Previously on “Joe Schmo”: Ben had a meeting with the supposed creator of this supposed show, Mr. Danish. Mr. Danish was of course weird and cryptic, so Ben immediately assumed this was on purpose to mess with him. Then there was a puzzle challenge, which Braxton won. Chastity got a “makeover” which was basically some makeup and she and Braxton got very close. Ben finally figured out she'd just replaced Trevor with Braxton in her power couple, which was not good for him. The elimination came down to Ben and Chastity, and of course then Ben was eliminated. On the way out, Mr. Danish showed up again and said that it wasn't over yet. Or something else cryptic I guess.(click for more)
Ben goes to do final interviews. The fake producer apologizes and he says not to be sorry. He doesn't feel great, of course, because he's sad to go home and tell everyone he lost. He wanted to figure out some of these puzzles, but Maya is a great friend and he had an awesome experience. He tells Braxton to keep winning challenges and “bring this home”. Don't get rid of Maya. To Maya, win this shit. “You're a nobody, I'm a nobody, pull it through, I need you to get this W.”
In the lounge area the actors sit around and mope a little bit. But they do laugh that he told Maya “you're chill as fuck”. A sweet dude goodbye. Heh.
Back in the interview, a “real” producer shows up and shows Ben a tablet with a message from Cat. It's a pre-recorded message addressing “contestant” and telling them tomorrow they are headed to “Losers' Loft”, to rejoin the other sacrificed contestants. And there will be an opportunity to rejoin the competition so be ready. This is a good update. This kind of thing is so common now, to let people back in. Ben's thrilled and ready to go. In the control room the producers pat themselves on the back for how well this is going.
So the “eliminated contestants” return, and Cat voiceovers that they have to be briefed by the writers, and convince Ben they've been living in this loft for almost a week. Why didn't they just..do that? Right? They could have hung out there out of character doing nothing! The loft is just to hang out and chill, play foosball, but they'd all rather be back in the competition of course. Ben shows up in a van, but he also says they've been hiding his friends “less than 100 yards away from [him]”. It kind of feels like Ben isn't super familiar with the concept of Sequesterville, where you send eliminated contestants from a reality show so they don't go home and spoil the elimination order. Just the basic “everyone on this show must be away from home for the same amount of time”, not even considering “you're going to have your own competition to return”. Man, when “Survivor” first showed up with that twist, where everyone just appeared and Probst was like, oh them? They're going to have a challenge and come back to the game. That was fantastic.
Anyway they show an aerial shot of the property, and this building is across the circle drive from the main house. It is also apparently directly next to the control room, so someone didn't plan this very well. Because now the producers all have to whisper and not use any audio monitors or anything. Ben runs through the French doors and yells, and there are high fives all round. Cat voiceovers that the loft was created out of one of the production offices yesterday. But why? You knew you would need it, right? Did you really not have the space or something? It just seems like really terrible planning, is all. Charles Michael is like, wait how did you get eliminated? Ben says it's a long story but he brought Charles Michael a book that I guess he left in the house. The terrible planning continues because now everyone's had several days off and they have to get back into character. Ryan says something about not having cameras, but there ARE cameras. This footage of them filling Ben in is not like, security cam footage. Trevor is not doing super well mentally. Ryan tells Ben that a producer comes around like once a day and they just make videos all day. So if Ben has any ideas they can make some sick videos. Heh. Ben interviews there's some element of a comeback but it's nice to just chill.
Back in the main house everyone does like, yoga or something. Jessica says you can take a little breather but not totally relax, since he's still on the property. Maya hangs out with Louie and is pretty glad Ben seems to be in good spirits. She says this is the craziest thing in her life, so she can't imagine how crazy it must be for Ben.
Naturally there is an overzealous social media producer, in a very loud 80s jumpsuit, to show up to Losers' Loft and encourage them to make videos. Her job is just to fuck around and have them be goofy. Ben says one of them should be Braxton and one be Chastity. Heh. The producer immediately says she's got wigs and lipstick, “it's for TikTok, it'll be stupid.” She puts makeup on him and flirts, and confirms she “heard” there's a chance he could still be a winner. So Ben plays Chastity and Ryan plays Braxton, with a cameo from Trevor. She was right, this IS stupid. But honestly I bet if this was real they'd all be cooped up together and they'd all be doing dumb shit like this constantly. Everyone dances to “I'm Comin on Jesus”, then they all twerk, Agnes says swag a million times. It is very stupid, but they seem like they're having a blast.
Once again the producers are preparing for a challenge that is extremely important and has to go perfectly according to plan. Obviously because Ben has to win so he can get back on the show. There seem to be a lot of goats. The challenge is rigged but they know that means nothing. Currently Ben is wearing a blond wig and pretending to be Cat, as Cat walks in the door. Heh. They ask if she got eliminated, and she says Ryan Seacrest has got her job. Ha! That was pretty good. “But he does look very good in those sparkly frocks”. Nice. So Cat tells everyone they're going to compete in a challenge to get back into the house this afternoon. No one else is really reacting, which I feel is kind of suspicious. Ben is freaking out, and he was so ready to never stress about a challenge again.
Time for the Goat Resurrection Challenge. Cat claims goats have been extinct twice. Somehow they “bounced back”. This is terrible but fine. The Three Ordeals of Winifred. First, The Scrutiny of the Legions. Figure out how many goats in this herd are male and how many are female. Second, The Escape from the Alderley Edge. Spin around this goat's head 20 times and then retrieve a necklace. Third, The Nugget of the Alchemist. Dig through a pile of goat shit to find a gold nugget, then race to the finish line. This whole thing is framed as a story about a goat named Winifred and some battle. I didn't write any of it down because it's terrible. If you win you can immediately return and take your place in the Final Four. They do not explain how that's going to work when there are still four people in the house. The producers ask themselves why every day is so stressful. Because you are terrible planners and you haven't adjusted for modern-day reality show strategies.
So the first challenge is just everyone wandering around and looking at goat butts. The plan to rig this is that Ben will leave first, so I guess whatever Ben says will be correct, and then everyone else will be told they are incorrect at least once to give him a head start. And I guess they'll hope he's far enough away that he doesn't hear someone say exactly what he did and be told they're wrong. Ben is told his first guess is wrong. Ryan says he was supposed to be right behind Ben, so if Ben went to guess, Ryan went up too. Charles Michael goes up and just says “How's it going?” and is told “wrong answer, go back to the goats.” Heh. The producers start to get agitated, because I think they were supposed to let Ben go through no matter what he said. They're trying to yell at the yeoman (I guess he has an earpiece) to let Ben win, but apparently his earpiece is broken. Good job guys. Just as I'm wondering if this guy even knows what the right answer is, Ben finally gets it and can move forward. It looks like everyone immediately is let through, which is not what the producers said would happen.
Ryan has some kind of plan apparently to get ahead of Ben on the second round and then fall behind at the end. Just for the drama I guess. They spin around, and there are producers telling them when they're good. So Ryan only did like 5 spins. Charles Michael laughs that he did like, 4o spins, and then thought, “Why am I doing this? No one is watching this.” Heh.
The goat droppings are real. Ben is fine with it. Ryan was told to pretend he doesn't see anything if he finds a nugget, but Ben was like kicking stuff everywhere so he didn't see anything either. Trevor shows up, and now both Ryan and Trevor are pushing any rocks they find in Ben's general direction. Ryan says in confessional that he thought, what if I just take one of these? What if Ryan comes back and Ryan is the Goat?” Heh. Finally he finds something, but it took way too long. Ryan immediately follows him but is careful to not catch up. Ben tears off his shirt and screams about being the keeper of the goat or whatever. They all cheer on Agnes to finish, which is cute. He says he's going to go give out some hugs with his goat poop hands and not tell Jessica. Well thank God that worked.
In the confessional room, a producer gives Ben back his track suit. He fist bumps Louis, who has shown up to explain how he's going to return to the house. They're going to disguise him as a yeoman, with the hooded cloak and everything, during the Elimination ceremony. Amazing. Ben is fully on board with this. Louis and the actual yeoman try to tell him how to walk and move which is kind of dumb but sure. After 40 minutes they tell him he's fine. Cat voiceovers that the actors know Ben is coming back, but they don't know he's going to be a yeoman.
Louis tells them it needs to be epic as fuck. The yeomen have masks, which I don't remember but it's not like I was paying attention to them before. So not only is Ben wearing a hood, but he's got a mask on. Cat tries to fuck with him, but he won't move so she's thrilled. The actors all enter, and I was wrong, there are five people left. So Ben can't enter the Final Four unless they are doing a double elimination. Or he's immune for the next challenge. Who knows, maybe they just fucked up the counting. Meanwhile, the other yeoman has his hood pushed back way far on his head so you can easily see his face. They should both be mysterious. Supposedly Danielle played some Token during the challenge, so she won. As you might expect, they didn't even have a pretend challenge. As Ben goes to help get the Horns down, the control room is amazed he's covering his hands. I guess his fingernails are still painted from a couple of days ago. I feel like this is too risky. Right? Just let him be a yeoman without forcing him to interact with everyone. Eventually they get the Horns down and Maya interviews that she was delighted to see his performance. I thought they didn't know he was a yeoman? You guys literally just said that! Braxton says it's obvious too. They're all laughing at him because he's too obvious.
Cat says this is the most important Elimination ceremony thus far. They send Ben back to get the scroll, which he can't find of course, because they never told him where it would be. The producers all laugh at him. OK that was dumb. The two people up for elimination are Braxton and Chastity. Ben is convinced no one knows it's him. Braxton says he's been competing this whole time but he felt like he won something anyway because he found Chastity. Danielle is tearing up. Chastity says baby our connection is so good, but it's not about us. Then she turns to Danielle and says, he just said he doesn't care about being here, in front of everyone. Cold. Braxton tries to protest, but she shushes him and then says to kill him as Cat tells her time is up. Then Cat says it's a special sacrifice tonight because the Eve of the Jewel-Headed Succubus is upon them. She is a “cruel and bloodthirsty sorceress”. So it's a double elimination. Oh shit. So I was right about a double elimination to get the numbers right. The producers want to give Ben something he wants. Danielle I think can barely lift the sledgehammer, because she's using it sideways and basically knocked Braxton's vase off the pillar instead of smashing it. As they are escorted out, Chastity asks if there is any way to get separate cars, as Braxton says no, the same car, they have some things to talk about. Heh. Then Cat is like, we've been joined by a mystery yeoman! But you know him! The girls fake shriek and Maya runs up and hugs him. This is the Final Four.
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