I had a dream last night. In the dream I was driving the Road Rules Tioga. Blair was sitting shotgun eating a pie, while Sophia was up in the loft doing something with Jisela's underwear. ADDam was mooning cows we were passing, and laughing, and Ellen was rubbing some sort of exfoliant on her ass. I have no idea where Steve was, and Jisela was screaming at me, "When we're fucking, I don't want to hear no 'C'mon, Jisela!'" And as I drove, a serene calm came over me, and I realized I could handle everything. I could handle these six. It wasn't so bad. But suddenly, in the middle of the road stood Holly, smiling at me with her Scaryteeth, beckoning for me to come to her, and I swerved the Tioga to the right, and we went Thelma and Louise-ing off a high cliff wall. I saw a bright light and Pablo was there, and he was telling me to go back, that it wasn't my time. I woke up with a start, unable to breathe or see. And then I realized my cat was sitting on my face, trying to smother me. I threw her off and took a few deep breaths, oxygenating my near-dying brain. My cat meowed petulantly and stormed off to puke on my kitchen counter. Things aren't so good, folks.
So last week. Jisela can't do the rappelling -- can't get her big ass up the mountain. She yells at the instructors and everyone else to "shut up!" Then in the Tioga, the B/M Crack Editing Staff shows us a scene we didn't see before, in which Jisela is complaining to Sophia about Ellen and Ellen is talking shit to her and giving her dirty looks and Jisela is saying, "Oh, bitch, no you didn't!" Ellen floats that Jisela and Sophia have bonded, and that they're leaving her out. So basically, the whole "Previously" is now a place for them to put shit that wasn't in episodes so we can follow their shit because this crew can't craft a good story line to save their lives. Shit, Beetle Bailey has more compelling and linear narratives.
Opening sequence. Things are different. Fuck your mom. Someone will be eliminated. Crying. Crying. And that's just me. The kids. Pictures of the kids. Skinny-dipping. Ellen crying. My cat biting me. Me calling Pink Dot for fifth of Wild Turkey to ease the pain. And the crest. Fuck off.
The moon. The Tioga. ADDam and Left Eye Ellen are on top of the RV talking. Ellen is talking about Sophia and Jisela and saying that there is more bad than good with them, and "seriously, they can just go kiss [her] ass." What's her fetish with people smooching her ass? ADDam floats that the girls are not speaking and that the tension is going to affect their performance in the mission tomorrow.
Sophia and Jisela. Lying in the RV bed. Man, for someone who was just worried about giving her lesbian friend the wrong message, Jisela sure is being cuddly. At this point, if Jisela wakes up to Sophia muzzling on her titties, she shouldn't be surprised. Jisela is joking that she wants to go up the mountain first tomorrow, and then if she feels like quitting, she'll have Ellen talking down behind her and she'll immediately be so annoyed that she'll find the strength to make it the rest of the way up. "Whatever your motivation may be, you'll get it done, though," says Sophia, with the sad diplomacy of someone in full-on lurve. Sad.
Day. Driving. ADDam floats that El Chorro is so beautiful it's out of a dream, not a postcard. Doesn't "El Chorro" mean "The Cinnamony Pastry Item You Buy at the Carnival"? Shots of the kids driving and having fun. Money shot of the poor andaluciaextrem.com guys. Then the boys knock on the Tioga and drag the kids out kicking and screaming for their mission. There is gear laid out, and the guys explain that, every year, they hold an eight-day multi-event race, and the kids will be competing in a scaled-down version. Adam smiles. The Spanish boys smile, erroneously thinking that their deal with B/M is going to bring big returns when all the American kids see it! Poor dudes. They go on to say that all members of the Six of Suck will have to finish every event before they can go on, and that they'll be completing together against the clock. EllenExposition floats that they'll be doing -- and we see shots of all -- mountain biking, running, a zip line, swimming, and rappelling. Ellen reads her lines very stiffly, concluding, "This is the most physical mission we've had." Yeah, you mean, like, of the two other so far? Wow! We're in for a special treat! Adam then floats, over an image of the crest, that Endurance is the "virtue" they're going after, and that he's stoked. I hope he's "stoked" on his meds. Jisela, wearing the Purple Bandanna of Imminent Expulsion, then tells the camera that she suddenly feels very confident, and says some stupid shit about having her rock climbing gear on, and then lies, saying that she's definitely not the "weak link," receiving twenty dollars from M, standing just off-camera, for saying that.
The Music of B/M's Fifteen-Dollar Score Budget plays as the kids drive up the mountain in a short bus. As the kids stand with tandem bikes, getting ready, Blair floats that the mission is all about teamwork and coming together -- and then he says that it's going to be a long day. Hee. Yeah. It already is, fucker. Ellen floats that she has no problem saying goodbye? To people? Who don't pull? Their own weight? "Check you later. See ya," she adds for good measure. Ellen then hugs Jisela, wishing her luck. We then get the hug again in slo-mo -- hee -- as Jisela sluts that Ellen was just trying to look good and act nice. "Not!" floats Jisela. And then with very unintentionally funny comic timing, she gets serious and adds, "She's not."
The Spaniard tells the Six of Suck to start and the kids get on their tandem bikes and start pedaling and they have helmet-cams on, which is just so The NHL on Fox but whatever. ADDam is yelling for everyone to pedal and "pedal home" and then Pop! -- His and Jisela's chain breaks. Hee. What shit equipment. Fucking funny. They all get off their bikes and push uphill and they're coming together as a team, I guess. Then they're at the top of the hill and they all jump on to coast/ride down and Steve -- hey Steve! -- floats that he swears the least of everybody (he fucking exists the least of everybody) but, "Oh, shit," he says. Hee. We see, I think, Blair and Ellen fall hard off their bikes. Damn, that's funny. They jump back on and everyone rides and The Crap-Ass Music of This Band Couldn't Get A Video On MTV if Spike Jonze Directed It plays as the kids cross the checkpoint, with two hours left. Adam checks his phone or some shit and discovers that they all have to run to the checkpoint. "Run!" he yells, and they do. The kids run; Sophia floats that suddenly they're running through deep mud and "Ew! Mud, mud, mud," adds Ellen. Someone says it's like running through glue. "I may not be able to run, but dammit, I'm not stupid," yells Jisyella. Hee. ADDam then floats that it was when he was running with Jisela that he realized she was going to be fine as long as they don't get "hung up" anywhere. The kids are on a hill running over rocks, and they reach the checkpoint with an hour and a half to go. Okay, yeah, it's easy to say it as I'm sitting on the floor in my boxers with a cup of coffee and a donut on the table in front of me and the Girls Gone Wild videotape on top of the VCR, but man, this shit really doesn't look that hard. (Quick note: it's now been three months since I had a cigarette, so give me a break if I fashion myself healthy and vital alla sudden. And yes, I expect congratulations gifts in the mail.)
At the checkpoint, there are wetsuits and the time doesn't stop as they try to fit into them. Of course the time stops many many many other times since this two-and-a-half-hour mission apparently lasts all fucking day. So the kids slide into their suits, Jisela, naturally, joking that her big ass is not going to fit and I think Sophia probably wants to deck with her false talk of having such a big ass. The kids gets suited up. Blair asks to see Jisela's ass and says, "It's gotta be huge," and Jisela turns around happily and Blair yells, "Oh my God!" Ellen is staring up at the trees while this is happening, her left eye catching sight of a bird up in a tree.
So the kids get ready to do the zip line, and Jisyella floats that they're instructed to stay curled up so they can get speed going. The line is pretty horizontal, and Blair lets go, making the long and sorta slow trip over water to some rocks where a Spaniard awaits to steal his booty and rape his women. Oh, no, this is the twenty-first century. Never mind. "Very fine," says the Spaniard to Blair when he lands, which is funny enough on its own. Ellen is , and she immediately sprawls out, showing off. Jisela floats that Ellen must not have been listening and bitches, "She such a show-off." Really, she is, because immediately she starts to slow down and then Ellen stops altogether in the middle of the cord. The kids start yelling for her to use her arms, and Ellen is grunting and flailing, and Jisela is bitching, and Sophia is voice-overing that Ellen should have been smart and just gotten to the end and they all watch helplessly. Jisela bitches, "I bet you wish you had a big ass now." Hee. I mean, I like the fact that she's proud of her big ass and all, but really, shut the fuck up, finally. Thanks. Steve is bitching that it's taking so long and killing their pace as Ellen tries to pull her way hand-over-hand to the other side. Blair is yanking on the rope to try to make her move -- man, I hope he pulls the rope loose and Ellen goes crashing into the water below. Ellen is yelling and moaning and Jisela floats, in an act of obvious self-preservation, "If we lose this, it's because of Ellen." Ellen is really stuck and she yells, "Blair, help!" and we fade to commercials.
We're back and Ellen is still dangling mid-zip line, fucking up the program. "I messed up," voice-overs Ellen. No shit. She says that Blair is the only one who will help her -- we see him encouraging her as she complains that her arms are tired. He tells her to pull herself hand-over-hand, and she does for a while, but mostly just hangs there. She looks much more like a sad, bundled-up Eskimo than a "Pretty, Pretty Princess" right now. Everyone yells and we jump cut to Ellen almost there and Blair reaches out and pulls her and everyone cheers. Everyone cheers the big fuckup. Whoooo! Blair voice-overs that the time was an issue, but that he's more concerned that Ellen is going to be more tired later. We see they've only lost fifteen minutes. Oh Boo-the-fuck Hoo. Sophia slides. Steve slides -- but naturally we only get a long shot of him because he somehow terribly offended B/M and they hate his box-livin' ass now. Jisela slides, the andaluwhatever.com sign she's forced to carry nearly covering her face. Jisela floats that she's having so much fun since she's never done any of this stuff before. Someone goes, and then Adam goes, so I don't know who that person was. Some stowaway. Adam floats that he has no fear of the zip line and ooh, what a big man. I used to do that shit at a huge park near my house when I was seven, and I wasn't even strapped in, so go take your meds and get in the crack you love so.
That's over and they only have one hour now. They all jump in the water and have to swim five hundred yards to the other shore. Blair floats (and we see) that Ellen pretty much just gives up and starts drifting, unable to swim because she's so beat from her immense fuckup. Ellen rolls over. Slo-mo. Slo-mo. Oh, now it's all "dramatic," and Jisela floats that she's an army brat (no, just a brat) and "never leave a fallen man behind," so she swims back to help Ellen. Pull her under, Ellen! Jisela has Ellen flip on her back and she sorta swims under her, pulling Ellen. Jisela acts for the camera, yelling that Ellen has never left her and so she's not going to leave her now. Adam floats, "I think the group is really coming together in the water." Oh, gross! (That's the dirtiest line of the season so far.) Blair floats some fucking homespun Louisiana hyperbole on us when he says that this was the greatest display of teamwork he's ever seen in his whole hick life. Lord. They reach the end and Ellen and Jisela hug while some crap-ass song B/M surreptitiously taped from some guy playing his guitar for quarters in Grand Central Station plays. The kids get a short time-out.
Jisela floats that they're being transported to another location, so it must be the last section of the race. I don't understand how this is only a five-minute break when they're getting into a fucking short bus for a jaunty ride up the mountain, but whatever. Blair asks a shivering Ellen whether she has any arm strength left and she says no. Jisyella continues to jockey hard not to get booted when she gets Sophia and they hug the freezing Ellen to keep her warm. Sophia is so reluctant, but since she'd lick a hornet nest for Jisela, she throw her arms around Ellen; it also lets her touch Jisela more. Jisela makes a joke about her ass again and then tries to get them to remember a time they were hot and now Ellen is floating that the person who helped her was the person she was having issues with and that made her cry so much as it all hit her and Jisela tries to get them to laugh and remember when she fell on the bike and Sophia laughs because...well, Jisela wants her to, and Ellen just cries and licks snot from her upper lip. That's fucking sexy.
The kids get in the short bus. They drive up a mountain, then they have to hike the rest of the way. It's really high up when they get to the top and Sophia floats that she could see all of Spain; Blair says, "That's hard-core extreme." No, Blair. That's hard-core andaluciaextrem. C'mon, you gotta help B/M pay the bills, yo.
They meet Crazy-Looking Spaniard guide; he says that they just have to rappel, and he tells them not to get hysterical but that it's higher than their training and here, I'm not sure why they had to climb the fucking mountain in the first place the day before when they're just going down, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that Jisela can't climb and so they didn't want to totally have a shit mission and so they just cut it to going down -- something that Ellen is very good at. Steve -- hi, Steve! -- floats that they have to rappel three hundred feet down and something about the "burden" being on themselves. Then Jisela goes floaty, crabbing that she's scared, but that she's going to do it.
Crazy-Looking Spaniard says that Sophia and Blair are going first, and they get ready as Jisela asks Ellen whether this is "Empire State Building high." Yes, Jisela. The Empire State Building is three hundred feet tall.
Now Jisela is near the edge talking to Sophia: "If I just get it over with, I'll be straight." I don't think that tactic will work for Sophia. Jisela's teeth are chattering with fright and the wind kicks up and it gets dark as Blair tells us this, and he thinks that maybe they shouldn't go right now. There is rain on the lens and they have a fire going as Jisela tells us that she wonders if this is a sign. CLS asks the kids whether they're ready; they're just going over the edge when CLS decides they're not going to go -- that it's too windy and dangerous. Blair doesn't want to fail, but the only thing he's failing is to grasp what's going on -- that they'll just do the fucking thing tomorrow when there is less chance of someone dying and B/M getting stuck with a lawsuit that could totally mess up B's trip to Europe this fall. Stupid. CLS says he wants them safe while Jisela floats that she wants to go -- she doesn't want to have a day to let the fear take root. ExposEllen explains that they'll make up this last part of the "race" the day. Over a shot of their fire, she says she hopes they still have the "fire" in them to do it tomorrow. B/M Crack Editing Staff: nice.
Night. Tioga. Somewhere. Sophia and Jisela look for Ellen. They find her. Ellen says that she wants to be alone, but Jisela makes everyone hug. Ellen floats that she never felt bad in any of the missions before, and now she was the "weak link" (fuck off) and she learned something about herself and also about others. Over this, we get shots of Jisela swimming and carrying Ellen. Ellen cries that she discovered some stuff out about herself, and now she feels like a big hypocrite; she apologizes to the girls. By way of trying to make Ellen feel better, Jisela says how much Ellen was getting on her nerves, but that it doesn't mean that she's not going to be there for Ellen. Hee. Sophia tells Ellen to let it go and everyone hugs as Jisela reluctantly says that she likes Ellen even though she gets on her nerves. "Everyone is entitled to change their minds," Jisela opines. The girls walk and talk about how they're going to get down the mountain really quickly the day, and Ellen thanks Jisela again. Ellen floats, reading another line even more stiffly than before, and says that no one wants to go home and that she knows that when it comes down to it everyone will help each blah bleh bloo.
Moon. Okay, now it's morning. Sophia and Jisela stand by some water and it's misty and Jisela is saying how scared she is. She says, and we see, that when she was coming down the helicopter on the first mission she freaked out, and that's the feeling she has about the rappelling. Jisela floats that "last night" she had a dream that something bad was going to happen on this mission and fuck the timeline because we already heard this jigga-when? and ah fuck it all. Dramatic shot of the girls. Short bus. Flash. The girls. Short bus. The mountain. Commercials. Someone go get a drink with me. Please. I need one bad.
Tioga. The kids get ready to die. Jisela asks for her deodorant. ADDam writes a Latin word about "transformation through courage" on the tongue of Jisela's shoe and instead of punching the fucker for tagging on her kicks, she thanks him, saying that it's "tight." Adam floats some shit about people finding their own way to get up a mountain and through life and Jisela is "hearing that." Kids today. Man. Jisela floats that she's starting to appreciate the reason Adam is on the trip (yeah, to piss us all off doing stupid shit when he goes off his meds like Sally Field on ER) and then she says something to the effect that helping the weaker people is good and bleh.
Montage of stupid shots of nature and shit. The Music I Used To Make On My TRS-80 plays and Jisela voice-overs a mantra that she can do this and all the kids are on the mountain and Ellen stretches and CLS babbles and my cat runs full-speed into the screen door but it holds and she runs into the closet to sulk. Blair floats that he and Steve are going to go first, and CLS says it's so that the boys can make sure everything is safe for the girls and sexism just seems like chivalry with the Spanish -- it's so unfair. So Steve and Blair starts going, and Steve immediately slips a bit. CLS laughs at him, saying, "No problem." Jisela floats that she's scared. Now Blair voice-overs that he thinks he's going to die, but you can tell B/M just made him say that, because he looks totally calm. Steve is enjoying the view, but worries about time so he doesn't dawdle as much as he would like to. I can't believe I just said "dawdle." It looks pretty fun and very cool.
So up top, Jisela goes into a little comedy routine where she confesses before going down. She says that she urged her friends to hook up with a couple of coaches at her school but then she didn't follow through and do it as well like she'd said she would -- she did it just to be mean. Down at the bottom, the boys land. Up top, Jisela goes on that she broke the shoe of her rival for prom queen. Okay, that's kinda funny. Even Ellen, who still hates Jisela, cracks a smile. When CLS says her name, Jisela instantly stops her laughing and starts weeping. She hugs ADDam. She looks around. She hugs Ellen. Sophia starts doing "I'm a little teapot," but Jisela simply cries through it. Adam tries to help her out, but only sings "pour" along with Sophia.
At the bottom, Blair says that he did it in seven minutes, so if everyone gets a move on, then they all should be able to make it to the finish line in time. Above, Sophia tells Jisela that it's not that bad. As if, like, Jisela is suddenly going to stop crying and go, "Oh really? Now that you told me it's not that bad, I'm no longer scared." Jisela's bottom lip quivers. Sophia says that the boys are below and the ropes are safe and "nothing is going to happen." CLS clamps her in saying, "All right, sweetheart. Are you ready for Freddy?" Hee, all butchering English colloquialisms. Adam laughs half-heartedly, but no one else does. Adam is going to be going down with Jisela, which sounds disappointingly dirtier than it is.
Jisela edges out on the rock, and everyone mumbles encouragements, and Jisela is full-on weeping, and someone says she's a warrior, and she cries, and the B/M Crackhouse Editing Staff gives us a flash of the view from the first mission's helicopter, and Jisela cries as Spaniards touch her and, okay, on that I don't blame her. More weeping. Finally she says, "I can't do it." Everyone says that she can. CLS whispers and Jisela is about to go. Suddenly, she once again starts saying she can't do it and you know she's serious when her voice gets a little more street and she says, "Fuck y'all, I can't do this shit." Okay, mission's over. Fo' sho'. She keeps yelling that her life is more important than this, and Sophia is trying to tell her the first part is the scariest, and Jisela says that she can't help it if they don't care about their lives but she does! And..."To be continued..." Fuck. You know, it's just like when I was a kid and the Fonz was about to jump the shark and I was all excited, sitting like an inch away from the screen, and suddenly it froze and said, "To be continued..." I just remember the sheer anger and frustration and disbelief. So this is very much like that, except without any of the emotions.
week: up on the mountain, Jisyella reverts to the self we all know and dislike when she more strongly insists she's not going. Sophia floats that this is going to look bad to the group (ya think?), and that she might have to say goodbye to her friend. CLS asks a sitting Jisela whether she wants to go, and tries to encourage her, but Jisela just shakes her head. Ellen, somehow at the bottom now, says that they've all been told she's not going, but they're still hoping she is. And that's it.
Well. Crap...except for Ellen crying and Jisela crying. I think people should just cry more. Maybe if Steve wept he'd get some friggin' screen time.