind of a certain level of grace and understanding that you need to have when interacting with them because the fact is they are viewed differently and it’s unfortunate that this situation has played out with Ciara as many times now as it is, and this is kind of a dig toward you, but I can’t help but feel like anybody can get this kind of treatment, and I know it’s something you’re working on and you don’t want to be that guy, but in your past, you’ve been that guy,” Nelson said, to which West replied, “Despite trying to be better about s*** like that, I ultimately failed.”
According to Lucas and Nelson, West also failed to properly show his emotions at the ‘Summer House’ reunion. When pressed, West confessed, “I don’t consider myself an emotional person by any means.”
He then tried to explain his thought process going into the reunion.
“My game plan was to apologize and not be defensive for s***, but I’ve been criticized of that now for two reunions, for just not feeling much,” West said. “We should have my mom on to explain this; she has a lot of theories. … My dad had a lot of anger issues when I was little and they think I tried to make him happy for a really long time, internal compass is to not react and to keep everyone calm. He’s better now.”
In the second video, West acknowledged the damage he caused to relationships in the ‘Summer House’ cast.
“As someone who cares about friendships and friends groups, I would be mad as f*** at me too if I dropped a bomb on a friend group like that,” he said. “It is why this show and this house are special is because we all do like each other. I did f***ing f*** that up, and that sucks. I get the anger in that capacity.”
He was asked to clarify the timeline around his and Amanda’s relationship. As he did on the reunion, West maintained nothing happened until late February, a month after Amanda and Kyle announced they’d separated.
“I made the first comment out loud,” he said. “It wasn’t, like, pursuing, think of the whole summer, I had her back a lot of times, she’s had my back a lot of times, we’ve been close, we’ve hung out multiple times without fornication for years, sometimes stuff happens, and that doesn’t mean it’s the right thing but it does happen.”
According to West, his and Amanda’s romantic relationship grew out of their close friendship.
“We were hanging out a lot, running around New York,” he said. “I did see her unhappy for so f***ing long, hanging out with her and, like, seeing her f***ing, like, smile and have fun, this sounds like a Disney f***ing speech, but, like, that meant a lot to me and it probably stoked f***ing some butterflies and then, you know, I brought it up one day, I probably shouldn’t have, but I f***ing did.”
West was also asked about the timeline of his relationship with Meija Moreno, who he had been seeing for over a year, crossing over from his time dating Ciara to his time starting to see Amanda.
“The projection of what our relationship was, we were on the same page, it was the actual intimacy of what our relationship was that I, like, threw her a f***ing curveball,” West said, to which Lucas replied, “You’re so good at saying nothing sometimes.” West answered, “There’s not a lot to it other than I wanted my cake and ate it too.”
He did confirm texting Meija, “You win” after the reunion and shared that wasn’t the last time the two had been in touch.
“Her and I have kind of been in contact a few times recently, everything was so rushed and insane, and I, like, I really f***ed over Meija so bad, super-gutted over how I f***ing handled that,” West said. “She has every right to, like, do what she wants because I kind of f***ed her story up.”
After appearing with Ciara on the “aftermath” episode, there have been rumors online that Meija will be cast in the next season of ‘Summer House,’ which is set to start filming over the Fourth of July weekend. West confirmed that he will not be appearing on the show next season.
“I wanted to tell it on my own, but, um, that is true, but in their defense I don’t think it would have been a fun summer,” he said.
Watch the full ‘Summer House’ definitive breakdown with West and The Broadcast Boys below.
(Photos: Instagram; Bravo)
