Beach Blanket Bogus

'''The teams participate in a beach-themed challenge. One player attempts to befriend the rest of her team, while her team captain starts to have some problems with his relationship with the other captain. Meanwhile, a certain contestant begins to show his true nature to everyone.'''

Plot
The episode opens with the remaining castmates getting their breakfast. Trent discovers that Duncan has pranked him by unscrewing the tops off both the salt and pepper shakers, causing all of their contents to pour onto his eggs. Trent tosses the spices over his shoulder, accidentally landing on Heather, who gets salt in her eyes and pepper up her nose, causing her to sneeze uncontrollably and be temporarily blinded. She then runs away screaming. Duncan walks over to Trent and takes an egg off of his plate, which upsets him because there are now only eight pieces of his egg left. Gwen takes another piece, which makes it an odd number again, in an attempt to calm Trent down. Duncan is confused by Trent's weirdness, but Gwen tells Duncan to leave him alone and says that she likes weird. Meanwhile, Lindsay and Beth are sitting down to breakfast with offerings for Justin. Lindsay brings bacon, while Beth brings "facon," claiming it's better for his complexion. Each girl argues about whose offering is better, until Justin tells them that he accepts them both. They choose to just sit there and watch Justin eat instead of eating something themselves. Beth is then shown in the confessional making friendship bracelets and obsessing over Justin, until the bracelet she is working on breaks apart and a piece of it falls into her mouth, causing her to choke. Chris then comes in and announces that this week's genre is a teen surfing movie, which no one except for Harold is familiar with. The two teams will compete in two challenges, followed by a possible tie-breaker if needed.

The first challenge is a surfing contest, in which the person who stays on a surfboard over a swimming pool the longest wins for their team. However, to make things difficult, the temperature on set was set to freezing and the challenge featured the return of some fan favorites: the sharks. Most of the castmates failed, but some managed to stay on longer, causing Chef Hatchet and Chris to bring in heavy special effects to try and knock them off. Lindsay is knocked off by a heavy stage fan. Trent starts to scare the Killer Grips with his obsession with the number nine. Beth starts to see Trent as a little "weird." Owen manages to break the surfboard and knock the sharks and all of the water out of the pool when it is his turn, prompting Chris to call a break. Gwen thinks she doesn't need to worry about the sharks after they go on their break, but she soon finds out that Chris will be firing seagulls at her and the last few contestants. Justin is hit with a seagull and falls in the water, making him blackout. Lindsay and Beth rush to his aid, but they are pushed out of the way by one of the sharks, who rescues Justin, revives him, and hugs him. Finally, Duncan gets on the board and is able to simply knock the birds aside, causing Chris to throw some equipment and even Lindsay at him. However, Duncan manages to dodge all of those things and wins the challenge for his team. Gwen gives him a congratulatory hug for winning, which Trent observes, as his team cheers, while Owen and Trent talk about how unstoppable Gwen's team is.

The cast is then taken on a bus to Camp Wawanakwa where they must build sand castles for the second challenge. The Gaffers have a great lead due to the half hour early start they won from the surfboard challenge, while the Grips try hard to get a castle going. Meanwhile, Duncan and Gwen slip away and sabotage the bus they rode to get there so they can spend more time on the island (strangely missing the old cabins). Back on the beach, the Grips finally manage to start a castle, but Trent knocks it down while trying to put on a ninth flag. However, Beth reminds everyone it's a "prop sandcastle building contest," and that they use some of Lindsay's magazines to make a paper-mâché castle and win the challenge. Gwen soon starts to notice that Trent is naming things after her and even constantly using the number nine (which Duncan says is because it's actually the total number of letters in Gwen and Trent's names). After it is announced that the Grips won, a tie-breaking challenge is set. Chris sends everyone off to gather some wood. Trent and Gwen then meet up in the woods, and Gwen notices Trent carrying nine sticks. She runs away, worried that Duncan is right and that Trent really is obsessed with her. When Trent asks what's wrong, Owen says that the girl likes to win.

The final tie breaker starts and is announced to be "Watusi-Twist-Mashed Potato-Dorky-Old School" dance off. Trent is chosen to go up against Leshawna, who claims she's been known back home as "Leshaken it." Leshawna's performance was considered poor by the rest of her teammates, except Harold, while Trent got cheers. However, he soon remembers Owen's words and purposely trips on a branch and starts writhing on the ground to throw the challenge, allowing Leshawna and the Gaffers to win. While the Gaffers are celebrating, Chris asks the losers to return to the bus, until he finds it's broken due to Duncan and Gwen sabotaging it to stay at the camp for a little while longer. Therefore, he says the Grips have to now watch the Gaffers celebrate. Gwen and Trent meet again later and make up. They are about to kiss, until Owen interrupts them and they throw branches at him. Later, the Grips are on the beach shore, where Owen is disposing of the paper-mâché castle, by eating it. Then, Justin tells Beth that he never got a friendship bracelet. She then gives him the one she is wearing and says it's a little sweaty, but he says it's nice. The two happily smile at each other. However, Justin is then shown in the confessional saying he will do anything to win. He looks at the bracelet on his wrist and asks whether or not Beth wants an alliance. Chris, watching from his control room, says he and Justin are both clever and manipulative and may be related, but then says Justin wishes. Justin then tells Chris from the confessional that he really doesn't, and Chris immediately cuts the transmission, since he did not know the two way microphone is on. Chris, about to sign off the show, says to tune in next time. Then, he gets up and asks who left the two way microphone on.

Exclusive clip
Following the events of the episode, Harold is in the confessional, talking about the party that the Gaffers had as their reward. He talks about how he ate poi with pineapple. He then explains how poi is "the world's most effective substitute for breast milk."

General

 * Beth, Heather, Leshawna, and Trent are not shown participating in the surfing challenge.

Continuity

 * This is the first time in the series where an episode has a reward challenge with teams.
 * This episode marks the first time that words such as "crap" and "sucking" are said in Total Drama Action.
 * This episode marks the second time nudity is shown in Total Drama Action (the first being when Owen's pants fell down in the previous episode). In this episode, DJ is seen naked after the sharks manage to snag his swimming trunks on the surfboard.
 * DJ is the third person to display full-body nudity on screen. The others are Owen and Harold.
 * During the dance-off, Leshawna does a dance similar to what she later does in Come Fly With Us and in Baby as well.
 * When the Screaming Gaffers are shooing the seagulls away from the "Taj MaHarold, DJ is moving in a way that he does later in Can't Help Falling in Louvre
 * Like the previous episode, Tyler is mentioned by Lindsay.
 * This is the last episode Justin, Trent, and Leshawna return to Camp Wawanakwa.

Goofs

 * When Harold gave up the surfing challenge Heather told him "That's a big job for such a saggy-sag thing," but her eyes were the color of her skin, not white.
 * DJ is wearing his hat with his swimsuit during the surfing contest, yet when he is running out after losing his bathing suit, it's missing. It appears again in the next scene.
 * After the surfboard challenge, Chris is seen with all of the castmates standing outside the lot in their teams. The team logos floating above the teams' heads are switched over to incorrect positions.
 * It is unknown how the bus could arrive at the island, since there is no road that are connected to the island, and the only way to get there is by boat, as seen in the beginning of season one.
 * When Duncan wins the first challenge and his teammates are cheering, Heather is nowhere to be seen.
 * When Trent is putting the crab shells on the castle, there are seven. He said he was going to put the final one on, making a total of eight, not nine, as he earlier insisted.
 * When Gwen hits Duncan jokingly, his nose piercing is missing.
 * Beth is absent when the Grips are declared the winners of the sandcastle building contest.
 * When Gwen hugs Duncan, the top strap on her shoe is missing.
 * When the sharks are begging for "facon," Beth has her braces on, although she had them removed before the season started.
 * When Chris announced that the Gaffers won the first part of the challenge, the ammo clip for the seagull gun is full despite it supposing to be empty after using it on Duncan.