Last week on The Mole, players had to solve crazy brain teasers to help their teammates find wine bottles hidden in a huge vineyard.  With $70,000 added to the pot after that challenge, host Jon Kelley decided to throw each of the contestants off a nearby bridge.  Thankfully, they were tied to bungee cords before plunging hundreds of feet toward the rocky ground, but that didn't stop Craig from screaming like a madman and assuming he was going to die.  After imbibing a bit too much wine and failing the quiz about the mole, Alex was eliminated from the competition.

Tonight, the five remaining contestants are reunited with their families, but only after Jon makes them suffer to earn their reward.

The episode kicks off with Jon splitting the finalists into three smart players and two dumb ones.  Nicole and Craig volunteer to be the idiots.  Jon gives everyone clues that will lead them to different locations around Mendoza, where they'll find brain teasers that have numerical answers.  $30,000 will be added to the pot if everyone comes back with the correct answers.  The smart trio will have to figure out three puzzles, while the dumb team has to figure out five.  This is a perfect opportunity for the mole to sabotage the other teammates.

The players sprint around Mendoza and solve the brain teasers as the clock ticks down.  Nicole and Craig get the job done quickly, but the "smart" team loses valuable time when Paul gets them completely lost.  Is that mole-like behavior, or is Nicole's inability to count tiles in the final puzzle more suspicious?  All the players make it back with minutes to spare, but after inputting their answers into the computer they discover that the dumb team got one incorrect.  They have 20 minutes to input the right answer.

Nicole runs off to take another look at the puzzle, but everyone thinks she's the mole and ignores the answer she brings back.  Instead, the other teammates figure out the correct answer by assuming the numbers equal some sort of alphabetical code.  They get it right with only nine seconds to spare, adding $30,000 to the pot.

The final five fly to Buenos Aires for the next challenge, which could add another $50,000 to the pot.  After Jon asks each player who they trust the most, he reveals that everyone's family members are coming in on trains.  The players head to the train station and are paired up with the person they trust.  Craig and Clay are up first.  Clay asks Craig thirty random questions about his girlfriend, and afterwards Jon asks Clay five of the same questions.  Clay has to remember at least three of the answers correctly, otherwise Craig's girlfriend will be sent right back to the airport.  This could definitely turn some teammates against one another, but luckily for Clay he remembers enough of Craig's answers.  Craig's girlfriend hops off the train and $10,000 is added to the pot.

Though I was hoping for some serious drama and crushed souls during this challenge, everyone is happily reunited with their loved ones.  How boring.  $50,000 is added to the pot, proving that the mole has a bit of a heart.  It'd be more fun if the mole was an evil monster, but oh well.

After a nice dinner spent with their family members, the players take this week's quiz.  Nicole teases that she's going to throw the quiz so she can quit and go home, but that's probably a mole-like deception.  Jon gathers the finalists together and goes over their quiz results.  Everyone is safe except for Clay, who is executed on the spot and sent back home.   Nicole admits that she decided against quitting the game.

Next week, the final four are blindfolded and forced to walk across a plank that's suspended between two tall buildings.  They also get to play some souped-up laser tag and pretend to kill each other, so it's not all bad.



- Don Williams, BuddyTV Staff Writer
(Image courtesy of ABC)