What’s going on with the Carlos King shows? For years, King has been the standout executive producer of reality television.

But more stars from his shows and other projects he’s worked on, past and present, have spoken out and/or have left the shows. This happened very recently with two stars from OWN’s Belle Collective exiting that series. Are they simply disgruntled? Depends on who you ask. But, there is a trend here worth highlighting.

Rumors and discourse have been going on for some time, dating back to his time working with Bravo and Truly Original as a producer on The Real Housewives of Atlanta (he also worked on Bravo’s The Real Housewives of New Jersey as a producer).

As time has gone on, King’s reality empire has grown with projects on TV One, OWN, BET, We TV, and even HBO. And as his popularity has grown, so has the mixed response surrounding some of the shows– both from cast members and fans.

Let’s break down some of the internet chatter over the years, from RHOA Season 9 to present-day:

What happened in ‘RHOA’ Season 9 and what were the rumors that came after?

The Real Housewives of Atlanta fans will always remember the Season 9 fallout between Kandi Burruss and Frick and Frack (Porsha Williams and Phaedra Parks). The three spent the whole season at odds after Burruss’ friendship with Parks fell apart seasons before amid her then-husband, Apollo Nida, going to prison. Burruss voiced her concern for Parks not allowing their young sons to visit Nida during such a long stint. Williams, who’d gone through a contentious divorce on her own, cozied up to Parks to show her support.

Simultaneously, Parks began saying things about Burruss and her husband, Todd Tucker. She claimed Burruss paid Tucker an allowance when he expressed grievances over the lawyer-turned-reality-star not paying him adequately for his work on her infamous “Donkey Booty” workout DVD. Burruss’ mother, Mama Joyce, said Parks was being fraudulent. For the most part, Burruss stayed quiet until a tense sit-down with Parks, where she accused her of lying about feeling abandoned in their friendship and putting on a farce about Nida when she was dating a new man all along.

Williams inserted herself into the argument, and in one of the craziest scenes in RHOA history, she argued with Burruss and alleged Burruss had a sex dungeon, that she and Tucker planned to drug and sexually assault her, that Tucker was unfaithful and went by the alias of “Marvin,” and that Burruss was a lesbian. At the Season 9 reunion taping, Williams revealed Parks was behind all the rumors she brought to the forefront. Parks sat quietly as her co-stars and Andy Cohen expressed shock and disdain. She claimed she’d “repeated” something she heard on camera.

Parks exited the show, as King would go on to leave the series. For years, internet rumors have alleged that King had a hand in all of the drama, and some believe that his exit from the show after Season 9 was not coincidental.

However, he has consistently denied a role in the drama, and has stated that he left the show on his own accord. He dismissed the rumors in a chat with Married to Medicine’s Dr. Heavenly Kimes in 2020. He broke his silence on the ordeal, saying: “I left the show. I did not get fired. That will always be the dumbest rumor when it comes to that. And it’s funny because when you Google anything, I’ve been fired so many times it’s like I was on The Apprentice. It’s the dumbest rumor out there. I did not get fired. And the other thing about the whole situation that happened Season 9, I had nothing to do with that. Let me make that very clear. If that was the case, I wouldn’t be here today. I’d be in jail so let’s start there. And that’s all I’ll say about that.”

In 2022 interview with Page Six, he got candid about being a RHOA producer during the Parks-Williams-Burruss drama. He said, “To see this rumor circulate during Season 9 without any sort of hard facts was very weird as well because we kept asking ourselves as producers, ‘Where is this going?’ … We had no idea where it came from. But because it was reality, we followed it. And to see how it all culminated at the reunion was just very uncomfortable to say the least.”

His relationship with Kandi Burruss and Xscape biopic development

Initially, Burruss and King’s relationship seemed unaffected by the Season 9 RHOA drama. It was later revealed that Burruss ended her personal and professional working relationship with King after she alleged she had discovered he purchased the rights to an Xscape biopic, without her or her group members’ knowledge or consent.

In a 2023 interview with The Shade Room, Burruss detailed how she learned of what allegedly happened. She said:

“A friend of mine is a producer or director, me and [my husband] Todd were talking to him, and I said, ‘It would be dope if Xscape had a movie about our lives.’ And our friend was like, ‘Oh, they’re already doing that movie.’ We were like, ‘What you mean? Who’s already doing the movie?’ And he was like, ‘Yeah, I just took a meeting about that.’ He told me the network or whatever, so I called my agent, and I asked what was going on. He looked into it and found out that it was true that the network was doing it. It took us a couple more weeks to find out who had put it all together. Come to find out, it was Carlos who was supposed to be a producer, director, or whatever of the movie. Right before I found out it was him, one of his producers that he works with reached out to my mom and was like, ‘Oh yeah, we’re trying to do a documentary about girl groups and we wanted to get some information…’ to interview my mom. So you’re going to do all of that, and you don’t even tell me?”

King has opted to stay silent on specifics of the matter and would rather talk with her about it. He has denied her claims.

The Monique Samuels drama on ‘Love & Marriage: DC’

Monique Samuels will go down in reality television history for two things: her physical altercation with Candiace Dillard-Bassett in Season 5 of The Real Housewives of Potomac and binder-gate during the reunion. After her exit from the show, she says she fostered a relationship with King and began thinking of ways they could work together.

But this year, she alleged that King (without using his name) reeled her in using “the Black card,” noting that he’d handle her with more care than Bravo due to being kinfolk, but she was dissatisfied with her edit in Season 1 of OWN’s Love & Marriage: D.C. She claimed she was used for promotion of the show.

“I believed him when he used the Black card. And he did me worse than the white folks. I was like, ‘He could have at least waited till the second season to trash me,’” she said during an interview on The Jay Hill Podcast. “It was just like, ‘We got her. Dog her a** out.’” It was like my name was used to gain the audience and I felt like I got trashed on that show. They didn’t show any of my real moments where I gave more context to what was happening.”

She’s since vowed to never do reality television again.

King’s relationship with Melody Rodgers from ‘Love & Marriage: Huntsville’

Whether you are a fan or not, Melody Shari Rodgers is the bonafide star of Love & Marriage: Huntsville. Without her, some fans would say the show doesn’t stand a chance. But the way things seem to look between her and King right now, the show may be undergoing a massive change sooner rather than later.

King and Rodgers were initially two peas in a pod. But things took a turn when she appeared on a live edition of his podcast. No matter what Holt has allegedly done, King has stated publicly his affinity for Holt and pushed the idea of a reconciliation between the two. King has maintained that Holt will not be fired because he, along with Rodgers, helped bring the show together while they were married.

Recently, Shari and King’s social media revealed they no longer follow one another. This comes after she made comments on social media that fans believe were direct shots at King.

“When you are in a leadership position or so-called leadership position or executive position, there are just certain things you’re supposed to do,” Shari said on a livestream. “You don’t talk about the people that are putting a check in your pocket. I’ve never seen the owner of Seventh Avenue talk about the people putting money in their pockets.”

Shari also criticized behaviors she characterized as “self-destructive,” adding, “That’s all they know is self-destruction.” Later, she defended her remarks in an Instagram Story, doubling down on her earlier statements.

‘Belle Collective’ exits of Aikisha Colon and SoGucci Williams

Another popular series from King’s production company is OWN’s Belle Collective. The end of this season saw the exits of two cast members, Aikisha Colon and Sophia “SoGucci” Williams. Colon quit the show during a YouTube livestream, leaving him and his two co-hosts of the night with their mouths ajar.

The season saw the family drama with Williamses following an explosive fight between SoGucci and her husband’s ex-wife, Selena. The family was estranged due to her stepdaughters having no contact with their father. At the reunion, King blasted SoGucci’s husband, JJ, for not properly handling the situation between the two women from the start, which all agreed with. But his handling of the Colons is what sparked backlash.

Aikisha was never welcomed with open arms by the other Belles. Both she and her husband were accused of thinking they were bigger fish because of their lifestyle. Things reached a breaking point in the season finale after the men came to a brawl. Some viewers criticized King’s handling of the reunion, feeling he unfairly blamed Willie for tensions that had built up over seasons.

His YouTube show has also caused controversy

King’s podcast and weekly recaps are only adding more fuel to the fire. In addition to interviews with reality stars, he recaps his shows and others with guest hosts, which many feel is a step too far as an entertainment executive. As his presence grows publicly, many are pushing for him to make a choice: be a public figure or an executive producer. For some, both roles cannot exist at the same time…or at least in the way that he’s been doing it recently.

Carlos King’s influence on reality TV is undeniable. But as more stars speak out, the question remains: Is he uplifting the people he works with, or prioritizing ratings at their expense? Only time will tell how King’s legacy will be shaped by these ongoing controversies and conversations.