Bon Voyage

It's all made to look nice and easy, but if you think about some of the events in this premier for more than five minutes, you're bound to scratch your head!

Analysis

Another season of Road Rules is upon us, and I must say Semester at Sea has managed to stay afloat despite my "slight" (To put it mildly) lack of optimism a week ago.

One thing that was refreshing about this premier was the open book introduction of the different cast members conversing in their respective environments; interacting with family and friends as appose to last season when all we got was...."Hi! I'm so-and-so, from such-and-such, and I'm 20 something!". It seems that over the past two seasons, B-M has shown more interest in exploiting a hip cast as to a hip cast with actual LIVES beyond the confines of the show!

Hopefully this season will be different; and it appears it may, judging from what I've seen thus far, but consistency usually isn't the name of the game on Road Rules, so the jury's still out!

But no doubt Veronica A.K.A "The Drama Queen" wins first prize for character development here. I thought it was rather nobel of Veronica to look-up her relatives in Cuba to help bridge the gap between them and her parents back in the states. On the flip side, Drama Queen appears to be a witty little vixen with a hidden agenda to shack-up and party rather than shake-down and study! Hence her abrupt departure from the lecture hall to go chillin with acouple seedy frat boys whose obvious mindset was to concur the twin peaks of S.A.S!

Ayanna, second runner-up appears to be a levelheaded--outgoing ball of energy who simply expresses what's on her mind, but not to the point of forcing it!

Pawel seems to be an all around nice guy (Reminds me of last season's Josh). I just hope his "personality gear" kicks in soon! And while we're on the subject, Shawn could use a jump-start as well even though he shows signs of emerging as the leader of the group with his gung-ho--"Let's just do it!" attitude.

The jury's still out on Pua A.K.A "Marlene" (According to BMP, that's her real name) Who's personality so far has exhibited anything but "a ball of energy"--according to her bio.

And last but not least, we have Yes A.K.A "Smooth Operator". Obviously the ladies man judging from his Matador/Romeo like performance before a mob of hormonally charged teenybopper school girls, will no doubt give Real World's Teck a run for his money!

And while this season consist of an interesting and diverse group of travelers, I wonder how much they'll actually interact with each other as appose to splitting off to do their own thing. I thought one of the main ideals behind Road Rules is the fact that the cast "can't" in essence escape from one another in a cramped winnebago; and in turn are forced to work together to accomplish their mission. Over time, forming bonds that could last a lifetime.

However, in Semester at Sea I honestly don't see that happening. Here the kids are dumped onto a floating resort with dozens of tempting distractions to interfere with the bonding process: dance floors, game rooms, tennis court, bars, and of course a swimming pool! Road Rules: "Club Med" at Sea indeed!

And with 600 other students on board, it's bound to complicate the situation even more! In fact, who wants to bet either Yes or Veronica will be the first to ditch the group in search of some humping on the high seas?

Goofs

• Continuity: Was I the only one who did a double-take when the BMP intern showed-up swiping the groups' cash and credit cards? Isn't the whole "Passing on the Torch" job up to former cast members from the previous season? What's the deal B-M, got greedy and put a stop-pay on the Latin American cast welfare check or something?

• Blast From The Past: I guess B-M just wasn't content with how well the first half of the show was going, so they broke up the momentum with an old worn-out recyclable cliche--you guessed it, the skydive [TM]. Even as annoying as its sister cliche (bungeejump) is, at least they try to put a different spin on it (ski lift bungee, bridge bungee, group bungee, crane bungee) whenever it's re-used. As with skydiving....it's the same old-same old buddy system assembly line-jump!

• Time Warp: This is small potatoes, but it perfectly illustrates how botched the cut & paste procedure can get at times. When Veronica and Co. were reading the clue on how to build their make-shift raft on Sandy Cay Island, it was clearly daylight; but once the group began constructing the raft, it had suddenly jump to night (Or dusk at the very least)! Either the kids horsed around a few hours before getting to work, or winter days in the Bahamas are "much" shorter than I previously thought! But, more probable....my hat goes off to the good folks over at B-M Editing for Yet Another Blunder!

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