The Ruins: Is That A Plunger in Your Bed or Are You Just Happy to See Me?

MTV owed us since we suffered through last week’s total snoozer of an episode and I’m happy to say that they delivered. There was drunk-yelling, plunger-beating, head-smacking, trash-talking and even fly-eating. Another popped boob implant and I would have nominated this one for an Emmy.

We start this episode in the Champions’ room and Kenny and Evan are antagonizing Katie. By the way, we know it’s night time because Evan is wearing his evening lollipop shirt. Shout out to K37744 for explaining the reason for the two shirts.

Katie and Veronica are hammered as evidenced by the slurring and yelling. Then Veronica “discovers” a plunger in Katie’s bed and based on her “it was just there,” I’ll bet a nickel Veronica was in on the joke.

Side note: Shiny pants? Those thighs? Poor choice. Katie is sure Kenny and Evan are behind the plunger and even though she knows that a crazy reaction is exactly what they want, Katie can’t restrain herself and delivers as expected. She goes bonkers with the plunger and starts wailing on someone else’s poor, defenseless bed. Kenny and Evan (ooh – Kevan!) are beyond pleased.

Back in one of the Challengers’ rooms, Kellyanne is explaining to Dumbar, Brad and Rumer some strategy using nothing but pronouns so I have no idea what she’s talking about.

Of course, this doesn’t stop the others from agreeing wholeheartedly. Dumbar adds his own wisdom and suggests that the Challengers have to be really smart about how they go forth into the Ruins.

We cut back to the Champions and Katie must have passed out because Kevan move on to Wombat.

And then Wombat falls over for no good reason. Drunkenness confirmed. Johnny joins in the festivities and the three assholes start squirting her with toothpaste and throwing baby powder in her face. Now, Wombat is a grown woman and should probably steer clear of the alcohol (or at least leave some for the rest of the cast) but it’s almost painful to watch them abuse her and then reach out a hand and pretend to help her. It’s like Welcome to the Dollhouse or something.

Wombat claims to have a line that these guys have crossed but it’s hard to plead “enough” when you’re a non-functioning, semi-comatose disaster 98% of the time. On what looks to be the next morning (waiting for the white lollipop shirt from Evan to confirm), Wombat tells Katie and Ibis how difficult her real life is and that she wished she didn’t drink as much as she did. Here’s an idea: How about you not drink? I know that’s from the advanced class but I think you can do it.

Wombat decides that her job is to not be drunk anymore. Good luck with that. Ibis must be drunk too because she thinks that Wombat has what it takes to get ahead and stop hurting herself.

Katie and Kimberly are complaining about Kevan and the lines that they keep crossing. Katie tells us what we already know — Kevan think they can control the game, use the girls throughout and then dispose of them at the end. Hmm . . . I just can’t understand why they think this. Except that they Do. It. Every. Time. The problem is that Kevan are strong and they would probably win a couple of Ruins, but they’re no Mark or Landon. Siiigh, Landon. If the rest of the team could get together and get the numbers to vote them in every time, there’s a possibility they would lose.

While the Challengers pretend they could win the next challenge (T-Mobile Sidekick Clue: Did your team burn more bridges than it’s built?), it’s Plunger Redux in the Champions’ room. Specifically, in Katie’s bed. Katie loses it and starts screaming and swinging. Kevan are hysterical but it’s Rumer’s laughter that sends Katie over the edge.

Katie gives her a what the fuck, bitch! and demands that Rumer get the fuck out of their room. Don’t laugh at her when she has a plunger in her bed, bitch! Ever! How many times do you think Katie has said that? Rumer doesn’t move fast enough so Katie shoves her out the door.

Rumer is gone but Katie is done. She yells that Rumer can go suck a cock and she’s fat and she has tattoos and no one gives a shit and she is one bitch that Katie does not like.

Kevan decide that Rumer is their new cause and want to protect her from big, bad Katie. Rumer is taking it all personally and thinks that Katie speaks for everyone else when Katie says that she doesn’t like her. Katie can hardly speak for herself, how can she possibly speak for anyone else?

And it’s challenge time. Over on the Champions’ side, Katie and Susie nominate themselves. Then Susie says that she thought that Wombat was going to nominate herself but Wombat would like some time to think about it, hear what everyone else has to say, talk to the birds, throw back a shot (or four) and then decide.

They put it to a vote and come up with Wombat anyway so it’s Katie, Susie and Wombat for the girls, and Darrell, Chin Pubes and Slim Jim for the guys. Wombat says she’ll go crazy if her team keeps sending her in. Uh huh.

The Challengers play some sort of child’s choosing game involving ice cream (now that’s the smart playing we were talking about) and nominate Dumbar, Danny and Cohutta for the guys, and Rumer, Casey and Kim for the girls.

So the game is Burning Bridge and the goal is to build a floating bridge from the shore to a team raft and then light the raft on fire. One at a time, each player will swim out to a piece of the bridge, dive underwater to release it from its anchor, then swim it over and attach it to the last piece of the bridge. Once the bridge is finished, one player (who didn’t swim) will run across the bridge with a torch and light up the raft.

The teams talk strategy: The Champions put their best swimmers up first and the Challengers organize their line-up so that Kellyanne and Casey only have to swim once. Oh, and Kimberly is the torch bearer because she hates water. Katie doesn’t like the ocean either so she’s the runner for the Champions.

Then there’s swimming and anchor-releasing and bridge-building and the Champions take an early lead. That is, until Rumer jumps in the water, unfurls her fin-tail, speeds through the water and the Challengers catch up. They then get ahead even further while Wombat flounders (punny!) around, unable to unclip her piece of the bridge. Things are looking good for them until a Casey-cloud settles over the land. For some reason, she decides the backstroke is a super-speedy way to swim out to the bridge.

So Casey is in the middle of the water doing nothing but grunting and groaning and watching the Champions come back for the win. Again. Since TJ has to earn his keep, he repeats the nominated players from each team and tells the six from the Champions that they have to decide the two Ruins match-ups. Just in case you weren’t paying attention the first twelve times he told you.

Darrell agrees to go in and asks if everyone is cool if he goes up against Danny. His strategy is that Cohutta is smaller but Danny is a fat slob. Good call. Katie says she’ll go in because she knows they’re gunning for her and would vote her in anyway. She decides to go against Casey but Slim Jim points out that the Champions won the challenge because of Casey and they should keep her around as long as possible. Fine. Katie agrees to go against Rumer. Susie tells us that no one cares if Katie wins because Katie stinks.

So Susie is now a member of the Rumer Fan Club (President/Vice President = Kevan) and tells Rumer she’s sorry that she had to be a part of anything bad happening for her. But Rumer is confident and thinks that whoever wants it more is going to come out the winner. It’s a nice sentiment but quite a load of horseshit. Oh, and she’s going to visualize herself winning so she has nothing to worry about.

And Wombat is at Defcon 1. As Ibis says, she’s shmammered which is a word I like very much, thank you. She’s running her mouth off but has time to enjoy a little snack with Wus. She Mister Miyagi-ies a fly, slams it in her hand, and downs it with a beer chaser.

Then she decides to confront Veronica for calling her out for masturbating at the Inferno II complete with sound effects and dramatic re-enactment. Veronica still thinks it was pretty funny but Wombat disagrees and says it’s the rudest thing Veronica could ever say. Here’s another suggestion: How about you not masturbate in public/on a television show?

Shmammered Wombat decides this is her time to rise up! To defend herself against the evil that is Veronica! To throw soup on the floor! So Wombat comes after Veronica, screaming at her to shut the fuck up and threatening to piss her off. Veronica, who probably should have walked away or, at the very least, not prodded the drunken animal, goads her on knowing full well that Wombat is a moment away from a straight jacket, a happy pill and a rubber room.

Wombat can’t stop the stream of inanities — she calls Veronica every name in the book and yells at her for making fun of a girl half her age. Um, excuse me? When Veronica asks who might be this half-her-age-girl and asks Wombat if she’s half of Veronica’s age, Wombat says “not now.” Oh, but yesterday? Yes.

Veronica keeps screaming that Wombat is crazy and Wombat proves her right by smacking Veronica in the head. Hard. Remember when MTV used to send cast members home for being alcoholics? That’s so old school.

Evan holds Wombat back and she starts sobbing. Evan pretends to play hero and tells Veronica to get the fuck out of the room and tells us that Veronica has ‘bad news’ written all over her. I would have thought “Hazardous Materials” would be written all over her but Evan is the expert here, not me.

So it looks like the Sexual Favor Alliance is over. There’s a touching moment where Evan tries to comfort Wombat and says that even though she’s crazy, she’s part of their family and that to her, it’s the only family she has. It would have been lovely but for the fact that Kevan and Slim Jim spent the better part of the night before mocking her and coating her with various bath products.

Evan and Slim Jim blame Veronica for the fight and Veronica is pissed that she’s not getting more support — especially from Evan. So she rescinds his cuddle time as punishment. I think he might be okay with that. Evan goes on the defense saying how everyone had their fun with Wombat but Wus is quick to point out that it was only Kevan and Slim Jim who tortured her.

Katie and Chin Pubes are talking and Katie promises us that this will be her last challenge so she wants to win the Ruins, stay to the end and go out on a good note. I’m hoping she’ll just go out.

The only thing more awkward to watch than the toothpasting/baby powdering of Wombat was Rumer’s quoting of the legendary Rowdy Roddy Piper in They Live with “I came here to kick ass and chew bubble gum and I’m all out of bubble gum.”

We’re at the Ruins and the ladies are up first. They’re playing Oh-Ring. Each player is suspended by a harness, holding opposite sides of the same ring. The first player to wrestle the ring away from their opponent twice, wins. Dumbar seems to think that it’s Katie’s game because she has sick hand strength. And you know this how? But he’s right and Katie wins the first round.

The girls are up again and Rumer wins round two. She flashes Katie a select finger as well and the shit-talking continues. The game is tied and next point decides the winner. It takes a little while but ultimately, Rumer wins it making her the richest player in the game with $6400 in her personal bank account. Katie responds with two fingers of choice. She’s happy to leave since all she’ll remember from Thailand are the bugs and the house full of assholes. Way to see the big picture.

Then it’s the guys’ turn and I’m just happy to see Darrell getting some face time.

The guys try and keep it interesting and throw in some sort of alligator death roll. It looks like something that would make me puke instantly. Darrell wins the first round, Danny wins the second round and Darrell wins the third to send Danny packing.

Another meeting of the Rumer Fan Club convenes and Susie and Kenny tell her how great she is. Susie is also happy to see Wombat and Katie go because they were on the “verge” of crazy. On the verge? I think they were smack dab in the middle of the crazy. She also says that Veronica isn’t far behind.

Then we cut to Veronica who is finally waking up and realizing that she just may be on the chopping block. When your only female company is Ibis, Susie and Johanna, it’s a pretty safe bet that you and Ibis have numbered days. So finally everyone understands that Kevan are running this game and no one (except Kevan) is all that happy about it.

So Danny leaves and the Challengers are down to three guys — Dumbar, Brad and Cohutta. It’ll be interesting to see what MTV does going forward. Are the three of them going to have to be nominated every time? Or is MTV going to tweak the rules and pretend it’s some sort of pre-planned twist? Personally, I’m just looking forward to whatever atrocity Ibis is going to wear.

Until next week,
TinyElvis.