User blog:Fedora Kid/The Bold and the Booty-ful Review

Pros (5): Chris (surprisingly, he was at his best in this episode; complaining about "real soap" and the other "problems" with the Spa Hotel, treating Chef like crap once again in a funny, non-cross-dressing way, and loudly declaring certain contestants' statuses just to make it harder for them, all reminded us of classic TDI/TDA-era Chris that we all know and miss); the scenes inside Mike's head (finally, I enjoyed them. The bit with Mal catching and burning Mike's dreams per Mal's orders was actually kinda clever and funny, to the bit of banter between all of them towards the end); that brief callback to the TDA finale with the pirate ship set (nice bit of nostalgia there); Scott (once again, from his line comparing sharks to pigs, to his line comparing silver platters to tin platters...and yes, even his conflict with Fang. In this episode, it was utilized as part of the challenge and actually fairly well-executed, with almost a Looney Tunes-esque feel to it); Mal, once again, at his best so far (manipulating and taking out Gwen and Scott)

Cons (3): The toilet humor involving Sasquatchinakwa and the Bear (really? Was that really necessary? XP); Scott claiming that it was Gwen's fault Courtney got eliminated (Um, hello? It was Mike who revealed the chart. How can you possibly blame that on Gwen? And more so...she apologized to him for something she didn't do. Writing inconsistency at its worst. XP); Chris controlling the elimination (...and we're back to TDWT-era Chris. XP)

Main Aspect (Con): For quite a majority of the episode, we were led to believe that the theory proposed and believed by many (including yours truly) had finally come true: that Mal was the original personality, and Mike was just another one of the alternate personalities. They leave us for a majority of the episode with the cliffhanger reveal, then a brief discussion among the other personalities as they cope with it...and then BAM, it's just suddenly not true? Worst. Fakeout. Ever.

Overall, I actually liked the feel of this episode as it went along. The challenge was a great callback to numerous past challenges ranging from TDI up to TDR, and the physical comedy was almost always spot-on. It was very Total Drama-esque, from the hazards, to the narcissism of Chris, to the classic plotting/executing of an evil plan by a villain that, although it came from the worst villain in the series, seemed like acts worthy of Heather herself, or Scott. Although the number of Pros and Cons themselves is almost even (5:4), I feel that most of the Cons (the brief toilet humor, the inconsistency between Scott and Gwen, and a frustrating - but familiar and somewhat understandable - controlled elimination by Chris) are much more minor compared to the Pros, which featured wonderful, nostalgic callbacks to the original seasons (Chris's humor, the Boat of Losers, Chef being put in humiliating disguises, the callback to the TDA finale as mentioned above, the challenge being very much like something out of TDI), as well as improved versions of the scenes within Mike's head and the wonderfully-paced comedic scenes with Scott and Fang. And my main, massive beef with the episode is ultimately a fakeout over a theory that had been proposed and circulated along the fanbase, rather than anything that had a chance of being real. So I'm more angry at what it could've been than what it was, I guess. But my main summary is that, as an episode meant to just entertain us, from the physical comedy, to the treacherous villain, to the drama, this was indeed a solid episode. Definitely a nice bounce-back from the atrocity that was Episode 11.

With 5 Pros and 4 Cons, this episode is a 9/10.