Watching tonight's episode of Road Rules: X-Treme made me think that television might just be a better place if more washed-up reality stars beat the shit out of each other every week. Imagine it. Coral vs. Omarosa. Rupert Boneham vs. Boston Rob. The Miz vs. Evan Marriot (that's Joe Millionaire, in case you forgot). The possibilities are endless.
The thought dawned upon me while watching Angela and Tina punch the bejesus out of each other during the climactic event on Face Off Island. You see, tonight's episode served as Part 2 of the fascinating battle between Road Rules: X-Treme and Road Rules: South Pacific. Savvy viewers might remember that when we last left this electrifying showdown, the new cast had a comfy lead over the pros, which is baffling since half the older kids had kept their skills sharp by performing similarly inane tasks on various Real World/Road Rules Challenges. Still, despite being behind, the older kids had one last shot to reclaim their dignity during a wild and chaotic boxing showdown. Needless to say, blood was shed.
Before we got to the pugilistic antics of this episode though, we did need to wrap up some sloppily tacked on cliffhanger issues from last week. When we last tuned in, Mary Beth was doing the tango with Patrick, much to Jillian's consternation. We were left to fret about the romantic implications of this flirting, but contrary to MTV's assumptions, I don't think anyone has been spending the past seven days nervously wondering if the Jillian/Patrick union could withstand this major setback. I mean, it's not like they're Demi and Ashton. Actually, I don't care about them either.
Well, in true Bunim/Murray fashion, this minor flirting resulted in... nothing. Jillian started dancing with Abram, Mary Beth let out a mannish laugh, and the entire tango tease fizzled away into a medley of peppy rock music and footage of the moon. Has anyone else noticed that on any given reality show, lunar cutaway shots have become the de facto "Uh, we don't know how to end this scene..." transition cheats? It's like the moon adds some significance or irony to something that wasn't there before. Cast members could be discussing lint, and then a random transitional shot of the moon will show up, and we're supposed to say "Ooh, how romantic" or "Ooooh, there's gonna be a fight" or "Ooh, this is foreshadowing something ironic. Perhaps a visit to a laundromat!" You get the point.
After the white hot romantic action at the top of the show, the Road Rulers woke up early for their next X-Treme face off: egg chugging. I know what you're thinking: was there a bungee or a blindfold involved? No. People just had to chug six raw eggs as quickly as possible. Now maybe I'm a little jaded, but this just wasn't very hardcore compared to the poor people on The Amazing Race who had to eat a whole ostrich egg, which is the equivalent of, you know, 24 normal eggs. Stupid Road Rulers.
MTV once again took the classy route by happily airing ample amounts of egg-vomit footage. First we saw Abram proudly standing above a floating mess of boot in some now-polluted body of water. If that wasn't bad enough, we then had to watch almost all of these people regurgitate their eggy stomach contents in a variety of ways. Chris, who said cheers to the Holy Spirit before drinking his eggs (okay Chris, we get it. You're religious. Big deal...), went galloping over to the water for some Jesus induced-vomiting. I hope he didn't kill some poor Christ-representing fish. Meanwhile, Tina followed her egg cocktail with a variety of unflattering hacks and grunts which proved that her vileness knows no bounds.
Probably the most comedic reaction was Angela who burst into a fit of tears after her egg-sperience (get it??? Okay, I'll never do that again). The resident drama queen threw a minor hissy fit when she discovered that no one had filled up her water bottle and then ran over to the lake or river or whatever it was and booted. For some reason she burst into tears, which had me wondering if Angela knew she was actually drinking just eggs. I mean, it's not like she was being forced to kill a little peasant boy. Maybe she had some yolk-induced childhood trauma. A Jehova's Witness visit gone wrong?
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Comments (3)
i'm still confused why the gay didnt have to fight?
granted i was so revolted by the lack of halfway decent editing, storylines, or character development, i spared myself and tivo'd through much of the show.
i was disappointed to not see the gay (nick is it?) take on, i dunno...tina?
bitch could scatch her eyes out.
1 of 3 | Posted by jash | Posted on September 7, 2004 11:09 AM
Jodi, Cara, and dave didn't fight either. What was up with that? I don't think they ever explained it. I wouldn't have minded seeing Jodi vs. Cara and dave vs. Nick. The more fights the better!
2 of 3 | Posted by sjb | Posted on September 7, 2004 12:03 PM
all those jerks didn't fight because Road Rules X-Treme had already clinched the prize. But i would have liked to have seen some more reality on reality action. then again, seeing how cara fared with the thin piece of wood last week, I think it may have been for the better that she was benched.
3 of 3 | Posted by b-side | Posted on September 7, 2004 12:11 PM