The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills debuted its second season last night, and what’s eminently clear is that this series, while grounded in reality, relies too much on ridiculousness to actually tackle serious issues. Gawker’s Richard Lawson put it best : “They should have buried this season and left bad enough alone” because the episode was “entirely gross and ghoulish.” That didn’t happen, and Entertainment Weekly’s Ken Tucker said “that Russell Armstrong’s death had at least one effect upon the world: It brought this reality show into the real world, for a few seconds, at least.” The problem with that is that the contrast doesn’t work. The episode opened with somber music and a scene filmed last week, on Aug. 29, during which the group gathered and pretended they did so on their own (instead of being assembled at the producers’ and Bravo’s request). Taylor wasn’t there, and everyone talked about how they had no idea, but knew Russell was struggling financially. Kyle Richards sai...