Don’t panic! There hasn’t been another episode of the show. I’m going to take this opportunity to thank everyone for coming here to read the recaps and join the discussions over the last couple of months. It’s been fun! Hopefully the Recap will return with the coming of the next season, but it will probably be on hiatus until then, unless something particularly noteworthy happens in relation to the show – like new trainers being announced or something.
As a couple of people have suggested, I’ve now gone and got a mailing list set up if you’d like to be notified about the return of the Recap, or if you’re interested in whatever I do next. :-)
You should be able to signup over on the right. I hope! The usual disclaimer applies – I won’t use your address for anything except informing you of changes/updates to The Biggest Loser Recap or mythor.net in general (if you tick that box). You can subscribe to either or both mailing list. You can subscribe to neither, if you want, but that would be kind of stupid. ;-)
Note: You will need to verify your address in order to subscribe. If you don’t get a verification message, check your junk folder. If you still don’t get one, you probably entered your address wrong!

Since the show is over various news stories have popped up online. Here’s a selection of some of them:
Chris winning article
Chris wants to gain weight again
Mel and Kelly talking about the unrealistic situation in the house
Various contestants pigging out?
TBL ratings info

Got any more? Let us know in the comments section, as usual! If you don’t know how to make a link, just paste the URL and I’ll take care of it. Oh and don’t panic if they don’t show up right away, comments with URLs get moderated by default, sorry. :-)

This season has had a lot of ups and downs. Seeing the growing maturity of Courtney was marvellous, but the “twists” overshadowed so much of the hard work being put in by the contestants. The producers got a little too carried away with their precious contrivances and seemed to forget why so many people tuned in to the show in the first place – to see a bunch of really fat folk get put through the wringer and come out the other side happier, healthier and in much less danger of being mistaken for a beached whale.
Obviously the feeling is that the show in its “original” format isn’t exciting enough, but is that really what the show is about?

What would you do to change the show next season? Would you change the available options on the stones of The Walk? Would you ditch The Walk altogether? How about Temptation, good or bad idea?

But what I’m mostly interested in talking about is an alternative to the current voting system. The current system clearly heavily rewards those who form an alliance and form it as early as possible in the game. Yes, Pati was a strong competitor by the end, but there’s no denying that she got there primarily by virtue of her alliance with Courtney and Munnalita and her willingness to do whatever it took to get to the end.
That, to me, shouldn’t be what The Biggest Loser is about. Next season there needs to be some way to encourage people to work as hard as possible each and every week, rather than relying on alliances to get them through any eliminations and “saving” their big numbers for later.

My proposal would be to introduce the yellow line right at the beginning of the game. Have the two teams competing against each other for which team has to face elimination, but then on top of that have the losing team be sorted according to percentage of weight lost, with two team members facing elimination if they fall below the line.
Or, at the absolute minimum, give immunity from elimination to a team’s biggest loser for the week. It is absurd to allow contestants to vote out the best performers from their team as it rewards those who’re not working as hard while punishing those who are. This needs to change!

But how would you change things up in the voting? Maybe we can come up with something good and forward it off to Fremantle in time for the next season!

Last but by no means least… I have pictures of the before/after contestant shots! And a picture of who I think might be Sarah, as she was sitting in the crowd during the finale.
And a gratuitous shot of Mel’s guns, purely for my own gratification. ;-)
Check out the pictures after the cut, as well as some interesting statistics…

Contestant page views over the course of the show:
Alex: 450
Chris: 272
Courtney: 711
Damien: 619
Gerard: 778
Greg: 450
Kelly: 342
Kimberlie: 224
Laura: 398
Mel: 441
Michael: 298
Munnalita: 605
P’eta: 360
Pati: 341
Sam: 331
Sarah: 417

Bear in mind, four of the contestants were not in the game from the start and Kimberlie and Chris in particular were very late introductions to the game. Regardless it’s clear that Gerard is the winner… Though primarily by virtue of his sharing a first name with one of the lads from My Chemical Romance!
Yeah, really, that’s part of why he’s so far ahead of the pack – an MCR community linked to Gerard’s profile page a couple of weeks back. Crazy kids!

That about wraps it up. If you have any questions, fire away. And please, share your thoughts (if any!) on alternate voting schemes or whether The Walk should remain a part of the game next series, etc.
I’m in the planning/designing stage of another site which may or may not go up soon. If you want to see what I do next (or at least until TBL3!) then make sure you tick the mythor.net box when subscribing to the mailing list.

And now it’s time to cut the fat… ness of this post. Enjoy the pictures!