Beauty and the Geek 5, Episode 1: Take a Number

Thanks to the writers’ strike we get an extra season of Beauty and The Geek this year. Well…actually Beauty vs. the Geek. This time around the beauties will be competing against the geeks for $250,000.

We begin with a montage to illustrate that the geeks have limited social skills and the beauties are vapid. You see, one of the girls believes that her mother’s homeland of Egypt is in South Africa, which of course it is not. Everyone knows Egypt is in Scandinavia.

The nine geeks arrive at an airplane hanger (to the tune of “What A Man“) in the Geek Mobile and here we meet seven of them for the first time: John is a child genius and recovering Microsoft addict. Greg is a self-proclaimed “Gaysian Gaymer” because he is both Asian and into gaming with homosexual themes. Puns will out a geek every time. Joe is a cowboy who can’t remember the last time he made love to a woman, but doesn’t miss it because making love is overrated. He couldn’t have been doing it right. Chris is an MIT Oceanographer, and a virgin. Matt is a poet, but seems charming despite that fact. Tommy is a “sweater vest enthusiast” and has been since before middle school.

Here I call foul. Tommy is very good looking and doesn’t seem at all at home in his sweater vest. I would put money on the fact that he’s just posing as a geek.

Jim, however, is the real deal. He’s a video game programmer and claims geeks created our society.

Here, to the tune of “Cherry Pie,“ the beauties arrive in a jet. At this point my hopes are confirmed that my 12-year old son would never make the cut as a geek when he yells that someone is playing a Warrant song on TV. But let’s meet the beauties: Jillian is a Playboy model who considers anything intellectual such as math, science, or politics to be conversation killers since that’s all just jibberish to her ears. Amber is a runway model who considers herself a 20 on a scale of 1-10. Cara is an aspiring soap star with a voice like Minnie Mouse who can’t tell time. Tara is a Daisy Dukes hostess. Amanda is a Hawaiian Tropic model whose worst subject in school was history. To prove this point, when asked to name the last five presidents of the United States her answers are: Bush, Clinton, Nixon, Theodore, Roosevelt, and Higley.

Kristina is a daddy’s girl who isn’t stupid, she just doesn’t know a lot of stuff. She used to think that victims of car accidents were actually buried at the side of the road beneath the commemorative crosses until she was proven wrong. I can’t be the only one who was wondering if there was actual digging involved in the act of proving her wrong.

Tiffany thinks her IQ is a little below average, so it’s probably about 200. The editors sidebar the screen to let the viewing audience know that an average IQ is 100 points and genius is 150. There is debate regarding the IQ score being indicative of genius, but I don’t think there’s any doubt at all that Tiffany falls below 100 on the Gaussian Bell Curve for the Wechsler test. How many standard deviations below she falls is anyone’s guess at this point.

Letitia is an extreme sports model who bears a striking resemblance to Cameron Diaz. She wishes everyone would be honest about being there for the money. Randi is a Navy Diva (I have no idea what that means) who thinks that books are like sex to geeks. She opines that since they can’t get women, books must be their sex. I wonder what would happen to her carefully constructed theory if she knew the world is full of literate people who also enjoy active sex lives?

Mike, the least irritating host on reality TV, lets the contestants know that this season, it is Beauty vs. the Geek and the two players who make the greatest transformations will win the $250,000. They have a little meet and greet party in the hangar where we see how far the guys have to go in acquiring even passable social skills. Jim admits he doesn’t usually attend parties because they are too loud. Jim claims to be a “newbie” when it comes to women, which he pronounces “noob” which is the opposite of a pro. I guess he doesn’t know women don’t use pros; not even ugly women have to pay for it. He apologizes to the camera for his use of air quotes as he knows they are intrusive.

Chris attempts small talk with Tiffany and needs to define grad school for her. Matt claims he was reluctant to break out the poetry too soon, as he was afraid to scare people off - yet he does it anyway. Please don’t make me recap his poetry verbatim, because it may not scare his cast mates but it makes me uncomfortable. Also, he seems pretty sweet and I don’t want to use my anti-poetry bias to mock him. Not yet, anyway.

Cara says the geeks are all aliens to her. Letitia isn’t happy about this season’s restructure of the competitions. Jason (since he wasn’t introduced earlier, I’ll do so now. Meet Jason - the One Buff Geek) agrees that if he wanted to hang out with only the guys he could have done so at home.

We move from the airplane hanger to the mansion where the contestants make a mad rush to the bedrooms to decide sleeping arrangements. Amber offers Greg the other half of her bed and he agrees. Tommy and Jason are in the room with bunk beds. where Tommy asks Jason if he’s a top or a bottom. Jason doesn’t have a preference, but knows he wants bunk beds as if he has to share a room with another guy he’d rather not be laying next to him in case it “comes to that” and it always does.

Is it too early for me to pick a favorite for the win? It’s Jason hands down. Quick witted and funny wins my heart every time.

In the kitchen the contestants toast to their new adventure, until the laughing is brought to an abrupt end when John raises his glass while making the toast “girls suck.” Not to be outdone, Joe ends his toast with “tonight we dine in hell.” Yeah, I think the point that these guys are awkward around women has landed.

The girls are all drawn to Greggy, and beg him to join them in the pool where he takes an immediate header into the water. He came up smiling, gaining points for their favorite geek.