Xebug67

I always get so enraged by the Machiavellian manipulations of Lucy Steele as regards Elinor Dashwood, because I love the Elinor character so much. However, with regards to Sidney's more amateurish manipulations as regards Allie and Gary, I find those so cringey and I just don't care enough about her two victims to be bothered. It's merely pathetic entertainment mixed with a touch of secondhand embarrassment to me as I watch her go about her sad attempts to prevent Gary and Allie from hooking up.

If you're a Jane Austen fan you'll know what I'm talking about when I say that Sidney reminded me of the character Lucy Steele from "Sense and Sensibility" and how she forced Elinor Dashwood into her confidence about being secretly engaged to the Edward Ferrars. Lucy oh so manipulatively finagled Elinor's good character and fine sense of what's right and wrong into not allowing herself to expect anything of Edward towards herself because of their engagement, despite it being a secret and not condoned.

I misspoke. I was wrong. It wasn't the crew that was banished. Upon rewatching, what the message said that appeared onscreen at the start of the segment where Natalie returns to Mike's house was, "As soon as Natalie arrived, Mike requested that she stop recording. They turned off all cameras." So this basically amounts to the same thing as dismissing the crew from being able to film. My point being that deciding what and when to film should NOT be left in the control of the cast members.

TLC should stipulate in the contracts of all these losers that they are not permitted to banish film crews whenever they feel like doing so during filming seasons. We're probably missing out on some of the juciest dirt and shenanigans at these times. That's one of the things that frustrated me most during Anfisa and Jorge's season, the constant banishment of the cameras by Anfisa. They are after all under contract with TLC. They need to do their jobs at all times, which includes being filmed during filming season. If they are going to permit this to continue (banishment of the cameras) then there should be cash penalties against the cast members who are forbidding the cameras.

And I thought that was her saving grace. I thought the caked on makeup made her look better than she's ever looked, as did her bridal hair style. Without the gorgeous eye makeup she's so physically ugly to the point of repulsive looking IMO. And to me her unattractiveness has nothing to do with her weight gain since the previous season, since I think she looked beautiful on her wedding day, and at her current perfectly fine weight. She's just so facially unattractive IMO. A lot of it has to do with the horrifically bad skin that she has, which I don't recall her having the previous season. Even back then I thought she was unattractive, and that was when she was a skinny little twig. Her saving grace is her gorgeous long hair. Minty was much prettier.

I wonder if she does finally realize her good fortune in finding someone like Tarik. He's been good to her since he went to the Philippines the previous season, where even over there he repeatedly showed her he cares for her happiness and well-being (this coming from someone who is NOT a Tarik lover - I don't dislike him, but something about him has always rubbed me the wrong way, but despite that, and by the same token, I've always thought he was too good for her, and still do). When she said about him during their ceremony something about she was marrying the love of her life or the man she loves (I can't recall the verbatim wording), I hope that was sincere on her part because she finally realized he was a true love to her. He does have very good friends, and the old adage about being judged by the company you keep speaks well of him and his friends with whom he keeps company (including his older brother). Not only were his friends happy for him, and lovely to Hazel as well, but it seemed like his mother was also delighted with her son's happiness and choice of marriage partner, as did Hazel's family. Though none of them had the princess wedding that some of them seemingly had wished for, of all the couples Hazel was a princess for a day because that's how Tarik seems to treat her, like his "little princess".

That's exactly what she sounds like to me as well, and why her shrill voice grates on my nerves. She sounds like a French impersonator. Funnily, after having read a bunch of posts online about Andrew and his mother, along the lines of Amira being the phony and manipulator in the relationship, that supports what I thought about her all along. Andrew may be horrible in his own right (I thought he was in the manner of how he DIDN'T handle the Mexico situation well or empathetically at all), but I've always had the impression ever since Amira's first appearance on the show that she's no naive angel. All she ever talks about is how Andrew pressures her, and honestly I have not seen any pressuring on his part in the bits and pieces we've been shown about them. The only thing I will say is that his persona did visibly change in my eyes when she told him that she WOULD do the Serbia thing. He did seem to brighten up and appear much happier than he had earlier in that same conversation with her. But that to me is still not "pressuring". She's a grown ass woman. Nobody pressures a grown ass woman who's willing to leave everything behind to pursue a make-up counter dream of "Coming to America". I believe 100% that Andrew's a tool for her to use, abuse and then discard once she's over here attempting to glam it up and become some type of "influencer" (God, I hate that word) minus Andrew being in her life. This is NOT by any means even remotely a woman who'd going to be content being married to "Mr. Day Care". With regards to feeling sorry for Natalie and Mike being a piece of S-H-I-T-E, I have ZERO sympathy for Natalie. She deserves everything that S-H-I-T-T-Y dishes out to her, regardless of the fact that she left her country, because she's a full-grown adult and should be responsible for her life choices, be they good or bad. There's no sympathy for her as far as I'm concerned, in light of her superiority complex and condescending calling out of Mike to be "low IQ" and "low class" and all the other terrible things I'm sure she says to him that we don't get to see. Not to mention her hatred of his house, lifestyle choices, and religion.

I wonder if anyone else noticed that at least as of last week, when I first noticed this, Pete is no longer included in the opening credits. And as another poster already mentioned, at least as of this most recent episode there's a lot less of him (and virtually nothing involving him speaking, anyway). These are good things!

When in an attempt to further stir up trouble as he's addressing third class, Layton says something along the lines of "We're the ones who are doing all the work" (I'm paraphrasing poorly I know), my first thought was, "What work has any of the tailees done?" for the most part anyway, not including the ones who've gotten out of the tail and moved up to third class, or the sanitation team. All I can see that the tail has done is use up unplanned for resources in keeping them alive and sustaining this pack of low life stowaways for 7 years. It's frightening just how much this series is emulating real life circumstances nowadays, and just as frustrating and angering as the real life rioters and unjustly self-entitled dregs of humanity are constantly wreaking havoc, so are the low life stowaways on this train doing the same exact thing. I was so angered when I saw all the jack boots being killed by these undeserving scum bag tailees. Yes, I side with those passengers who have paid their way (first class), and empathize only slightly with third class, but not enough to the point of rooting for them to win the revolution. I have ZERO sympathy for Layton and his usurping minions.