Thus Spake the Big Guy
RW/RR Challenge Season 05 - Battle of the Seasons - Episode 16

By Weezie
5/20/2002

Hey, it's the episode all twelve of us have been waiting for! We'll FINALLY get to find out who won the Real World / Road Rules Battle of the Seasons! It was pretty mean of BMP not to give us any hints, or even like a dozen or so heavy-handed moments of foreshadowing per episode, but tonight's the night! On the morning of the final challenge, the RR team gently shake the slumber from their beady little eyes and wish out loud for a physical challenge, since that will mean they have it in the bag.

Now here's an interesting little factoid that I had completely forgotten in the 7 days since the last episode: Theo is a blithering idiot. That's not so bad as a standalone characteristic, but his unfortunate decision to try to mask his stupidity with confusing quirky phrases in the hopes he'll sound deep makes it downright criminal. Only other blithering idiots would fall for it... which is why the other RR kids do not beat him with a large wooden club every time he opens his mouth.

Theoism #1: Today we separate the MEN...... from the MORAL MEN.

Whatever.

Meanwhile, over on the RW side, Elka talks about how nervous she is, and Sean mentions the wife, kid, baby and mountains of debt, but it is NOT foreshadowing. Several minutes are spent rehashing the entire dealmaking between the RW and RR gang, making special note of the fact that only Holly refused to make a deal with Coral, but don't even think it - that is also not foreshadowing. Holly says she doesn't want to make a deal because if she wins, "it's because I was CHOSEN to win." So you heard it here first: the results of the contest will be directly due to the will of the Big Guy (not foreshadowing).

Coral calls Holly the "Wicked Witch of the East" but that is obviously not true, because then somebody would have dropped a house on her already, and we'd all be drinking champagne. This one is still flying about on her broom, damn it all to h-e-doublehockeysticks. As summarizer, I must aver, I thoroughly examined her, and she's not only still around, she's still the biggest pill around. Holly is shown eating alone --- a common occurrence, no doubt. The soundtrack sings about calling her Sunshine - har har, Mr. Funny Music Editor. So clever. She smirks smugly at her place setting, having apparently quizzed it on its spirituality and found it lacking.

They all arrive at the site of the final challenge, and learn that it's going to be a relay involving kayaking, diving, longboarding, solving a "mind puzzle" and then climbing up a rope ladder. Sean is disheartened that it will be more physical than he was expecting, and says their odds have dropped dramatically (no, I'm telling you, this is not foreshadowing).

Theoism #2: Dude, we could take an IGUANA with a Road Rules sticker on its back and put it through this thing!

Timmy and Emily quickly take the lead over Danny and Kelley in the kayak, and then just as quickly fall behind when one of the toy fish they're supposed to collect on each of the first three legs of the relay turns out to be tightly knotted to a buoy. It's strange how this just happens to heighten the tension and give the advantage to the less physical team. Holly stomps all over the RR boat, screaming that "this is not okay" and "this is SO not okay" and "this is not cool!" Since this is all up to the Big Guy, we can only assume she is screaming at Him. Sean cheers their great stroke of luck, and Elka proudly exclaims, "I think we have a chance now!" The RW team makes it to their catamaran first, but nobody can seem to figure out where the diving gear is, or where the water is, or something. Sweet, sweet Elka bellows "HELLO! ANYBODY!" in a very unladylike fashion. In desperation, Emily gnaws through the rope with her teeth, and they're finally off in hot pursuit. As the diving portion ends, Road Rules is ahead again due to Elka's inability to dive five feet for more than two seconds before she has to come back up because she has "no breath." Must be the Big Guy getting her back for smoking and lying about it way back in the Boston days. Theo and Holly have a commanding lead over Mike and Coral, but in yet another bizarre twist of fate, a mischievous porpoise shaped just like a bouffanted onetime soap producer in a wetsuit reaches up and snatches a fish out of Holly's hand, and Theo has to retrieve it. You'd think this would allow the RW team to edge ahead again, and they would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for that meddling Mike and his insatiable desire to hump his female teammates in da booty. Although their longboard has room for two or three people on it, Mike lies right on top of Coral at the head of the board, wiggling around in a distasteful and unsettlingly familiar manner. Try as she might, Coral cannot move the board through the water from this position, and the back of the board rarely even touches the surface. Theo continues to try to get the fish and himself back to the longboard.

Theoism #3: I'm struggling like a shot squirrel in a pile of poo. I got nothin'.

You got nothin' is right. I think someone wrote a song about Theo once...

Some folk'll never wear a star
And then again, some folk'll
Like Theo, the slack-jawed yokel

Finally, Holly and Theo get back on track and race to the shore. The RR team runs off towards the "mind puzzle" and as they climb over the rocks to get to the clearing, a helpful arrow points out Mike and Coral still several miles offshore, Mike still giving Coral the pounding of her life, their longboard still showing only vertical movement. The RR team really needs that lead, too, because this part of the relay requires doin' some thinkin' with their brain things, and unfortunately the mere presence of Theo drains IQ points off of those around him. He is like some sort of intellectual black hole. They have to take some fish off one pole and put them on another pole, but with certain restrictions like "big fish no go on little fish" and "no move more than one fish at time" and "don't eat the fish, Theo." The Road Rulers shout, point at stuff, grunt, scratch their heads and generally devolve. They really should have let the iguana with the Road Rules sticker on its back give it a shot.

The RW team arrives, and after a brief period of everyone frowning at the fish, Mike announces that he's got it. The sound effects editor adds a "BOING! -spring sound- KLANG!" to highlight a thought making it all the way through Mike's brain. It's no big mystery that we haven't heard that one before. He swiftly solves the puzzle, and everyone oohs and ahhs over him figuring something out in a very patronizing way, as if it's pretty much established between them all that Mike is mentally challenged, or as Kelley puts it, "like, Rain Man." They clamber up the rope ladder, and...

Okay, I FOOLED YOU! That WAS foreshadowing all those times! Real World wins! Wahoo!

As the Real Worlders hoot and holler over their winnings, the Road Rulers continue to struggle with the "mind puzzle," so they can, as Holly says, retain their dignity. Marinate in that for a bit. While you're doing that, BMP will give you a puzzle of your own to figure out: a strange montage of rocks, a pelican, some clumps of sand... figure it out yet? These are all things that could have solved the fish puzzle by now. The music editor shows he puts the "miss" in "hit and miss" by not using "Thus Spake Zarathustra" as the RR team finally puts the last fish in place. They trudge up to the plateau where the RW team is still celebrating.

Danny: We're S-M-R-T!

Elka: Brains over brawn. That's how it's always going to be.

Define "brains." And then define "brawn." This isn't Marilyn Vos Savant vs. Arnold Schwarzenegger. This is some vaguely active young people who are smarter than airplane glue beating some more active young people who would probably have to call it a draw playing Scrabble with a tube of airplane glue. And besides, this is not about brains OR brawn. This is about the Big Guy shoving Holly's smug, cranky face in the dirt! BOOYEAH! Eat it! The camera lovingly alights on her stony visage for a nice long moment. Ahhhhhh... Coral dances around like an evil leprechaun and gloats over Holly's refusal to make a deal with her. What a catty bitch. GO CORAL!

Over slo-mo reminiscences of heartwarming Challenge moments past, such as, yes, Mike humping poor Sharon, the gang reflect on what they've learned and what they will take away from this experience. Holly says she's learned how to lose. While she DID learn the shit out of that lesson, she hasn't yet learned how to lose without being a big fat baby about it, so that's something she will have to work on when she goes on the next BMP show she swears she will never do. Dan offers up "I've made friends in ways I've never made friends before," which is probably something we should just leave alone.

Theoism #4: It's just special people, in, like, a secret little pocket of history that only us have to share.

Because YOU are, like, special people, I'd like to share a secret little pocket of hope with you, however brief its existence may be: that this is the last Theoism us will ever have to share.

Archive > Television > RW/RR Challenge > Season 05 - Battle of the Seasons

©1999-2005 PlånetSocks