Snakes And Rats And Spiders, Oh My

Alright, it's time once again for my recap of the most recent episode of Who Wants To Be A Superhero?, the Sci-Fi Channel's wacky pseudo-reality show where regular people are striving to be the next big superhero. Let's not waste any time and get right to the show.

The episode begins with the heroes receiving a news report that stats Doctor Dark is diverting electricity from all over town, causing rolling blackouts. Stan informs them that he's discovered the power is being directed toward a power station on the outskirts of town. When the five heroes arrive at the power station, they're told that if they hope to stop Doctor Dark, they must individually crawl through a tunnel into a darkened room and remove five fuses.

But there's two catches. One is that they only have six minutes in which to do it, and the second is that the room contains things that the heroes are afraid of. So the room has rats, snakes, and spiders, in it, plus it's a bit claustrophobic to boot. They do succeed, and end up getting the job done with five seconds to spare. To commend their bravery, Stan sends them to a Mexican restaurant for a night on the town. And humorously, the night ends with the heroes working off the bill thanks to a lack of money.

The next day, Doctor Doom decides that he's going to borrow a trick from last season's villain, The Dark Enforcer, and reveal a few embarrassing secrets of each hero. And that he does. Those secrets are...

• When someone she had a crush on didn't let her into their house, Whip-Snap spent the entire night sitting outside until she was allowed entry. She also fesses up to once having "confiscated" (i.e. stolen) a friend's car.
• Hygena likes burlesque dancing, prompting Stan to quip, "Are we going to have to put some kind of a stripper pole up in the lair now?" He did create "Stripperella," and Major Victory from last season was a former stripper, so maybe that'd be a good idea.
• During his days with the circus, Hyper-Strike once made a fool of himself when a too-slick floor prevented him from properly attempting a stunt.
• Parthenon has decorated every room in his house with a separate theme, one of which is pirates.
• The Defuser didn't graduate from high school with his classmates because he was always goofing around, and during his police training, he got loaded and destroyed a public bathroom.

After these revelations come out, Stan decides it's time for the heroes to fill out their mission reports. Revealed in the mission reports: The Defuser and Parthenon are believed to be the strongest, Whip-Snap overreacts under pressure, Hygena underperforms, and over half think that Whip-Snap is the least heroic. Notably, Hyper-Strike pulls Whip-Snap aside and admits to saying he thought she was the weakest contestant, saying that the only reason he told her was because he felt it could encourage her to perform better.

And now it is time for the elimination ceremony. Called up to the chopping block are the Defuser, because Stan believed he disrespected himself by giving a fan a piece of his costume at the Mexican restaurant; Whip-Snap, whose self-doubt seems to be getting the best of her; and Hygena, because her fears have negatively affected her performance. Ultimately, it is Whip-Snap who is sent home.

With the episode coming to an end, we see that Doctor Dark managed to siphon enough power to bring his evil Stan Lee clone to life. Awesome, they're doing a Bizarro Stan after all.

That's it for this episode. There are only two or three more episodes left after this one, so I think things might be heading into the home stretch within the next few weeks. Things are starting to heat up too, now that we're down to just four contestants. The ones that are left have all grown on me as the season's gone on, so I'd be satisfied with any of them winning. We'll just have to see how it goes, won't we?