'The Biggest Loser' abandons all pretense

The Biggest Loser continued its descent into being just another annoying reality show this week, as scheming and alliances became more important than actual work.

I hate that people see me as a spoiler, but it's nice to have someone believe in me.

Gameplay
Weight loss is apparently no longer its own reward. No, the Biggest Losers of the week now get a prize. Team Orange chooses a Gameplay prize, winning two votes in this week's elimination. (The other envelops would have granted them a 24-hour visit from a family member, or a week of massages for themselves and another team of their choice.)

The double vote could be a heck of a benefit -- or it could be worthless. "It only really matters if a strong couple falls below the yellow line," Jackie says. She's hoping that strong couple will be Team Black.

The challenge of the week is also All About Gameplay: One member of each team races through a giant mud pool to get to a stack of medicine balls, which they bring back and place on another team's rack. Once a team's rack is full, they're out of the game. The last team standing gets immunity.

So let me get this straight: One member of the team isn't even working in this challenge? Why do that? You give up all but the slimmest pretense of this being about weight loss and change when you have one team member hanging out and yelling instead of actually doing something physical. This was about stirring up drama, not about the theoretical point of the show.

Final Gameplay feature: After the elimination, Alison asks: "If you could vote off one more team right now, who would it be." What the hell?

Personal Dynamics
Mark of Team Black continues his reign of terror, blowing up at Jay during the challenge. When confronted about it later, Mark is confused -- why would anyone think bellowing in my brother's face is objectionable? I do this all the time! Right -- you're always a deplorable schmuck. Mark doesn't get it at all.

Jackie of Team Orange continues to annoy by taking a holier-than-thou attitude to, well, everything. She spends as much time directing people during the challenge as anyone else, but when Jay (I thought jokingly) yelled "Hey, play your own game!" she lost it. How dare Jay criticize me for doing what I'm criticizing Mark for doing! The nerve!

Neill is just not that into the game, and takes every opportunity to rest or make things easier for himself. Jillian and Bob are both frustrated with him, and Jillian makes sure everyone knows it: Every time Neill holds on while running on the treadmill, everyone gets to sprint another five minutes. Dear Neill: You're toast.

However, Jenn may bug me the most for being the gossip queen. First she babbles about Paul and Kelly, then bitches about Neill: "When you signed up to do the biggest loser, you signed up to change YOUR life, because YOU wanted to make that difference for YOU." That's right, Jenn -- so what say you pay attention to YOUR business instead of everyone else's?

The Weigh-In
Team Gray posted a great result even though they had immunity -- Trent fell below the 400-pound mark, and is thrilled. Orange and Black continue their rivalry, with Orange coming out on top. Blue has a great week , and are in first place for a while, but Team Yellow, who were nearly eliminated last week, beats them by 1/100th of a percent. Paul is so thrilled with his weight that he stands there, staring at the total, until Alison tells him "Paul, you have to get off the scale now..." It's sweet.

Teams White and Purple are in the bottom two. It's the Bland and the Bitchy vs. the Slacker and the Delusional, and it's pretty obvious which way it's going to go. Amanda worries that they'll be sent home because people think they're strong and can support each other -- you know, the line that was used on Curtis and Mallory last week -- and is shocked to hear everyone votes for them because they think Neill sucks. Neill interviews that he's "a little bit offended ... I was working just as hard or harder than anyone else in the house." Maybe it was the editing, but it sure didn't look like that was the case.

The Rants
That final question -- "If you could vote off one more team right now, who would it be?" -- makes me lose it. Are you seriously talking about eliminating someone who doesn't fall below the yellow line? Because if so, you're giving up all pretense that this show is about losing weight and changing lives. Folks might as well be eating scorpions or flirting for roses. If you're seriously saying eliminate someone just for the drama, you have moved over to exploiting desperate people.

Speaking of exploiting, I HATED that the producers manufactured a tearful, touching scene between Ali and Bette Sue. I don't doubt that both women have abandonment issues, that those issues contribute to their weight, and that they've got to work through them in order to keep weight off. However, I DO doubt that it served the pair well to broadcast their tears to the viewing public. I had the mental image of producers high-fiving each other as they sucked down those sweet, sweet tears and applauded themselves for bringing a photogenic moment of family dysfunction into people's living rooms.

Other thoughts:

• Jillian talked about how discombobulated she is having to pretend to care about everyone on campus. She's used to having her group, and the groups her people must crush. Now, everyone's important. How's she supposed to deal with that?
• At the weigh-in, we find out it's Trent's anniversary. "And he gets to sleep with me..." Roger cracks. Awww. I like those two.
• Brittany and Bernie also stand out as my favorites. Brittany is straightforward with Mark, but not self-righteous, like Jackie was. And Bernie? He notes that when Team Yellow beat them by so little at the weigh-in, "that's the difference of my not shaving." I have the morbid fear that he's going to wax his entire body before next week's weigh-in.
• While Mark is definitely the bad guy of Team Black, Jay isn't helping -- I got the impression he was thrilled to have some excuse to challenge the power dynamic without it being his fault. Everyone hates you for being mean to me, he told Mark. OK, that's a start -- now tell Mark to quit being mean to you on your own, ok?
• Daniel showed he's a bit of a punk kid when Team Orange had to pick which reward they wanted by telling Jackie to choose. That way, "if she opened it and it wasn't what we wanted I could kind of blame her." Nice.

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