‘Opposite Worlds’ review: The eliminations change, and a muscular caveman
The first thing that we’ll say about “Opposite Worlds” tonight is this: Frank looks like the most frightening caveman ever. Seriously. The tailors seemed to have run out of material for his outfit for one, and he is also going to struggle more than others given the way in which he needs food to keep himself going.
This was one of the more interesting / polarizing episodes of the show, mostly because it exposed yet another flaw in the plan: Allowing there to be eliminations twice a week, and eliminating the whole concept of the duel of destiny at least temporarily. It made it suddenly more about playing a strategy inside your team, and it’s not really clear just how prepared any of the players were for this. There’s nothing we dislike more than twists that the players cannot prepare for that alters the way that they play the game.
With all of this in mind, you could argue that the decision to get rid of Steve was somewhat justified. He was originally a twist that Epoch had not prepared for … but they were also not prepared to get rid of Frank. This entire move felt very awkward to suddenly have a survivor-esque vote-out at this point in the game; we had it during our season of “Beauty and the Geek,” as well (where we ironically lost our CarterMatt podcaster Jason Prager), and it was just as annoying and game-altering there. Also ironically, both shows share an executive producer in J.D. Roth.
We get it: You have to get rid of some people quickly in order to make your finale date, which is totally going to get swallowed up thanks to airing against “Survivor”, but are there not better ways to do it than this? If your game is determined on challenges, why change it now? This was the perfect chance for Epoch to really make a game-changing move, and instead they decided to show once again that these people are not strategists. At this point, we almost want Jeffry to win because it’d be hilarious.
A show that is so visually stunning and fairly well-produced should be better than it has been. As a matter of fact, it feels like the show doesn’t have the tools necessary anymore to be ready for the future. Grade: C.
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Photo: Syfy