This One's For Gladys

Brain gets to be a punk and Abe gets redemption.

Analysis

Now that's more like it! Well sort of. First, let me get a few things off my chest...

< VENT >

Man I tell ya, I don't know how much more crap I can take from those con artist over in the MTV advertising department. They managed to piss me off not once, but twice during the half hour of Road Rules Monday night. Now there're pawning these poor saps to do commercials. "Hey, if you're bored, down on your luck, and happen to lose your keys to a rat dog, come crash with your pals in Nike T-shirts and flush yourself with Citra! Citra, guaranteed to make you a winner!" Ugh, thank you sir, but no thank you. I'll stick with my Mountain Dew!

Watching Josh get loaded on Citra will not inspire me to run to the nearest super market to buy a six-pack, nice try thought! Oh, and anyone with half a brain can figure out from both the calendar and commercials that spring break is this weekend: Therefore, I don't need an annoying scroll bar at the top right of my screen telling me there're four days left to Spring Break '99, every five freakin seconds for crying out loud!

And boy, after a while I was wondering if they were going to rename this show Real World Latin America! Considering the cast has been in Veracruz for the fourth freakin week! That's now a month they've spent in this eastern port city of Mexico. I feel like I know every street corner, every restaurant, and every soul that has wandered into the lens of the camera by heart. Then they get the clue telling them to pack-up their bags, crank-up the woodie, and head to Mexico City (Although I bet the woodie choked a few times while starting due to its extended hibernation).

And after two months there're still in the same damn country! I'm sorry, but they should've been out of this area long time ago! In seasons one and two the Roadies would visit a new state just about every other episode. Here there're going nowhere fast. And that once promising premise of exploring the Mayan ruins and tropical rain forest of Costa Rica has mired itself into the same old thing....there're still milling around in Mexico!

This is after all Road Rules LATIN AMERICA isn't it? Now to be fair, other cast have wore-out their welcome in certain regions in the past: Season's one, two, four, and five brought us wornout-return visits to New York, New Orleans, and San Francisco with the Northern Trail gang camping out in Seattle for three weeks. Europe brought us a sort of new spin with the gang at times hop-scotching from country-to-country via the TGV. But in the end they left out some interesting regions such as Germany, England, and Scandinavia to name a few. Then along came Australia with the Roadies immediately killing three weeks in Sydney, not the mention repeatedly darting back and forth to different cities only in the eastern two/thirds of the continent. Plus propping their feet up in a plush hotel every night, but that's another rant!

That's three exhausted continents. Then we get Latin America, a fresh start, a Road Rules posse way the heck down there....and it seems the more things change, the more they stay the same...same country, different city. What I'm saying is move it, pick up the pace! Tell Newbill to pack up the auto club, put the pedal to the medal and get the heck out of dodge! Leave all that baggage of the first eight weeks in a dust cloud as you seek out new territory, new cultures, and hopefully new and exciting missions. Just think: There are at least six other countries in Central America, not to mention a whole other continent that encompasses Latin America. You want adventure? You want the ride of your life? Head thataway!

< / VENT >

Now on to some of the less irritating highlights of the show.

One week after my peak disgust over the dismal "Deep Sea Therapy", BMP makes the same mistake by throwing in a somewhat uninteresting mission where the Roadies get a chance to climb on stage to embarrass themselves in front of hundreds of people with the hit Mexican Rock Band--Molotov. And judging from their music vedio, they appear to be a cheap rip-off from the Beasty Boys.

You know your talent's pretty crappy when you're reduced to banging a tambourine, counting to get the rhythm while beating your drums, relying on close captioning to decode your wailing because the viewers can't understand a dang word you're saying, and the worst of all! The notion that you need back-up in order to keep the audience from booing you off the stage with tomatoes! I'm sorry folks, but Josh is the only one I can give extra props to for doing a bang-up job.

With that said, we now come to the main headline this week....Abe seeking redemption and to re-admit Gladys back into the group. And it wasn't until the Roadies arrived in Mexico City that Josh mentioned something I wish he'd said two weeks ago, "I don't understand why as a group we didn't say...Gladys is us, she's staying with us....and that's all there is to it." Why? Because Road Rules cast members have no voice anymore, that's why!

Oh well, better late than never. This in-turn leads to the group (Well not the whole group! I noticed Brian was missing. I'll get to my speculations on the whereabouts of Brian in a minute) campaigning for the return of Gladys. And where Abe gets on the phone to butter-up Mary Ellis with one of the oldest lines in the book, "I gotta tell you off the bat, you're beautiful, heh heh!". A quote that has SUCK-UP pasted all over it! But I have to really commend Abe for stepping up to the plate and admitting his wrong in the whole Gladys situation. However, on the same plane, what's going to prevent Mr. Hyde from turning back into Dr. Jerko next week, especially given the teaser? I recall either Holly or Sarah mentioning that Abe has become more compassionate since he's been drinking. Does this mean that Abe can only be Mr. Nice Guy when loaded? In that case, you best stock-up the woodie with the best boos money can buy!

But in the end, Abe's efforts prove futile when Ellis calls back to inform him that her lawyers viewed Gladys's return as "violating their insurance policy". Ok, I can swallow that, but again I must raise my hand and ask exactly what insurance policy were they looking at when they allow Stephen to remain in the house after the slap incident? Oh well, I'm sure they'll come up with something that begins with bull--! So there's good news and there's bad news. the "bad" news (Depending on your perspective) is that Gladys won't be coming back. And the "good" news is that Abe has for now redeemed himself with the girls. Even with Sarah going as far as to tell him that he's scored an extra point with her. Well at last it's now confirmed that Abe has managed to "score" with one girl on this trip!

And with that said, I have one more item of business to take care of! That is the Roadie M.I.A during this whole affair--Brian. I suspect he killed the time his travelmates use to negotiate for Gladys's return with his friend (And I use that word lightly!) Sylvia who he was introduced to back in "Trust" because she was seen eating with the gang in that final table scene.

So call it a 3. I spent a while debating whether to give this one either a 3 or 4, but I ended up siding with a 3 because there were just as many things in this episode that annoyed me than those that didn't.


NEXT WEEK: Abe and Holly humping? Who would da thunk!

Jump straight to "Strike the Gold". Or go back to "Deep Sea Therapy".

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