American Gladiators "Episode 211" (2008)

It's the second round of the semi-finals and I can remember now why the show was so much fun to watch last season. Competitors giving it their all against the Gladiators and finishing off with truly thrilling Eliminator races are what the show is about. I don't mean to continually harp on the gimmick episodes of this season so I'll just leave it with this. The last two episodes have seen some of the best competition all season and it's because we have the best contenders competing for spots in the finals. Please if there is a third season, focus on the competition and finding the best people who can stand up to the Gladiators and not stories that are supposed to pull at the heart strings. They're not and there are talk shows for that. All right, no more griping.

Moving right past how we keep kicking off the shows with RocketBall, another aspect that needs to be dropped next season, we got to see the indomitable Crush taking down Lillian (Red) on Pyramid. If you ever get to compete against Crush in any event, it would have to Pyramid. She just wraps herself around you in that bear hug grasp for the entire time. It's like a American Gladiators erotic fantasy. Anyway, it was good to see her prevent yet another hopeless contender from scoring any points. Crush also had another great round in Joust, knocking both contenders off with plenty of time to spare. She even got to do her patented victory dance which is always a crowd pleaser.

Some notes regarding Gauntlet, the first being why do the Gladiators keep making a show about switching the first two positions. Seeing as how they have to alternate the types of pads used to hold off the contenders it means they purposefully went in the wrong order just to highlight the change. Seems a little pointless. The other is that Militia seems to be recurring more since his triumphant return in Earthquake. This time however he gets into a bit of a tiff with James (Blue). They really were going at it before the referee was able to break it up. I think Militia flew off the handle a little too easily though as it doesn't look like he was hit all that hard. Maybe we should sideline him for a little bit again. It might just have been due to his frustration at not being featured in a while or it could be that Jeff (Red) blew past him a little too quickly.

Favorite moment: After a close female race in the Eliminator, the male race was by far the closest I think we've ever seen. Given an eleven second head start Blue's lead is demolished as Red tears after him up the cargo net. There is a great shot where Blue is on the rope swing as we see Red leap into frame on the rope swing right behind him. Her ferocity though ends up hurting him and he lands face first and slides right off the platform. Again he catches up at the rolling pin as he looked like he was going to tackle Blue once he reached the bottom. Going neck and neck down he zip line (Red going backwards!), the teeter-totter proves Red's undoing as he loses his balance and falls into the Travelator while Blue is able to use him momentum to shoot straight up it. A very tight race and Blue better be thanking his lucky stars for that head start. Otherwise he would never had stood a chance.