10 Days

As the season end nears, the gang crams for an exam while Clueless plays poor little rich girl and Yes plays honorary slacker.

Analysis

Hmm, "10 Days" definitely has a lot to chew on; most of it's sweet, but there're enough bitter segments to hold it back. From a Road Rules theme basis, this is probably the worst season finale ever!

The cast was given a lousy mission--if you'd call it that; In fact, let me go on the record by saying that this was not a mission, it was a tardy assignment given to the cast by Professor Warn-out, at the beginning of the semester no less! And are you telling me that it took these twerps three months to come up with a S.A.S theme song (and a very crappy one at that)! If these twerps had so much as won those MTV Music Award tickets, I would've called for an immediate investigation!

And how about that handsome reward eh! A spiffy new(?) Imac, Aww shucky, shucky! B-M definitely knows how to screw you don't they? How in the heck can you go from handing out a cool reward like a VW Beetle to a freaking Imac, a mac of all things! You'd think if the cheapskates could dish out $120,000 bucks just to put these kids on a floating resort, they could at least give them a respectable computer... a Gateway or something, yeesh! Then Pua had the nerve to say, "This is the best handsome reward ever." Someone wash her mouth out with soap!

However, not to come across as too negative... this finale featured some of the strongest characterizations that I haven't seen in quite some time, perhaps ever.

The show picks up where it left off last week with Pua confronting and wanting Clueless to admit that she stole her shirt. But I must say in contrast to the "Judge Judy" good cop--psycho cop interrogation of Ayanna back in "Hot Voodoo" this is more like "Pua Light" with feather-weight negotiations along the line of, "Please, please... ugh, I'll be your friend!"

Of course Clueless didn't rise to the bait; and actually took offense to being labeled a (gasp) thief, "I don't know, I feel strange" she said. Of course you feel strange you ditz, you were caught red handed! What school did you say you went to? Then all of a sudden, Clueless has a change of heart in the middle of the night, so she leads Pua to the ladies rest room where she confesses to stealing the shirt (Clueless would be up for expulsion if this type of incident occurred at a real university). But since Pua's very malleable, Clueless cooks up some poor excuse about her father spoiling her with material goodies all of her life, which in-turn led her to steal Pua's top (uh, huh).

Oh ya, nice one Clueless. Blame your poor old man who is God knows where, or in what situation for your despicable actions! Reality Check Ms. Portillo: You are a freaking 22 year old ADULT who's responsible for her own freaking actions! Mom and dad's liability stops at 18, get with the program kid! Then Clueless is making me sick when she's sobbing to Pua on how ashamed she is of herself--oh cut the crap! You're just sorry because you got caught! I can't believe the kind of stunts this girl pulls to get the job done! Another example came near the end of the show- in a supposed good will gustier, Clueless offers Pawel that flee market chess set they won in Vietnam; saying that she has no use for it what so ever, which translates to, "I'm not giving it to you because I'm generous, I'm giving it to you because it's useless junk!" Gee, what a good girl!

For her part, I have to give Ayanna credit for not taking advantage of the situation by gloating to Pua- "I told you so, I told you so!" eventhough she pretty much called Clueless out from day one. I assumed this was a rough cruise for Ayanna, but I didn't know it was that rough until I saw that teary-eyed family reunion in Seattle (you'd think she had been away at sea for ten years). Though it's nice to see that her mother's doing ok- thank you B-M for keeping us informed on her condition, NOT!

Everyone else got a decent reunion as well: We met Pawel's brother, Shawn mentioned something about a dog, and Pua in fact HAS a family (for a while there I was really wondering); however Yes's mom didn't even bother to show up, so in order to keep him from feeling "left out" Alissa introduced Yes to her mom and dad who pretended to act PC for the camera by (temporally) accepting him into their family! And of course, Clueless and Jason (her current fling) had to put on a bad soap opera type reunion.... and I don't know about the rest of you, but if I hadn't seen my girl in over three months I'd be making tracks; but here Jason's all-to careful not to move out of camera range the whole time! Hmm, it seems that Clueless isn't the only one who's had too much of themselves lately.

So a decent ending for a finale; however, I thought it was rather corny of B-M to tack on that filler (A.K.A "Reunion Segment" - since when did Road Rules start having those things anyway?) where the cast reunites to discuss their experience. But if B-M was trying to conjure some sort of closure, I didn't pick it up. Not only did Clueless fail to apologize to both Ayanna and Pua, but she had the audacity to talk about loyalty and what being a true friend is all about. At which point I threw up both hands in defeat (and don't even get me started about her claimed celibacy on the trip!) Oh, and Pawel's "Big" secret turned out to be nothing more than a "Big" smoke screen. How typical for Road Rules's promos to be trite, over hyped, and misleading to the max!

With that said, I have one more item of business to take care of in this episode that was rather late on arrival. That is the show's sloppy attempt to make up for three months in one hour with S.A.S students cramming for exams, acting busy, and seemingly interested in academics (where in the heck were these study group shouts during the past 12 weeks--and I'm not talking about five second sex education segments either!).

Even deans Kohler and McCop-out ganged up on Yes in a mock "emergency" academic meeting with Kohler as a wannabe hip Tom Berenger in "The Substitute"; shuffling onto a scene that Yes and the viewers were suppose to take seriously. But Yes, smooth as silk didn't flinch! Instead, he scored four As just to prove to them that Semester at Sea's slacker mentality didn't rub off on him. And to prove that he's the better man, Yes declined to rub it in their faces--though I would've been tempted to paste those As on their doors with a little footnote that read, "Who Da Man!?!"

Goofs

• Consistency: Just last week, Pua informed us that she purchased the infamous black top while in India. However, this week she claims that she bought it in Japan (I'd sure like to take a gander at that receipt).

• Consistency--First Runner Up: No, don't adjust your television set folks! Pawel's hair really did change color about four or five times during the finale--which could only lead to two possibilities: 1.) Pawel had a Dennis Rodman vibe going on, or 2.) Someone inhaled too much in the B-M editing booth and went crazy with the cut & paste button! Well my money's on the latter (as usual)!

• Consistency--Second Runner Up: During the reunion, Ayanna made a reference to her and Clueless's dead beat dad chat they had in Malaysia--Say What? As I recall the D.B.D chat occurred at their newly acquired posh resort in "India". Unless.. Ayanna was referencing to another chat.

• Mystery: And just who the heck was that chubby little boy (with the cape) playing superkid anyway? I thought S.A.S didn't allow kiddies on board; although they said they didn't allow booze in cabins either, so...

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