Crackerbarrel, why did I type all this? Now it is too long to not get a seperate page. Alas, it is also too late to be relevant. Worse than that, it is not interesting enough to read outside relevance a year from now. Maybe if I dump it here and do not say anything, I can pretend it had been here before it was irrelevant. Ah, but if I do not say anything, no one will likely ever see it. Well, think of something. And delete this part before you upload it. I think the biggest loser is whoever decided the television show by that name could fill an hour timeslot. Half of the show is fancy swooping camera shots of the various sets, and unnecessarily long focus on the various gimmicky doohickeys. That scale doesn't really take ten seconds to determine someone's weight. I have a mechanical, as in: non-electric scale from like 1961 that makes a decision in less than two seconds. Granted, the weight can vary by five pounds either way depending on how hard you step on it, but I think if 48 years fixed that, it could have done so without creating a new problem if it also needed to be plugged into an outlet. My only guess is that the scale is powered by a 1950s mainframe computer, perhaps so the fat contestents don't feel so bad, in which case my technology is actually more advanced. Sure, a lot of those "non-actors getting filmed for some reason" shows will intentionally draw things out so that a commercial break can happen right before the end result of whatever junk was just happening, but this show does it more badly, and even if it didn't I still hate that. The Biggest Loser delays the deed twice: before the last weight registers and before and the last vote-off card is shown. You might think that since the vote-off happens immediately following the last weight you wouldn't be able to fit two commercial breaks in there. I envy your innocence. For some reason, maybe, the vote-off cards have to be on trays, and we have to see the fat people carrying the trays down a really long hallway, one-at-a-time. But not before we've seen the time-lapse video of day changing to night and the building the hallway is in from a distance. And then the fat people all sit in chairs. And then the seemingly soulless Caroline Rheaah asks each one "Dorbo? Who did you vote for?" "Gorikz, who did you vote for?" "Nunfip, who did you vote for?" like they didn't know why they had written names on the cards and prepared speeches trying to justify it. And then each gives that speech, followed by a bit of moaning. "aw ban, this is one of the hardest decisions I ever had to make." These people are as pouty as a Nicholas Cage movie poster. And then whoever loses has to get really self righteous "well. I thought you were my friends. I guess I was wrong." Hey ho, dwobo. Someone had to go. There wasn't a choice to vote for no one. You expect them to all vote for themselves? Guess what, greuben, only one person can win. It is not an exclusive fatso-only club that you've been unjustly banned from. I'd hate to see these big losers play musical chairs. I can't believe you took that chair from me. We were supposed to be in this together. Don't act like they intentionally set you up to look stupid. The minute you put on that giant red shirt and appeared in public, let alone before the camera, you'd sealed your own fate. Although now that I think about it, the competition could easily be held and more legitimately be called such if there were no voting. But then there wouldn't be as much petty drama and small-time humiliation, and I guess those things are good for ratings. I personally found them the most annoying parts of the show, but I wasn't planning to watch it again anyway, so my opinion probably doesn't count. I saw a bit of the show the week after the one I saw more of. Since there was one less person, that means there was one less three minute pound computation and one less vagina monologue at the vote-off table. How will they fill the time? By sending BOTH groups down the hallway carrying trays. Individually. I meant to watch the show, a full show, that week, so that I might become certain that I hadn't just witnessed low moments, so that I would not worry I had given an unjust assessment of something I only saw once. However, I forgot the show was even on. You can tell it meant so much to me. I finally remembered two or three weeks after that, and guess what: Everyone who was fat before was still fat. Maybe not as fat, but that is only because there is no cake at the Biggest Loser compound. Everyone who was whiny was still whiny. Exactly as whiny. People were whining about being on newly arranged teams, forgetting anew that there could still only be 1 winner. And then one of them walked in a field for about ten minutes interspersed with various scenes of people whining about teams, birds, whining, flowers and whining. Nothing any of them said mattered, since the guy walking in a field, alone, not listening to them, was the only person choosing teams. When the time came for him to choose teams, we were shown the building he was choosing them in. Then we saw the room. Then people walked into the room. Shanon, please step over there. Shannon goes without complaining. Ah, now we get somewhere. Commercial break. Resume. WHY IS SHANON BACK HERE AGAIN?! Don't tell me why you're sending her there; all of you are fat. Just send her and get done. When that was over, there were various scenes of clouds. Then the teams found two less-fat, non-Konami-hued shirt wearing people and told THEM about the teams. Because if I had not seen that I would not have been able to assume that someone told them about the teams off-camera, that being employees of the show they knew already, or that they could figure out the team situation when they saw pairs walking around together. Astoundingly, instead of ending, this episode seemed to enter a third half-hour. The Double Dare all time champions couldn't have filled this show past the red line with content, and yet it continued. Hooray, scale time. Since there were less people to fill the hallways than before, I was permitted to see them come down the stairs as well. Now, due to the pairs, the magical TI 2.3 scale struggled to calculate their weights to an additional decimal place. Naturally, this made no sense, but it did fill more time. Personally, I feel that... the scale isn't a reflection... of... how I feel. That is good, because if the scale did reflect how you felt, that being of the opinion that the scale does not exhibit that, you could not feel that way! If the scale showed that you did feel you didn't feel that, we'd all be doomed, and very confused. But you know, why do we even have scales if they do not accurately represent what we think our weights should be? We should be able to say we weigh however much we believe that we should weigh! And why stop there? I do not feel that my bank account is a reflection of how much money I feel like I have. I just went and exchanged two twenty dollar bills for 800 nickels, so don't you tell me I can't buy this helicopter! Caroline Griegah explained that there would be trouble for whichever team fell below the yellow line. Then the physics of the yellow line were explained. I don't know why she bothered, though, because each step of each rule was recounted as it became relevant each time it became relevant. "The yellow line" actually just ended up meaning that whoever lost the least weight failed. Oh, really? Is that why you just showed me various montages of fat people using exercise machines and standing next to fatter pictures of themselves? Gosh, who would have thought it would be the exact same thing as every other time you made them step on the scale? The losing "team" would have one of its members evicted by the other teams' votes. Thus ensuring that the teams whose choosing and mewling about of dominated much of this show will be abolished next week. Why teams? I do not know. The reason I was shown, however, involved a silly game challenge, to win voting immunity, and there needs to be a voting immunity aspect, because Survivor also had a voting immunity aspect. One sap from each side held a handle connected to a large bucket. The other fool from each faction was commanded to fill smaller buckets with water, dump the contents of those buckets into the stationary, non-emptying buckets held by an opposing team's member of their choice, and continue doing that until three were too heavy for their bearers to bear. Since each team only had two members, no interacting need have taken place. The only goal was to make the person you liked least drop its load first. Because it's not fun to watch cooperation; targeting of the least popular is much more enjoyable. Hitler even devoted his life to it. There was a Plan 9 From Outer Space feel to the game (always a good thing), as when only two lift twits remained, the same clips of them readjusting their grasps on their bucket handles were shown, over and over again, because 1: we needed to know that yes, the buckets were getting very heavy by this point and 2: if they were just shown standing there, like they were for the 98% percent of the challenge during which they were not readjusting their grasps, people watching might realize there's no reason for this Legends of the Hidden Temple homage (yes, bungee cords were involved) to last so long, figure out that it probably didn't really, and know that it was just a trick . The most important reason is 3: otherwise the game would have ended before the commercial break, and we can't have that. Everyone needs to know about Diet Rite. Live right. Diet Rite! TALK RONG! Why sell "diet" junk at all? I would assume the primary audience for a program like this is thin people glad not to be that fat. Also, "live right" seems to be an ironic slogan for a product that sounds like it was named after priest jargon for a short funeral. Music schizophrenia. If the live finale is in November, and each show represents one week, that means there are less than four weeks remaining in the game. How is the fat ones seeing their families the ultimate prize if every one of them will be done with the whole thing and back with their families in less than a month, some of them sooner than that? The one who was evicted this week was even shown re-meeting his wife "24 hours later." I thought the ultimate prize on this show was to not be fat anymore. They all saw their families before they entered. Why would they give up the ultimate prize for a chance at winning a lesser prize? Ehhh, just how nasty is this place? I thought you said "oh my god" when you saw a cow step on a land-mine, not some dope you last saw two months ago. I meant that you just saw the dopes, not cows stepping on them. Though I suppose if that did happen, you might be justified in invoking a deity. Call me when it happens and I will deliver my ruling. Last week, the challenge winners were awarded with an expense-paid trip to Hawaii. This week they only get an awkward chat and a guilt trip back to Alkaseltzertraz. Still, that is better than going back here.