Randi, Randi, Randi, Randi, Randi, Randi…
Are you feelin’ it?
Welcome to the world of My Big, Fat, Obnoxious Fiancé. This is the Fox Network’s latest attempt to pull civilization into the sewer. It’s a Big, Fat, Obnoxious Idea.
Joe Millionaire 2 was not enough. Average Joe 2 is insufficiently belittling to humans. Now, as a species, we must reach lower. Trust Fox. They reach into the depths of idiocy, where we no longer allow reality show contestants to be actually real. It has come to this: We must manufacture reality show contestants in order to achieve a more perfect reality. So Fox could not find a real Big Fat Obnoxious guy who was, chiefly Big, Fat, and Obnoxious enough. They have to create one. Sort of Steve Austin, the six-dollar man.
And this guy is not just lowercase “o” obnoxious. He is full-bore over the top OBNOXIOUS. This guy is so Obnoxious that only a complete idjit, or a first-grade teacher, would be unable to detect that the man is acting. Yes, acting. Is there anyone in the viewing audience who could not see through this sham in an instant?
Before the show opens, we are provided with a promo that covers all the main points of the show, from the first meeting to the wedding. We see the bride’s family leave, we see the bride in tears. We know this will not turn out well. In fact, you could have watched this two-minute version of the show, and be spared the remaining episodes. But you would have missed the “back fat.” And really, what’s a television season without the back fat?
So, because you are souls in search of torture, here’s what happened when America met My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiancé…
When the show opens, we see a fabulous mansion, similar to all the other fabulous reality mansions that have popped up all over TV land. This one is apparently in the center of the drizzle belt because every time we see the front of this house the front walk is a shimmering puddle. Other than that it is unremarkable, except to point out that it is decorated with detritus left behind when the gargantuan Kirstie Alley chewed through a string of Pier One stores.
Our hostess Claudia DiFolco sets up the premise for us. And yes, it is stupid.
We meet Randi Koi, a clueless first grade schoolteacher from Arizona who has be sequestered for two weeks waiting for her cue to participate in some unnamed and undefined reality show. She’s hoping it’s one of those romance shows, like “Who Wants to Marry a Bimbo Schoolteacher” or “Average-Looking Blonde 1 + 1 = 2”.
I should point out here that a koi is an ornamental carp, those monstrous gold fish people keep in ponds. And Randi is, of course, a code word for sexual hunger.
So remember, Randi Koi = lusty ornamental carp.
Fish woman arrives at the mansion, stepping out of a long black limo in a sleek and silk white dress. As she moves into the house, she accumulates all the traditional bridal accoutrements: the bouquet of flowers, the long train, the veil, the hickey from the best man after the rehearsal dinner.
Eventually she reaches the end of the white carpet thingy. Claudia meets her and says Randi will be getting engaged tonight. Suddenly, our ornamental carp looks like she’s been beached. Her mouth hangs open, her eyes roll around her head. It’s so cartoonish I want to fillet her on the spot.
Claudia tells Randi she’s about to be paired up with a complete stranger, and gestures wistfully at a phalanx of tuxedoed Adonises assembled nearby. Randi’s interest is now piqued.
Claudia now sets the hook. She explains that Randi, and the chosen partner, must con her friends and family into believing this cockamamie tale: The couple met on a still-filming and yet-unseen reality show. The couple has fallen in love, and plan to be married in three days. And the camera crews are just part of the romantic reality show we are on. Yes, this is true love in the reality age.
Randi agrees to this idiotic scheme, and sells her dignity for a half-million, probably because she’s willing to spend a few days fantasizing about any one of the stud muffins across the room. In order to collect the cash, she has to get all her family to sit through the entire wedding. If someone boycotts the wedding, or objects to the marriage, nobody wins a penny.
Review with me here. The promo shows her family walking out on the wedding. So we know they get there, we know they leave. For your own sanity, cut here to the final episode, please.
But no. You are still here. So we continue.
The 10 stud muffins introduce themselves. They are all named Biff. They are all wealthy investors from Tampa who mentor underprivileged kids, and they all drive a Maserati. They are all scenery for Randi’s Big Fat Vibrator Fantasy.
And none of them stick around for another 3 minutes. Blah blah blah, pick three, blah blah go home, blah blah blah oh yeah one more twist… we picked one for you.
Enter Steve.
Big.
Fat.
Obnoxious.
Stuffed in a too-small tux. Wearing white socks. Hair askew. Watery eyes spinning around the room. Central Casting has done a fine job. This guy’s just too geeky to be real.
Randi’s eyes bulge. Her lips flap open and quiver. And the soundtrack gives us slasher-movie “Ai-Ai-Ai-Ai-Ai…” violins. This is NOT a subtle show.
We cut away to commercials, which I’ll tell you about some other time.
We come back from commercials, and repeat the whole “Heeeere’s Steve!” moment again, just to see how many teeth Randi Carp-face actually had capped. (Correct answer: 37.) A few moments of nervous introduction in which Steve says Randi is hot. Now we know he’s acting. Randi, pressed for something to say about Steve, says he has really pretty eyes. (uh… personal confession. I’ve been told that. Suddenly, I realize what it meant.)
In confessional Randi says her family will think she’s lost her mind. Steve says the most important thing is for Randi to believe he is real. No one in America could buy this schtick, but the carp goes hook, line and sinker. Claudia passes Steve a ring, he slips it on Randi, and they are engaged.
Claudia now leads them on a tour of the mansion. Randi is impressed by shag carpeting. Steve inhales whipped cream, flops on her bed “where Randi gets randy”, and screams obscenities at the neighbors. He squirts himself in the face with the bidet. He purposely smashes one of the Kirstie Alley props, just to seem more obnoxious.
Randi is smiling and laughing, but she hates this guy. “He’s not the total package.”
After the tour, Claudia tells them to go to their rooms, and says good night. Steve wants a good night kiss, and Randi’s blood turns cold. She allows a kiss on the cheek. She says later she doesn’t want him to think they are doing this for anything other than the money. She’s going to try her best to humiliate herself and her whole family for a few bucks. Such a good lil media whore. Someone in Fox casting deserves a bonus check.
More commercials… far more entertaining than the show.
The next morning, the betrothed couple heads for a breakfast buffet. Randi has decided to treat Steve as one of her first-grade students. She’s going to educate him.
Steve stuffs Kleenex in his nose, and joins her at the table after opening champagne. She wants to refine him; he wants to put his floppy sausage in her mouth. He’s as disgusting as possible without actually stealing lines from John Belushi.
Randi proceeds to warn him about her family. Her father is intimidating, her mother is judgmental, her brother has hated all her boyfriends. She suggests dealing with her sister.
Steve describes his “family” which will all be played by actors later in the series. (If in fact the series lasts beyond this insipid episode.) His sister tried to kill him, his dad is alcoholic and his old girlfriends were rundown bar whores he picked up at the end of his drinking binges. Cue the maniacal laugh.
Claudia arrives with copies of the wedding invitations. Randi has again realized that everyone she knows will believe she’s marrying Steve. The whole idea is creepy, it is disgusting, it is deplorable, but... It is for money, so what the hell.
W H O R E!
Uh... OK. Commercials… and we are back.
Our lovebirds are off on a “first date” at a spa so they can get a massage together. Before we even get there, viewers know this is merely an opportunity for Steve to wobble his naked fat for Randi. Of course, they get “massaged” in the same room.
Steve is naked, moaning and covered with oil and hair. He blissfully describes the feelings to Randi as the world’s most underpaid masseuse violates his “back fat.” All I can think about is bacon.
Then he says “some good things are happening over here.” He starts repeating, “think about baseball, think about baseball.” Even the world’s most underpaid masseuse can’t keep a straight face at this point. SHE knows he’s acting, and Randi is still clueless.
After the massage (which may have included a “happy ending” for Steve, but we don’t have to watch), the pair go off to adjoining showers. Steve suggest it would be a good idea for Randi to see him naked, and proceeds to dance outside her shower curtain in a pair of tight white briefs. More of this is shown than was actually necessary. Much more.
Much, much more.
We return from commercials, and Steve is trying to get Randi to drink with him. She wants to go to bed. Alone. She confesses she can’t figure him out, and worries he wants to have sex with her or something. She worries that he is falling in love with her, and reminds the world that this is strictly a cash deal. As in “leave the folded bills on top of the dresser and I’ll pick them up on the way out of the motel room.” He’s bouncing off the walls shouting, and she warns him to “watch that exploding stuff.”
(Same advice they gave the masseuse.)
Now we reach the final act, and Steve takes it way over the top. His Emmy performance. Randi has been pulled away for a confessional, and he begins the drunk scene. He’s outside her room, walking through the halls, slurring her name loudly and begging her to join him in the hot tub. It’s like bad dinner theatre, but for what? She’s in her room, goggling her eyes and flapping open her lips like the carp she is. And crying, which she better get used to.
He’s stumbling, sloshing his way into the hot tub AND RANDI IS NOT EVEN THERE. She cannot see this. He is an actor being paid to convince HER and her family that he is an unredeemable pig. None of them are there to witness his climax, so to speak. So why does he do it? Is this how actors masturbate?
Next week: Steve taunts Randi with pet names and tells her that he would sleep with her for real. During a meeting with their wedding planner, Steve forces himself on her. No, no, just a kiss. They lie and curse at a minister left over from the Salem witch trials. Then, Randi’s best friend Anna arrives…
Will Steve make Randi crazy?
Will Randi realize Steve is merely overacting?
Will Anna remember she saw Steve in a Burger King commercial last week?
Will anyone tune in to watch Episode 2?
And oh yeah. There’s an encore of the debut Thursday night. Double check my work and get back to me.
Hey! That wedding cake top couple under the credits? Shouldn’t he be all Big, Fat and well, Obnoxious??
Email this topic to a friend
Printer-friendly version of this topic
Bookmark this topic (Registered users only)
Purrrrfect Siggy by the Talented Kittyloaf 
Fester 
;
Lead Clerk
