The Beauty and the Geek Begin Their Quest
9.5
"Superb"
The Beauty and the Geek Begin Their Quest
Ah...Ashton Kutcher does it again with that crazy mind of his. Beauty and the Geek is “the ultimate social experiment.” It poses the question, “Can seven beauties and seven geeks become a whole lot more?” After this episode, I think they can. And if Ashton’s lying and the editing is making me say likes that, the show’s still fun to laugh at.
You see, with Beauty and the Geek, it’s fun to laugh, but not in the Average Joe kind of way. Laughing at those geeks made me feel dirty. Laughing at these geeks is okay, because: 1. I’m laughing at the beauties just as much, and 2. These geeks know that they’re geeks, and they’re trying to improve themselves. I admire every one of these 14 contestants (well, except for Caitilin…at least in these first two episodes – were her comments necessary?) for putting themselves out there and trying to improve themselves.
Speaking of those 14 contestants, here they are: Mindi, a pretty brunette with a nose ring, is a “sorority girl.” Apparently, that’s her only job. I don’t know. She chooses Richard, the nerdiest of the bunch, as her partner, who has “never kissed a girl.” Erika, a “life-size Barbie model” (how does that work anyway?) who’s kinda pudgy (but in a good way!), picks Joe, a short, albino-looking kid who has “never been on a date.” Scarlet, a Spanish looking girl, winds up with Shawn, who I keep confusing with Bill. Cheryl, a tall blonde, chooses Eric, a short and glasses-wearing (is that even an adjective?) boy who works at the school library. I think. Bill, the Vice President of The Dukes of Hazzard fan club (I’m president), teams up with Lauren, a hot blonde who actually looks really annoying. Chuck, who picks Caitilin, is studying medicine or something like that. Caitilin’s just a cheerleader. Krystal and Brad are the final pair in the game. She’s on the Sixers Dance Team. He’s a MENSA member. With the help of Ashton Kutcher, can they become dancing MENSA members? Maybe. Maybe.
Once the teams are done being picked – it alternates girl picking the guy and guy picking the girl – the new teammates pick a bedroom to sleep in. Turns out that they’ll have to sleep in the same bed, which freaks some people out. Like Scarlet. She says something along the lines of, “I just met this nerdy guy and now I have to sleep in the same bed with him! But I guess I’ll be okay. And if I’m not, I’ll just…scream!!!” Yeah, I don’t like her very much. She’s kinda annoying.
After the teams are done meeting each other, they go down to the living room to see what girly-man host Brian McFadyn has to say about the first challenge. Does it make sense why producers chose Brian to host this show? It’s called Beauty and the Geek, and Brian McFadyn is neither. You know what they should’ve had for hosts? One smart and beautiful woman and one smart but attractive and athletic man. That would’ve at least given the contestants something to strive for. I mean, do I wanna be like Brian McFadyn? No. That dude hosted Superstar USA. Anyway…Brian tells all of the people in the room that they’re all going back to the fifth grade. The women need to brush up on their fifth grade knowledge like history and spelling (which you’ll see must be a lot harder than what I passed), and the men need to get groovy with the ladies by learning some dance moves (the tie in here: feeling awkward at fifth-grade school dances). Immediately, the guys look around at each other. Richard goes snow-pale, and Chuck starts getting a nosebleed. Poor Chuck. I guess it’s no big deal for him; he tells his partner, Caitilin, that it must be the smoke in the room that dried up the mucosa and something else is now difibulated. Or something like that. Caitilin apparently doesn’t know what that means. “Sometimes Chuck is talking, and I’m like, “What? Huh?” It doesn’t even sound like he’s speaking English,” she says. Oh well. Brian sends everyone away with some study materials, and tells them that they’ll have the night to learn everything they need to.
And now comes the fun part, the montage of “let’s make fun of the dumb-but-pretty girls” scenes. In five minutes, any seven-year-olds who are watching decrease their already-low IQs by ten percent. “What’s the date of D-Day?,” Cheryl asks. “1942? No, 1942 is when Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” Lauren thinks that Thailand is in Korea. She doesn’t know how to spell “armoire” either. I wouldn’t either if I didn’t have spell check. Erika admits that “fifth graders today must be real smart, because I’m not following.” At least she’s honest.
Then the guys get their chance and nation-wide humiliation - their partners try to teach them how to dance. Nothing’s working though…not freestyle, hip-hop, ballet, jazz. You name it, they can’t do it. It’s not Brad’s fault though. He’s “white to the point of being clear.” He can’t do that hip hop stuff. Because he’s not black. (Speaking of which, are there no hot-but-dumb black girls or any nerdy black dudes? Think of Steve Urkel! Yeah, I can’t spell that.)
All of the couples retire to bed after lots and lots of studying and practicing, and the next morning, all of them are refreshed enough to embarrass themselves in front of a crowd at a school. The girls go first, in a spelling bee-like competition. The women have to answer questions pertaining to geography and spelling. Things like, “What state is east of West Virginia?” (which Caitilin answers, “Massachusetts”), “What state is farther south: North Carolina or South Dakota?” (guess what Krystal answers), “Spell Tattoo,” (Lauren misses one of the T’s, but I would’ve missed that too), and “spell Calendar.” (Cheryl replaces the second ‘A’ with an ‘E,’ an honest mistake. Then she makes herself feel better by saying, “I spelled it just like I would’ve typed it. But then I would have hit ‘spell check” when I was done.”). The Beauties competition comes down to Mindi getting the final question right, making her the winner of the game, and guaranteeing that she and her partner, Richard (who runs up to the stage to kiss Mindi’s feet), will not be the first to be sent home.
The guy’s competition comes shortly after Mindi’s victory. They do their dances with their partners, and everyone’s dances honestly look really good. There’s only a few minor setbacks for some of the teams; Chuck gets another nosebleed during his dance, Eric gets frustrated when he makes a slight error, and then he just stops dancing, and Richard makes a little mistake, which doesn’t seem to get to him onstage. It’s not until he and Mindi are offstage that he really flips out, blaming himself. “He doesn’t understand that it’s okay to make mistakes,” Mindi says. The audience votes for who they thought had the most confidence up on the stage, and turns out that everybody loves a goofball – Richard is rewarded with a win. That means that the only team who is immune this week is Richard & Mindi. And that also means that they get to nominate two teams for elimination. Mindi feels like nominating the weak people, but Richard feels like nominating the stronger people. “It’s like a lose-lose situation,” he explains. “Until you win.” Yup.
That night, after a celebration for Richard & Mindi, Erika just needs someone to cuddle with. She dumps her partner Joe for Brad, who’s “kinda cute.” The two spend the night together, which does two very different things to their respective partners. Krystal’s kinda pissed. “What the hell is going on?,” she asks. Joe’s disappointed. Cue the somber, slow, and quiet music, usually reserved for when one of the girls on The Bachelorette doesn’t get a rose. “If I got jealous every time a girl I liked went home with another guy, I’d be jealous all of the time.” And I think that in some way or the other, that statement means something to everyone watching the show – I know that I’ve felt it. Okay. Serious Adam gone. Sarcastic, “take-no-prisoners” Adam has returned.
At the elimination ceremony the next day, Richard & Mindi choose to send Erika & Joe and Eric & Cheryl to the elimination room. Of course, there’s no hard feelings, and though there’s some tears, both teams hold their head up while they’re brushing up on politics, history, music, and dance. They go off to the elimination room, where they are greeted by Brian McFaden, the former host of Superstar USA (I’m not gonna let that go). He shows them a shelf-like thing with six cards on it. He tells the four contestants that each team will be given six questions (the guys will answer three of them, the girls will answer the others), and whoever has the most right when all of the questions have been answered will be deemed the winners, and the losers will have to leave the mansion. Forever. Until the reunion show.
The girls go first, and Brian makes the guys leave the chamber and go into the viewing room, where they can see and hear their partners answer the questions, but their partners cannot see or hear them. Erika gets two of her three questions correct, including something about the Democratic party (what’s the symbol?). Cheryl gets none of hers correct, which, in all honesty, were much harder than Erika’s. But that’s the luck of the draw I guess. Joe and Eric go in to see their partners and congratulate (or hit, in Eric’s case) them. Then the Beauties go into the viewing room, leaving Brian to torture Eric and Joe with the deadliest weapon of all – trivia pertaining to pop music!!! Well, I thought it was pop music. Joe got a question about 50 Cent, who I thought was a rapper. Eric got a question about Britney Spears’ now-ancient video for “Hit Me Baby One More Time.” Joe also got a question about a magazine (What Madonna song later became the title of a magazine? Joe answered “Like a Virgin.” The correct answer is “Vogue.”). Anyway, Joe & Erika win the trivia round, sending Eric and Cheryl, who probably didn’t get much out of the experience, seeing as how they’ve only been there for two or three days, packing. Sucks for them.
Just remember, that was only the first episode in the fantastic, six-episode season of Beauty and the Geek. Look out for more of my reviews for this series throughout the summer.
- Adam Polaski
