Nevertheless! We must leaveAihe’s incessant jibber-jabber and join Wētā, where the wily Aidee Walker is again looking to secure an alliance. Having failed to convince team captain Wairangi Koopu, her attention turns to team punching bag Dunkedon Garner.
“I know Millen and Michelle, I could try to get a message and ask them not to put you up for elimination,” she says, dangling the carrot of a safety net.
“Why would you do that?” Dunkedon Garner asks, full of suspicion.
Duncan Garner joins Aidee Walker on the dark side. Photo / TVNZ
“To protect you,” she coos. “If we win today, we’ve got more chance of being eliminated.”
“We can’t control that!” he says with wide-eyed naivety.
“Well, we can,” Wily Walker whispers as she lures him to the dark side. “If we throw the challenge.”
“Let’s do it,” he smiles, visibly delighted by the treachery.
While they conspire, Camp Aihe gear up for their Charity Challenge. Today they must use very big tweezers to stack very little jars of jam into a pyrmaid.
“It seems simple, but it’s harder than it looks,” Coffey despairs as his jam jars tumble down for the umpteenth time.
After three rounds Langstone proves to have the steadiest hands and takes the win. She also proves herself a sneaky sausage when, under pretence of peeing, she slips away from her Aihe teammates to conspire with a mole in Wētā.
“They think your whole team is so weak,” Wily Walker tells her, dishing the dirt and rendering Langstone only able to splutter “wow” in response. However, her eyes soon fill with glee as Wily Walker hands over precious intel from Camp Wētā.
“As long as we’re choosing, you’re safe,” Langstone promises with a barely contained grin. Having secured her own personal safety, Wily Walker then seeks protection for her co-conspirator Dunkedon Garner.
“He’s not really on our radar,” Langstone says dismissively.
Shortly after, the teams meet at the face-off. Today’s challenge requires the players to co-operate as they move lettered blocks over balance beams using a wobbly board to complete a mystery phrase.
It is an elimination challenge, but the delicious hamper of bakery delicacies like sausage rolls, jam doughnuts and lamingtons is the real prize.
“I’m absolutely frothing,” Spankie Jackzon drools, eyeing up the baked goods. True to his word, he immediately solves the mystery phrase, whispering “all for one and one for all” to his teammates. Wily Walker may be an actor, but she can’t hide her irritation that her team is ahead before the game’s even begun.
Her fellow conspirator Dunkedon Garner is not worried. He’s excited. He’s all in. He’s a better actor than Walker. On his beam, he huffs and he puffs and he moves slower than - as he puts it - “a tractor on empty”.
But even with his masterclass in meandering, Wētā still take the lead as their opposition squabble, drop blocks and generally stuff up. Wily Walker realises she needs to slow progress down, fast.
Her big problem is Wētā expect incompetency from Dunkedon Garner. So as Wily Walker inches slowly along her beam and futzes with her blocks, the eyebrows of her teammates quickly raise. The puzzle-solving Jackzon is immediately suspicious, wondering, “Is there a snake on the team?”
Even with its plodding traitors, Wētā keeps pace. It’s a nail-biter finish as both teams rush to manipulate their final block.
“Slow and easy!” Dunkedon Garner cries out. But it is too late. Wētā win. Unlike Aihe’s Mutinous Four, Wētā's two saboteurs have failed.
“We didn’t do our job,” a glum Dunkedon Garner says, enthusiastically wolfing down a jam donut.
Aidee Walker's cunning plan backfires. Photo / TVNZ
Co-conspirator Wily Walker, however, has lost her appetite and is plagued by demons.
“I’m a deceitful b***h,” she sighs regretfully, as her chickens come home to roost. “I hate myself.”
Another hui is called to discuss who Wētā should nominate for elimination. Koopu’s single-minded focus on physical strength and complete disregard for mental ability leaves Wily Walker sour-faced and seething.
When he says, “It’s gotta be one of our younger players, like Aidee”, her frustration boils over and she snaps.
“I’m the same age as you, Wairangi!” she scoffs.
Fortunately for her, he is seemingly untroubled by her disgruntled outburst. Or perhaps she’s correct in thinking he doesn’t view her as a strong team member. Either way, she’s safe - for now, anyhow - as he puts the physically strong James Rolleston against the physically weak Paul.
Team Aihe watches on as Paul takes on Rolleston. Photo / TVNZ
It’s a ruthless power play calculated to whittle down Aihe’s numbers. Aihe’s captain Baird sums up the pairing best.
“Brutal,” he says.
The challenge is a physically gruelling endurance battle. Paul and Rolleston must balance themselves on pegs stuck in a giant wheel. The first to fall goes home.
“We’re about to put an old lady up on this thing,” Gaby Solomona says, as Paul valiantly struggles to reach the pegs. “We’re horrible people.”
“This challenge is my worst nightmare come true,” Paul admits, stretching every limb of her body as far as humanely possible. She looks like a pained and uncomfortable version of Leonardo da Vinci’s famous drawing, the Vitruvian Man.
Wincing in agony, she says, “I can do it.”
She can not do it.
But it is surprisingly close.
Suzanne Paul gave it her all. Photo / TVNZ
Through sheer force of will alone, the Infomercial Queen pushes aside all her pain and discomfort to valiantly hold on for five long and aching minutes before conceding. It’s a heroic display that surpassed everybody’s expectations and almost bettered the sweating Rolleston.
Hers is a teary departure and Wētā shows little jubilation over the win. Instead, a sombre cloud descends as both teams recognise Paul’s elimination as a pivotal moment in the competition from which there is no going back.
In other words, for our celebs, s**t just got real.
Celebrity Treasure Island airs Mondays to Wednesdays at 7.30pm on TVNZ 2 and is available on TVNZ+.
Karl Puschmann is an entertainment columnist for the Herald. His fascination lies in finding out what drives and inspires creative people.
