"What the heck?" Elvis Lopeti tells the confession cam. Photo / TVNZ
REVIEW:
Destiny's Child watch out, Jesse Tuke is coming for your Bootylicious throne.
We've entered the second half of Treasure Island and if you're a frequent watcher, you'll know this is the time when the celebs begin to let their hair down.
Today at Kuaka, letting their hair down includes some surprise booty shaking from Tuke and an equally surprising Dame Susan Devoy doing the splits. "I'm losing it. This is the greatest thing I've ever seen," Tuke tells the confession cam through laughter.
Unfortunately, at Mangō the atmosphere is a little different. While Kuaka were like a bunch of pre-teens on a sugar high, Mangō was more like an 18-year-old after their first night on raspberry vodka sodas - then begging their mum to come pick them up.
"I'm hungry. Feed the beast," Ron Cribb says while deflatedly smacking a stick on the ground. Thankfully Joel Rindelaub launches into mum mode and sorts some flatbread for the starving child.
What would we do without mums?
Once the silliness is out of Kuaka's system they get down to business and Devoy, Siobhan Marshall and Cam Mansel sit Tuke down for an alliance chat. "This is the first time I've been in the boardroom," the sports commentator smugly tells the confession cam.
But before he can make any serious commitments to the alliance, his teammate Melodie Robinson also pulls him for a chat. Is Tuke the navigator or the Bachelor? At this point, I'm entirely unsure but I'm very intrigued as to who gets the rose.
Unfortunately, neither party give Tuke a good enough proposal – sorry, alliance pitch, and he leaves confused with all the roses.
On the other side of Bachelor X Treasure Island, Mangō's Cribb and Courtaney Louise meet at their secret spot and Cribb pulls out something more exciting than a rose could ever be. That's right, it's the clue Te Kohe Tuhaka left him when he was eliminated last night.
"I wasn't sure if Ron would share them but he has which has really cemented our alliance," Louise grins to the confession cam.
"That's potentially 5 clues," he tells her, causing her to giggle. May the record show me saying, we've got to watch these two. They're giving me final six vibes.
On the topic of alliances, Mangō's Elvis Lopeti and Rindelaub sneak off for a chat. "The moment I met Elvis, I just fell in love with the guy," the celeb scientist tells the confession cam.
The secret meet-ups, love confessions and bromances may be leading us to believe the producers told everyone they are on the Bachelor, not Treasure Island, but Lopeti clears things up, "At first I thought Dr Joel was a weirdo."
The competition is still alive and well.
Still, Lopeti decides to bring Rindelaub into his "Siblings" alliance with Marshall and Mansel and tells Rindelaub he can be the weird uncle. It sounds creepy, but I don't know, I kinda love this.
At the team face-off, hosts Matt Chisholm and Bree Tomasel reveal the losing team will have to pick a new captain. It's made Robinson's day. She will most certainly throw this challenge in order to try her arm at captaincy.
Surprise, surprise, the win ultimately goes to Mangō leaving Kuaka's Mansel terribly upset. Or is he? "I don't like power," he grins as he gives up his captain privileges.
Well, that was easy.
Later at Kuaka, Marshall and Robinson are both campaigning to become captain. With Devoy and Mansel in Marshall's corner, they approach Tuke and more or less tell him to vote for her. It's giving me major flashbacks to the manipulate Dylan Schmidt campaign last time they had to vote in a new captain.
Unlike his pal though, Tuke flips the manipulation, and somehow he ends up convincing everyone they should vote for him as captain? I've got whiplash.
Devoy is onboard purely for her own motives because she does not want to see Robinson as captain and tells the team, "we need to make sure we don't f*** this up".
Finally, Chisholm turns up and they make their votes revealing their new captain as Tuke. If he wasn't so entertaining, I would be pulling a Kimye V Taylor Swift and calling him a snake but alas, he's bringing the drama in a good way so congrats Tuke.
He takes on the captain's test against Louise in a game called bluff and balance. It's all things sassy and suspenseful but Louise takes out the win and her smile says it all. Her competitive streak is soothed for another night.
Tomasel tells her she has earned the right to give another celeb one more day on the island by making them immune from the next elimination round. The only catch is she has to decide right then and there. Instead of choosing her new alliance buddy, Cribb, she picks Robinson.
It was a rose ceremony I didn't see coming.
Every single celeb looks gobsmacked but it's Lopeti who says it best, "What the heck?" he tells the confession cam.
So how will Louise deal with the fallout? That's yet to be revealed.
Celebrity Treasure Island airs weekly, Mon-Wed, 7.30pm on TVNZ2 and TVNZ +.
'Sometimes you can't plan unpredictability and fun, it has to just happen.'