Episode Report Card Miss Alli: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Reports Of Granny Fairplay's Death Are Greatly Exaggerated
By Miss Alli | Season 7 | Episode 11 | Aired on 11.26.2003
"Jon," Jeff says next, "here's your buddy Dan." Around the corner, making Fairplay Fingers all the way, comes Jon's bud, who looks very much like the beer-swilling idiot friend you'd expect a pipsqueak like Jon to have. They hug, and then Jon says softly to Dan, "How's Grandma?" There is a pause, and then Dan says, "She died, dude." You know, there are a number of moments that are burned in reality-television history on the basis of sheer idiocy, and "she died, dude" is definitely one of them. The fact that it doesn't seem to arouse more suspicion in more of these people is how you can tell they're not that bright. ["I'd also say that the rest of the contestants didn't react to this announcement with more suspicion may have been because being all alone in an intense situation can create a kind of mass hysteria, like when you go to camp and sit in a Spirit Circle and a counselor reads a sappy poem you're all supposed to think is meaningful, or some such fruitiness, and then one girl gets a little emotional about it and then before you know it everyone is totally bawling and you don't really know why except you just get carried along in the moment." -- Wing Chun] Would Big Dumb Dan have been making with the Fairplay Fingers if he had been about to tell the guy that his grandmother died? Would Jon, had he really been expecting either Big Dumb Dan or Old Granny Fairplay, have started by gloating to Big Dumb Dan about being in the final seven? It's just patently absurd. It's not worthy of Eddie Haskell, let alone Richard Hatch.
Anyway, Jon acts all broken up at "she died, dude." Overhearing this, the other castaways begin to react. Lill, of course, is all sad, because she missed the scout badge in intellectual curiosity, and she takes things about as literally as a four-year-old. Jon and Dan hug again. When Jon sits back down, Jeff asks him about what just happened, and Jon says that it was either supposed to be Dan or Old Granny Fairplay showing up, and the reason it's Dan is that Dead Old Granny Fairplay is no longer with us, having gone to the Dead Granny Resort in the sky, where she is playing Dead Granny Canasta with all the other Dead Grannies. ["Watching this a second time, I did notice that Jon was careful to be vague about the details of exactly where Granny Fairplay was now -- in a metaphysical sense -- and just said something along the lines of 'She's not around' instead of 'She passed away' or even 'Jeff: she died, dude.'" -- Wing Chun] Burton pats him on the shoulder. "I can hope to win this and get some more information," Jon blubbers. Darrah looks teary. Lill clutches Jon's hand. Sandra looks at him, thinking precisely the following: "Like hell your grandmother died, you creepy little lowlife toad."