Episode 7 of Tough Enough already and it’s save to say this show has been about everything except finding a future wrestling star. Contestants are lined up from the start and the judges give them some words of wisdom. You need to step up (for most) and stay humble (for Amanda). We switch to the barracks and we get a close-up of Gigi’s ass. Not that I’m complaining but it just shows where the focus is put on. Usual discussion about everybody being surprised at who went home. Amanda expresses how happy she is that Miz sees some potential in her. Chelsea retorts by pointing out that Miz was staring at something else than her potential. Well, who isn’t. ZZ is angry about everybody calling him lazy. And I’ve just watched six minutes of nothing.
And we join the trainers for a bit of… Wrestling??? On this show??? There must be an apocalypse scheduled somewhere. Theme of this week is teamwork but first we get treated to some cardio exercises and, of course, the sight of ZZ being near-death after two minutes. They train on some hip-tosses and again, ZZ is shown displaying all the agility of a sandbag. After that they have to work together on a series of moves. Guess who’s the worst? Yeah, ZZ. Tanner and Josh actually have some rather smooth exchanges earning them praise from the trainers. Chelsea gets blasted by the trainers because she is “selling” Amanda’s moves. Wait, that was selling? I’ve seen better selling in a low budget porn movie.
Ad then comes the BIG drama moment of this episode. While Sara lee hadn’t done badly up until this point, she botches a power-slam on Gigi, causing her to fall somewhat on her side. Gigi then proceeds to explain how she got dropped on her head, and could have been paralyzed.
Of course this would be the focal point of the rest of the show, with Gigi calling Sara Lee incompetent and dangerous while Sara Lee countered by saying the trainers would stop her if she was that bad. It’s funny how everybody who says he/she is not there to create drama ends up creating drama. Josh and Tanner have a bonding moment. I’m having an headache.
Teamwork theme continues as the Prime Time Players and a group of firefighters join the contestants. Apparently ZZ has some experience in firefighting and leads his team to victory. Back at the barracks, Tanner, Josh and ZZ enjoy some calm conversation while the girls are cat-fighting again. It’s Gigi vs Sara Lee, Chelsea vs Amanda, and I’m starting to wonder if there is a point to all of this.
Judging time, and the judges are (rightfully) very critical of the contestants, with, especially, DB having had enough. he calls out Giorgia for being fake and making a problem were there wasn’t really one (the botched move) and Paige calls out Sara Lee for not apologizing. Miz had warned Amanda to not let the fact that he called her hot last week go to her head, and apparently (and unsurprisingly) Amanda failed because Miz now says he will nominate her. ZZ gets some more critique, but, in the end, Bryan nominates Giorgia for the fact she completely over-reacted to the Sara Lee botch, Paige nominates Sara Lee for not saying sorry and Miz nominates… Chelsea? Oh that Miz sure is a crafty one. Anyway, Paige saves Giorgia and Chelsea is eliminated because Sara lee got 53% of the votes. Interestingly, Giorgia would have been the one eliminated if not for Paige’s save.
Tough Talk was actually more interesting than the episode itself with Bryan and Paige arguing over whether Giorgia over-reacted or not. After Amanda and Giorgia called Sara lee dangerous and a liability, Paige asked Bryan if he would like having a liability in his locker-room. Bryan answered by asking Paige if she knew with how many liabilities he had to work with during his career. Paige got owned there. Basically Bryan’s reproach towards Gigi was that her reactions were totally fake and that she was just playing a strategy to make Sara Lee look worse than she was. On a roll, Bryan continued by stating he didn’t know why everyone else was here, but he came here hoping to find out who really had the potential to become a WWE superstar, and that’s not really what’s happening right now. Poor Daniel, his naivety still gets the better of him sometimes.
Some thoughts:
I can’t say I really care about Chelsea being eliminated. Sure she got some moves but her promo work was just boring. She still needs a lot of work to live up to her own boasts.
I don’t see how Sara Lee can lose the female side of the competition. Giorgia and Amanda don’t even come near her when it come to social media popularity. If they want to get rid of her, their only shot is putting her in the bottom three with ZZ and have Daniel use his save on the third nominee.
Same thing on the male side. Only Josh seems to have a small chance of beating ZZ in the voting and that would be a coin-flip at best. There is a very real chance of ZZ and Sara lee winning this whole thing, which means we’ll probably never hear from them again afterwards. All that watching for THAT result? Thanks WWE.
Chelsea tried to bring up the experience advantage she had over the others. But talking of the experience you accumulated in promotions NOT named WWE on a WWE show is still a mortal sin apparently. Besides, two years of experience isn’t that big a deal, Chelsea.
It was, however, great to watch Daniel Bryan criticizes the whole concept on Tough Talk and calling several contestants out for being fake and only pretending to have interest in entering the wrestling business. Bryan looked genuinely annoyed there
Miz is basically playing a reality show version of his heel character. Quite funny
I apologize to fans of the show if it seems to them I’m being overly negative here. But I’m covering the G1 climax at the same time, and it’s quite difficult to stomach so much non-sense and fake drama after watching the awesomeness that was Ibushi vs Naito. The problems with Tough Enough remain the same. No direction, too much emphasis on meaningless drama and a show concept that now gets criticized and ridiculed by it’s own judges. The most fake thing of all is perhaps TE pretending to find the next wrestling superstar.
