User blog:CF12/The Show's Most Confusing Moment (Not What You Might Expect)

At work the other day I was thinking about why exactly I disliked the episode Search and Do Not Destroy (spoiler alert: the confusing moment is from this episode), and while I already kind of knew why, the more I thought about the moment that makes me dislike the episode, the less sense it made to me. I'm bored and wanted to make a blog.

At work the other day I was thinking about why exactly I disliked the episode Search and Do Not Destroy (spoiler alert: the confusing moment is from this episode), and while I already kind of knew why, the more I thought about the moment that makes me dislike the episode, the less sense it made to me.

The most confusing moment to me is when Heather enacted her plan to kiss Trent in front of Gwen. It's a confusing sequence for a number of reasons. I somewhat get the rationale behind it - the show needed to find a way to eliminate Trent - but when most of the leading events, or even some of the subsequent events, are factored in, the execution just isn't that great.

I thought it had been made pretty clear to a majority of the campers, including Trent, that Heather did not like Gwen, and it was mostly Heather's fault. Not Quite Famous makes this pretty clear, when Heather read Gwen's diary for no apparent reason, something which a majority of the contestants thought was uncalled for, Trent included. Heather had done a lot of other bad things to contestants, especially Gwen, so the fact that Trent just bought in to what Heather was saying was pretty weird. He didn't really act suspicious even though they, at this point, did not get along very well.

Also, if Gwen's diary stated that she liked Trent, why would she ever say that she didn't actually like Trent? Some of what Heather said went against what Trent should have known. I wouldn't really be surprised if this was just discontinuity though; Gwen and Trent's relationship admittedly had a lot of that. They seemed to go back to square one an awful lot.

Going back to Not Quite Famous, I presume part of the reason Heather read Gwen's diary was because, just in case the team lost (which was a long shot at that point - Harold had to get a perfect score just to barely win - though I doubt Heather's actions would have been different otherwise), she was prepared to convince people to vote off someone else. Sure enough, Heather was able to convince Owen, Izzy, and her alliance to vote off Justin and he was the one going home instead. This time, however, Heather did not make any attempt to save herself from elimination, and had to be saved via an invincibility pass that was awarded to her at random. I hate to say it, but it really felt like a copout to me. In case Heather's 9% chance of not being up for elimination didn't work out, did she even have a plan to get herself out of elimination? With the exception of Lindsay, everyone else would have likely voted out Heather instead of Trent solely based off of popularity. Now granted, you could argue that some of the contestants would have voted off Trent anyway because he was the one who allegedly cheated on Gwen while Heather was just involved, but the way everything was working out was still putting Heather at a larger risk in my opinion.

Even then, this misunderstanding Leshawna spread around would not have occurred in the first place had Gwen just talked to Trent about what happened, or vice-versa. Trent and Gwen have one the most interaction based relationship of any of the contestants, and unlike certain other relationships like Duncan and Courtney or Alejandro and Heather, they interact from understanding, not their occasional dislike. Practically every time they just talk to each other they make progression. If I recall correctly, after the event, the next time they interact is after Trent has already already eliminated... where they immediately make up and try to squeeze in one last kiss. Heather might have admitted what she did, but still. Gwen also stated she didn't even eliminate Trent, so something had to have been on her mind that was worth sharing before the ceremony. Given that they two had different perceptions of what actually occurred, they could have been able to collaborate and figure out that they had been fooled sometime that day (it's not like they were doing anything else after the event). Now, could the show have maybe had them come to an understanding after the event but before the elimination, but still have everyone else's perceptions warped due to what Leshawna said? Perhaps, but this still wouldn't have changed everything else.

Basically, in order to make this event work, Heather had to mostly rely on luck and Gwen and Trent believing what occurred completely.

Disagree with my assessment? Feel free to comment below.