Ready? OK!
Before I get to talking about the lovable butterball of an MTV documentary that is Return to Fat Camp, first I would like to meditate on the reason we all tuned in:
Can you say "Om?" Dianne looks so peaceful, so zen, so...much like someone who lives in a van down by the river. Seriously, I was expecting her to hike up her pants and give me a coke-fueled lecture, like, any second.
Dianne was not a main subject this time around -- she merely popped up here and there quietly, possessing all the wisdom of a sprig of sage. She's like Yoda if Yoda had a glandular problem, different pigmentation and was not from Alabama.
Many will lament her lack of screen time, but I kind of liked things this way -- her impishness reached new heights as she...
...exited the bus...
...talked on the phone (she looks like someone so strikingly here in the eyes, and I can't figure out who it is. Tatum O'Neal?)...
...basked begrudgingly...
...played volleyball (I guess she got over her aversion to balls?)...
...and drank water. This part was actually awesome: Sam, who we'll discuss in just a bit, was bitching about being fat even though she was among the thinnest campers, and undoubtedly the thinnest person we've followed thus far. Her counselor took issue with this, saying, "When you say, 'I'm so fat,' if someone is more overweight than you, they're gonna say, 'Well, if you're so fat, how am I?'" Uh, fat. You're at fat camp. Duh.
The absolute best Dianne moment came when the despicable Adisa (again, we'll get to her in a sec) was lisping like Daffy Duck all about her upcoming quinceañera. "My quinthe! My quinthe!" Adisa is clearly black, and it's unclear at best if her racial makeup goes beyond that. After Adisa left the area to undoubtedly prey upon the need to be dominated and exploited within some weaker camper, Dianne asked the camper next to her...
"Did she say 'My quinceañera?' Is she Spanish? Cuban?"
I love that she's as amused by this whole thing as the viewers undoubtedly are. Ah, Dianne, you've learned the joy of mocking others. I finally feel that we are one.
Also, I love that if you have a quinceañera in Dianne's world, you're either Spanish or Cuban. There's going to be a lot of sad 15-year-old Mexicans this year. Sorry girls, it's Dianne's mandate, and she, after all, is the queen of the world.
Obviously, with that title, no one that the filmmakers followed this time around had a chance at living up to Dianne. That's a given and it's OK: we'll always have the original Fat Camp. And, I'd argue that collectively, the four kids they followed this time around were more compelling than the ones in the original. Really, Dianne's the only one who made a truly lasting impression (though, it was pretty awesome seeing Petey living up to his douchey potential with a chinstrap...
...yammering about the girl-to-boy ratio to a kid who I suspect, deep down, does not care. So that's cool.). Anyway, the kids this time around were so awesome and the drama was so ridiculous (Hairbows! Lice! Failed quinces!) that I'm not afraid to say that Return to Fat Camp is just as good, if not slightly better than Fat Camp.
And you know how I love me some Fat Camp. MTV has an atrocious tendency to focus on members of society above the age of 20 whose vileness and vapidness are at constant odds (see The Real World and A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila, which I've taken to calling Teelya Taqueelya, just because it's a little more fun that way. In recent days, I've developed a crush on referring to it as Tila Tacheelya, too. You have to amuse yourself somehow, you know?). But for some reason, MTV cannot lose when it sets its focus on those under 20, My Super Sweet 16 excepted. Endlessly entertaining shows like Made and True Life have this wonderful ability to take the lives of teenagers seriously and present it in a way that feels simultaneously lighthearted and far from condescending. I think all the talk of MTV being out of touch is bullshit. Representing the youth of today accurately and entertainingly is a far more noble endeavor than pandering to it (though, obviously, MTV does plenty of that, too).
Mostly, I'm just thankful for Fat Camp. Here are our campers:
Justin
I like Justin because he was clearly using his sprained leg as an excuse to get out of activities, but he didn't let his walker go to waste. If you don't need it to walk, use it as a fort. That's what I always say.
Other than that, though, Justin's the only certified dud to have been followed in either of the documentaries. He left halfway through camp because, clearly, his heart wasn't in it. Also, he was sort of hazardous to everyone around him. He, like, put eye drops in some kid's stagnant water. It was weird. He also kind of giggled when recounting his gargantuan weight gain, but at the same time, refused to reveal his weight:
And then, during the final segment of the show, was it just me or did it look like he was taking a gravity bong hit?
I do like the most likely unintentional but still poetic parallel between "weight loss" and "burner." Get it? Because you burn off calories/weight? I can only hope that if Justin releases a memoir, it will be called, A Watched Weight Never Boils.
Oh, but for all his inertia, Justin, impressively, was able to do this:
If he can do that, he's not really morbidly obese! He's faking it! Faker!
Dan
The thing is, I kind of relate to Dan. See, I was once a ladies man.
And I've done this more than a few times:
But this?
Nightmare territory.
For whatever reasons (I assume there are many), Dan has separation anxiety. He is 14. His parents seem like awfully nice and nurturing people. However, if you ever wondered at which point being supportive turns into an all-out weenie roast, look no further than Dan's case. He is Milhouse as a boy.
When his phone is confiscated, he sort of stammers what could serve as a perfectly good catchphrase, were he actually animated and on a weekly series: "I don't get that whole no cellphone rule." Dude, cut the cord. You can't see it, thanks to modern technology, but CUT IT.
Other than that, Dan seems like a nice kid and in the end, he loses a shitload of weight. He seems to be an overachiever with plenty of potential. I just hope that he doesn't put his mind to living with his parents for the rest of his life.
Adisa
Lordy.
I'm sure people will become upset at my lack of sensitivity toward a minor, but I cannot describe Adisa as anything but rancid. From what we saw, she is a terrible person. She's a troublemaker who simply cannot wait to spew her bile: when she arrives at camp, she reintroduces herself by saying, "Did you miss me? Good!" For some reason, her friends find this hilarious and the girl that she says it to, for obvious reasons, finds it humiliating.
OK, so I'm not saying this because of any weight thing (seriously!) but for a while, I've been thinking that New York fills the pop-cultural void left by Miss Piggy. It has nothing to do with appearance...OK, it has little to do with appearance. Mostly, it's that she's this loud anti-hero that most people would throttle if only they could shake themselves from the trance they fall under whenever she's on screen. Adisa one-ups New York by having the thick, mayo-filled falsetto that I previously thought Frank Oz was capable of. For example, here's her barking orders at her minions who are making cards to her aforementioned quince. And, just for the nausea of it, here is another.
And here's the card:
I like to think that that last comment is snarky, fat-camp humor. Realistically, I think it just might be the truth.
Oh, and that party turned out to be a disaster, mostly because Adisa felt the need to be exclusive about things and only invite certain campers (hence the invitations):
She couldn't even get kids to go to a party that was held on grounds that they weren't allowed to leave. Like, what the hell else did they have to do? But see, that's what happens when you try to leave people out. This isn't karma, it's cause and effect.
I don't blame her fellow campers for avoiding her. Though it seems that Adisa can seduce a few kids into Pavlovian responses to her barking, I like to think that most people find her as insufferable as she is. I hope, so at least. Otherwise, Adisa needs an intervention now because her ravenous ego is the stuff that propels people to spearhead genetic cleansing. At one point, Adisa claims surprise over always finding herself at the center of drama and yet, moments later, we see her practically knock over girls to confront a bunkmate on rumors of a drug problem even though moments before that, they had already discussed and settled it.
That incident leads the ever valiant camp leader Tony Sparber (my hero, seriously) to call Adisa's mother -- from the sound of it, Adisa's behavior is largely permitted as her mother can't believe that Adisa is being accused of bullying. "You actually think I would make this phone call if there was not a serious problem?" asks Tony, incredulously. Adisa would seem to be a link in a familial chain of entitlement. You see it a lot on reality shows. Seriously. I suppose that she cannot be blamed entirely for her agonizing conduct, but for real: it doesn't make her any easier to deal with.
In the begging of the episode, she does this to emphasize where she'd like to lose weight:
And all I can think is: SLAP HARDER.
In the end, Adisa reflects on the her changes: "At the beginning of camp, I was much fatter. I was much louder. I was a tad bit ruder." She's either completely self-aware, admitting that she's changed very little in the rudeness department, or completely up her own ass, claiming that she was only a tad bit rude in the first place and so altering it did not require much. I admire neither scenario: PLEASE SOMEONE INTERVENE NOW. THE FUTURE OF OUR PLANET COULD DEPEND ON IT.
So yeah, no redeeming qualities at all, as far as we see. For all I know, footage of Adisa helping AIDS patients and singing to children was left on the cutting-room floor. However, the Adisa I got to know is no one worth knowing.
Although, I did snicker when she said, "I'll be the bigger person, even though she weighs 1 lb. more than me." I mean, that's clever. I also found this endearing:
Because that's exactly how I would have reacted to...
Logan
Imagine Courtney Love with a smattering of fly DNA and an addiction not to drugs, but food. That's Logan. More times than not, Logan punctuates her sentences with a Pat-like, "Eh" (here's an example). This is one of her endearing qualities.
Oh, in the shot above, Adisa is reacting to this:
It is what Logan calls "chub rub." She explains in graphic, harrowing detail: "It hurts. It was bleeding a little, like in places unmentionable." Of course, the irony is that she just fucking mentioned them. Thanks, Logan. You know, I consider myself a progressive gay who isn't afraid of the vagina at all, but instead is fascinated by it. I see it everywhere. It's always on my mind. Until now. I think Logan's description made my feminist spirit retract with my balls.
Although, I gotta give it up to her for "places unmentionable." Nice word organization. Clearly, this girl is smart, and that's kind of her problem, at least for our purposes: her nonstop whining posits her as this entry's Dianne, but she's a little too self-aware for her own good. You'd never catch her singing "Sweet Home Alabama" because she knows how laaaaame that would be. It kinda takes the fun out of her, but only kinda, because for real: Logan is awesome.
I mean, Blonde Redhead? At 14?
OK, so maybe she's not entirely self-aware...
...I mean, that's her friend, right? And she wants her friend to, like, continue to breathe, right?
But on the upside of her quick wit, she's good for wonderfully succinct assessment of her life and its problems:
"My weight is such an issue and it causes problems and I hate it and I hate everybody and I just wanna die!" That's like a speed memoir, so direct and to the point. Eat your heart out, Hemingway!
Logan, pretty awesomely, gets lice. She hates this. How do we know this? Because she tells us: "It's not fair! Why did I get lice? (Sob!)" Oh, Logan, you're smart enough to know that that's one of life's great existential questions. An answer would defeat its purpose! I do love that she blames getting lice from "the dirty, big bitch in my bunk." I mean, if it were a clean, little bitch, it just wouldn't be fat camp, right?
Anyway, Logan must throw her hair things way and she goes on and on about this, and in the process says the phrase "hair bows" about 5,000 times. Hair bows as opposed to what? Bow-tie pasta? I don't think so: the lice would slide right off. Anyway, a counselor eventually replaces Logan's precious hair bows and Logan recounts the tale: "Since all my bows got taken away because they're lice-infested, some counselor, I have no clue who she was but she's Chinese, she went out and got me more bows. Eh." Let me guess: that counselor is going to have a quince.
Logan, by the way, is the one that Adisa confronts about drug use, on account of Logan's ever-present sunglasses:
"OK, all my kids in my bunk think I'm doing cocaine 'cause I wear sunglasses. They're like, 'Are you hiding your dilated pupils?'" I get the feeling that Logan loves this, if only because it gives her the chance to say a big-girl word like "cocaine."
Predictably, before the end of camp, she's had her fill of Adisa:
As long as you make it look like an accident.
Six more quotes from Logan that show just what kind of a gem she is:
"I got my period and I'm fat and I have to do my activities and I don't want to!"
"That was the first time I cheered, ever. That was the first cheer I actually went along with." - How monumental!
(When informed that she's lost 2 lbs.) "Ohmigod that sux." (When it's then pointed out that this brings her total up to 8 lbs. in two weeks) "OK."
"You skanky bitch! You skanky fake bitch. Eh." - I love how the "fake" twists the knife ever so slightly.
(While approaching the camp with her mother and brother) "You're walking away from me, come 'ere. Don't hold my hand, I'll look awkward. No, RJ, let go of my shirt. No, let go. No, you're awkward, let go!" - I love a girl who isn't afraid to put her teenhood on full display. You know who else loves that? The camera.
"I lost a lot of clothes in the laundry, I got lice, I've been picked on..." - You''ll notice that Logan cries. Like, a lot. I'd give her her own personal crying count, god knows she deserves it, but it'd be so one-note. So just imagine this...
...like, 50 times.
Anyway, I love Logan a lot, but I love Fat Camp alum Marisa's response to one of Logan's tantrums even more:
"Get a disease, and then I'll feel sorry for you!" I think that this is a great philosophy for dealing not just with Logan, but people in general. Return to Fat Camp, you teach us so much. You are far too good to us.
And, finally, there is Sam.
I feel for this girl. I don't know what drives me more: the fact that her wet-or-is-it-crispy hair could be found on approximately half of all females that I encountered from birth to age 18, or that she's so explicitly damaged: "I don't like my weight. I don't like my size. I don't like anything about my body."
Sam makes me sad, although I do love that she completely takes advantage of her hot status at fat camp (at the start, she's at most 20 lbs. away from her target weight of 125 and decidedly slimmer than most of her fellow campers). "At home, I walk through my school and no one notices I'm there. I'm 5'2", I'm chubby, I'm walking through the hallway. I'm taking up space. But here, I'm not taking up space." Only in guys' hearts.
She is a big fish in a small pond, and given the circumstances, that statement verges on literal.
She has this guy that she tells...someone about in the only context in which a person should discuss a "confusing" relationship: while applying eyeliner.
"He's not really my boyfriend, but he is, but he's not. It's a confusing relationship but it's worth it." In lieu of shrinking her or spending too much time worrying about how irreparable her mother's attitude has been to her self-image ("She can't actually wear them, but she enjoyed buying them," says her mom regarding a pair of jeans), I will merely say that it thrilled me that she hooked up with a hot guy...
...and that she ended up getting down to 130 lbs.
Beautiful. So are her guns.
But before you start thinking that she's a strong woman, consider this:
I'm not quite sure that that constitutes a happy ending.
First!
Saw this on TV and was walking around my apartment saying "I need to call Rich!" Rich, you need a hotline number we all can call when we see great pop culture.
Posted by: scorzi | December 05, 2007 at 02:48 PM
The pic of Diane on the phone: she looks exactly like Jenna Bush in the eyes, no?
Posted by: Blanched | December 05, 2007 at 02:51 PM
I was sad that Dianne was not featured, especially since she's fatter than ever - clearly she didn't stick to any sort of diet during the winter. Brilliant recap as always...
Posted by: Butt Nugget | December 05, 2007 at 02:53 PM
!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Josh | December 05, 2007 at 02:57 PM
!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Josh | December 05, 2007 at 02:58 PM
the "fake" that logan tossed in her insult was enough to send adisa off of the deep end. well played, logan. well played.
Posted by: silky jumbo | December 05, 2007 at 03:03 PM
Bjork! Dianne has Bjork eyes in that one shot.
Posted by: Wendy | December 05, 2007 at 03:13 PM
I was trying to explain to my friends the Logan/Hair Bows issue when they asked me why in the world I was freaking out about DVRing Return to Fat Camp. At least there's one other person in the world that understands
Posted by: Erin | December 05, 2007 at 03:15 PM
They should make this a weekly show because these once a year specials are just not enough to satisfy my fat camp obsession.
Posted by: Tiff | December 05, 2007 at 03:26 PM
I was so happy to see your prediction for a Fat Camp 2 to be true!
I was majorly bummed that they taunted us with a few glimpses of Diane. Logan was pretty awesome, especially her meltdown over the lice/bows.
I thought Adisa was hilarious, especially when she was enslaving her friends to make birthday invites and then goes, "You're all invited to my quince. You can all give yourselves a card you just made."
I also loved her blubbering on the phone to her mom: "There's this girl in our bunk who cries a lot and wears sunglasses and we thought she was doing drugs!" Amazing stuff.
Posted by: Mango | December 05, 2007 at 03:31 PM
this just made my day. I wish I watched tv more.
-her eyes do totally look like jenna bush's
-I have a friend who does that "eh" or "unhh" when she's pleased with something she just said, it's so annoying--we talk about her all the time--we've even tried to mock it, but that's surprisingly a hard sound to replicate
at any rate i love you and your blogs unnhh!
Posted by: tom | December 05, 2007 at 03:41 PM
I knew you'd come through.
The quince thing was just plain terrible.
Even though the camp I went to as a teen over 10 years ago was not a fat camp, but a regular camp (arguably), as much as I love this show it makes me cringe about the camp lifestyle. It's so cultish and adding the weightloss thing to it makes it soo much weirder. I would have loved to have Rich recaps at the end of every camp day back then. If I were recapped at the time, I probably would have been like that girl in that cycle of ANTM who got forgotten by the acting coach lady and at judging. And I'm super ok with that.
Posted by: Stephanie | December 05, 2007 at 03:52 PM
"Imagine Courtney Love with a smattering of fly DNA..."
This was the funniest and best description of Logan I could have ever imagined. I am jealous I did not come up with it.
Posted by: | December 05, 2007 at 04:01 PM
It's Tea Leoni that she looks like.
Posted by: meepmorp | December 05, 2007 at 04:08 PM
Dianne looks like Reese Witherspoon "in the eyes".
Good recap. :)
Posted by: MsKit2u | December 05, 2007 at 04:26 PM
(she looks like someone so strikingly here in the eyes, and I can't figure out who it is. Tatum O'Neal?)
It's Jan Michael Vincent! Check out an old picture of him if you don't believe me.
Posted by: Nicolars | December 05, 2007 at 04:27 PM
Damn it - I meant Renee Zellweger!
Posted by: MsKit2u | December 05, 2007 at 04:28 PM
I think she looks like Mariel Hemingway for some reason...
http://www.imdb.com/gallery/granitz/1088/Events/1088/hemingway_mariel.html?path=pgallery&path_key=Hemingway,%20Mariel
Posted by: Twinkie | December 05, 2007 at 04:31 PM
Dianne equals Bjork, right?????
Posted by: jenna | December 05, 2007 at 04:33 PM
Why aren't we friends in real life? Why can't we be the kind of friends who call each other and screech in the phone "RETURN TO FAT CAMP" and then hang up, because we would be close enough to not have to say anymore? New York is big, but not big enough for us not to be friends.
Posted by: Stella | December 05, 2007 at 04:40 PM
i finally understand those who don't watch top model but still enjoy your recaps, cause i missed fat camp2 but still feel as if i soaked in the experience... i actually desired to be double my weight to get into fat camp, wow-eh
your GIFs will keep me smiling all week
Posted by: jtalia | December 05, 2007 at 05:00 PM
Diane was channeling some Bjork-ness with her eyes in that frame, yo...
Posted by: T-Rye | December 05, 2007 at 05:34 PM
The best part of my weekend was realizing that a) a Fat Camp sequel existed and b) I caught the first glimpse of it. That my husband was just as excited was icing on the cake.
I wanted more Dianne. I could have had two hours of Dianne and been thrilled. But her Adisa comment was pretty satisfying and keeps her on a pedestal. As little Petey as there was, I would have loved less. That guy is the male form of Adisa. I was almost sad to see him thin. Ugh! Evil, I know.
And as for Adisa. Sigh. I think age and growing as a woman teaches that there's nothing good about being known as a bitch. It's a meanspirited way to be. And its just so trite. I hope she works it all out. Yikes.
Posted by: Jacbak | December 05, 2007 at 05:43 PM
My roommate and I tuned in part way through (sadly), just in time for the hair-bows freak out. Before we knew what her actual name was, we referred to Logan as "Shades". Somehow, it just seemed to fit.
Posted by: Rioux | December 05, 2007 at 05:56 PM
watching this on saturday, my first thought was 'oh boy I can't wait to read his (your) recap.'
and man, you made my afternoon.
I was waiting for logan to say to marisa, 'obesity is a disease!' and start crying some more.
Posted by: mel | December 05, 2007 at 05:57 PM