Skid Nation

EPISODE SEVEN

By all reasoning, I should've stopped watching Kid Nation after three episodes. But I kept at it because I saw a clip of this episode on YouTube. If this one ends up sucking, I may be done with the denizens of Bonanza City.

First Part

Day 20. The kids are halfway through their quest to build a nation. Divad decides to be a budding capitalist, opening a snack bar with food she has taken from the kitchen. Free canned apples from the kitchen now cost 5 cents. But they come with a stick! Jared says he's going to compete against her, and the anti-semitic Asian girl goes off on him. "Bill Gates has so much money. He made Microsoft. No one complained about that." I'm not sure where she's going with this. "Divad has the entire snacking monopoly," claims Jared, the trustbuster. Fuck yeah! He just wrecked Divad's snack stand. The Asian girl acts like Jared just burned Divad's house down. Divad can make more snacks though, and sweeps up the mess. Stop watching the clip there.

That stupid whore Sophia tries to sell Mallory a jaw harp full-price. The book says the original settlers found gold in a mine. A treasure map is included. Laurel doesn't want them to go because people will get greedy. Bitch, you're telling me you wouldn't follow a treasure map if you found one? The Goonies this is not. "Let's hope we don't end up like the Donner Party, eating our own people," suggests Anjay. Fucking weirdo.

Go back to the clip. Divad waits for Jared to come talk to her. What? He's the bad one? She stole food from the kitchen and started selling it. This is pissing me off. Stop watching when they hug. I might.

The leaders reach the abandoned mine. It's cool-looking at least. Wanna see how much smarter the older kids are? Fucking fourteen-year-old Sophia comes up with a genius plan to solve the town's money problems. Let's waste even more food by mixing a bunch of stuff together to look gross and then put money at the bottom. The bat is in the cave. And a treasure chest. Wow, 375 nickels. "We could double everyone's pay," suggests Guylan. Anjay counters, "That's not what we should do. Greed is the root of all evil. This is $18.50 worth of greed." Hold on, retard. It's $18.75 worth of greed. That's really not that much greed. What is he worried about? Too many jaw harps in the town? "I think that choice is important in a democracy, but I think it's important that the smarter people make the choice," says Yellow leader, Zach. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. The council buys baseball bats and musical instruments for the town. "I don't play baseball." "You're a nerd." Kids suck. Nathan, 11, is concerned about the laundry. He's wearing like a WWII pilot's jacket, so he must not have many clothes left. Laurel tells him to lighten up. "Is there something we don't know about you? Do you have a deep, dark secret?" Nathan slowly looks up. "I was a fighter pilot in Korea, and my plane was shot down. I blacked out and the next thing I knew, I woke up in a town run by forty stupid kids." Actually, no. "My mother home-schools us." Bingo! I told you. Kids with no friends. He asks the older kids to help him with water. "Look at the damn dishes," says the asshole, Greg. Nathan helps out, scouring a pan, and gets scolded by Greg. Greg's dishwashing method? "Dip it in the water, then it's clean." Greg decides to be a bully and makes Nathan cry. I bet he goes home. He says he won't though.

What? The guys even wash the girls' laundry? Little Alex seems very excited to scrub away at a pair of panties. Pharaoh, 12, is a great dishwasher. Divad gloats that she is the richest person in Bonanza. "What's that on your face?" someone asks, pointing to the large brown mark on her cheek. "I got splattered on the face with oil, but a little grease won't stop me," she responds.

Showdown, fools. "This showdown is about collecting golden eggs," says Karsh. "What?" says Laurel. I'm with her. What the hell is this about? They have to slingshot eggs over a wall and catch them on the opposite side. They are real eggs though. If four dozen eggs total are caught, a reward will be given. All the kids have goggles on to protect them from the eggs. Red is sucking eggs. Blue is rocking it 'cause they figured out how to use hand signals. Green just got its first egg. Time's up. They probably only have like 4 eggs total. 5 for Red. 6 for Green. 18 for Yellow. Blue needs 19 eggs to win the town the prize. They open their box, which has a lot of eggs.

Alex Screams

38 eggs for Blue! Let's see the reward. "This reward is about money laundering." I do not know anything about no money laundering. Choice 1: coin-operated washing machines for 20 cents a load. Or a new pair of clothes for each person and 4 free hand-crank washers. New clothes. It's fucking easy. They've already gone halfway with one pair. Who knew kids were so concerned about laundry? They decided to go with the new clothes. That wasn't even a choice. Jared better kill somebody soon or I'm gonna stop watching this bullshit.

I may get my wish. Go back to the first clip. "This magnifying glass is focusing the light into a small pinpoint," says Jared froggily. He's trying to burn stuff. And what better a spot than on the steps of a town building. He's selling necklaces for 10 cents. And selling a lot of them. "Holy banana bread!" he shouts, $2.90 richer. He buys long underwear and some shoes. "I'm the Bill Gates of Bonanza City people are saying." Generic funk music plays as he pimp-struts trough the town.

Pharaoh wants the gold star because he has a single mom who can't pay her bills. "That sucks," says Zach. What sucks is that she decided to send her kid off to the desert to make her $5000. "To be honest, I think that I need the money more than any of the kids in Bonanza." What you need is a new mom. Guylan finds Nathan washing clothes in the middle of the night, repeatedly saying it needs to be done. Guylan orders him to bed, where Greg apologizes to him. Will Nathan get the star? Divad thinks she's gonna win. She's making signs to promote herself. Doesn't she know what happens to posters in this town? Now she's passing out snacks to people in line before they make their nominations. It reminds me of this time I was in college when the fire alarm went off in the dorm. When I got outside, there was no smoke or anything, and there was a girl outside handing out cookies. "Make sure you vote for me in the dorm elections," she said. I ate her cookies, but I didn't vote. I don't even know what dorm elections are.

In a surprise move, Jared votes for Divad. In a non-surprise move Divad votes for Divad. Greg nominates Nathan, which makes the council members smirk. It's now between Nathan and Pharaoh, the latter of which only started working once he found out the gold star was worth $20,000. Everyone in the town, even Sophia, thinks the council has done a good job. "There are some people in town who just fry potatoes," says Greg. "I don't just fry potatoes," says Divad, her face scarred from constantly frying potatoes. Is anyone going home? Nope. It's too easy to live there when you don't have any friends. Who's gonna win? Close-ups of Pharaoh, Nathan, and Divad. Nathan! Suck it, Pharaoh. Start washing clothes at night if you want a gold star for your broke-ass mama. Nathan tells his mom he can use the money for college, boarding school, or candy. I've never thought of boarding school as a good thing, but maybe he should look into getting out of his house so he doesn't end up so damn weird. Divad: "I do just as much work as Nathan. Do I have to drag them to my workplace?" No, we've all seen the frying pan, thanks.

Okay, so I'm gonna lay it out here like Jonathan Karsh would. You have a choice. I can stop blogging about Kid Nation, or I can watch the rest of the season. I have comments enabled, so let me know your thoughts. There is a talent show, and I think Jared wears a dress. Discuss.