The Mole: A Perfect Ten!

This weekend, a little boy came up to me on the subway and reenacted the entire Incredible Hulk trailer, word for word. He then said that he can’t wait for July 13th to see that movie. When I pointed out that it was already July 14th, he freaked out. Then he showed me some yo-yo tricks. He was really cool.

So I stole him. What are you going to do about it, authorities??

I tied him to a chair and we watched The Mole together. If that’s not true kidnapper-parental love, I don’t know what is.We begin this week with SmugJon consuming an apple and then acting surprised and choking on it when the team arrives. Dude, don’t even. I dislike you enough as it is without you trying to pull that pretend-surprise bullshit. He demands that they split up into two teams: one for people who don’t trust anyone, and one for people who trust blindly. The title of this week’s challenge is – get ready – “Fruit of the Luge”. I have to wonder if the writers come up with the puns first, and then work from there. “Fruit of the Luge! It’s perfect! Does Chile have a luge? Does it have fruit? YESSS!!”

“I just inhaled a seed.”

Basically, they are to pair up, one from each team, and go down this massive steel luge together. The driver will be blindfolded (with a “sexy, silky blindfold”, Jon creepily smarms), and the navigator will be shouting out directions. Along the way, they will see a series of pictures of various fruits. The navigator is to yell these out to the driver, and the driver will have to remember the order when they get back and arrange the fruits on a table. For every one they get right, Jon will add $2,000 to the pot. I love how Jon keeps claiming to be doing all of this on his own, like he’s the fiendish mastermind behind all of this. I like to think of him spending his nights physically lugging $2,000 in change (in bags with money signs on them) into the giant Scrooge McDuck-type silo that contains that elusive “pot”.

Oh, and the players are NOT allowed to discuss anything once they cross the finish line. A big deal is made out of this rule, so you know it will be soon be blatantly broken.

Case in point: Bobby and Clay are up first. Bobby fails miserably as usual, not accurately describing the fruits and incorrectly identifying an avocado as a pear. And, of course, as they cross the finish line, Bobby continues barking “Pear! PEAR!” Fun fact about Bobby: gets really worked up over graphical representations of fruit. Clay is able to compensate for Bobby’s ineptitude by correctly guessing avocado in the lineup, and they get 5/7. I should note at this point that Bobby, Clay, and Mark are all in a coalition together, which must make for some craaazy home videos. (Mark cries, Bobby whines, and Clay just stares at both of them, shaking his head in disbelief and pity.)

The game continues. Paul and Ali get 5/7. Craig and Victoria (who hilarious claims that she felt safe because Craig’s flabby body enveloped her like body armor) get 7/7, but they yammered on way past the finish line so you know they’ll be screwed. Mark and Kristen get 7/7. Alex and Nicole are next, and Nicole bungles the whole thing up by repeating the first fruit twice, which Alex then doubles on the table, and so they only get 1/7. Nicole looks fine with this, although at this point I think it’s fairly obvious that she’s just trying to make herself look like the Mole. Well, physical appearances to the contrary, we’re just not buying it, honey.

Lady-parts doctor or furry woodland creature? You decide!

After the commercial, Jon informs the group that Team Bobby/Clay and Team Victoria/Craig talked beyond the finish line, and have therefore added 0 dollars to the pot. The best thing about this part is that Jon sounds really offended by the fact that they disobeyed his orders. “The rules were clear!” he shouts. Calm down, Smuggy. Don’t get your frighteningly high-arched eyebrows in a twist.

Later, Clay and Mark discuss the fact that Bobby is a wackjob and could very well be the Mole, so they jointly decide to distance themselves from him within their coalition. Poor Bobby. His high school yearbook prediction couldn’t have been more accurate.

Bobby: Most Likely To Alienate Potential Allies, Fail At Running, and Generally Suck At Everything At All Times And Especially While Being Filmed For A Reality Show

The next day, the players are told to dress up in their Sunday best. They are then delighted to find out that Jon has booked them a day at a really nice spa. With a waterslide! While they frolic about the pool and get fancy massages and bandy about passive-aggressive accusations in the hot tub, I have to imagine that Jon is impishly prancing about the windows, cackling to himself and whispering “My precious…”, as he eventually commandeers the locker rooms and steals all of their clothes. Ah. So Jon is apparently That Kid at the neighborhood pool.

“Heeeere’s Jonny!”

As the bewildered players return and realize that they’ve been robbed of their attire, Jon explains all. He sent their clothes out to be dry cleaned, but they won’t be ready in time for dinner tonight, which is at a restaurant across town. So they are to go out into the streets and find clothes from themselves: guys need pants, with a collared shirt and a tie, and girls need a two-piece top with a skirt or pants. For every person that arrives properly clothed, $5,000 will be added to the pot. If they don’t get there in time, they don’t get to eat. Oh, man. Bobby could waste away to nothing! Craig might consume a fellow player!

Unfortunately, they are not allowed to take the robes they’re wearing, so they must prance through the streets of Santiago in Mole speedos for the guys, and Mole slutsuits for the girls. We knew this day would come, but I don’t think any of us expected it to be this soon.

“I designed them myself. Shit just got real, folks.”

Before anything starts, Clay and Mark both drop out. “Dignity and self-respect are way more important than money to me,” Clay says. Um, you DO know you signed up for a reality show, right? Didn’t dignity and self-respect fly out the window ages ago?

So the kids split up into teams and take to the streets. Bobby, Craig, and Nicole are all on a team, and Best Line of the Night once again goes to Craig as he looks at himself and Bobby and declares them to be “a walking impersonation of the number 10.” HA! Craig, you’re the funniest Mole ever.

Just like Sesame Street!

Second place for best line: random Chilean woman informing Bobby that he doesn’t need clothes, he needs food. Daaamn, Bobby. That old woman just schooled your bony ass.

Meanwhile, Team Slutbaggery is making quite the splash on the streets.

ABC: The Family Channel

Victoria explains that all she’s wearing is a pair of what she calls “hooker boots”, or, as known to me and the rest of the more foul-languaged nation, “fuck me boots”. Following a rather disgusting and gratuitous montage of their boobs and asses, the girls attract the attention of a number of men, plus two busfuls of horny high school boys, who proceed to follow them for several blocks. Anyone else waiting for Chris Hanson and Dateline NBC to jump out of the bushes and cry foul on this entire operation?

“You can take my pants! They no longer fit!”

While the girls keep pretending to be offended by the attention, Alex is able to use his fluent Spanish to score some clothes for himself and Paul from some nice cab drivers. Bobby gets a top from someone, and Nicole manages to get a whole outfit, even though part of it is an apron. I bet you anything there will now be an Apron Challenge in the upcoming season of Project Runway. Tim Gunn will squeal with delight over the ruffled pockets. It’ll be good fun.

Paul gets some pants, then runs into a fellow New Yorker, who offers up another pair for Alex. After securing a final tie, their outfits are complete, and they are allowed into the restaurant. Over on Team Trampy McHarlot, Ali wants to give up. This is viewed as suspicious by the other girls, but they prod her along and eventually they run into some American guys who give them their shirts. A little later, they meet a woman who gives them all pants. So, much to the dismay of every male in Santiago and the clearly horny producers, the girls are now clothed and are allowed into the restaurant.

Bobby, Craig, and Nicole hook up with some locals to score pants and a tie for Bobby, and a shirt for Craig. Suddenly, Craig spots a laundromat. And it just so HAPPENS to be the exact laundromat where all of the players’ clothes are being dry-cleaned. Craig and Bobby congratulate themselves on being useful for once, which really makes me suspect that they’re going to be disqualified for this. But when they return to the restaurant, Jon explains that the cards that he handed them with the restaurant’s address on them also had a small code at the bottom that pointed to the address of the laundromat. Yay hidden codes!

Meanwhile, Clay and Mark are denied entrance into the restaurant. They stand under the dining room window, hungry and dejected in their silly little robes.

“But they’re terrycloth! The finest of all cloths!”

In a bout of rather terrible editing, we come back from the commercials to the team sitting down to yet another dinner (a.k.a. the Pre-Quiz Supper of Dysfunction) the next night. What did they do all day? I MUST KNOW. Mark is chided for being such a fastidious note-taker, and then Paul starts yelling. And yelling. He shouts at Mark, calls Bobby a punk, and blares that he’s here to make money, not friends. Then he and Nicole trade some words. She apologizes to the table for threatening to kill him. He demands an apology directly to him. She apologizes directly to him. He yells that he doesn’t want her apology. Paul, if you have given anyone at that table a reason not to drive an icepick through your chest, I’d love to hear it.

“JUDGING.”

Quiz time! My favorite question, once again included only for the purpose of mocking a certain player’s ineptitude: “In the ‘Fruit of the Luge’ mission, did the Mole put two apples in their fruit lineup/answer?” Take THAT, Alex’s stupid brain!

When the kids sit down to receive their quiz results, Jon suddenly raises a single eyebrow. Uh oh. Either he’s about to steal their clothes again, or something is Up. He offers them a bribe: $20,000 in cash to leave the game, right now. Shocked faces and sweaty brows abound. But no one takes it, so the execution begins.

Kristen, Mark, and Victoria are safe. Now that there’s a 1-in-7 chance of being executed, Jon ups the total for the bribe: $30,000 to quit and leave. And Ali takes it! Addressing a bunch of gaping mouth holes, she says that she doesn’t feel that she did very well on the quiz. As Jon takes her out to the car, the rest of the players are split on her decision. Alex thinks that that was a really smart move, whereas Bobby says that he never would have taken it, that he’s here to win. Ali says that she misses home, and with that, she’s gone, and without even a proper group eulogy.

Jon returns and tells them that Ali would have been safe. Oh well. Time to continue the execution! Uh…wha?? Now THAT threw me for a loop. I did not expect them to get rid of two people in one episode, but then again, that’s the game. That Jon (creator of everything and master of all plot twists) sure is a trickster.

And the redprint goes to…Bobby! Bobby, who only two minutes ago said he was here to win. Oh well, maybe not so much. He leaves the group with a sad puppy dog face, and Victoria cries (really?) as he goes. Paul smirks and says that he’s two people closer to winning the money. Oh, Paul. Your charm is as infectious as the multiple STDs probably raging through your groin.

Farewell, Bobby. We’ll miss your ability to never do anything useful, ever.

Well! Any new suspicions? I’m still thinking either Victoria (especially after the finish line snafu) or Clay (for refusing to take part in the Dress Code mission). Part of me also really wants to suspect Craig, but then again he found those clothes at the laundromat. But then again, he’s so likable that no one would suspect him of being so devious. Plus, I want him to be around until the end so that he can compare his body type to more things. A bowling ball! A beluga whale! The abstract representation of irony! The possibilities are endless.

What do we think? Can we get a group consensus on the longest, most painful way to dispose of Paul?