“Okay guys, there’s two balls and three boys.” – T.J. Lavin
I’ve been waiting all season for the fact that Team Aneesa/Rachel is comprised of two females to come into play during one of the challenges. I expected that the one of the ladies would get dominated against a guy in a test of strength kind of challenge. Instead, the show engineered a challenge that gives Rachel and Aneesa an advantage over the other teams.
In the “Lube Me Up Challenge” (awful name, T.J. apologizes after he announces it) the girls and the guys are separated into individual heats. The girls go first, then the guys. The goal of the challenge is to slide down an oiled up tarp, grab a beach ball, and scramble back up the tarp before the other competitors. Here’s the catch: there is one less ball than competitor. So if you are the last one to grab a ball, you have to try to steal someone else’s.
Rachel and Aneesa both get to compete in the same heat. If they were smart, they would have use this to their advantage and employ a little bit of team work. Instead, Rachel grabs a ball and charges up the hill, leaving Aneesa by herself without a ball. Eliminated!
Fortunately, they last a little bit longer than Paula and Dunbar and avoid an automatic trip to The Dome. Unfortunately, Johnny and Camila, who win “Lube Me Up” and become the Power Couple, vote them in anyway.
The lack of a male competitor really hurts Aneesa and Rachel in The Dome. The show reuses the “Banded Together” challenge from a few weeks ago (the episode when Leroy and Naomi are sent home). Paula and Dunbar use the technique where one person (Dunbar) hangs back while the other person (Paula) gets to the pole as quickly as possible. Aneesa and Rachel, in another strategic blunder, both try to get to the pole at the same time. Of course, they fail and are sent packing.
In non-challenge related news, Paula and Ty hook up. It’s kind of gross, really. Of all of the girls on the show, Paula would probably be the one I’d hook up with last. She looks like she’s in her mid-fifties. Here’s a sample of their flirting:
Ty compliments Paula on her beauty. Paula says, “You know what I’m gonna look like in 20 years?” (I have a guess). Ty replies, “My baby mama.” Yuck. Johnny Bananas, The Challenge’s go to guy for one-liners, sums things up rather succinctly: “Paula walks to the beat of a totally different drum, and tonight Ty’s thumping that drum pretty hard.”
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.