New at BOP: Review: Matrix Resurrections Movie Review: Moonfall Movie Reviews: Scream The #1 Movie in America November Forecast The Many Saints of Newark October Forecast New Trivia Question All site updates Share & Save   Tweet Print this column

The first blind date couple fight occurs during the noodle challenge. Bergen doesn’t mind the taste of the noodles. Kurt actively despises the flavor. Bergen tries to solve the problem by force-feeding Kurt, and that goes over about as well as when you try to make a toddler swallow paste that some food company liberally describes as apples. The disappointment of not being paired with a potential mate seems to be getting to both men, which is completely understandable. Now, they’re just racing a person they have to tolerate for several weeks.

Some of the long term couples aren’t doing any better. Rochelle sees that they are only a few feet away from completing Chair, but there are only a few seconds left. She pushes her partner to spring. He trips on his skates, the chair goes sliding away, she hits a wall, and then she tumbles to the ground. She immediately begins to cry and asks for a medic to examine her wrist. Oddly, she still declines the opportunity to switch to Share. Eventually, Mike stumbles across the magic phrase, “It’s not you, it’s me.” Based upon how melodramatic she was about her fall, we suspect this will not be the last time Mike says this to Rochelle. Eventually, she does relent and switch to Share.

The New Kids on the Block finish in fourth place and then celebrate their Date Night announcement, presumably by snorting a ton of blow off of Magic Mike. Bergen & Kurt complete the leg in much grumpier fashion, quickly followed by Jeff & Jackie. Jackie basically professes her undying affection to Jeff at this point, declaring that he’s “perfect!” He is flattered, but she clearly sets him up for a first kiss. Rather than relent, he forcibly pulls his head to the side to perform an awkward hug instead. He’s Just Not That Into You (Yet), Jackie.

Matt & Ashley have also finished Chair, and they claim seventh place. Meanwhile, Mike tries to reclaim Rochelle’s affection by shoving some noodles down her throat. Results are mixed. He regurgitates his noodles into her bowl. We…wish we hadn’t watched that. Still, they comfortably finish the challenge in eighth place.

The only two remaining teams are Blair & Hayley, the stars of the season premiere, and CJ & Lebya. Hayley has been largely invisible this episode, a stark contrast from last time. We presume that if there were any danger of her being eliminated, she would be the focus of the entire episode. Instead, they only show some ice rink escapades and a bit of flirty laughter between the couple. Their adoration isn’t quite as intense as Jackie’s, but there does seem to be a spark. The editing shows them fail a couple of times, but it’s all for show. We suspect the gap between the final two teams measures in the hours.

In the end, we wildly overestimated CJ & Lebya when we gave them a 20 percent chance of survival. In reality, it wasn’t even one percent. Their entire leg was over the moment they took an ill-timed selfie as their train drove away. While nobody will remember the mistake since it occurred so early in the season, it is possibly the biggest blunder in the history of the show. They were literally 10 feet away from their train. For no good reason, they just stood around and did nothing while it moved away. And in case you were wondering, Lebya did not get her engagement ring. Hell, she didn’t even get her selfie.

Continued:       1       2       3       4