Should you ever find yourself stranded on a desert island with me, you’d be in luck. I was sent to sleepaway camp when I was only six years old and back then we learned real sh*t, like how to forage through the forest for sustenance and build fires. (Years later, I’d also learn at camp how to give a killer blowj*b, but that’s really a tale for another day.) Anyway, I can collect you a leaf filled with berries that probably won’t kill you and then strip birch bark into kindling to keep us warm as we wait for either actual help or for the leader of The Others to arrive. And while we recline beside that roaring fire, I can take your mind off stressful things – you know, like forever solitude – by quoting entire movies. I am well aware that, in civilization, this quality of mine may not be deemed so adorable, but on a barren beach where there’s no Netflix? My friend, I will be like a God. Included in my personal repertoire is the full John Hughes collection. I can give you all of Caddyshack. I can Triple Lindy into Back to School, call you “Twin” after performing Overboard, and recite all of Pulp Fiction – and not just Ezekiel 25:17; I’m not some amateur. But should you find yourself still feeling blue due to concerns about imminent starvation, I will calm those nerves by launching into Clue. I will play all the characters. I’ll hold a petrified starfish by one of its spiked points and pretend it’s a knife to perform the part where Wadsworth explains how the cook was murdered. Clue is guaranteed to elicit at least a giggle while we huddle beneath palm fronds whispering comforting affirmations to one another about how it all could be worse because at least now we will never have to buy coconut water and, though we may never see electricity or good porn again, at least we are not stuck in that psychologically-haunted villa in Hawaii with anyone from Ex On the Beach.
It’s not just a Would You Rather situation that has me contemplating Clue and Ex On the Beach, though for the record, I’d rather watch Clue in Latin while doing CrossFit naked inside of a sweat lodge built by someone Trump forgot to pay than ever come face to face in real life with any contestant from Ex On the Beach. Still, the movie has been flitting into my mind lately as I watch this show. Part of it is that the sight of people who crave reality stardom more than things like education and dignity causes flames to heave around the sides of my face, but I’m also starting to wonder about the hidden places yet to be discovered in that Hawaiian mini mansion. Just like the secret passageway that led from the conservatory to the lounge in Clue, there’s gotta be another location besides the Shack of Secrets still to come, right? Certainly in the coming weeks, someone will stumble into the Attic of Atrocities or the Terrace of Terrors and come face to face with the person who once stood her up at the prom. It’s unlikely, but could there maybe be a Cellar of Self-Awareness where one person will shriek, “F*ck this sh*t! Let’s be better! I hereby swear that I will never again pull a fellow woman across the lobby of a hotel by her weave just because she hooked up with a man I was never going to end up with in the first place! Who’s with me?” That mental picture warms whatever is left of my corroded heart, but I think it’s far more probable that the last place left for these people to discover will be Anywhere Angela Might Turn Up and one will know she has arrived there by the angry spittle that hits you in the face as a greeting when the location’s namesake screams bloody murder because the man she decided she owned chose to willfully suck tequila directly out of another woman’s sphincter. Are these not problems we all face?
Last week’s episode ended in fury. Chris wouldn’t agree to vote out Cory’s ex because he was more invested in getting rid of one of his own exes and such duplicity was too much for several of these people to accept. The shouting began and rose in decibel. Words like “loyalty” and “respect” were tossed about, as though those words mean anything in this sort of producer-contrived scenario. It all ended with Tor’i storming off and Angela raging like the sort of psychopath who was taught from an early age that her feelings are the only feelings that matter. Tonight’s episode picks right back up with “the most explosive elimination ceremony ever,” and that would be pretty auspicious sounding if there hadn’t only been one ceremony before this one. In any event, I find myself slightly impressed that Angela is reserving the majority of her rage for Tor’i instead of Faith because it’s not like Faith is the person who f*cked her on night one. I have no idea if this is simply Angela’s initial reaction and she will later attempt to use a rusty butter knife to slice off Faith’s tongue so the girl can never again lick shots off her man or make that idiotic bird sound that one person in the world once swore was adorable. (And should that rusty butter knife still have a groove or two left in the blade, I hope Angela finds that one person and exacts her revenge on him as well.) As Angela announces that Tor’i is dead to her, Tor’i is inside complaining to Cory that nobody there kept his secret. You are being filmed 24 hours a day, Tor’i. Time to annihilate any illusion that remains in your mind that anything that happens there will not be seen by your f*cking grandmother and by mine too. Both Heaven and Hell get basic cable, right?
Angela then proceeds to react exactly as you’d expect: by announcing that she will retaliate by f*cking Derrick in front of Tor’i. This announcement causes expressions of both utter panic and pure relief to pass over Derrick’s face. The panic is because Angela is a walking human horror show. The relief is because he thinks he will finally get laid in that villa. We will be forced to return to this situation later – and we know there will be casualties – but first we have to see which ex is getting voted off. It comes down to Chelsko and Alicia. If I were either of them, I would begin begging to be the one sent away. I would promise those voters riches beyond their wildest imaginations. I would swear to bring them soup after their next rounds of plastic surgery. I would offer to drive to the home of the person each one hates the very most in the whole wide world and then proceed to pee on the front stoops of all of their enemies. I would even appeal to Romeo by insisting that if he procures me a getaway ship, I will hunt down the stylist who put him in the shirt he’s wearing that closely resembles all my fever dreams combined and force that stylist to publicly apologize as long as I was the one selected to leave that house filled with crazy people who appear to have no sense of humor and no desire to see themselves for what they are: reality TV participants who will sell whatever is left of their souls to keep gigs like this one lined up. The girls don’t make such offers and the vote comes back as a tie. It will now be up to the exes to vote out one of their own – and their vote also comes back in a tie, so the rule is that both Chelsko and Alicia get the old heave-ho. I’d feel badly for them, but they actually have the gumption to look disappointed and I cannot summon up legitimate emotions for people who refuse to recognize sheer f*cking luck when they see it.
Once those two float back into the sea, the announcer’s voice pops up. In as smarmy a tone as possible, he says that hopefully things will calm down now, as though any person working on this show would get hired for another season if anything actually proceeded calmly. Luckily, all their jobs seem secure because Tor’i immediately swears to Angela that he never had any interest in his ass-sucking partner. To prove it, he turns to Faith and announces he’s not interested in her in the slightest. Since the editors on this show know what they’re doing, we quickly get a flashback of Tor’i telling Faith exactly the opposite. Does Faith laugh at Tor’i for being such a wuss? No, dear readers, she does not. She instead stalks after Tor’i and announces, “If I wanted you, I could have you on your knees, bitch!” so if we have learned anything, it’s that Tor’i has a type and that type is Vulgar Psychopath. But people can be multifaceted! We soon find out that Angela is not only a Vulgar Psychopath; she is also The Retaliation Queen Who Sidles Up to Pathetic Morons. She enters the confessional room where Derrick sits and her appearance causes him to look thrilled and I think I speak for all of us when I suggest that we should take turns attending the murder trial that will eventually transpire because of the fallout from this coupling. I’ll take the first shift. I appreciate a good opening argument.
