TUF Episode 8: Splushi

Written by Mike Wilkerson   |   Thursday, November 06 2008

Mike Wilkerson gives you the 4-1-1 on TUF Episode 8: Splushi

Show Viewing Date: 11-05-2008
Show Title: Ultimate Fighter: Week 8 Team Nogueira V. Team Mir - Splushi
Network: SpikeHD
Reviewed By: Mike Wilkerson

Week number eight begins with a memorable fruity freshness - well - perhaps a less-memorable, more saline-doused, but still somehow fruity fresh beginning as the boys of the Ultimate Fighter Show launch into an apparently Jackass-inspired, completely un-inspiring Episode. If you thought the Savage Science Television Review of Ultimate Fighter's 8th week episode would be forgettable, you would be sadly mistaken. Prepare yourselves.

As with many of my online reviews, I'll be reviewing this initial episode in a "stream of consciousness" format, giving you essentially what I'm thinking as the show airs. I encourage everyone to send feedback in regard to any of the points below and let's use this opportunity as a rallying and sounding-off point for our love, of the truly SAVAGE SCIENCE...

-- Fruity Jokes a-Plenty: Hold on a second: Pissing in a fruit tray that your friends/potential opponents are going to eat later - umm, okay. Yes, I am professionally reviewing pissing-in-one's fruit tray and for the first time in a long time - I'm - speechless. But wait, now all four gentleman have urinal-cake-without-the-urinal-or-cake moment as they take a go at the fruit tray. What the hell are we watching here? Is this supposed to be entertainment?

-- Phillipe, and Dave - Come On Down: I know nothing about either of these fighters, and - having listened to the few people talking after the selections - it sounds like it'll be interesting to say the least. Are we going to follow the un-eventfuless of last week's fight characteristics or will we see something different?

-- The Follow Up to Pissing in the Fruit Cup - a "Bigger One Than Last Time": "Uhh, yeah, we did eat piss." Two of the saline connoisseurs liked it not so shockingly. I would provide more commentary, but frankly - it's not worth the piss it's sitting in.

-- Dave Review: A division one wrestler, who graduated and went to Holland to Tae box. He's apparently well-conditioned, throwing a variety of jabs and kicks that looks to be very devastating. "Super tough" and a sadly all-too short cut to commercial.

-- The Episode Vibe: I'm not sure if it's just because the MMA-themed Jackass episode-like beginning of this episode, but the "tone" of this episode just feels wonky. The best way I can showcase this is that usually, I am in "hold" mode while putting down and fleshing out items in the previous review entries, but this time I've reached the "live" point of the evening, where I am actually needing to watch live and cooling my heels waiting for commercials to be done. Let's hope that the episode takes the 22nd minute to show us some television program conditioning and move forward to something way more entertaining than the fighter contestants eating piss-drenched fruit.

-- Ah Ha - Something's Fishy: Philippe loves sushi - ok. Does this mean that we're going to have to deal with some other body-fluid reaching a container? "I'm gonna' set up my sushi..." "What if we get our spunk on it... I can't wait bro, this is gonna be fun." No, it's not and I, for the second time can't believe I'm actually reviewing an episode that includes this different flavor of the same style, infantile joke.

-- More Gooney Junie: After whining about not having enough training partners and berating his fellow fighters for not wanting to fight or train, Junie hits another infantile moment (par for the episode I suppose) and then tops it off with some trash talking. Waiter, may I have an order of clueless with a side of inflated ego? Perhaps some buttcheese on it to go for the childlike triad.

-- An Interesting Discussion for This Week: Hey Mike! What did you do while one of the contestants on the SpikeHD reality show, Ultimate Fighter, went gingerly into the group bathroom to masturbate, collect the ejaculate, and smear it on the Sushi Rolls as an infantile prank this week?" Answer: Fell into disbelief, realizing that I have real, legitimate show ideas that could make a network money that have nothing to do with masturbation, infantile jokes, or sushi. Yawn. The eventual banter offered post "semenal moment" from Dave Kaplan? "You will have my fecal matter, on your person within the next three days." Annnnd the Emmy goes to: SpikeHD's Ultimate Fighter... Frankly I am embarrassed to even share any of this with a show that I am reviewing for several different websites and apologize for the showcasing of what is less entertaining than even the worst joke I played on friends in high school. The uncomfortable moments following the discovery were equally as unsatisfying. What a literal and undeniable piss-poor job, Spike.

-- Phillipe Review: A nurse who works 12-hour tours in the emergency room (I wonder if they have a piece of the courses he took on the transfer of bodily fluids/material during his schooling), "a busy one" in New York, where he sees things that simply don't scare him. A believer in experiencing life to it's fullest, he's "now ready to die." He's made for the cage and ready to rumble. We can hope so, so as to provide us with something entertaining for this episode.

-- More Great Food Goodness: An almost born duck egg - can the episode get more entertaining? Answer: Nope. Let's eat the little hairy ducks with grey-not-quote-cooked-eyes on television. Ok. "It's just an abortion." Quality entertainment, folks. Check please.

-- 48 Minutes In: Finally with what is a reasonable series of what each fighter is going to do with the other in the ring, the episode begins to get back on the horse that is a television show for real people to watch, and then quickly goes to commercial. To quote Dr. Smith, "Oh... The pain."

-- This Week's Fight Begins: If there is an entertainment god "up there" then this fight will not suck. Dana introduces the fight and - if I'm gauging it right, he's seen the beginning of this episode and the expression and "let's get on with it" attitude so as to have something remotely entertaining in this episode. Boy. Josh Rosenthal steps to the center and asks if both fighters are ready. At this point, I could use a "ready?" too - no love for the reviewer, eh Josh? They tap in the center of the ring and quickly exchange a punch for a kick. The initial blow to Dave was clearly a measuring off point. Dave returns a couple of solid tae-style kicks, but on the trailing edge of those kicks are a peppering of hard, solid blows that rock Dave. Dave crumbles to the ground as if finally realizing that he ate semen-icing on top of sushi (yes, I typed it - don't get smart or I'll break out the ear wax or clipped toenail shavings, thank the boys and editors of The Ultimate Fighter) and holds on for dear life and consciousness. Philippe ends up in Dave's guard as his eyes wander back into his skull, and we see positioning on both fighter's parts begin. Phillipe begins to posture up and Dave tries to defend potential blows one-by-one, but it truly seems a matter of time. Philippe ends up taking Dave's back and in about as much time as it took the other fighter to ejaculate his "small collection", Dave is tapping out in a Filipino-flavored Rear Naked Choke. Phillipe stands with arms raised as I watch the gears of the fighters grind to think of what new and "funny" antics they can capture for the end of this episode. A second yawn befalls this episode review. Philippe falls to his knees as if to offer prayer for his win, and I do the same - praying to the lords of television in hopes to not have an offering this bad, ever - again.

Winner - Phillipe by way of Rear Naked Choke

The Savage Science Review Moral: Coach Frank Mir - at the trailing comments section of this fight actually says "I don't think I said a thing. I was in total shock." As am I, Frank. This had to be one of not only the worst television episode reviews in my history of writing, but of all time. I've had terrible movies, I've podcasted about what were terribly-written episodes of award-winning shows, and I've watched enough fights to know what I enjoy, and this episode makes for the bottom rung of the ladder to date. There is no sportsmanship, quality, sports knowledge or redeeming social value for this episode. The only salient educational moment comes with less than a minute left in the episode where Frank Mir and Dave review what was the gameplan, what happened and why did he fail, but you've got to be kidding me - it took an HOUR to get to THAT? Almost prophetically, Mir asks Dave, "What made you divert from the gameplan" to which Dave responds, "I don't know, pride probably." and I have to wonder if that's why this episode aired as it did. This is a colossally UNfunny, unentertaining episode that I believe will make people that chance upon it think that "Mixed Martial Arts" IS that joke that people once thought it was, and that we continue to fight hard to make it not be. There IS a tiny bit of redeemable social value in reviewing it because folks - were I to have written this and showed it to people that usually read my columns, they'd have SURELY thought it was April 1st. The sad reality of this episode of the reality show, "Ultimate Fighter", is that it's November 5th, 2008.

The bad reviews are always more fun to read and garner traffic. Watch the hit count to see my point, folks. It's a matter of time.

Quote of the Episode: "He's better than me at being Filipino. He's better at cooking and at having a lot of veins that I don't have." - Dave Kaplan

Overall Show Rating: It's tough to give this show what is only 1 Savage Science Skully, when in reality, I don't think it deserves any. I hope to never have something this unremarkably remarkable ever in my television review crosshairs.

Bottom Savage Science Line: I find it terribly ironic that this morning some coworkers of mine and I at my 9-5er were talking about the Jackass movies and television show. This was an HD, d-grade version of the outtakes of that show. Fart jokes, dick jokes, and naked butt-cheek-smacking cowboys BEWARE - there's a new playa' in town - one that I hope only steps up to the proverbial episode saloon once in my collective reviewer lifetime.

< Prev		Next >