Beauty and the Geek 5, Episode 6 Meltdowns and Mayhem – This Isn’t Jerry Springer

Previously on Beauty and the Geek no one went home, but Tara and Joe are up for elimination this week because he didn’t make a very cute drag queen.

Everyone is in a playful mood due to the non-elimination week. People with time on their hands and producers to amuse get into mischief and these guys are no exception. Tara thinks the mansion is haunted so they decide to dress Tommy up in a vampire costume (he’s reminiscent of a younger George Hamilton in Love at First Bite) and prank her. Joe, showing his lack of social skills, goes into overdrive in his efforts to protect what he claims is an innocent girl.

Joe has clearly not been to enough slumber parties in his life since he has no appreciation for the art form of a good-natured practical joke.

Randi is livid that he’s put a stop to the shenanigans and gets in Joe’s face. As he scrambles to process this verbal assault, he tells Randi she will rue the day she met him. She retorts that the day is already ruined. He tries to explain the definition of rue, somewhat incredulously. I guess no one has ever impressed upon Randi the benefits of a wider vocabulary.

Tommy is upset because it started as just an innocent prank and the next thing he knows there’s screaming and swearing. Randi continues blasting Joe and he loses patience and spits in the general direction of her feet. That’s where he lost me. There are lines a man just shouldn’t cross, poor social skills notwithstanding. Spitting indoors, out of anger, and at women is definitely a line.

You will be surprised to learn this doesn’t have a calming influence on Randi. She threatens to “whip that fat bitch,” telling Joe he’s lucky his loogie didn’t touch her. Greg is embarrassed by his partner’s mouth and this isn’t the first time. Jason correctly notes that Joe and Randi are both wrong in how they are behaving. These scenes are never fun for the onlookers.

Tara wakes up in the middle of the drama and is understandably confused. She was sound asleep and was awoken to vampires, spitting, and the feeling that someone is peeing on her.

I’m thinking the latter was just delirium in the sleep to wake state, since I’m pretty sure the editors would have tripped over each other to showcase actual urination.

Tommy, who still feels responsible for this because he looked so dashing as our favorite Count, tries to get Joe to apologize so they can get past this. Joe doesn’t apologize because he didn’t agree with the joke. She continues to harangue him, telling him he isn’t Tara’s husband nor is Tara his wife, thus she has “no pity for his ass.”

I would have paid cash money to see Joe explain to Randi the redundancy in her comment… although he’d have had to define redundancy.

Tommy says that they all need to live together so they have to treat each other with a certain level of respect. Joe is holding the Bible while Randi continues her ranting diatribe.

What is this, Big Brother?

Jason reminds us that the first week Randi also got into a verbal altercation with the now-evicted Amber. This isn’t an anomaly with Randi, she’s intimidating by nature and it probably works for her, but it sure isn’t pretty to watch.

Tara defends Joe and is grateful that he is trying to protect her. She is sick of how Randi picks on him all day long, and while he was very wrong for spitting, she sees how he was provoked. She gets angry when people pick on the unfortunate and geeky.

I wonder what she thinks of people who pick on the unfortunate and marginally pretty? I don’t think she would like me very much.

Joe feels like a bad person, but Tara assures him he’s not and she’s happy he tried to protect her. Joe cries through the rest of Tara’s pep talk, saying that he doesn’t know how much more he has left in him to play this game.

As I sit through commercials, I wonder: Am I the only one who hates the way Drew Barrymore overenunciates? I usually love Cover Girl commercials, but they’re ruined for me now.

Enough of the corporate shills and we’re back to the show, heading right into the Challenge Meeting. Our host Mike, in his usual laid back style, dismisses the drama. He tells the contestants that while Joe and Tara have been selected for nomination, if they win either of their competitions this week they will be able to save themselves.

The girls’ competition will be math-based while the guys get something a little more exciting. They will be playing firefighters in an exercise where they rescue their partners from a burning building. Greg wonders if there will be any hot firefighters there, to which Mike says he’ll see what he can do.

I can’t blame the guy, all the other geeks are surrounded by eye candy every day he’s just trying to find something where he can. Resourceful, that one.

Matt won’t be able to actively participate because he still has a broken clavicle from the football challenge. In this case, Leticia will be able to take his place. He is frustrated as he’d like to show her that he’s strong, but she’s excited since she’s all about fires. The meeting ends with Mike’s admonition to hit the study materials.

They get to the challenge hosted by the L.A. County Fire Department. There is indeed a burning building, such as they use for training purposes. Joe is determined to win to save himself from nomination, while Tommy is having flashbacks from falling out of a tree as a child and wondering if he can handle the heights.