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"The Lord Bath
Affair" -
March 15
The objective of this show is simple. There are very
luxurious artifacts that are being securely guarded.
All you have to do...steal them. Two teams will
compete against each other to steal these items. The
team that does this the best wins the challenge.
Whoever wins the 3 out of 5 episode challenge splits
up $100,000. Simple, right?
For the first challenge, the teams have 4 hours to
steal a 10 million dollar piece of artwork. In a
recreated heist in the 1800's, the estate of Lord Bath
is the setting. On January 6, 1995, a group evaded a
set of lions and broke through a second story window
to steal the artwork. The police got there 8 minutes
later - but they were too late and the art was never
found. This is the challenge that the teams have to
deal with - and to make it even tougher, the teams
will have to go up against a variety of obstacles,
including real lions and a state-of-the-art security
system instead of the system that was used back in
1995.
Let's meet the teams who will be trying to achieve the
impossible...
RED TEAM
Nick Annunziata (Bodyguard/Surveillance - Los
Angeles) - He knows when to go back - and when to go
forward. That made absolutely no sense to me.
Renata Dziak (Climber/Forensics - Los Angeles)
- She can climb, so I'm guessing she's the person who
gets to waltz with the laser system.
Michael Glasser (Security - Fairlawn, NJ) - He
can deal with a lot of things - including alarms and
security camera systems.
TJ Myers (Ex-Army - San Diego) - She's also a
sharpshooter who says she is smart.
BLUE TEAM
Charles Paden (Ex NYPD/Detection and Logistics
- NYC) - Think of the nappy-haired African American
sharp-shooter in Alien Resurrection and you're pretty
accurate to him.
Kelleigh Miller (Acrobatics/infiltration -
Washington, DC) - In English, the blonde is the
climber - and a leggy blonde, too. Whoo-whoo.
Mark Swetland (Pro Safecracker - Buffalo, NY) -
How does one become a 3 time safe-manipulation
champion? This martial artist knows.
Melissa Brasselle (Stuntwoman - L.A., CA) -
What's a rugged powertooler doing here? Well, maybe
she'll create a dinette set for the lions.
Penn Jillette (from Penn and Teller) narrates the
action as the teams are briefed on the task. They have
to drive to the roof of the parking garage, then
traverse to and cross over a pit over the lions den,
which contains three hungry lions. You then have to
unlock the garden doors, either by breaking in or by
finding a key. Once in the house, you have to get by
motion detectors and when you get to the painting,
there will be another set of lasers. The team has only
4 hours, and the team who does it the fastest and who
leaves the least amount of clues behind after a
surveillance crew is done with them is the winner.
Both teams work out and discuss strategy. Michelle is
worried about how to get the pudgy Michael over.
Michael has his own response. 'If the lions bother me,
I'll probably die.' Very astute guess, Michael. On the
blue side, everyone is concerned about Mark and his
temper.
The teams have to decide who is the driver - aka who
doesn't do much on this challenge. TJ gets the task on
the red team, as they start the challenge. Renata sets
them up perfectly as they quickly move to the lion's
cage. The lions are immediately sensing their presence
and quickly run over to the red team. Right now, they
are separated by a cage, but it's going to be a
problem if they screw up the cage climb...
We now go over to the Blue team, as they are
squabbling and the stunt hasn't even started. The
women are feuding and Melissa gladly accepts the role
of being the driver - if just to yell at Kelleigh is
they screw up the challenge. Nice attitude, Melissa.
The blue team starts their mission with the 50 foot
rappel from the parking lot. Charles easily repels
down with Kelleigh and Mark is ready to go - until he
hears the lions roar and then turns tail. They waste
20 minutes to calm down Mark and it could be a very
quick competition if they spend any more time
consoling him...
...unless someone on the blue team gets turned into
lion chow. They have to cross a 30 foot gap in order
to get over the cage. Renata tells the guys how to set
up the rigging - but the guys are now squabbling and
they are losing time.
At the 1 hour mark, the Red Team is still on the cage.
The blue team...is still in the parking lot. They use
a pulley system which works very well for Renata as
she has no problems getting across. The Red team
decides to grab the poop with a pooper scooper - but
Nick drops the scooper and they just left evidence
behind. Mike is terrified of the lions - but he gets
past the lions - albeit slowly, but they get across
the cage.
The blue team finally gets Mark down from the garage -
now they have to get him over the cage. Good luck. The
red team decides that they have to go get the pooper
scooper and Renata decides to go in and get it. Wha?
she actually climbs down there to see if there's a
door, then succeeds in getting the scooper - but then
makes a quick bee-line out of there after the lions
spot her.
They get out of there at the same time as the Red Team
gets to the cage - and they have to hurry. Charles
notes that there is a lot of poop near the entrance to
the cage - and they decide to collect it before
traversing the cage. Smart move on Charles part, as
they save some time that cost the red team as they had
to spend time to collect their scooper.
Speaking of said red team, they are at the doors of
the mansion. Michael is picking while an impatient
Nick is asking him to step aside. The blue team sends
scaredy-Mark over first, then Charles as they make up
a lot of time on the red team.
At the halfway mark, the red team is still at the
lock, while the blue team just completing the cage.
Nick keeps on asking Mike what he's doing, as a guard
and dog patrol the place every 20 minutes. Nick
decides to give up and look for the key, which is what
he probably should be doing instead of harping on
Mike. He tells Mike to not look over an area that he
searched - but Mike looks anyway and finds the keys.
Heh.
Next up for the red team - a set of lasers that they
have to avoid. Nick tells Mike to duck down in the
water - but Mike doesn't do that and promptly sets off
the alarm. That brings the guy and his dog over, and
the group wastes 20 minutes hiding in the water as the
guard and his dog come over to look.
While they are in the water, the blue team gets to the
doors. Kelleigh does her best Nick imitation and Mark
is wondering if he can put Kelleigh in the lion's
cage. After 5 minutes, they also look for the key and
find it 20 minutes faster than the red team.
Now what was the lion poop used for? To cover
themselves in as they go across the lawn to the
interior of the mansion. The red team does this
without a problem. Michael uses their skeleton keys
quite quickly and gets into a room with more lasers.
If they happen to trip up the system, it goes into
'amber alert' and the teams have to freeze until the
system resets themselves. Michael tells Nick to not
move, but Nick doesn't listen to him and trips up the
system. While they are wasting even more time...
The blue team gets past the fountain and covers
themselves up in manure. They also to get to the
mansion without a problem and gets to the interior
laser system - but the red team is past the laser
system and is now up to the final challenge - freeing
the painting. There are two things that the teams need
to deal with to get the art - disabling a laser in the
front, and making sure that the weighted arm doesn't
fall in the back.
With 30 minutes to go, Nick tells the red team that he
is going to drill a hole in the back and attach the
wire to the weight in the back. Michael disagrees and
they get into it. The blue team gets past the motion
sensors with no problems and get to the painting
security - but they only have 25 minutes to get past
it.
With victory close, Mark...goes off the deep end and
starts cursing everything out. Meanwhile, Mike and
Nick are still arguing and Mike modifies Nick's plan -
by tying a screw around the weight, that should stop
the weighted arm from falling. Mark decides to tie the
wire around the weighted arm by breaking the beam -
which they can do for 5 seconds without the alarms
sounding.
We're under 10 minutes, and both teams are going
through their plans. The red team, due to the limited
time, decides to try to switch off the wire with a bag
of sand. That....fails, and the alarm goes off. They
run out to the getaway car, where Melissa comes with
the car and picks them up, with security and the dogs
in close pursuit.
As for the red team, the red team grabs the painting
and it...works? Yes it does, and they get out of there
without tripping any wires with only seconds to spare.
This should be a simple decision - the red team wins,
right? Well, it depends on the evidence left behind.
CSI expert Allan Pollard is brought to the scene to
give his adjustment. Allan tells the red team that
Nick's fingerprints was exposed on the Lion's cage and
Charles's fingerprints was exposed on the rappelling.
Since that evens everything out and the red team
didn't set of any alarms, Allan gives the decision to
the red team. They lead 1-0 and the blue team is
talking about how they need to regroup as the show
ends.
My take? This is a fun show, with the interaction
reminding me of Beg, Borrow and Deal. The personality
problems on both teams make this very interesting to
see if either team can set those aside and work
together. If they can, they will have the edge. We'll
see in 7 days if either team can do so.
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