User blog:StrangerAtaru/If You Can't Take the Heat... - Where the Gophers Hit Freezing Point

Honestly I'm probably going to have a hard time with this episode considering it isn't one of those that I consider my favorite. But I'll try to do it as best as I can:

-One of the biggest stories of this episode, and the one that sort of makes me feel sick about talking about it, is the whole war that Harold ends up having with Duncan, Geoff and DJ over his underwear and shorts being left around. Honestly, it's really hard to say what exactly lead to all of this in the first place: whether it was Harold himself that did it or, as I strongly suspect, someone doing it just as a means to rile Duncan up into further tormenting of Harold. I know some people probably should suspect a lot of what happens as pure juvinille pranks that shouldn't be taken seriously, but I think that all that happens to Harold this time just takes things way too far. Heck, he should have seen the whole nonsense with the hot sauce coming with the stain in the shorts they just so happened to leave behind. And the underwear sandwich was just...uugh. Honestly, the only great thing that happens out of this whole nightmare that Harold goes through is the epic revenge he gets in "Basic Straining", even if it's as the cost of...(sighs deeply)...

-The idea of a cooking challenge is a nice one, it's mostly just the human drama, both the good and the bad, that seems to ruin it. I guess though that when you challenge your minds, it ends up challenging relations as well.

-A dolphin drives the food truck...I hope that's not the same one from "Brunch of Disgustingness"...remember what Bridgette said: "Dolphins are our friends."

-Aside from Harold's sad scenario, the other main problem with the episode, both the good and bad, is that Heather pretty much drives the rest of the team completely against her leading to the sudden events that occur. After the previous episode, it was obvious that Beth had no further use for Heather and wanted nothing to do with her. But the fact that Lindsay is starting to break away and actually sides with Leshawna as well for a lot of what they do...well, maybe she has something in her that slowly emerges as we finish up this season and head into TDA.

-It's disturbing that Geoff and DJ have time to prank Harold, yet still work on Bridgette like they do. Then again Bridgette does have a lot of barriers to break through if they want to get to her.

-Strangely enough with Harold's scenario, Sadie made the antipasto on her own. Yes, Sadie did it...by herself...and she thought I wouldn't notice. See, you can have them do things without each other!

-Meanwhile you have Duncan and Courtney...it's hard to say how much of Courtney's hatred is posturing and how much is just denial at this point, but considering her mind she probably just doesn't want to admit to herself she's into him. It will take a few more episodes before it finally breaks but of course making cannolli and cutely dumping frosting on Duncan's head while stealing some of it does give hints...or at least should. Even love can give hints in some ways.

-Lindsay...well, at least she got the general idea of flambe, even if most of it has to do with turning a cake into cinders without realizing.

-Owen is weird in this episode: on one hand, I really don't get the idea of him and the bees and the oranges...I mean, it just felt like it was a way to keep him out of the kitchen for all that time, let alone driving away Trent. (well that and he had no lines in the episode so they had no real need to have him stick around)

-And then...who the heck would leave Owen to watch over the ribs anyway!? Wouldn't someone just try to put someone responsible who isn't a serial glutton, especially after all he has done by this point? What they forgot how much he ate before the Awake-a-thon, and then put him in charge of watching ribs? Shouldn't someone put two-and-two together about leaving the fat guy whose always hungry in charge of ribs?

-Heather with those eyebrows...those bizarre eyebrows...she reminds me of Bert for some reason. (great, now I'm imagining the images of Alejandro's puppet...well that's one more thing they have in common!)

-Honestly, I think the whole purpose of the Hawaiian theme for the Gopher's side was to reveal Beth's stolen idol. The girl has been through so much, not being told a thing about the artifacts on Boney Island by Chris and the whole break-up with Heather, they really should just leave her be and give her a bit of a break. But of course, Chris really isn't as such and of course would just publicly announce the failure in order to make Beth a bigger target, regardless of her fighting against Heather.

-The elimination this time...well it pretty much was down to three as mentioned: Heather, Owen and Beth. Beth probably has the weakest motive of the three to being eliminated: she did help out in the challenge and was mostly being punished for the idol and being used as a sacrifice to end the Screaming Gopher's losing streak. On the other hand, Heather pretty much bullied everyone (again) into elimination, while Owen...was running around with bees, oranges and eating ribs. Though Heather once again probably had the greatest motive for elimination: she was supposed to be a leader and failed at doing so, sacrificing a piece to stay in longer. (that and there was still a morsel of ribs left...it didn't taste as Chris wanted but he did eat some)

-Was I the only one who nearly got a "Meatballs" feeling with the ending? Well it was based out of a Canadian summer camp...