Episode six seems to be about the family’s capacity to dissolve the boundaries between the ordinary and the iconic.
It populated headlines at the time: After the Grammys, Kourtney and Travis got drunk and scampered to a Las Vegas wedding chapel, resulting in highly Instagrammable disposable camera photos conveying the cinematic spontaneity of an elopement. In truth, this was a ceremony without an actual marriage; no papers were signed, making it a perfect exemplar of media theorist Daniel J Boorstin’s concept of a “pseudo-event” or any of semiotician Umberto Eco’s analyses of Las Vegas.
Later, at the shoot, Heidi and Tyra encourage Kim to jump into some shots. Though it seems unlikely that this wasn’t the original plan, Kim expresses uncertainty about whether she should go for it – after all, she didn’t previously fit the form of a traditional early-aughts underwear model! Of course, Kim ultimately joins, closing the gap between past and future and reclaiming an ideal she was once excluded from.